Tag Archives: Economy

Geithner, Maybe Next Year We'll Fix It

The next time you hear anyone in this administration tell you how we’ve turned the corner, and that all the deficit spending that has been done has prevented the economy from sinking further, consider where housing markets and foreclosures are going.

  • Fannie Mae will seek $15.3 billion in U.S. aid, bringing the total owed under a government lifeline to $76.2 billion, after its 10th consecutive quarterly loss.
  • “Our financial results for 2009 reflected the continued adverse impact of the weak economy and housing market, which has resulted in record mortgage delinquencies and contributed to our recording significant credit-related expenses and net losses during each quarter of the year.
  • For the full year, Fannie Mae’s loss widened to $74.4 billion from $59.8 billion in 2008.
  • After the next government payout, Fannie Mae’s borrowings will carry an annual dividend cost of $7.6 billion, which the company said it will repay by borrowing more money from the Treasury. “This amount exceeds our reported annual net income for all but one of the last eight years, in most cases by a significant margin,” the company said.

What? Fannie Mae (owned by the government) will repay its bailout money by borrowing from the Treasury. Huh? This is illegal if you tried this scam. That’s why Bernie Madoff is in jail.

  • Losses at Fannie Mae are likely to grow with rising unemployment and costs to implement President Barack Obama’s plans to reduce foreclosures, the company said.

Here’s a Obamanomics for dummies refresher. Replace the word ‘investment’ with ‘bailout.’ Then replace the word ‘bailout’ with ‘takeover.’ This should make you feel better.

  • Fannie Mae and McLean, Virginia-based Freddie Mac survived last year on investments the government made in the companies. The Treasury on Christmas Eve removed a $200 billion aid limit on each company, extending unlimited backing through 2012.
  • A record 3 million U.S. homes will be repossessed by lenders this year as unemployment and depressed home values leave borrowers unable to sell or make their house payments.

Meanwhile, if you are looking for a job to keep from losing your home, it may take awhile. I think that’s the HOPE that candidate Obama was talking about. Right now, Obama is concentrating on taking over the health care decisions of all Americans instead of economic recovery through the private sector.

When President Barack Obama signed his $787 billion “stimulus” bill into law last year, he said the bill was “the beginning of what we need to do to create jobs for Americans scrambling in the wake of layoffs; to provide relief for families worried they won’t be able to pay next month’s bills; and to set our economy on a firmer foundation.”  The actual results of the stimulus tell a different story. I guess he just lied to us all. I think that’s the CHANGE part.

  • The amount of nonperforming loans that Fannie Mae guarantees for other investors rose to $174.6 billion from $163.9 billion in the third quarter.

But this might make you feel better. Or not. Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner told the House Budget Committee on Feb. 24.

“We are going to propose reforms to the Congress next year to try to make sure we bring about fundamental change in the housing market and get ourselves in a position where the government is playing a less risky, but more constructive role in supporting housing markets,” Geithner said. “That’s going to be a difficult set of reforms.”

No doubt it will be to borrow our way into hyperinflation. Let’s put this old dog to sleep. Save some money on that Debt Commission Mr. President. Try this simple method. Look in the checkbook. If you see red, don’t spend. Don’t borrow. And don’t steal.

Updated 2/28/2010

Link: Fannie Taps Treasury for $15.3 Billion More After a 10th Loss – Bloomberg.com.

Farid Khavari Interview, Florida Gubernatorial Candidate

Tampa community radio station WMNF 88.5 FM did their due diligence last week by informing their listeners on a candidate running for governor of the State of Florida. They broadcast a telephone interview with Dr. Farid Khavari in Miami.

There are two audio links below. The first one contains the interview. The show begins with listener comments about a previous show about oil drilling in Florida. The Khavari interview begins about 5 minutes into the show. The second link starts with the listener comments about the Khavari interview.

The interview: RadioActivity for 2/16/10
Listener comments: RadioActivity for 2/17/10

As Dr. Khavari explains his plans, his platform, you can also find it in writing on his website. You won’t find any smoke and mirrors there. You will find smoke and mirrors on the websites of his challengers, Alex Sink and Bill McCollum.

