". . . a republic, if you can keep it."
– Obama Administration Embraces Bush Position on Warrantless Wiretapping and Secrecy
– Following Bush lead, Obama moves to block challenge to wiretapping program
– Obama Economic Advisors Linked to Bankers
– Obama administration says government abuses are ‘state secrets’ beyond judicial scrutiny
Next time, please vote for someone who believes in LIBERTY!
Well, that didn’t take long at all.
Yesterday: “Pledging to take ‘the air out of golden parachutes,’ President Obama announced Wednesday that executives of companies receiving federal bailout money will have their pay capped at $500,000 under a revised financial compensation plan.”
Today: “The Obama administration is engineering its new bailout initiatives in a way that it believes will allow firms benefiting from the programs to avoid restrictions imposed by Congress, including limits on lavish executive pay, according to government officials.”
(Read more from propagandadetox.blogspot.com)
What do you say to that, Obamaniacs?
“In an interview conducted shortly before he was sworn in today as prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu laid down a challenge for Barack Obama. The American president, he said, must stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons�and quickly�or an imperiled Israel may be forced to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities itself.
‘The Obama presidency has two great missions: fixing the economy, and preventing Iran from gaining nuclear weapons,’ Netanyahu told me. He said the Iranian nuclear challenge represents a ‘hinge of history’ and added that ‘Western civilization’ will have failed if Iran is allowed to develop nuclear weapons.” (Read more from theatlantic.com)
Am I the only one who doesn’t like the idea of a foreign leader telling my president what his mission is?
See Also:
– Benjamin Netanyahu takes office with a warning to Iran
– Petraeus Says Israel Might Choose to Attack Iran
– Iran Photos
More change we can believe in:
“Despite now overwhelming evidence that ex-President George W. Bush and many top aides engaged in a systematic policy of illegal torture, national Democrats appear to be shying away from their recommendation last year for a special prosecutor to investigate these apparent war crimes.” (Read more from atlanticfreepress.com)
U.S.S.A. goons: Papers please?
See also:
Why South Carolina Doesn’t Want ‘Stimulus’ by Mark Sanford
“A recent report by the American Legislative Exchange Council ranked us 47th worst in the nation for annual debt service as a percentage of tax revenue. Our state dedicates nearly 11% of its annual tax revenue to paying debt. On top of that, South Carolina has another $20 billion in unfunded, long-term political promises for pensions and other liabilities. The state budget has already been cut four times in recent months as the national economic downturn has impacted South Carolina and driven down tax revenue.
President Barack Obama recently signed a “stimulus” bill that will spend about $2 billion through ‘programmatic means’ in South Carolina. In other words, the federal government will put this money directly into existing funding formulas and programs such as Medicaid. But there is an additional $700 million that I as governor have influence over, and it is the disposition of this money that has drawn the national spotlight to South Carolina.
Here’s the background: Before the stimulus bill passed, I asked for states not to be bailed out. After it was signed into law, I said that a state bailout would create more problems than it solved, and that we shouldn’t spend money we don’t have. That debate was lost, so I looked for a reasonable middle ground. I asked the president for his support in using the $700 million to pay down state debt.
If we’re going to spend money we don’t have at the federal level, it becomes all the more important that our state balance sheet is in good order — particularly if this is a protracted downturn. But many people do not realize that the stimulus money runs out in 24 months — at which point South Carolina will be forced to find a new source of funding to sustain the new level of spending, or to make sharp cuts. Sure, I could kick the can down the road; in two years, I’ll be safely out of office. But it would be irresponsible. . . .
When you’re in a hole, the first order of business is stop digging. South Carolina is in a hole, and it’s not a shallow one. Spending stimulus money on ongoing programs would mean 10% of our entire state budget would be paid for with one-time federal funds — the largest recorded level in state history.” (Read more from campaignforliberty.com)
10. Got More?
9. Goals missed
8. Giant Mess
7. GO MARX
6. Government Mooch
5. Grossly Mismanaged
. . . (Read more from ritholtz.com)
“Maybe posting the full map would help to take it for what it is, i.e. an illustration of the West Bank’s ongoing fragmentation based on the (originally temporary) A/B/C zoning which came out of the Oslo process, still valid until now. To make things clear, areas ‘under water’ strictly reflect C zones, plus the East Jerusalem area, i.e. areas that have officially remained under full Israeli control and occupation following the Agreements. These include all Israeli settlements and outposts as well as Palestinian populated areas.”
Shouldn’t we be talking about Palestine’s right to exist?
Obama = more of the same (but better P. R.)
