Vince shares with the Class

For those of you who may have missed it, yesterday brought us a new high/low in U.S. diplomacy. 

In one day and in one country (Belgium) Hillary Clinton managed to:

1. Assure a bewildered Belgian classroomful of students that they should take advantage of economic disasters.
2. Presented a comic gift to  a notoriously sour Russian minister who promptly told her the Russian inscription on it said something totally different than she thought it did 
3. Mispronounced the names of two conference delegates. 
4. Informed the conference delegates that American democracy was far older than that of any country in Europe (who trace their democracy back to the Greeks!).

Meanwhile, not to be outdone, Obama, who had received some lavish personal gifts from British Prime Minister Brown, sent him home with a stack of movie dvd's.  Brown was bewildered, the Brits insulted.

 

"Send In The Clowns," indeed!

Palin Appointment

Governor Sarah Palin (R-AK), who was once considered a viable Conservative candidate for high  national office, has chosen to appoint pro-abortion judge Morgan Christen to Alaska's Supreme Court. This comment from an article in the Anchorage Daily News provides insight:

"Aides to the governor wouldn't answer questions about specific concerns that might have prompted the governor's request. However, both Christen and Smith have been involved in organizations that might give Palin pause.

Christen's application included her membership in several charitable groups, including some from her past, but did not mention that she was on the board of Planned Parenthood in the mid-1990s. The organization, which didn't provide abortions in Alaska until 2003, is now on the opposite side of a Palin-supported bill to require girls under 17 to get parental consent for an abortion.

Back in the 1980s, Smith was executive director of the public interest environmental law firm, Trustees for Alaska. The group currently is on the opposite side of Palin over the listing of Cook Inlet beluga whales as endangered."

Some of us who supported Governor Palin in her run for the Vice-Presidency find ourselves disapointed in this choice. We once saw her as a more conservative leaven to the 'Maverick' John McCain, but perhaps she's more like him than we thought.

The Coming Collapse

In the Drudge Report today:

RUSSIAN ANALYST PREDICTS DECLINE AND BREAKUP OF USA
Tue Nov 25 2008 09:04:22 ET

A leading Russian political analyst has said the economic turmoil in the United States has confirmed his long-held view that the country is heading for collapse, and will divide into separate parts. 
Professor Igor Panarin said in an interview with the respected daily IZVESTIA published on Monday: "The dollar is not secured by anything. The country's foreign debt has grown like an avalanche, even though in the early 1980s there was no debt. By 1998, when I first made my prediction, it had exceeded $2 trillion. Now it is more than 11 trillion. This is a pyramid that can only collapse." 
The paper said Panarin's dire predictions for the U.S. economy, initially made at an international conference in Australia 10 years ago at a time when the economy appeared strong, have been given more credence by this year's events. 
When asked when the U.S. economy would collapse, Panarin said: "It is already collapsing. Due to the financial crisis, three of the largest and oldest five banks on Wall Street have already ceased to exist, and two are barely surviving. Their losses are the biggest in history. Now what we will see is a change in the regulatory system on a global financial scale: America will no longer be the world's financial regulator." 
When asked who would replace the U.S. in regulating world markets, he said: "Two countries could assume this role: China, with its vast reserves, and Russia, which could play the role of a regulator in Eurasia." 
Asked why he expected the U.S. to break up into separate parts, he said: "A whole range of reasons. Firstly, the financial problems in the U.S. will get worse. Millions of citizens there have lost their savings. Prices and unemployment are on the rise. General Motors and Ford are on the verge of collapse, and this means that whole cities will be left without work. Governors are already insistently demanding money from the federal center. Dissatisfaction is growing, and at the moment it is only being held back by the elections and the hope that Obama can work miracles. But by spring, it will be clear that there are no miracles." 
He also cited the "vulnerable political setup", "lack of unified national laws", and "divisions among the elite, which have become clear in these crisis conditions." 
He predicted that the U.S. will break up into six parts - the Pacific coast, with its growing Chinese population; the South, with its Hispanics; Texas, where independence movements are on the rise; the Atlantic coast, with its distinct and separate mentality; five of the poorer central states with their large Native American populations; and the northern states, where the influence from Canada is strong. 
He even suggested that "we could claim Alaska - it was only granted on lease, after all." Panarin, 60, is a professor at the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and has authored several books on information warfare. 

