A New Assault on the American Economy

By Dan Holler
02/22/2010

Legislative Lowdown: Continuous Gimmickry

As Americans become increasingly skeptical of government, those in power are looking for new ways to describe the same failing policies that are making them unpopular. Repackaging may work for cereals or Hollywood stars, but informed citizens won’t be fooled by such gimmickry when it comes to government spending, taxes, health care and energy policy.

Big Government Stimulus, Again

Last week, President Obama touted the results of his now $862 billion stimulus. He used the failed program’s one-year anniversary to belittle those who opposed it and, at the same time, call for another round of stimulus spending. Despite numerous signs to the contrary, and increasing public anxiety over our nation’s exploding debt, the president and his allies in Congress want to keep spending until they get it right.

Why the jobs aren’t coming back

By Bob L. Can any one see the problem.

This article tells it like it is, lower taxes and keep them down and we mite get jobs back.
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Posted by Erick Erickson
Sunday, February 21st

The Politico has an interesting story about Toyota up. It seems the company does not much care for this administration.

Internal Toyota documents derided the Obama administration and Democratic Congress as “activist” and “not industry friendly,” a revelation that comes days before the giant automaker’s top executives testify on Capitol Hill amid a giant recall.

It is not, however, just Toyota. Lots of businesses and industries are feeling the same way. In large part, this is why the jobs are not coming back. Businesses are deeply, deeply worried about the activist bent of the Obama administration and the anti-free market stance it has repeatedly taken on issues. The uncertainty and antagonism are causing businesses to keep money on the sidelines.

Last night I talked to a friend of mine. He said a business in his state has put a major new business development on hold because of the Obama Administration’s stance on carbon emissions. The company could move everything to another country and be perfectly happy with less environmental restraints, or it could keep everything in the U.S., comply with existing environmental laws, and create American jobs. But because Obama and the EPA are headed in the direction of even more regulation and expense, the jobs might go overseas.

Right now the Obama administration is excelling at two types of job creation programs: government jobs and jobs overseas away from the American regulatory regime.

Until the White House and its minion signal a willingness to work with businesses and not hurt businesses, the jobs will not come back. Toyota is not alone.

A Gun to Your Head to Take Obamacare

Reid will back public option if GOP barrier fails

By Bob L.   With out a gun our Enemies could walk right in and take over with out a fight, and today our Enemies are among

A question was brought up what does a gun have to do with this, well lets put it this way, the gun represents what this Administration is doing to the Americans, you take take health care or go to jail,is this the type of health care you want (This is where the gun comes in),  people want affordable health care but they don’t want the Government in it, it would be just like an HMO, there are other ways to get affordable health care (1) stop deregulating every thing because every time they deregulate, companies, they price them selves and others out of business. (2) They dropped antitrust from the insurance companies, but regulated where they can practice, so they don’t have any competition and can charge any thing they want.

Look at it this way if this Country comes under siege what would you do to protect you and your family.

Nancy Pelosi goes on offense

By Bob L.  If its not giving them selves special money to get Democrats  to pass their programs that people don’t want, now they are bribing the Republicans to get on board so they can make it look bad for the them. Obama and the Democrats will do any thing to get this garbage passed knowing that it is going to raise the deficit more, it just shows that they don’t care what happens to this Country.

Does any of this sound like they went in to office to protect this Country and the CONSTITUTION, NO, it sounds like I am a DEMOCRAT and you are a REPUBLICAN and vice versa, once they are elected there should be one Governmental body not TWO not THREE, but ONE, and ONE body ONLY.

They were not elected to be two parties, they were elected to protect the CONSTITUTION, and they were elected to serve and keep this country FREE and Prosperous, it is not their Country, it belongs to every Legal American Citizen and any one who becomes legal to stay in this Country, LEGALLY.

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POLITICO

By JAKE SHERMAN & MARTIN KADY II
Updated: 2/18/10

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is getting her hands dirty.

