Math v. Vitriol

With Wisconsin lost, all that is left for the Left to do is mewl and spit vitriol.
This is the perfect time for Conservatives to take the high ground, and win the day with calm, common sense, and actual honest-to-God numbers.

As Matt Welch argues over at Reason, "No amount of crying over evil Scott Walker will help governments fix their bleeding balance sheets."

Get Serious About Governing, Democrats

  [...]   Wisconsin has been the front line of America's Democrat vs. Republican, blue vs. red rhetorical war for 16 months now, ever since newly elected Republican governor Scott Walker pushed through a budget repair bill that withdrew government from the union dues-collecting business for public employees and removed the collective bargaining power of most government unions, an act that triggered historic public protests. So on the morning after Walker survived a labor-led recall election by a higher margin than he originally won office in 2010, there were plenty on the left grumbling darkly about the Dark Lord rising over our once-free country. 

At The American Prospect, Harold Meyerson compared Walker's actions to a "jihad" and suggested (paradoxically) that a post-union labor movement might just resort to rioting. Walker "wins one for the plutocrats," Joan Walsh lamented at Salon, without really explaining how the monocle-wearers could win 38 percent of the union vote. 

Such demonization was of a piece with leftish commentary in the run-up to the recall. Esquire's Charles P. Pierce described Walker as a "goggle-eyed homunculus hired by Koch Industries to manage its midwest subsidiary formerly known as the state of Wisconsin," which would now be subject to "the habits of oligarchy." Even more grossly, The Nation's Katrina vanden Heuvel wrote in The Washington Post that Walker's policies were intended to "cleanse the electorate of people who don’t look, earn or think like him."    

[...]    

So, progressives: What is the right percentage of a government budget to be spent on public sector pensions? If this requires that cities and states simply need to come up with bigger budgets (through increased taxes) precisely how much bigger would be appropriate? If you don't want to increase overall budgets, what other government services are you willing to cut?    

[...]    

As long as Democrats keep dodging these questions, no amount of plutocrat-baiting will reverse their political fortunes. Governments at all levels are out of money. Progressives are going to have to come up with a better response to that than saying "we were robbed."

Indeed....

Mitt Romney on Taxes and California

#hhrs #tcot   
From Jim Geraghty:

On California governor Jerry Brown’s call for a referendum in November on his proposal for an $8.5 billion tax hike:
“I think you are seeing the result of a series of actions in California, actions that have led to public-sector unions’ having benefits and wages out of line with those in the private sector. There’s an unwillingness to deal with fiscal problems before they reach near-crisis level. And the high rate of taxes in California is causing businesses to leave California.

“I hope that doesn’t accelerate, but as the governor continues to raise taxes on the most successful, the most successful will leave. Others will decide to not open their doors because the risk will be too great that even if they’re successful, the government will end up taking what they earn. The governor is taking them in the wrong direction. I wish Californians had elected Meg Whitman. She would have been more successful and explained to Californians the need to cut back on spending and eliminate unnecessary programs. There are other states that have very different records. I think it’s interesting that the state with the highest or among the highest tax rates in the nation also has the worst or near the worst deficit.

“You can’t tax your way out of debt or a deficit. You simply have to rein in the size of the government, because the government will simply ask for more and more and more, until the taxpayers finally say ‘enough.’”

Mitt Romney on Greece

#hhrs #tcot   
From Jim Geraghty:

On whether Greece should leave the euro, and whether the euro was a mistake from the beginning: 
“I think the euro is under the stress that many had predicted. Cobbling together in one currency nations with such different fiscal policies and such different levels of productivity was bound to cause strains that, if not addressed, could imperil the other nations and the currency itself. The fact that Greece has found it difficult to live up to the commitments it made coming into the euro — that has made those stresses even greater. And now you have an extremely threatening setting that has the entire world holding its breath. We’re all concerned about what might happen to Greece and the people there if aggressive action is not taken to restore its fiscal balance and allow it to grow again and start participating fully in the world economy. I can’t predict precisely what will happen. That will depend upon the people of that nation, the leaders of that nation, and the leaders of countries like France and Germany. They may decide that it’s in their interest to try to cover for the shortfalls of another nation, but that is yet to be seen.”

Mitt Romney on Bain Capital & Private Equity

#hhrs #tcot   
From Jim Geraghty:

On the fact that one of his successors at Bain Capital, Jonathan Lavine, is a top Obama bundler:
“I have no problem with people who have differing political sentiments participating in the political process. I can say I know that the Obama campaign misfired with this attack. The GS Steel Enterprises events that are in question occurred after I left the firm, so that obviously is not a very effective attack. Although the whole idea that we’re going to attack people in private equity — who make over 100 investments to get results in any one investment — is a very strange course for the president to take. I realize, however, that the president wants to do anything he can to deflect attention from his record, and he will persist in personal attacks.”


On how a firm like Bain can make money while the companies it manages, such as GST or Dade Bering, can fail:
“With very few exceptions, the times you are successful in an investment are when the enterprise itself becomes larger and more successful. That is how our firm and other firms were able to achieve such success. There are a few exceptions where an enterprise is doing well, and realizing dividends from its success, but then it encounters a reversal in circumstances, and it no longer does well. . . . That tends to be rare. The people in my firm, in every investment we made, we wanted to make the business more successful. The cartoon caricature of investors coming in, taking all the money out of a business and leaving it bankrupt is, of course, absurd. The only way you make money in the industry that I’m familiar with is by making the business more successful, more profitable, not by making it less so.”

Welcome to the Whine-mar Republic

Worried about default? Well, don't be! National Treasure Alan Greenspan says we can avoid default by simply printing as much money as we need!

For those who might think this is a grand idea, I refer you back to a previous attempt at this folly.

A time when 1 Mark became Millions...and not in a good way.

If we are truly entering into a time when the President would rather be petulant and deflect all blame to his opponents, while having his Treasury run the presses night and day, then perhaps we should start calling this era....the Whine-mar Republic.

[h/t: Instapundit]

Fiscal Crisis: Don't Worry, Be Happy!

Over at Ricochet Claire Berlinski introduces us to the 'Don't Worry, Be Happy' approach to the looming fiscal crisis:

Why Anarchist Anthropologists Shouldn't Make Economic Policy

Anarchist anthropologist David Graeber explains why we needn't worry about deficit spending in the New York Daily News. It's all wrong to imagine that governments, like households, must be concerned by debt, he argues. Why? Five reasons:

1. Households can't levy taxes.
2. When households owe money, they owe it to other people. The U.S. debt is owed mainly to ourselves.
3. When households owe money to other people, they can't just print it. The government can.
4. When someone in your household writes a check, the recipient tends to cash it. Not so when the U.S. sells Treasury bonds to banks in Brazil or China.
5. If a household doesn't pay its debts, creditors can take them to court or call the cops. Internationally, we are the cops.

Feel reassured now?

I know I do!

So....Graeber's main argument is that we have nothing to worry about because Government budgets are nothing like family budgets? If you think that is looney, don't read his OpEd any further, or you will run into amazing logic such as this:

"A major reason the U.S. has a deficit to begin with is that we spend more on our military than all other nations in the world combined."

and this:

"Most probably know that if we ever really did balance the budget, it would likely throw our economy into a tailspin."

OK...military spending bad...deficits good!

I hate to break it to you Daaaave, but even if President Obama zeroed-out the Defense budget in his 2012 budget proposal, he would only cut his deficit in half. You see the real-reason we have a deficit and climbing debt are not the discretionary spending, but the mandatory spending (SS, Medicare, Medicaid, Interest on the debt) which keep expanding and are of course "mandatory".

And I for one did not know that a balanced budget would throw our economy into a tailspin. I can't wait to read your sources and evidence.....oh wait, you didn't cite any. Shocking....

2011 SOTU Word Cloud

A quick look before tonight's speech, here is a word cloud of its most common words....



I suppose it is not a surprise that 3 of the most used words are "new", "American", and "jobs".

I am sure there has to be a message hidden in there somewhere.....

[h/t to the ever-handy Wordle]

Obama Saves Black Friday!

Great news! The 'Obama Recovery'® has led to all-time high Black Friday sales receipts!!

Retail sales rose a slight 0.3 percent compared with the day after Thanksgiving last year, to $10.69 billion, according to ShopperTrak. The firm says that's still a record for the day.

Never mind the fact that the economy only 'created' a 0.3% rise in sales. I have it on good authority that according to the new economic standard used by the administration, the 'Obama Recovery'® 'saved & created' a 100.3% rise in sales over last year. Had it not been for the 'Stimulus'® that 'Pulled the Economy Back From the Brink'®, there would have been no Black Friday sales this year at all....due to 'Bush Administration Policies'®.

® - Tradmarked in full by BHO Inc & RahmAxel Enterprises

[h/t Instapundit]

The Department of Free

A great new poem from Zombie.... #ocra #hhrs #sgp

The Department of Free

Years ago, a wiser man
than you or I devised a plan
to dole out goods at zero cost
to those of us whose jobs were lost.

It seemed benign, so nice and kind
the plan grew to include the blind,
the old the lame then you and me,
and they called this plan
The Department of Free.

It started as a helping hand
to needy folks across the land,
so those who could not make ends meet
would not be forced out on the street.

Unemployment benefits
were just a start, because now it’s
free food, free homes, free surgery,
rebates, bailouts, loans — all free.

Now half of us just stand in line
all day long and gripe and whine
about the stuff we feel we’re owed
the list of which has growed and growed.

The line wends hither, the line wends yon,
and by and by it comes upon
a door above which we can see
those magic words:
Department of Free.

Once inside: a shopping spree
of endless handouts: it’s all free!
Drunken on entitlement
we grab a meal, a house, a stent.

The other half? We’re all employed!
Hearing this, you’re overjoyed
to know that at least some of us
have jobs and never cause a fuss.

But one last thing you ought to know,
our economic Alamo:
The place where we all work, you see,
is in the accursed Department of Free!

I push papers,
while he counts beans.
She helps seniors
and they help teens.
It takes a village to raise a child;
it takes a nation to run hog-wild.

Paul pays Peter, and Peter pays Paul,
yet neither makes anything at all.
Round and round the money goes
but where it comes from no one knows.

It all runs out eventually,
can’t simulate prosperity.
The shopping spree was just a dream,
a baseless potlatch Ponzi scheme.

With nothing left to give away,
The Department of Free itself must say,
“We’re all laid off, the end is near.
There’s no point working, even here.”

The last employed man not offshore
has just one more remaining chore:
Switch off the lights
and turn the key
in the broke
Department of Free.

From Medicare and Medicaid
came Medicould and Medishould
now Medimust and we’ve gone bust
we’re trust-fund kids without a trust.

GOP Punches Dog....Twice As Hard

Apparently the President doesn't like it when his opponents "punch back twice as hard"...

Demonizer-In-Chief Upset People Demonize Him

Obama's line, in his Labor Day speech in Milwaukee before union leaders and a union crowd, that "[t]hey talk about me like a dog," is getting all the attention.

[...]

But what was most Obama-like about the speech was the launching of vicious attacks on his opponents, only to then cry foul over the fact that his opponents push back. Obama, as he did throughout the campaign and has done throughout his presidency, painted a picture of his political opponents as heartless victimizers of others, and of the capitalist system as cruel and inhumane.

[...]

This truly is another of those windows into his divisive soul. The Demonizer-in-Chief and the class warfare expert doesn't like being treated the way he treats others.

Why can't the rubes just appreciate what he has done for them?!?

And So The Vote Buying Begins....

According to the WaPo via the ever-watchful Corner, the Obama Administration will begin to attempt to buy off American voters before the upcoming election.

Obama Administration Considering Payroll Tax Holiday
September 2, 2010 5:31 P.M.
By Daniel Foster

The White House economic team is reportedly considering pushing for a second stimulus comprised of “tax breaks” for businesses — including a possible $300 billion payroll tax holiday, and a $100 billion extension of an R&D tax credit.

The Washington Post reports:

"The staff-level discussions are in preliminary stages. But with the unemployment rate expected to rise again in new jobs numbers due out Friday, such a move could serve both to spur hiring and to combat Republican charges that Obama’s tax policies would hurt small businesses.

More spending on infrastructure – particularly transportation projects – is also under discussion, sources said. But a person familiar with the talks said it would be easier for a package consisting purely of tax cuts to “avoid the stain of a ‘bailout’ or ‘stimulus’ label.”

The proposals could be rolled out as early as next week.

That sounds great if you ask me and my paycheck, but it won't change my vote. And I am betting it won't change a whole lot of other votes as well. In fact I would venture to say that it could drive more voters away, as those who are on the fence may well see it for the attempted bribe that it is.

Additionally, the WaPo offers some extremely flawed analysis by saying "such a move could serve...to spur hiring..." Really? They think that a temporary tax holiday will cause employers to hire permanent employees?? Once the holiday is over, they would have to start paying the taxes again, one of the reasons that they wouldn't have hired those people in the first place.

Tax holidays are good at spurring one-time transactions (purchasing school clothes, TVs, clunkers, etc), but will probably have limited effect on recurring transactions (e.g. payrolls).

Much like 'Cash for Clunkers' and 'First Time Homebuyers' tax credits before it, this proposed temporary tax holiday will most likely have temporary effect...and a bad aftertaste when it is all over.

But then again, this proposal isn't about improving the economy, it is about sustaining the Democratic Party...

Another take on 9.9% Unemployment

This week we saw the April unemployment numbers released, and they ticked up from 9.7% to 9.9%, despite the addition of 290k new jobs.

President Obama says this is progress, "...the storm is receding and the skies are brightening..." But others point out that without the hiring of people to record the Census, the numbers are a bit lower.

That leaves the question about how, if we added 290k new jobs, did the unemployment rate move *up*? As discussed by Jim Geraghty, "discouraged workers – those who had given up looking for work — are getting off the sidelines."

"Discouraged workers" do not show up in the unemployment rate, so if 100k discouraged workers start looking for work again, it is reflected in the unemployment rate the same as if 100k people had lost their jobs. [This is a good reason to follow the more inclusive U-6 Unemployment Rate, which rose to 17.1% in April]

So, why were all these "discouraged workers" suddenly looking for work again in April, and thus being counted again and raising the rate from 9.7% to 9.9%? Was it an improving jobs market? Perhaps so. But here is another option:

President Obama Signs Unemployment Extension

President Barack Obama has signed a bill extending unemployment benefits through June 2...People who lost out on the additional weeks of benefits after exhausting their state-paid benefits will now be able to reapply and receive those checks retroactively.

So, in the middle of April thousands of discouraged workers qualified for retroactive unemployment benefits that had previously run out? The last time I checked, in order to qualify for benefits, you had to be "actively looking for work". Thus in order to qualify, they have to give up being "discouraged workers", and become "unemployed" again.

So, I would argue that perhaps the reason the unemployment rate went up was that the government handed out more unemployment benefits.

Weird, huh?

America, The Gulliver of Nations

Powerline posts a keen insight on how Great Britain's present, may become our future:

Once the federal government becomes so deeply involved in allocating health care, it will come to be a dominant focus of political discourse.

Over the years watching on C-Span the British Prime Minister's Question Time, I've observed that a large portion of this exercise is devoted to specific questions about the quality care provided by The National Health Service in members' districts. A question on the terrorists threats to the UK will invariably be followed by a passionate query from a Member asking the PM if he's aware of nurses being re-assigned at a hospital in Sheffield. The PM seems to spend as much time on parochial health care issues as on national security.

The politics of deciding who gets what in the way of medical treatment doubtlessly will push aside traditional affairs of state. Every member of Congress will need to hire several staff members just to manage constituents' complaints about their care. Elections will be won and lost on the basis of who can get the most in the way of health care for their districts.

We will become the Gulliver of nations, a great power whose leaders are tied up in strings as they spend much of their time addressing the medical complaints, valid and imagined, of their electorate.

We *will* become the Gulliver of nations. And it will not just be due to healthcare. The more our Federal government becomes so deeply involved in the regulation of anything and everything (education, the environment, banking, retirement, fishing, car manufacturing....etc), the more we tie ourselves down. The more the Liliputians UN bureaucrats will take advantage of us. The more we will make ourselves irrelevant.

Socialism = Free Stuff!!

How could I have missed this?

According to this video, Socialism will bring you a free college education, free food, and a guaranteed job in the middle class!



How could I have been so wrong?!? Can I still vote for the utopia of Hope & Change?? Can I be on the People's Council?

Sign me up for the struggle!

[Hat Tip: Big Government]

The Pillage of the Future by the Present

City Journal is carrying a good read on the current addiction of the 'modern democratic state' to Keynesian-driven indebtedness, not from the normal American punditry, but in the context of the evolution of European states .

The thesis of German Peter Sloterdijk reminds us that we Americans are not alone when worried about our current 'financial unsustainability'.

The Grasping Hand
The modern democratic state pillages its productive citizens

[...]

The modern democratic state gradually transformed into the debtor state, within the space of a century metastasizing into a colossal monster—one that breathes and spits out money.

[...]

What is new is the gargantuan scale of public debt. Mortgaging, insolvency, monetary reform, or inflation—no matter, the next great expropriations are under way. Today, the state’s grasping hand even reaches into the pockets of generations unborn. We have already written the title of the next chapter of our history: “The pillage of the future by the present.”

Read the whole thing...

Blowing Cash in Vegas v. Blowing Cash in DC

The President is out with his latest economic advice:

"When times are tough, you tighten your belts," the president said.

Well said Mr President.

"You don't go buying a boat when you can barely pay your mortgage...."

Oh, OK....that must be different than increasing next year's deficit by 36%, and expanding the deficit by an additional $2 Trillion over the next decade? Must be....

"You don't blow a bunch of cash on Vegas when you're trying to save for college."

Again, I guess that is different than all of our cash being blown in the city of Washington DC.

Geez, it has only been a year, but Las Vegas has been replaced by DC as the city with the biggest financial gambles.

Thanks for the economics lesson Professor Obama...I know Harry Reid appreciates it.

How Conservatives Are Made

#hhrs #tcot #rs #sgp
From The Corner:

"They Just Took My Money" [John J. Miller]
That's what my 8-year-old son said about the sales tax on the ride home from Borders a few minutes ago. He had a $10 gift card from Christmas, bought a Clone Wars book for $7.99, looked at the receipt, and wondered why he still didn't have a full $2.01 on it

This is how conservatives are made.

Congrats John, you must be very proud!

Stimulus Subterfuge

Its all a Stimulus Subterfuge, a Recovery Ruse, a GDP Gimmick.

In other words, the 'Great Obama Recovery'® that was announced earlier in October by the White House is all hogwash, a hoax, a fraud...a lie.

Sure, the economy was announced to have grown by 3.5%. However, that has now been revised down (GDP numbers are often adjusted) to 2.8%. 'What's so bad about that?' you might ask. 'Isn't any positive growth a good thing?' Normally, but as the blogprof points out, the only thing making this a positive number, is Stimulus cash....

That "robust" 3.5% GDP growth rate in Q3 that the AP heralded as the end of the recession sans actual jobs? That just got reduced. A lot. As in down to 2.8% now. Even that is deceiving as consumer spending, which comprises 70% of the economy, declined 0.5% during the same period (Positive GDP Fraud! Consumer Spending DOWN 0.5%. GDP Up Because Of MASSIVE DEBT!). So how is it that the GDP increased in the 3rd quarter after consumer spending decreased? Well, that's got everything to do with the 'G' in the GDP - gross. That includes consumer spending, government spending, in fact all spending. So if the consumer spending is down, one way to artificially inflate the GDP number is to increase government spending with money that the government doesn't, by the way, have. In essence, the GDP number is positive due to increased debt! It's purchased on a government card that has no credit limit.

So Stimulus cash, which is created out of thin air and injected into the economy to unknown effect, makes up 118% of the GDP growth....

So what this really means is that we will be seeing increasing GDP growth for many quarters to come, and thus a White House trumpeting a full-throated recovery, just in time for the 2010 elections.

Since only 22% of the Stimulus had been spent by the end of October, that means we have over $600 Billion left to be entered into that 'Government Spending' column that blogprof tells us about. Thus, unless consumer spending craters, this glut of Govt Spending spread over many quarters will prop up the GDP numbers for those quarters. And as it will most surely do, the White House will point to the string of positive quarters, and how their actions have saved the economy, despite the fact that it is really a Potemkin Village of economic figures...

The only problem will be the ever expanding unemployment roles....and the largest spike in employment will be found in GOP political campaigns.

[Hat Tip: Instapundit]

Countering the Rise of an Epithet

In the newest edition of National Review [subscription required], Jay Nordlinger has a good interim retrospective on the 'teabagger' imbroglio in 'Rise of an Epithet'...

"To “teabag” or not to “teabag”: That is not the most pressing question of these times, but it is a question to consider. Routinely, conservative protesters in the “tea party” movement are called “teabaggers,” and those calling them that do not mean it in a nice way. Many conservatives are mulling what to do about this term: fight it, embrace it, what?"

I say fight it....and of course you may want to fight fire with fire. Because I am in the mood, I will ignore a normal tendency not to sink to the Lefties' level. If they want the discourse to utilize crass barnyard imagery to subtly insult one's opponent, so be it.

If those in this country who oppose larger government control, gangster government, higher taxes, and the general slide towards European socialism can be labeled as "Teabaggers", then the Democrats and lefties who are running the country can suffer a similar epithet.

From now on, in any public reference, the Democratic Party and its actions in running the Executive and Legislative branches of government should be referred to as...."The Donkey Show".

Washington, Tijuana....it doesn't matter. We are all getting screwed.....

Viva Reaganomics!

Megan McArdle declares that the Dems have found the 'Worst. Talking Point. Ever.'

"All I know is that Speaker Pelosi is trying to force her members to vote for a bill that the American people have soundly rejected," added House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio).

Democrats counter that their agenda has kick-started a recovery on Wall Street, even if it hasn't trickled down to the job market yet, and that Republicans are putting what they've begun at risk.

All I can say is that it is nice to see that the Dems are finally supporting trickle down economics.

(Hat Tip: Instapundit)