Developing... 

This guy isn't the only one making such prognostications.  A Google search yielded a couple of month-old articles by a guy named Frosty Wooldridge -- Part One and Part Two -- wherein he comments on a book, Civil War II: The Coming Breakup of America by Thomas W. Chittum.  Interesting commentary; I wonder why people are expecting the end of life as we know it? 

I should add, Mr. Chittum's book (now out of print)  was copyrighted in 1996, and Wooldridge's articles appeared on January 31 and February 4, 2005.  The Russian spoke last Monday, March 2, 2009.

I also found another such article on George Washington's blog with similar sentiments, posted on December 24, 2008.  The comments are at least as entertaining as the blog post.

God Bless, y'all...

Pakistani Christians

Pakistan is  not the best of places, even in the best of times, for one who professes Jesus Christ is Lord.  The following story appears today on ASSIST News Service -- but I haven't seen it on US television nor read of it in our newspapers.

Thanks to my good friend Graham Weeks for posting this information.

 

Thursday, March 5, 2009

One killed, 11 injured in Pakistan Church attack by gunmen
Violence continues to spiral out of control in the country

By Dan Wooding and Sheraz Khurram Khan
Special to ASSIST News Service

GUJRANWALA, PAKISTAN (ANS) -- As violence continues to spiral out of country in Pakistan, ANS has received news that indiscriminate firing by a group of Muslim men on congregants of a Presbyterian church in Gujranwala district on Monday, March 2 that left a woman dead and 11 others injured.

Several Muslim men, identified as Amjad, Balal, Zeeshan Azam and others whose identities could not be ascertained by ANS, opened fire on worshipping Christians at the Presbyterian Church in Songo, which is a town that is some 7 kilometers from Gujranwala city, a week after two Muslim men robbed a Christian resident of the area on gunpoint.

On February 25, two Muslim men intercepted a Christian man, Imran, on his way home and robbed him at gunpoint of 3,000 Pakistani Rupees ($37.3506 USD), a mobile phone and a wrist watch.

Bleeding, Imran, after going home, he then went to the local police station to report the incident. The matter was “resolved” after Muslim notables brokered reconciliation between Imran and the accused.

However, the patch-up proved short-lived, as several armed Muslims made forcible entry into several homes of Christians on March 2 and allegedly harassed and threatened Christians.

Another group of Muslims, who were carrying iron rods, clubs, and guns, entered into the church. They opened fire at the congregants. The culprits allegedly also smashed the windows of the church and desecrated Bibles. They removed the cross erected at the roof of the church and left the scene shouting at the Christians that they would face worse attacks if they did not leave the town.

Talking to ANS by phone, Pastor Patras of the Presbyterian church, said that moving the inured Christians to the local hospital was not without a struggle. Elaborating on this, he said the Muslims had blocked the road leading to hospital apparently to stop Christians from going to Gujranwala District Headquarter Hospital. He said they were eventually able to shift the injured to the hospital after police intervention.

”Police vehicles ferried the injured to the hospital,” he said.

Commenting on the death of Christian woman, Shakeela, who succumbed to her bullet injuries, Shahzad Kamran of the Sharing Life Ministry Pakistan (SLMP) called for her post-mortem.

He alleged that the police “are not taking any action to arrest assailants.”

Mr. Sohail Johnson, Chief Coordinator of SLMP, who visited the scene of incident, condemned what he called “a brutal attack” on Christians and urged prayer partners of the ministry to pray for protection of Pakistani Christians.

“Fundamentalist Muslims are targeting Christians as they cannot tolerate their existence in Pakistan,” he told ANS.

Pastor Patras claimed that the attitude of the nursing staff and medics at the government-run hospital was “callous and indifferent” toward the injured Christians. He said the gunmen had “exercised their influence over the hospital staff” after failing to “stop injured Christians from arriving at the hospital.”