Links:

Note: Those within reach of Pensacola may pick up a Khavari for Governor campaign data sheet and bumper sticker at Philly’s, 3900 Creighton Road.

Alex Sink's Plan, More Of The Same

Last week, Florida’s Chief Financial Officer, and the Florida Democratic Party’s anointed choice to replace Governor Charlie Crist, Alex Sink, had a sit-down with some small business owners to discuss how they can prosper in this tough economic climate. I don’t support Alex Sink. I support Farid Khavari. The reason I’m including this article about Alex Sink is that it does show you how ill-equipped and unprepared she is to help small business and Florida’s economy.

She stressed the need for small businesses to be able to get loans for their businesses. Unfortunately, there were no new ideas from her, just more of the same bailout mentality.

And when asked about Dr. Farid Khavari’s plan for a State bank, she flat-out ignored his existence and said we have plenty of banks already, including national and international ones. And haven’t they done so well for us?

Hear her Q&A at this LINK.

What Alex Sink is talking about amounts to just more smoke and mirrors. In response to Sink’s confidence in the federal solution and big banks, Khavari spokesperson Bob Waterstripe called her out for a debate and said this . . .

Sink hears businesspeople tell her they can’t get capital/credit. Then, when asked about the Khavari plan including a state bank, she says we have plenty of banks and they can meet the needs of business. FL’s share of $30 bln TARP money is about 2 bln, $100 per FL citizen. This will have no impact, at best a few thousand jobs. We need a MILLION.

In fact, $2 billion is almost 4 times LESS than the banks made in overdraft charges in FL last year. Over a MILLION are unemployed in FL and over 800,000 FL homes in foreclosure. Khavari has a plan to create a million FL jobs without subsidies and the proposed state bank will stabilize and rejuvenate the housing market as well as the entire economy, saving $100s of $1000s per family.

Sink declines to even acknowledge Khavari? No surprise; she won’t even answer a straight question on anything. As CFO she stood by while $10s of BILLIONS were lost by the SBA on phony deals. Crist, McCollum and Sink, as the 3 trustees, met twice a month for 15 minutes to oversee the SBA (per Crist, St. Pete Times). Most of us take more time than that on our household bills. Sink’s well-publicized Blackberry crackdown nets $250K, enough to pay the interest on $50 billion for about 40 minutes. YAY! Now she’s counting paper clips. You can bet the cost of counting them is 200x the cost of the paperclips.

Here is a little advice to Ms. Sink: Take care of the tens of billions, and the paperclips can take care of themselves. What about a debate between Sink and Khavari with Rob Lorie as moderator?

Links: Sink at the Greater Tampa Chamber of Commerce

Aside from losing $60 billion of Floridians’ pensions (along with Crist and McCollum), she has a record in BIG BANKING too.

Democrat Governors Want "New Strategy"

Democrat governors at the National Governors Association’s weekend meeting, are troubled about President Barack Obama’s track record on responding to Republican political attacks and urged him to better connect with anxious voters. Some calling for ‘a new election-year strategy focused on the economy.’

A new strategy? Focused on the economy? The truth finally comes out. Despite what the administration said all last year, and the media dutifully repeated, the focus never was about reviving the economy. Contrary to what candidate Obama said to get elected, that turning the economy around, fixing the home mortgage crisis, and creating jobs was going to be his top priority, once in office that priority quickly shifted to a takeover of health care .

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson offered this advice to Obama: “Rapidly decide what we’re doing on health care and then move to jobs and the economy.”

Bad advise Governor Bill. Democrats’ best chance of saving their political butt is to drop their version of health care. Recognize the fact that the folks (after 70 years) still don’t like it. Stop attacking businesses, and do something to promote economic activity outside of government deficit spending. Do something to help in the private sector, where money is made and jobs, permanent jobs, are created.

Unfortunately, the governors showed no regrets for the huge debt incurred with little to no results. Gov. Richardson, I think that’s Obama’s problem.