– Ron Paul on the budget, war, global governance, the dollar, and blaming freedom:
– Obama’s $163,000 Tax Bomb “The House and Senate are preparing to pass President Barack Obama’s radical budget blueprint, with only minor modifications, by using (abusing would be more accurate) the budget ‘reconciliation’ process. This process circumvents the Senate’s normal rules requiring 60 votes to prevent a filibuster. Reconciliation was created by Congress in the mid-1970s to enforce deficit reduction, the opposite of what the president and his party are aiming for. The immense increase in nondefense spending and taxes, and the tripling of the national debt in Mr. Obama’s budget, have been the subject of considerable scrutiny since it was announced. . . .
[Obama] claims to reduce the deficit by half, to shave $2 trillion off the debt (the cumulative deficit over his 10-year budget horizon), and not to raise taxes on anyone making less than $250,000 a year. While in a Clintonian sense correct (depends on what the definition of “is” is), it is far more accurate to describe Mr. Obama’s budget as almost tripling the deficit. . . .
Finally, what of the claim not to raise taxes on anyone earning less than $250,000 a year? Even ignoring his large energy taxes, Mr. Obama must reconcile his arithmetic. . . . Mr. Obama is going to leave a discounted present-value legacy of $6.5 trillion of additional future taxes, unless he dramatically cuts spending. (With interest the future tax hikes would be much larger later on.) Call it a stealth tax increase or ticking tax time-bomb. . . . If spread evenly over all those paying income taxes . . . every income-tax paying family would get a tax bill for $163,000.” (Read more from online.wsj.com)
– Obama’s Banking Rescue: O for Opaque
“President Obama has promised to run an administration of unprecedented openness. And in some respects, such as the ground rules for spending stimulus funds, he has. But in the most important area of all, the financial rescue, the administration is making trillion dollar decisions relying on the Federal Reserve and a small Wall Street club of advisors, with no transparency or public accountability.” (Read more from huffingtonpost.com)
– Stealing a Nation
“Bloomberg News reported earlier this week that it had calculated the total spending promised by the Obama administration to date as equaling the nation’s gross national product for one entire year—around $13 trillion. The public has grown inured to daily reports of massive spending programs and the administration’s fear mongering that the world will come to an end—or rather the cushy jobs of its friends on Wall Street will come to an end—unless our government spends and inflates on a scale that has never before been attempted. Ah, all the more reason to admire us, their propagandists proclaim, for the boldness of our actions in the face of such a calamity.
Yes, a calamity is approaching. It is the calamity brought about by reckless spending of the nation’s wealth in pursuit of the unattainable. There is no way that the trillions of dollars of malinvestment of the last few years can be pulled back out of the sinkhole. The money is gone. There is no way to get it back. What the Obama administration is doing is trying to make everyone pay for this massive loss when the proper, legal, ethical policy should be to ensure that those involved accept their losses like men.” (Read more form patrickbarron.blogspot.com)
– Geithner’s Plan Will Tax Main Street to Make Wall Street Richer
“The new consensus among the experts who missed the housing bubble (EMHB) is that Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner’s plan to subsidize the purchase of junk mortgages and their derivatives will help alleviate the stress on the banking system. That’s good news.
These geniuses have devised a plan that for $1 trillion (approximately equal to 300 million kid-years of SCHIP, the State Child Health Insurance Program) can alleviate the stress on the banking system. Note that no one claims that $1 trillion spent on the Geithner plan will actually clean up the banking system – that would be asking too much. The EMHB only assure us that this $1 trillion (more than enough to have energy conserving retrofits for every building in the country) will make things better. Isn’t that enough?” (Read more from truthout.org)
Obama’s court: “Taxes are for commoners.”
Add Sebelius to list of Obama Cabinet picks with tax troubles
“President Obama’s second choice to lead Health and Human Services said she’s paid nearly $8,000 for ‘unintentional’ tax errors. . . . The list of nominees with tax trouble includes Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and former Sen. Tom Daschle, who was Obama’s first choice for HHS and withdrew after disclosing that he paid $140,000 in back taxes and interest. Neither Sebelius nor the White House issued a comment.” (Read more from miamiherald.com)
“A record 32.2 million people — one in every 10 Americans — received food stamps at the latest count, the government said on Thursday, a reflection of the recession now in its 16th month.
Food stamps, the major U.S. anti-hunger program, help poor people buy groceries. The average benefit was $112.82 per person in January.
The January figure marks the third time in five months that enrollment set a record.” (Read more from uk.reuters.com)
Me: Of course we’re poor. Where do you think the wealth comes from to pay for our empire and our gigantic government?
“Fraternal organizations and friendly societies provided health insurance for hundreds of thousands of Americans and Britons before the surge of the welfare state. Their rapid disappearance underscores the fragility of voluntary institutions when challenged by government power.”
“At their peak, fraternal organizations and friendly societies provided health insurance for millions of Americans and Britons, mostly lower-middle-class tradesmen and skilled artisans. By 1886, the Independent Order of Oddfellows and the Ancient Order of Foresters each claimed more than 600,000 members worldwide. In the 1920s, roughly every third adult male in the United States belonged to a fraternal organization.
These groups were characterized by independent lodges, democratic governance, a ritual, and mutual aid for members (and often their families). Although camaderie was a leading incentive to join, disability insurance was also an attractive benefit.
Despite their popularity, however, such groups had all but vanished within two decades after being pushed aside by the surge of the welfare state. What accounts for their rise and fall?
The answer, according to Pavel Chalupnicek and Lukas Dvorak (both from the University of Prague), lies in the concept of social capital, and individual’s ability to use his or her network of friends and acquaintances for economic gain. Social capital, they explain, enables many people to function better in society, but its value depreciates rapidly in the presence of certain kinds of government activities.” (Read more from independent.org)
The vocabulary of so-called conspiracy theorists, “New World Order,” “One World Government,” “Global Currency,” returns again and again. Every day, their concerns look more reasonable. Are the they right? Is there a push toward compromising our sovereignty in the name of “stability”?
See also mass protests at G20 target banks. “Protesters pushed against police barricades outside the Bank of England on Wednesday, shouting ‘Abolish Money!’ Helicopters hovered over the capital. Many buildings in the financial district were boarded up and several streets were closed. Some bankers swapped their pinstripe suits for jeans to avoid being possible targets. Six people were arrested.
“The Postal Service has faced repeated challenges from more competent private companies and has responded with one legal counterattack after another.
In 1971, a federal district court prohibited a private firm from carrying Christmas cards in Oklahoma on the basis that the plaintiffs, a postal employees union, suffered ‘significant loss of work time, overtime, employment benefits. . and morale.’ The court concluded that private delivery of Christmas cards would be a ‘widespread public nuisance.’ The result was that the public suffered slower service and higher costs to support postal workers’ ‘morale.’
In 1976 in New York, a pack of Cub Scouts tried to raise money by delivering Christmas cards: Postal Service lawyers ordered them to stop, and threatened the ten-year-olds with a $76,500 fine. A New York Times editorial regretted that the Postal Service’s carriers were not as fast as its lawyers.
In 1978, the P.H. Brennan Hand Delivery Service offered same-day delivery of mail in Rochester, New York, for 10� a piece; the Postal Service could not guarantee overnight delivery even for 15�. The Brennan Service operated during snowstorms (when the Postal Service did not even try to deliver), never lost a letter, and never had a complaint. When U.S.P.S. attorneys closed in on the Brennans, Rochester lawyers provided them with a free legal defense. But the Postal Service persuaded a judge to issue a ‘cease and desist’ order on account of the ‘threat to postal revenues.’
For 200 years, the Postal Service has been playing a game of catch-up with its illegal competition. Throughout its history, U.S.P.S. has upgraded service or cut rates only after some private company came along and did a better job. Were it not for its competition, the Postal Service might still be charging by the page and requiring citizens to come to the post office to send and pick up mail.” (Read more from cato.org)
Government is not our protector from monopolies, they are the creators and enforcers of monopolies. Businessmen, whom we so readily blame for all our problems, survive by providing goods and services we want at affordable prices.
“The U.S. Post Office [1839-1851] returned almost no revenue to the general fund. It usually reported losses. Large profits were being earned, but they were distributed internally. Giving out the postage revenues to groups with political power became the Post Office’s second function. Measured monetarily, it was the Post Office’s primary function. Thomas Jefferson, suspicious of the Post Office, had written:
I view [the Post Office] as a source of boundless patronage to the executive, jobbing to members of Congress and their friends and a bottomless abyss of public money. You will begin by only appropriating the surplus of the post-office revenues; but other revenues will soon be called in to their aid and it will be a source of eternal scramble among the members, who can get the most money wasted in their states; and they will always get most who are meanest [Jefferson 1892-99: IX, 324-25].
”
“In the first half of the 19th century, the federal government’s legal monopoly over the mail was a monopoly over all intercity communication. Informal and illegal channels of communication had always existed, but their inconvenience and limited scope allowed the Post Office to earn huge monopoly profits. The government’s policy of running the Post Office on a ‘nonprofit’ basis simply channeled the rents (profits) to powerful political groups who were in a position to draw directly from the Post Office coffers. Those profits gathered from the U.S. Post Office were of the same magnitude as the profits earned more openly by the British postal service.
The transportation revolution lowered the cost of intercity transportation and communication in the 1830s and 1840s. Private companies met the change by offering low-cost transportation and communication. The Post Office, facing no formal competition, at first kept its prices fixed. As costs dropped, monopoly profits increased. The profits became large enough to draw competitors despite the legal risk. That competition, and pressure from consumer groups, caused the Post Office to lower its rates in 1845 and 1851 by 79 percent.
The effect of private competition went beyond the drop in postage rates. An equally important effect was the introduction of new techniques into the U.S. market. The most important innovations were prepayment with stamps and intracity pickup and delivery. The Post Office showed no sign of adopting such innovations until they were successfully used by private companies.” (Read more from cato.org)