“The medics at the DHQ Gujranwala asked us to take Shakeela to Lahore. It took us a long time to arrange an ambulance as we had no resources,” said Pastor Patras, who believes, Shakeela’s death could have been averted if multiple odds were not stacked against them.

Asked if the police had made any arrests, he said they arrested a couple of people but said “the real culprits are still scot-free.”

Pastor Patras described the situation as “extremely tense”, adding, “Fearing attacks, Christians have shut themselves in their houses. We are scared and are praying for our safety.”

He said Muslims had also attacked Christian residents of Kotli Sahvo, a village in Gujranwala district on February 28. “Police did not even file a report, let alone take action against the culprits,” he alleged.

“Even if a report was lodged. We would lose it in the court as we would not have resources to hire a lawyer,” he said.

ANS has discovered that local Christians have protested against the incident and have demanded immediate arrests of the culprits.

Oink if you love Barack

From Michelle Malkin's blog: reader Matt has done a masterful job of capturing the essense of  Obama's presidency with this PhotoShopped logo.  Well Done, Matt.

I can hardly wait to see how long it takes this Democrat congress and president to totally kill our economy and turn us into the Amerika prophesied by George Orwell in his book 1984.  NOT!!

Who's To Run the Census?

    President Barack H. Obama, the man who promised to run the most open and ethical administration in history, who promised to rein in spending by going line by line through the budget, who promised to have no former lobbyists in his administration, who said his budget would contain no earmarks, has decided that he would remove oversight and administration of the 2010 Census from the Commerce Department and have it run from within the White House.  A lot of people, including Don Campbell, think it's a bad idea to turn this important, once-a-decade count of our population into a political football.  Read Don's article here.

    Is the census that important?  Why not just estimate, or even just pick a number?  Consider this:  Census data are used to distribute Congressional seats to states, to make decisions about what community services to provide, and to distribute $300 billion in federal funds to local, state and tribal governments each year.

    Yeah, it's important.  Too important to let politicians deal and mis-deal with it.

Democrat Principles ... or Not

    Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University and also a contributor to the USA Today newspaper.  His article today is titled "D.C.'s speed bump: the Constitution."

    Surely you've heard that our Democrat-dominated congress is working on legislation to give voting representation to the District of Columbia. Never mind that the framers of the Constitution explicitly restricted representation to "the several states," your Democrat legislators are bound and determined to ignore Constitutional strictures now that they have absolute power in congress and the White House.  Check out Turley's article to see what this law professor thinks of their blatant disregard for the Constitution.  It is amazing to me that people elected to public office would conspire to do violence to the constitutional principles they were sworn to uphold.

 

Washington Post: Tens of Thousands on Government Payroll

    The headline of an article by Philip Rucker in today's Washington Post trumpets, "Many Hires needed for Budget Goals."  Under the headline, "Tens of Thousands Could be added to Federal Payroll."  The article begins:

 

    President Obama's budget is so ambitious, with vast new spending on health care, energy independence, education and services for veterans, that experts say he probably will need to hire tens of thousands of new federal government workers to realize his goals.

    The $3.6 trillion plan released last week proposes spending billions to begin initiatives and implement existing programs, and given Obama's insistence that he would scale back the use of private-sector contractors, his priorities could reverse a generational decline in the size of the government workforce.

    Exactly how many new workers would be needed remains unclear -- one independent estimate was 100,000, while the conservative Heritage Foundation said it is likely to be closer to a quarter-million.

 

    How many real, productive jobs in the private sector do you suppose it will take to support these make-believe jobs in government?

 

Democrat voters, What in the world were you thinking?

 

The Obama 'Tax and Spend' Economy is Here

From the Heritage Foundation Monday, March 2:

 

    Yesterday, just weeks after they signed their economic stimulus plan, the White House released a statement claiming credit for the reopening of a window and door factory in Chicago, Illinois. Vice President Joe Biden said, "The reopening of this factory and the rehiring of these workers provide an excellent example of how the money in the Recovery Act is targeted to spur job creation quickly." If the Obama Administration is going to claim credit for every job created since they were elected, then if they are honest, they should also take the blame for every job lost. Since President Barack Obama was elected on November 4, 2008, the Dow has dropped 2,562 points. This past Friday, the Commerce Department reported that the U.S. economy shrank by 6.2%, making it the worst quarter since 1982. Many economists predict that labor data to be released this Friday will show that as many as 700,000 jobs were lost in February.

    Why has our economic downturn only accelerated since President Obama took office? Because the Obama Administration's policies amount to a declaration of war on the investors, entrepreneurs and small businesses that make our economy grow. The budget released last week only confirmed the worst fears about the direction the Obama Administration wants to take the country.

    Taxes: At a time when only the economists on the White House payroll believe our economy is about to recover, the Obama Administration plans to raise taxes on the American people by almost $2 trillion. The first $1.3 trillion of these taxes are aimed at the highest earning Americans, corporations, and small businesses. According to Heritage Foundation senior analyst Brian Riedl, while the top 20% of taxpayers now pay 80% of all taxes collected by the government, under the Obama plan, the top 20% of tax filers would pay 90% of all taxes, and the number of families who owe no tax would climb to near 50%. Riedl warns: "You can only increase taxes on the rich so much before they stop working, saving and investing, and that reduces economic growth for everybody."
    Then there is the $646 billion tax hike on every American. The Obama Administration euphemistically refers to these taxes as "climate revenues" from their planned carbon capping scheme. But make no mistake: government taxes on energy will be passed on to the consumer. And the deadweight loss from this massive and regressive tax hike doesn't even include the costs of the invasive new government monitoring of all economic activity necessary to make the plan work.
    Spending: Obama's budget proposes $1.13 trillion in regular discretionary spending for 2010. This is a full 12% increase over the 2009 spending baseline. On top of this the Obama budget increases entitlement spending by another $700 billion. The proposed post-recession spending level of 22% of GDP has been exceeded only 8 times in the post-war era. And these numbers do not include the spending priorities of the unchecked far left in Congress.
    The Chicago Tribune reports today "President Barack Obama will break a campaign pledge against congressional earmarks and sign a budget bill laden with millions in lawmakers' pet projects … Taxpayers for Common Sense, a watchdog group, identified almost 8,600 earmarks totaling $7.7 billion."
    Deficits: The Obama budget claims to cut the deficit in half by 2012, but relies on audaciously optimistic economic forecasts that no one believes in. Adding the "stimulus" bill to a realistic budget baseline yields a projected 2010-2017 cumulative budget deficit of $8.4 trillion – 2.5 times the size of President Bush's deficits over the same 8-year time period. Before the recession, revenues were 18 percent of GDP and spending was 20 percent. After the recession, President Obama would maintain revenues at 19 percent of GDP, and spending at 22 percent. In other words, all new tax revenues would finance new spending, rather than deficit reduction. President Obama's structural budget deficit would exceed President Bush's.
    Defending Obama's budget on Meet the Press this Sunday, Democratic Leadership Council chairman Harold Ford Jr. said, "In November voters said, "We want a different path." If it doesn't work, [Obama]'s indicated, "I own this budget. I own this economy." Exactly.

"What Were You Thinking?"

 

 

 

Who Decides? You or the Government?

    Who do you think should have the last word in deciding what your children are taught about sex?  Who should decide what sort of moral values your children are taught?  Would you like your children taught that there is no "Right to Life," only a woman's "Right to Choose?"  Are you willing to have your children taught in a government school that there is no moral difference between a one-man, one-woman marriage and a homosexual relationship between two women or two men?  Is it OK with you if the government convinces them that there are no Absolute Values, but only Personal Choices?

    If so, you're a fortunate person.  Great Britain, within their program of socialized medicine, is encouraging citizens to talk about the big issues of life with their children.  But, unfortunately, not in a manner calculated to instill the values held by the parent.  No, the parent should merely encourage the child to make his or her own decision, with no reference to parental authority or any other absolute.  No rules except, perhaps, whatever capricious rules the government might choose to put in place.

    My good friend Graham Weeks, who is a pharmacist in that country, shares some information that the government would have their medical community distribute to citizens for their enlightenment.  Read it and let me know what you think.  If you're a citizen of the United States you really ought to give this some consideration, because the new president of the United States is promising to bring socialized medicine to this country.

Homeowner Affordability and Stability Plan ... or Not?

    There was a time when Democrats in Washington said it was good policy to give mortgage loans of 100% or more to folks who might not even have a job with which to earn enough to pay them back.  As long as you had some sort of income -- even if it was welfare -- the policy was to push lenders to make the loans.  "We'll guarantee the loan through Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac," Barney Frank (D-Mass) told them.

    The result was a spate of baseless mortgages, homes where the "homeowners" had no personal stake in the home they live in.  Many had bought in the expectation that house prices would forever continue to rise, and that they could make a ton of money by selling the house for much more than what they paid.  That expectation was dashed when supply began to exceed demand, when people started to default on their payments, and the economy turned south with many businesses having to lay off employees.  Now all those mortgages which aren't being paid back are called "toxic assets."  They have no value in today's economy.

    So who will pay for these bad decisions made by Barney Frank, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and greedy people who wanted something for nothing?  Not Barney Frank; for some reason the voters of Massachusetts keep returning him to the House of Representatives.  Not the buyers who made a bad decision to buy a house they couldn't reasonably afford.  Not the banks that made the loans knowing their clients had no way of repaying them.  No, it is you and I, the American taxpayer, who will be held accountable.  Barack H. Obama introduced, on February 21, the Homeowner Affordability and Stability Plan  which will use $275 billions of taxpayer money to assist up to nine million homeowners who may be at risk of defaulting on their mortgages.  Is this a good idea?

    Dr. Ronald Utt and David John say no, it is not.  In a February 25 article to the Heritage Foundation, Utt and John point to 12 problems with Obama's plan.  Consider this quote from problem # 12:  "Perhaps the most troubling part of the plan is the increased reliance being placed on the now federally-controlled Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, whose lax and corrupt behavior over the past decade was an important contributing factor to the present economic crisis."

The Typical Democrat Voter

    Why is it that the typical Democrat voter is so unwilling to debate political issues?  I have to admit that most of my friends are of a conservative bent, but I do know some who admit to having a hatred of Republicans in general, and the previous occupant of the White House in particular.  That hatred, coupled with their unquestioning adoration of our current president, a man whose accomplishments and associations, motives and methods are never held up to scrutiny, lead to a skewed view of reality.

    On one hand, they want to snipe at the previous administration and Republicans in general, assessing blame to them for the current state of affairs in the economy and the world at large.  On the other hand, they are unwilling to listen to any voice that speaks a reasonable word of truth into their alternate universe.  They faithfully listen to and parrot the biased talking points of the mainstream media while refusing to consider or even listen to any other view.  They call those who hold and put forth opposing views "mind-numbed robots" at the same time they maintain their own willful ignorance.

    On the one hand they talk about the need for everyone to have a vote and support groups that try to enlist all sorts of people onto democrat voters roles -- like ACORN, a group that is (or was) under investigation for fraud in a number of states.  On the other hand, they push for a misnamed bill -- the Employee Free-Choice Act -- in congress that would deny a secret ballot to workers who are considering whether to organize into a union.

    On the one hand they talk about the inordinate influence that conservative icons such as Rush Limbaugh and Shawn Hannity have on Republicans and conservative voters.  On the other hand they deny any influence from an extremely liberal mainstream media.

    On the one hand they say that we can't achieve energy independence by drilling for oil in our own country.  On the other hand, they insist that we can achieve a sound economy by borrowing a Trillion Dollars and spending it on (as Townhall.com reports) nearly 9,000 Porky Projects.

    Why is this so?  Chelsea Schilling posts a review of a new book by Dr. Lyle Rossiter for World Net Daily today.  In his book, titled The Liberal Mind: The Psychological Causes of Political Madness, Dr. Rossiter probes modern liberalism's irrationality.  I have yet to read the book, but I have put it on my reading list.  I hope he can tell me how to generate some meaningful discussion with these typical Democrat voters...

    By the way, Ben Franklin once said, "We are all born ignorant, but one must work hard to remain stupid."

 

"What Were They Thinking?"

Where's it Gonna Go?

    I just joined Stimulus Watch, a web site where you can take look at the so-called "shovel-ready" projects that mayors from around the country have submitted to be recipients of the government's largesse (that is, our tax bucks).  You can vote on the projects, share your opinions, and even (if you know something about the project) edit the wording of the project.

    Go on over there and see what's coming for your area.  Then make a note, so you can go back in five or ten years and complain when nothing is being done yet.

    "What Were You Thinking?"

The Constitution and the District of Columbia

The First article of the Constitution of the United States of America reads, in the second section and in part, "The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several States ... No Person shall be a Representative who shall not ... when elected, be an Inhabitant of that State in which he shall be chosen."

The Sixth Article of the same document reads, in the third paragraph and in part, "The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution."

The Heritage Foundation published the following commentary yesterday in The Morning Bell...

"For all of its many ambiguities, on the matter of whether the residents of the District of Columbia can vote in the House of Representatives, the United States Constitution is crystal clear: no. In 2000 the United States District Court for the District of Columbia affirmed this truth, writing: "The Constitution does not contemplate that the District may serve as a state for purposes of the apportionment of congressional representatives." The Supreme Court later affirmed that decision.

Despite the clarity of the law, Senate leaders have scheduled a vote today on S. 160, which would create two new seats in the House of Representatives and give one of them to the District of Columbia. The new fig leaf the left is using to push this blatantly unconstitutional measure is the argument that Art.1 sec. 8's grant to Congress to exercise "exclusive Legislation" over the District, gives them the power to grant the District a seat in the House. Heritage fellow Hans von Spakovsky exposes how specious this claim is: 

The Constitution’s provision giving Congress the power to run the affairs of the District of Columbia — the seat of the nation’s capitol — doesn’t wipe out other parts of the document. Congress could not, for example, restrict the First Amendment rights of District residents.

Furthermore, the very same section of the Constitution also applies to “Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards” and other federal properties. But it would be ridiculous to assert, on the basis of that text, that Congress has the power to award House seats to an army base, federal office building, or Navy pier.

Conservatives are not alone in pointing out what a blatant violation of the Constitution S. 160 would be. Liberal constitutional scholar Jonathan Turley writes: 

It would be ridiculous to suggest that the delegates to the Constitutional Convention or ratification conventions would have worked out such specific and exacting rules for the composition of Congress, only to give the majority of Congress the right to create a new form of voting members from federal enclaves like the District. It would have constituted the realization of the worst fears for many delegates, particularly Anti-Federalists, to have an open-ended ability of the majority to manipulate the rolls of Congress and to use areas under the exclusive control of the federal government as the source for new voting members.

Some Senators appear to believe they can in good conscience vote for explicitly unconstitutional legislation if they include a provision in the bill that allows a Member of Congress to challenge the law in court. But such a provision would only clear statutory standing. Any plaintiff would also have to muster constitutional standing and as Heritage scholars Andrew Grossman and Nathaniel Ward detail, Congress has the power to play political games with voting in the House to prevent such a suit from ever happening.

Members of Congress take an oath to defend the Constitution. This makes them duty bound to oppose any legislation that is unconstitutional. It would be a black eye on the entire Congress if they chose political expediency over their solemn promise to the American people."

More Chicago Politics...

    It just goes on and on and on and...

    These guys from Chicago have invaded and taken over Washington.  Now even the Washington Post is saying that Roland Burris (D-IL), the man chosen by impeached and convicted former Governor Rod Blagojevich (D-IL) should step down from the Senate, and that a special election to fill that office should be conducted by the state of Illinois.

    Do you suppose an election will provide a more honest and moral senator for the state? Given Illinois' track record, I wouldn't hold any great expectations.

White House: "Santelli's wrong"

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs wants to buy Rick Santelli a decaf coffee and show him where he's got the president's "stimulus package" wrong.  Typically, the democrats aren't interested in answering the substance of the issue, namely why the government can extort money from those who earn it only to pass it out (after deducting half to pay for a bloated bureaucracy) to those citizens and illegals who are unwilling to work for a living.  Asked by Hardball host Chris Matthews if he was coming down too hard on Barack, Santelli said, "No, I'm not, I'm not coming down hard on Barack.  I'm coming down hard on the notion that I don't see anywhere in the Constitution where if you work hard, you're looked at as being dispassionate, inhumane, because you won't let your government redistribute what you've worked hard for."

    Gibbs also said that he'd be happy to have Santelli sit in his (Gibbs') office and read the plan.  Of course, the administration told everyone before the plan was passed by Congress and signed by the president, that it was too important, too badly needed, for open discussion and debate prior to the vote.

 

"The Chicago Tea Party"

Did you hear Rick Santelli tee off against the President's home mortgage bill yesterday?  If not, surely you heard about it; he's talking about a "Chicago Tea Party."  After you watch the video on CNBC's web page, check out the interview in National Review in which he talks about feedback he's received.

Will it Work?

I mentioned in an earlier post my Daddy's thoughts on what to do when you find yourself in a hole: "Quit Digging!"  A couple days ago I recieved a link to this very interesting article on the Money and Markets website.  Titled The Obama Stimulus: Truth and Consequences, it's a long read but author Martin D. Weiss sets out quite plainly and vividly what our government has been doing and how successful they've been so far, and then projects what we may very well have in store over the next few years.

The Heritage foundation's blog, The Foundry, also evaluates the to-date performance of the several attempts to shore up the economy on the backs of our kids. Read The Seven Floats of the Bush-Obama Borrow-Bailout Parade and see if it reflects your thoughts.

It will be interesting to revisit Dr. Weiss's article in the coming years, to see how much of what he predicts has come to pass.  Now would be a good time to pray...

Who's Gonna Pay The Bill?

Obama likes to call it the Economic Recovery Act, but any way you slice it, it's a huge borrowing package, the likes of which this country has never seen and may never dig out from under.  It includes a fantastic amount of Jimmy Dean stuff -- you know, pork -- that won't stimulate anything except the pockets of some politicians who are looking to buy votes in their next election campaign.

If there's any bright side, it seems that while most Obama voters ignore the issue of payback, some of their younger siblings are asking why they are going to be stuck with the bill.  Matt Drudge quotes a Tim Hacker report in the East Valley Tribune.  Democrats would like to ignore the payback part of the bill, but it's not going away and will only grow as time passes and people see the results (more likely, lack of results) of this porky product from Pig City.

I happened to catch Dennis Miller on the Jay Leno show last night, and he was talking about Obama and the stimulus porkage and what it would mean to him personally.  He said that it has now come to pass that productive people in this country, about half of the population, are supporting the other half.  He related a story of how, when he was a kid, his family had supported an orphan in Honduras, and in return got a picture and occasional letters from her, thanking them.  He said that's all he wants, a picture of whoever it is he's supporting and an occasional letter of thanks.

I also tend to agree with Miller when he says that we (as a country) need to help the helpless, but as for the clueless, he couldn't care less.  "Get a job, Slacker!"

"..A Tax Cut for 95% of taxpayers.."

 Obama promised a tax cut for all but the wealthiest, and a lot of the New Losers bought the line, crossed the line, and helped elect him based on hatred of anyone who made more money than they.  Now it seems that these "tax cuts for 95%" will not be actual tax cuts, but rather a redistribution of wealth from those of us who work and pay taxes, to those who'd rather sit on their butts and are a net drain on the economy.

But Obama still calls it a tax cut -- I guess when you're president you can just go ahead and redefine the meaning of the term to whatever you want it to be.