Not taking responsibility for anything he messes up is another. Community organizers like to form commissions. Takes the heat off of them, puts it elsewhere. Obama doesn’t need a commission to tell him how not to spend money he does not have. All he needs to do is what we have to do. Look in the checkbook. If you see red, don’t spend, don’t borrow, and don’t steal.

AP: Democrats worried about Obama track record.

Spend More, Cut Little

The House has an important vote today that directly affects your wallet and those of future generations, again. Apparently, all the new cuts and freezes that Obama is talking about requires raising the debt limit another $1.9 trillion.  That amounts to $6,000 for every U.S. resident. Already, the accumulated debt amounts to $40,000 per person. What is important about today’s vote is that if the House does not pass this increase, then there’s not enough borrowed money to implement the budget that Obama just presented to Congress.

The nut of Obamanomics is for the government to spend its way into prosperity and borrow its way out of debt. So in order to say he wants to cut spending and freeze spending (by less than 1%), he first needs to borrow and spend another $1.9 trillion, raising the cap on federal borrowing to $14.3 trillion. It’s obvious that neither Obama or his advisers are economic geniuses, but rather tax and spend idealogs where increases are cuts and up is down.

Related links: FOXNews.com – House Faces Tough Vote on $1.9T More Debt. | Obama’s Economic House Of Cards

Obama's Economic House Of Cards

It’s a good thing the President has a handle on the economy now. I mean, after all, the deficit he inherited from the Bush administration was enormous. Last year’s deficit surged to $1.42 trillion, more than three times the record of the previous year. So Bush’s last year budget deficit was $454.8 billion. Obama’s budget deficit last year was $1.42 trillion. That’s nearly $1 trillion more that he added to it in fiscal 2009. This business that he “inherited a $1.3 trillion budget deficit” is a lie. It’s a lie through and through. He has added $1 trillion.

Jeb Hensarling (R-TX) went on MSNBC today to put the lie to what Obama had said at the retreat in Baltimore to rest. Hensarling . . .

If you look at the 12 years when Republicans controlled the Congress, the average annual deficit was about $104 billion. I’m not proud of that number. That’s too high. But in the three years that Democrats have controlled Congress, the average annual deficit is now $1.1 trillion. Do the math. What used to be an annual deficit under Republicans has become a monthly deficit under Democrats.

But he’s got a grip on it, or us, now. Now, his budget is built on a house of cards that takes the deficit to between $8-15 trillion dollars (depending on whose numbers you want to use) in the next 10 years. And that is dependent upon Congress voting to raise the debt ceiling another $1.9 trillion. In just this past year, his budget is a mere 35% greater than they said it would be 12 months ago. Imagine how their estimates for health care and all the other government-building spending they propose will be?

The President asked for ideas from us serfs during his SOTU speech. Here’s one. Repeal the drug program that you criticize Bush for creating, the one you voted for as a Senator. The one that you said couldn’t be paid for. OK, so kill it. Now. Viola, look how much of the deficit you just ‘saved.’

Do you get the impression that this administration doesn’t care how much they spend as long as they reach their goal of destroying the economy so as to reduce it to a socialist utopia via his facist economic policies? I do.

The house of cards, which I call this budget, is based on tax increases, it is based on the economy growing, it is based on taxes from cap and trade, it is based on costs of health care decreasing. Essentially, this budget buster is based on receiving trillions of dollars from from programs that are not in place and based on the most optimistic of projections. It is the definition of ‘smoke and mirrors.’

Here’s something else to ponder about our economic circumstances. At the current interest rate on bonds, which is at 3%, a historic low, in 5 years the interest on our debt will be nearly a trillion dollars a year. That’s over a third of our GDP and about equal to all the money raised by income taxes. What happens when China stops buying our debt, which it is already signalling it intends to do, and interest rates rise? The interest on this debt, and by this debt I mean the debt we’ve got right now. That’s not including the debt that Obama wants to pile on. When interest rates go up further, the interest payments on this debt will be more than our GDP. The only way out then is hyperinflation, the devaluation of the dollar.

