Shout First, Ask Questions Later

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

NYC Capitalists Acting With More Honor Than Obama

New York Businesses Give Iranian President Ahmadinejad the Cold Shoulder.

As well they should. If only Obama treated thugs and dictators the same.

Obama Economics Are A Blast From The Past

And not a good blast either.

From Arthur B. Laffer, the economist who created the Laffer Curve, comes this op-ed in The Wall Street Journal titled, "Taxes, Depression, and Our Current Troubles. Tariffs, rising state and federal taxes, and currency devaluation ruined the 1930s, and they could do the same today."

The 1930s has become the sole object lesson for today's monetary policy. Over the past 12 months, the Federal Reserve has increased the monetary base (bank reserves plus currency in circulation) by well over 100%. While currency in circulation has grown slightly, there's been an impressive 17-fold increase in bank reserves. The federal-funds target rate now stands at an all-time low range of zero to 25 basis points, with the 91-day Treasury bill yield equally low. All this has been done to avoid a liquidity crisis and a repeat of the mistakes that led to the Great Depression.

Constitutional Amendments I Can Live With

Like my post titled "25 things I would do if I ruled the country", Steven Den Beste over at HotAir.com has created a list of 10 things he would do to the US Constitution titled, "If I could amend the Constitution."

Between the two of us, I think we've got the TEA Party Protest Manifesto.

Even The Chinese Think Obama's A Socialist

A pal in Hong Kong sent this to John Derbyshire over at NRO - The Corner.(The Chinese characters say "Serve the People!" — a Maoist slogan, and written in Mao's calligraphy.)

Conservative Elites Wringing Their Hands

Where once they wrung their hands over Sarah Palin, now the same increasingly irrelevant cast of characters are wringing their hands over Glenn Beck.

Listen. No body is perfect. We all make mistakes. People in general don't mind that. Sure Palin made mistakes. Yes, Beck goes a bit too far at times.

But they are being far more effective in combating the socialisation of America than YOU are.

So rather than whine, become relevant. Help those commentators that are actually making a difference - Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Andrew Breitbart. Rather than waiting for one of your own to rise from the ashes.

It ain't gonna happen. And until the GOP gets its house in order, the small-c conservatives and the TEA Party folks will continue to far more accurately address the concerns of middle class Americans than you intellectual elites will.

And please, can we get rid of Michael Steele and put Ken Blackwell in charge?

The Conservative Debate Over Glenn Beck

Monday, September 21, 2009

Fuzzy Math on Capntrade

(Originally published by my husband on NRO - The Corner)

Last week our very own Jim Geraghty asked why ABC's Jake Tapper receives such flak from conservatives on Twitter, when he is one of the most prominent people actually holding the White House to account. Like Jim, I find this mystifying. That's why I'm glad to see Jake has put together a generally fair account of the increasingly complicated debate surrounding the release of the Treasury's internal documents about the likely cost of President Obama's plans for cap-and-trade. Jake is really on the money when he examines the hand-waving that is the reality behind the argument that the cost estimates aren't about the Waxman-Markey Bill:
Chris Holder [sic, actually Planet Gore's Chris Horner], the senior fellow at CEI, pointed out that the Treasury Department originally released the memo with the $100 billion-$200 billion figure redacted — for no obvious reason other than it was a "highly embarrassing" figure, in Horner's view. Moreover, the Treasury Department only coughed up five documents and e-mails, when CEI expected 50 documents and e-mails. CEI needs to decide in the next 30 days whether or not to sue for more.

And though the Waxman-Markey legislation is quite different from the cap and trade hypothesis in the memo, the Obama administration's original position was in support of a 100 percent auction. As Congress is really only at the beginning of the legislative process on cap and trade, the White House's view is not irrelevant.

It's also worth asking if the ultimate amount of revenue — even with rebates to consumers — is of so little value. Do Americans really think those costs won't end up impacting them in some way eventually? It may be politically savvy to tell the American people that this will cost them just a postage stamp a day, but is that the true ultimate cost of revenue that the administration argued in theory could possibly be "equal in size to the corporate income tax"?

Peter Orszag is the president's budget director, but back when he was director of CBO, in April 2008, he testified that "if firms that must purchase allowances were unable to pass those costs along, their profits would fall. More likely, some substantial portion of those costs would be passed along to others in the economy, such as consumers, in the form of higher prices, and employees, in the form of lower wages. Lower wages would reduce federal revenues from income and payroll taxes. An increase in the price level would reduce income taxes — because the tax system is indexed to prices — and increase expenditures for indexed benefits, such as Social Security. Those changes would offset some of the revenues from the allowances."

Orszag added that under "a cap-and-trade program, firms would not ultimately bear most of the costs of the allowances but instead would pass them along to their customers in the form of higher prices. Such price increases would stem from the restriction on emissions and would occur regardless of whether the government sold emission allowances or gave them away."

As as President Obama himself said (in another claim examined by Politifact) in January 2008, "under my plan of a cap-and-trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket....Because I'm capping greenhouse gases, coal-powered plants, you know, natural gas, you name it, whatever the plants were, whatever the industry was, they would have to retrofit their operations. That will cost money, they will pass that money on to consumers."

Obviously, the Waxman-Markey bill makes efforts to mitigate such problems, but no one can honestly argue that the bill the president ultimately signs will absolutely avoid these issues entirely.
However, I'd like to pay most attention to this conclusion:
Cap and trade is a complicated issue that demands facts and transparency. Opponents would do well to keep their arguments in line with reality, refraining from fuzzy math and invented claims.
We can argue all day about the appropriateness or not of Declan McCullagh's back-of-the-envelope calculation of costs, but there remain some very specific, unfuzzy estimates of the cost of the Waxman-Markey Bill itself. The Heritage Foundation analysis says:
The annual cost of emissions permits to energy users will be at least $100 billion by 2012 and could exceed $390 billion by 2035
The American Council on Capital Formation analysis says:
High energy prices, fewer jobs, and loss of industrial output are estimated to reduce U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by between $419 billion and $571 billion by 2030
Those numbers aren't fuzzy, and are in line with the Treasury estimates, even given the bait-and-switch of an initial period of 15% auction.

If you want real fuzzy math, try the claim that the Waxman-Market Bill will cost but a postage stamp a day in 2020.

As for invented claims, the recent one that Waxman-Markey represents "a good investment for the United States" is one that really doesn't bear much probing.

Finally, the question that is never answered during all of this is whether, even taking the assumptions behind Waxman-Markey as read, is whether it will actually deliver any emissions reductions worth talking about. The Breakthrough Institute doesn't think so.

Anyway, kudos to Jake Tapper for asking some of the questions that need asking, and being rightly skeptical of the answers he is being given.

Townhall Video Central

The 9/12 Movement

Lots of townhall videos and links to commentary from PJTV. A good resource for those who see the TEA Party Protests as a good thing for America.

Using Taxpayer's Money To Fund Partisan Propaganda

EXPLOSIVE NEW AUDIO Reveals White House Using NEA to Push Partisan Agenda.

This huge, detailed, and well-evidenced article from BigGovernment.com is the latest round of scandalous behavior from the Obama administration.

Executive Summary. Obama is attempting to use the National Endowment of the Arts (a taxpayer funded organization) to promote his specific political policies. This is an attempt to use taxpayer's money to pay artists to create propaganda for Obama's personal policy agenda.

How to Corrupt Artists in One Quick and Easy Telecon Another well-linked and extensive article by Nick Gillespie.

Full Transcript HERE

There's full audio and transcript at these links. There is no way the NEA and Obama can claim they didn't know what they were doing without some serious "fudging".

Propaganda, Health Care and ACORN: Full Context of NEA Conference Call Reveals Disturbing Pattern.

NEA CORRUPTION
$2 million behind National Endowment for the Arts politics push

Using Taxpayer's Money to Fund Partisan Propoganda.

UPDATE: What the NEA Says Vs. Documented Facts

THE NEXT BIG CORRUPTION SCANDAL?
Pregame Report: The NEA Conference Call

The EPA Chooses Fish over Americans

This is astonishing. The EPA has turned off the agricultural water for one of America's most productive food-growing areas to protect a two-inch minnow.

Millions are out of a job. The fields are fallow and in drought conditions. And 12% of America's food supplies will be in jeopardy because the EPA prefers a two-inch minnow to people.

Vile. Disgusting. Wrong.

Surely the geniuses at the EPA could have come up with a better solution than simply cutting off the water to millions of acres of farmland in order to protect a two-inch minnow?

If the EPA really cared about fish, it would be banning synthetic estrogen rather than causing droughts in California.

Here's the full story...
The Valley Hope Forgot: California Farmers at Obama's Mercy.

The Valley Hope Forgot: Schwarzenegger Responds to Crop Crisis.

General Round-Up of News Items

Breitbart a conservative rebel with a cause. Great article about Andrew Breitbart and his mission to stir things up. To quote Mal, "I aim to misbehave."

It's the Sun, Stupid. Earth approaching sunspot records. Low sunspots = cooler climate.

62% Hold Populist, or Mainstream, Views. That would make the TEA Party protestors "mainstream" and not "angry mobs".

Polling conducted from September 7 through September 13 found that 70% of voters generally trust the American people more than political leaders on important national issues. Sixty-eight percent (68%) view the federal government as a special interest group, and 71% believe that the government and big business typically work together in ways that hurt consumers and investors.

Whose Paranoia?

Corruption Daily Round-Up 09-21

NEA CORRUPTION
$2 million behind National Endowment for the Arts politics push

Using Taxpayer's Money to Fund Partisan Propoganda.

UPDATE: What the NEA Says Vs. Documented Facts

ACORN CORRUPTION
ACORN Chief Dodges Congressman's Call to Come Before Congress.

Bertha Lewis: Thanks for Playing, But We Have To Say Goodbye.

From Mighty ACORN, Grows Big Government.com Prety much the one good thing to come from ACORN.

Sowing the seeds of destruction. ACORN's shady tactics made headlines last week. But their shocking radicalism is nothing new.

ACORN Backed Group Now Targeting “Enemies” Of Obamacare Bring It, Slimeballs.

Embattled ACORN orders independent investigation.

Acorn: A Democratic Party Albatross

Cisneros and ACORN: Takes One to Know One.

GENERAL CORRUPTION
The Chicago Way

Purple People Beaters dot com And here

Is this to what the Dem operative was referring?

The Politics of Intimidation Come to Chapel Hill

Fed Rejects Geithner Request for Study of Governance, Structure.

Hillary's Honduras Obsession. The U.S. is trying to force the country to violate its constitution. This is deeply rotten.

Fear of the Constitution

Wilson and Obama? No Way!

MEDIA CORRUPTION
Strangers to Dissent, Liberals Try to Stifle It

Sliming James O'Keefe: A Case Study

Stephanopoulos and ACORN: Obama Lies Again. Who would have thought?

WaPo’s ACORN story ignored Fox and Beck

Deconstructing Dave

The New Racism

THE NEXT BIG CORRUPTION SCANDAL?
Pregame Report: The NEA Conference Call

The politicized art behind the ACORN plan.

Liberals Are Never to Blame.

Obamacare Daily Round-Up 09-21

Does a Federal Mandate Requiring the Purchase of Health Insurance Exceed Congress' Powers Under the Commerce Clause?

New poll: Majority believe government is doing too much. From Gallup via Bryon York of the Washington Examiner.

President Barack Obama is beginning to look out of his depth. Did he have any "depth" to begin with?

Political Ignorance and the Case Against Paternalistic Regulation:

MORE COWBELL

A dog is a rat is a doctor is a vet.

On-the-air prez seems like endless 'infomercial.'

Greying Britain looks to assisted suicide reform.

ObamaCare: Losing everyone.

The Medicaid Monster. From City Journal so you know it is good.

SPIN METER: $2 trillion in health savings? Where?

'Madison Weeps'

Conserva-care. Four prominent conservatives propose ways to make the American healthcare system better.

A Growth Vision for Health Reform. Why limit an innovative industry to a certain percent of GDP?

FROM RASMUSSEN:
"Fifty-six percent (56%) of voters nationwide now oppose the health care reform proposed by President Obama and congressional Democrats. That’s the highest level of opposition yet measured and includes 44% who are Strongly Opposed."

48% Want Abortion Coverage Banned in Health Care Plan

Among the Uninsured, 58% Favor President’s Health Care Plan. Of course, they do. It's the something for nothing brigade.

Palin’s Advocacy: The Turning Point in Health Care Reform Debate

The Chicago Way

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Nothing is Too Big To Fail

I've said it before and I'll say it again, nothing is too big to fail.

And yet Obama open to newspaper bailout bill. If anything in this country deserves to go belly up, its the newspapers.

Speculation

Andrew Breitbart, the man who brought us ACORN as child-prostitution enablers, is promising something juicy is coming out.

What's Breitbart Got Next?

Breitbart Promises New Bombshell from “Left Field”

I'm looking forward to this.

Czars

TEA Party Daily Round-Up 09-20

Nearly 10,000 gather for 'Tea Party' along Milwaukee's lakefront

Roger Stone & Instapundit, the 9/12 Interview: Will the Tea Party be the Third Party?

Thousands rally at Milwaukee tea party

Video Tribute

Blitzing America - And Still Not Convinced

Why Can't Obama Stop Talking? Ann Althouse thinks its too much as well.

In Media Blitz, Obama Beats Back Criticism of Health Care Plan. President Obama appears on the ABC, CBS, NBC and CNN talk and public affairs Sunday shows, and on the Hispanic network Univision, to talk about health care reform. Not surprisingly, Obama is not appearing on Fox which begs the question what is he afraid of?

Obama: Mandate is Not a Tax. This is either a lie or reveals an incompetancy of understanding basic economics.

Report: Obama Urges Paterson to Reconsider N.Y. Gov. Race. The New York Times reported political advisers made the suggestion to request Paterson withdraw, and Obama approved it. So basically Obama is meddling with everything, everywhere.

Obama on ACORN: 'Not Something I've Followed Closely' Won't Commit to Cut Federal Funds. This is either a grotesque self-deception or reveals a mendacity of stunning proportions as Obama was once ACORN's lawyer. I'm not the only one who thinks so... Parsing "a whole lot of" federal money.

Obama Faces Week of High Political Stakes. In a span of four days, Obama will plunge into the politics of the United Nations and host a summit in Pittsburgh on the world's wobbling economy. He is also under pressure to push along stalled Mideast peace. Obama faces worse than that if this healthcare media blitz fails.

Obama Defends Medicare Advantage Cuts. Great way to alienate senior voters.

Latino Lawmaker Rips Obama for Making It Harder for Illegals to Buy Private Insurance. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. I almost feel sorry for Obama - he's now experiencing what even slightly conservative Americans experience at the hands of liberals.

Obama chides media. THAT is hilarious. Obama is actually rebuking the media that is MOST friendly to him because it occassionally or accidentally covered actual events that reveal Obama's true nature. Let's face it, the only media outlet it would make sense for Obama to say such a thing to is FOX News but he's too chicken to even appear on that station. What does that say about Obama?

Boehner: 'Tea Party' Protests a Legitimate 'Political Rebellion'. House Republican leader John Boehner says nationwide protests known as "tea parties" are the result of pushback against Democrats' spending. A little love for the angry mob of dumb racists, hooray.

You can say it over and over again, but doing that will never make what you're saying true Obama says health plan 'not radical'

It's not just me and Rep. Wilson calling Obama a liar.

OF all the wishful thinking, denial of realities and blatantly false assertions that surround President Obama's push for government-dominated health care, the biggest whopper is the claim that public administration will be more efficient than private health plans.

From this article titled, "Health-reform follies: Who's more efficient?"

Blitzing the world and still not convinced. Obama's Worldwide Star Power Finds Limits. Skepticism Abroad Echoes Doubt at Home. Doubts?!? I think you mean outright rejection.

Health Reform and the Polls. Obama’s biggest obstacle is the 68% of voters who rate their health coverage as good or excellent.

Boehner Says Democrat Health Care Plan is Dead. Here's to hoping.

Random Round-Up

Below is just stuff I thought was interesting.

The Week in One Liners.

Huckabee is tops in conservatives' straw vote.
This Weekend's Values Voters Summit. Romney taunts Democrats with memories of Carter

Sweden Slashes Income Taxes to Promote Job Growth. How come the socialistic Swedes get this econ101 move but Obama doesn't?

Palin emerges as Facebook phenom

Right On... Iranian Freedom Protesters Rip Down Hezbollah Sign As Crowd Cheers (Video) How come Obama supports the thugs while these freedom fighters die?

Will Perot Voters Determine Outcome in 2010 (& 2012)? Interesting points as always from GayPatriot.

Crybabies In The White House.

From PJTV
Instapundit & Gatewaypundit, The 9/12 Interview: The Power of Organizing Locally
and
VodkaPundit - Keeping Abreast of the Czars and One Cool Explosion

Pawlenty decries 'appeasement' Go get 'em, Tim! Pawlenty: I’m Calling Obama Out

Corruption Daily Round-Up 09-20

Keep an eye on your Congressional Representatives. The Political Mechanics of ACORN

Independent prosecutor for ACORN Surprise: ACORN audit to be conducted by panel full of leftists and cronies.

The headline says "A quick guide to The Examiner on ACORN." and while pithy, this guide is actually quite impressively exhaustive. A definite keeper if you want to plumb the depths of ACORN's corruption.

ACORN, Kanye West and the Hierarchy of Multiculturalism.

ACORN watch. More proof that the press is a pressure group.

Lawmaker Tried to Block U.S. Attorney Pick. Civil-Rights Icon John Lewis Called White House About Nomination of a Prosecutor Who Won Conviction of His Political Ally.

ACORN scaling back or shutting down in many cities.

From that Right-Wing, Anti-Obama media source, the Boston Globe-Democrat:

Breitbart: Prepare for a “blockbuster” “from left field” next week; Update: A clue?; Update: NEA?

Mainstream Media: The Devil Wears Pravda

ACORN CEO 'Outraged' by Behavior of Employees in Prostitute Tapes. ACORN chief organizer Bertha Lewis tries to calm a growing firestorm over the behavior of her group's employees. Yeah, yeah, I'm sure it is a shock.

Saturday, September 19, 2009

The Kennedy Killed By The Right Myth

(Originally posted on NRO - The Corner by Jonah Goldberg. The article below is well worth reading because thanks to Obama and the liberal elite over-reach, a whole lot of left-wing myths are being exploded. The more the Left claims, the more the Right debunks. And it is about time.)

Sigh, Mark's post below is so exhausting. FWIW, from my book:

They set about creating the fable that Kennedy died battling “hate”—established
code, then and now, for the political right. The story became legend because liberals were desperate to imbue Kennedy’s assassination with a more exalted and politically useful meaning. Over and over again, the entire liberal establishment, led by the New York Times—and even the pope!—denounced the “hate” that claimed Kennedy’s life. The Supreme Court justice Earl Warren summed up the conventional wisdom—as he could always be counted upon to do—when he theorized that the “climate of hatred” in Dallas—code for heavy right-wing and Republican activity—moved Lee Harvey Oswald to kill the president.

The fact that Oswald was a communist quickly changed from an inconvenience to proof of something even more sinister. How, liberals asked, could a card-carrying Marxist murder a liberal titan on the side of social progress? The fact that Kennedy was a raging anticommunist seemed not to register, perhaps because liberals had convinced themselves, in the wake of the McCarthy era, that the real threat to liberty must always come from the right. Oswald’s Marxism sent liberals into even deeper denial, their only choice other than to abandon anti-anti-communism. And so, over the course of the 1960s, the conspiracy theories metastasized, and the Marxist gunman became a patsy. “Cui bono?” asked the Oliver Stones then and ever since. Answer: the military-industrial complex, allied with the dark forces of reaction and intolerance, of course. Never mind that Oswald had already tried to murder the former army major general and prominent right-wing spokesman Edwin Walker or that, as the Warren Commission would later report, Oswald “had an extreme dislike of the rightwing.”

Amid the fog of denial, remorse, and confusion over the Kennedy assassination, an informal strategic response developed that would serve the purposes of the burgeoning New Left as well as assuage the consciences of liberals generally: transform Kennedy into an allpurpose martyr for causes he didn’t take up and for a politics he didn’t subscribe to.

Indeed, over the course of the 1960s and beyond, a legend grew up around the idea that if only Kennedy had lived, we would never have gotten bogged down in Vietnam. It is a central conceit of Arthur Schlesinger’s Robert Kennedy and His Times. Theodore Sorensen, Tip O’Neill, and countless other liberals subscribed to this view. A popular play on Broadway, MacBird, suggested that Johnson had murdered JFK in order to seize power. But even Robert F. Kennedy conceded in an oral history interview that his brother never seriously considered withdrawal and was committed to total victory in
Vietnam. Kennedy was an aggressive anti-communist and Cold War hawk. He campaigned on a fictitious “missile gap” with the Soviets in a largely successful effort to move to Richard Nixon’s right on foreign policy, tried to topple Castro at the Bay of Pigs, brought the world to the brink of nuclear war during the Cuban missile crisis, and got us deep into Vietnam. A mere three and a half hours before Kennedy died, he was boasting to the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce that he had increased defense spending on a massive scale, including a 600 percent increase on counterinsurgency special forces in South Vietnam. The previous March, Kennedy had asked Congress to spend fifty cents of every federal dollar on defense.

The Kennedy myth also veers sharply from reality when it comes to the issue of race. The flattering legend is that Kennedy was an unalloyed champion of civil rights. Supposedly, if he had lived, the racial turmoil of the 1960s could have been avoided. The truth is far more prosaic. Yes, Kennedy pushed for civil rights legislation, and he deserves credit for it. But he was hardly breaking with the past. In the supposedly reactionary 1950s, Republicans had carried most of the burden of fulfilling the American promise of equality to blacks. Eisenhower had pushed through two civil rights measures over strong opposition from southern Democrats, and in particular Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson, who fought hard to dilute the legislation.

Eroding US Sovereignty

Global regulations are a violation of the US Constitution. Obama however is calling for them.

Obama Says Financial Regulations Must Be Strengthened Globally

A Harvard education ain't what it used to be.

Shout First, Ask Questions Later

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

NYC Capitalists Acting With More Honor Than Obama

Obama Economics Are A Blast From The Past

Constitutional Amendments I Can Live With

Even The Chinese Think Obama's A Socialist

Conservative Elites Wringing Their Hands

Analysis of the Obama-thon

Corruption Daily Round-Up 09-22 UPDATED

Obamacare Daily Round-Up 09-22 UPDATED

Monday, September 21, 2009

Fuzzy Math on Capntrade

Townhall Video Central

Using Taxpayer's Money To Fund Partisan Propaganda

The EPA Chooses Fish over Americans

General Round-Up of News Items

Corruption Daily Round-Up 09-21

Obamacare Daily Round-Up 09-21

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Nothing is Too Big To Fail

Speculation

Czars

TEA Party Daily Round-Up 09-20

Video Tribute

Blitzing America - And Still Not Convinced

Random Round-Up

Corruption Daily Round-Up 09-20

Saturday, September 19, 2009

The Kennedy Killed By The Right Myth

Eroding US Sovereignty

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