In a rare rebuke from the speaker, Pelosi is taking direct aim at individual Republicans, hinting at hypocrisy in their opposition to the stimulus package, saying it provided hundreds of thousands of their constituents tax cuts.

Pelosi, in an e-mail from spokesman Nadeam Elshami, pointed out Thursday that the legislation gave 282,000 of Minority Whip Eric Cantor’s constituents tax cuts, in addition to providing tax breaks to Republican Reps. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, Scott Garrett of New Jersey and Tom Rooney of Florida.

Reid will back public option if GOP barrier fails

By Bob L. I take it as the Democrats are they will not pass a health care bill if the Republicans are involved. In other words, they are saying,  you are going to take this program whether you want it or not because we have stock in it.

They are small time DICTATORS trying to get bigger with the help of some ones backers and thugs with a gun to the peoples head, take it or go to jail.

This is why they want to take away your guns so you can not PROTECT your self or Family.
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Fri Feb 19

WASHINGTON – Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid says he will support allowing the government to sell insurance in competition with private industry if the White House and Democratic leaders push a health care bill with no Republican backing.

Many conservatives and some moderates oppose the so-called public option. It’s in the House bill, but not the Senate version. The White House is trying to reconcile the two bills before Thursday’s bipartisan summit.

Reid’s office said Friday he will work with the White House and Democratic lawmakers to try to craft a public option that can overcome obstacles such as a bill-killing GOP filibuster.

Some congressional Democrats say they doubt the White House would include a public option in the proposal it will unveil Monday.

Obama to spell out new healthcare plan

By Bob L. The way I see it!
I Solemnly swear on the U.S. Constitution and the ah ah ah Bi–e, that I do not lie and every thing that I said was not just CAMPAIGN PROMISES, or were they, NO they were just promises so I would get Elected.

Him and every one of the Democrats and and some Republicans don’t seam to have any concern what happens to this Country or any U.S. Citizen, because they want to shove His programs down our throats, because they are not going to listen to any thing the Republicans have to say.
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By Donna Smith
02/19/2010

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama is expected to publish his healthcare plan as early as Sunday or Monday, combining features of the two Democratic bills passed by the Senate and House of Representatives, congressional aides and healthcare advocates said on Friday.

The administration’s bill will aim to jump-start the stalled healthcare overhaul and comes just days ahead of a planned televised White House summit with congressional Republicans, who are calling on Democrats to scrap the bills and start over with a far less sweeping proposal.

Democrats are struggling to push healthcare legislation over the finish line in the face of sagging public support and solid Republican opposition bolstered by recent election victories in Massachusetts, Virginia and New Jersey.

States must fill $1 trillion pension gap

By Bob L. The way I see it!

Here is a good example of why you have high taxes, Government hires to many people to do a job that fewer people can do, then they hirer consulting firms to do what is suppose to be done by the people in these Government jobs that you the tax payer is paying for, then you have to pay for their PENSIONS and HEALTH INSURANCE also. A good example, a private company sends out FOUR workers, to where the Government sends out EIGHT to TEN workers to do the same job, now why are taxes so high, (when some are making $45.00 dollars an hour or more.) Who pays for these WAGES, PENSIONS and HEALTH INSURANCE benefits? YOU, and JUST THINK, you pay into them and don’t get any of there benefits.
This whole article sounds just like Social Security, except on the State level.

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By MARK SCOLFORO, Associated Press Writer
Thu Feb 18

HARRISBURG, Pa. – States may be forced to reduce benefits, raise taxes or slash government services to address a $1 trillion funding shortfall in public sector retirement benefits, according to a new study that warns of even more debilitating costs if immediate action isn’t taken.

The Pew Center on the States released a survey Thursday of state-administered pension plans, retiree health care and other post-employment benefits in all 50 states that blamed a decade’s worth of policy decisions for leaving them shortchanged. [My insert]( Better known as spending money you don’t have.)

Judging stimulus: Jobless rate high, growth real

By Bob L. How I see the directions this Country is headed!

How many of these job that they are saying they provided are year round and full time at good wages, does any one know. Ask the people that are still out of work who don’t have a UNION job.

It seams that the only jobs that were saved were Government and some Unions who are still getting pay increases.

Will there ever be full time General jobs in this Country that pay a good wage again for people who can’t afford to go to college, or will there be more people who want to work but can’t get a job because they don’t have a college degree that the Government says you have to have to get a job.
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By BRETT J. BLACKLEDGE and JIM KUHNHENN, Associated Press Writers
2/18/2010

WASHINGTON – Did the stimulus work or not? A year after Congress passed President Barack Obama’s huge economic revival plan, the results are mixed — and hardly final.

Despite Obama’s bold promises, unemployment remains stubbornly high. But job losses have slowed dramatically.

A different kind of Olympic drama: Foreclosure

By Michelle Caruso-Cabrera, CNBC.com
2/18/2010

The Whistler-Blackcombe resort, where the Alpine events such as snowboarding and ski-jumping are being held, could go into foreclosure this week, smack dab in the middle of the Olympics, and be owned in part by the now defunct Lehman Brothers, one of its creditors.

Whistler Blackcombe is one of several ski resort properties owned by Intrawest. Others include Steamboat and Stratton. The company is in deep financial straits and missed a debt payment of more than $500 million in December. The lenders have given Intrawest a deadline of this Friday to come up with the money, or they say they will foreclose.

Intrawest is owned by Fortress Investments, a well known, private equity firm and hedge fund, which bought Intrawest in a leveraged buyout in 2006 for $2.8 billion. The rationale for the investment was that condo sales slopeside would provide cash to pay back the $1.7 billion in debt they took on as a result of the deal. Then the real estate market collapsed.

The CEO of Fortress, Dan Mudd, was on CNBC and acknowledged Intrawest is having a tough time with the real estate sales, but that the on-slope operations of the business – lift tickets, etc. – are doing better. He says they want to manage their way through the crisis and realize the full value of the investment. He said negotiations are ongoing right now with the creditors.

Resort investments have been particularly hard hit in the economic downturn. On Tuesday, East West Resort Development, owner of various luxury ski resorts and a Jack Nicklaus golf course near Lake Tahoe, filed for bankruptcy.

US debt will keep growing even with recovery

By Bob L. Trying to ride out this non recession!

If any one says that we are not in a recession or ready to drop into a recession you are being misinformed by our Government bureaucrats, and the news media.

Do you think you are better off today then you were TEN yours ago? if you are then you are one of the lucky ones, you better be thankful and hang on to what you have and not look for some thing better.

At this point of time I don’t believe one word this Government is peddling.
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By TOM RAUM, Associated Press Writer
2/14/2010

WASHINGTON – It’s bad enough that Greece’s debt problems have rattled global financial markets. In the world’s largest economic and military power, there’s a far more serious debt dilemma.

For the U.S., the crushing weight of its debt threatens to overwhelm everything the federal government does, even in the short-term, best-case financial scenario — a full recovery and a return to prerecession employment levels.

The government already has made so many promises to so many expanding “mandatory” programs. Just keeping these commitments, without major changes in taxing and spending, will lead to deficits that cannot be sustained.

Take Social Security, Medicare and other benefits. Add in interest payments on a national debt that now exceeds $12.3 trillion. It all will gobble up 80 percent of all federal revenues by 2020, government economists project.

That doesn’t leave room for much else. What’s left is the entire rest of the government, including military and homeland security spending, which has been protected and nurtured by the White House and Congress, regardless of the party in power.

The U.S. debt crisis also raises the question of how long the world’s leading power can remain its largest borrower.

Moody’s Investors Service recently warned that Washington’s credit rating could be in jeopardy if the nation’s finances didn’t improve.

Despite election-year political pressure from voters for lawmakers to restrain spending, some recent votes suggests that Congress, left to its own devices, probably isn’t up to the task of trimming deficits.