After taxing the rich, the spending programs will end up taxing the rest in increase cost all the way down the scale. So what’s left for the government to get their hands on when all else is maxed out? Your retirement plans, your 401K’s, your IRA’s. Whether this happens before or after hyperinflation kicks in is just a matter of timing. They’ve already got their eyes on the trillions of dollars Americans have managed to save for themselves. If only the government ran its business like you and I have to, we wouldn’t be in this precarious economic condition.

Best bet now is to salvage what you have left before the government takes it and gives you an IOU like they did with your Social Security. Asset protection now means cashing in your retirement funds and investing it somewhere where the government can’t get its greedy little hands on it.

You’ve heard it before, but it’s worth repeating. You can’t spend your way into prosperity, nor borrow your way out of debt. Sir Winston Churchill

Updated: 9:43
link: Big bang gives way to busted budget

aSide Order

A note on man-made, man-ajustable,  climate change.

UN scientist admits unverified data used for politics…
India, China won’t sign Copenhagen Accord…
Calls for UN climate chief to resign…
Scientists using ‘selective temperature data’…

‘Whites only’ basketball league announced

And in the ‘you gotta be kidding’ category, except that it doesn’t look like they are, some idiot thinks its a good idea to have a whites only basketball league.

According to the Chronicle, Lewis said he wants to emphasize “fundamental basketball” instead of “street ball” played by “people of color.”

“There’s nothing hatred about what we’re doing,” Lewis told the paper. “I don’t hate anyone of color.”

Lewis pointed out recent incidents in the NBA, including Gilbert Arenas’ suspension for bringing a gun into the Washington Wizards locker room, and said, “Would you want to go to the game and worry about a player flipping you off or attacking you in the stands or grabbing their crotch?”

The misguided premise here is that whites are better behaved than non-whites. Would cleaning up the NBA’s act kill the NBA, or make it better? Or, would wanting to clean up the NBA’s act be construed as some sort of bigoted or ‘racist’ motivation? Is it about the sport of basketball, or is it about franchises and money?

Excuse me, but where are my fries?

The White House Compass Points To Centralize Control

After one year in The White House, and after the Massachusetts special election, the President applies to his party the only thing he knows to do to the country, centralize control.

Campaign setting, complete with props in the background.

It is becoming more obvious to the American people that there’s more to running a country, and fixing economic problems than campaigning on how bad things are and blaming Bush for it.

As Mr. Obama prepares to deliver his State of the Union address on Wednesday and lay out his initiatives for the second year of his presidency, his decision to take greater control of the party’s politics signals a new approach. The White House is searching for ways to respond to panic among Democrats over the possible demise of his health care bill and a political landscape being reshaped by a wave of populism.

Improving tactical operations addresses only part of his challenge. A more complicated discussion under way, advisers said, is how to sharpen the president’s message and leadership style.   {emphasis added}

It was a wave of populism that carried Obama into The White House. He has lost that advantage now. Now it is working against him and his agenda. No doubt his advisers have an undaunting task. How to make a community organizer appear presidential and as a leader at the same time? According to the New York Times . . .

The White House intends to send Mr. Obama out into the country considerably more in 2010 than during his first year in office, advisers said, to try to rekindle the relationship he developed with voters during his presidential campaign.

His first big chance will come when he delivers his State of the Union address. Rather than unveil a laundry list of new initiatives, advisers said, Mr. Obama will try to reframe his agenda and how he connects it with public concerns.

Instead of the campaign-style pep rally in Ohio last week, wouldn’t you rather have seen the President behind his desk in the oval office, telling Americans what his plan is to fix the economy and create jobs? And to justify why he needs a second stimulus package when, after one year, only 30% of the first package has been used while unemployment continues to rise?

Be aware of the community organizer’s tactic. When Obama speaks of the need for greater accountability, what he really means is greater government control. You don’t have to look very far to see how he has held sections of the private sector ‘accountable.’ It has been by taking them over. Could it be that a strong centralized government like that of Chavez or Putin is not really what Americans want?

What, or who, is missing in this picture?

related links: