Underemployment: Obama’s dirty little secret
Even the best-qualified, highest-skilled, and hardest-working Americans are up against it these days. Yes, even those Americans who still have jobs! We all know that the official unemployment statistics are vastly understated, in that they focus only on claims for unemployment compensation. The stats do not properly account for older workers who have taken early retirement after losing a job; young workers who cannot enter the labor force; “discouraged workers” who are still looking for work, but whose unemployment benefits are exhausted; disabled persons who could work to a limited extent, but who aren’t being hired; and American citizens who have had to travel overseas, often at great sacrifice and financial loss, to find work.
But perhaps the biggest of the dirty little secrets hidden by the official unemployment statistics is underemployment. I know about this from personal experience. Despite all of my qualifications, I have not been able to find full-time employment in over two years. The reason? With all of the hidden ramifications of Obamacare looming over everyone’s heads, along with the other past and future attacks on private enterprise, nobody wants to hire full-time people at all if they can help it. Certainly nobody wants to hire someone over 55 for a full-time job where the employer will be forced to provide overpriced health insurance or be fined for not providing it. Some people may call it age discrimination, but it’s the government that is causing it, not the prejudices of private employers.
There’s no need to take my word for any of this. Look at any job board or want-ad listing and notice the proliferation of part-time, temporary, and contract assignments, and the relative absence of full-time jobs with benefits. For example, a retail store that would normally hire two or three full-time employees will instead hire five part-time employees for 15 to 30 hours per week, at minimum wage, perhaps with commissions, but no benefits. A recent Gallup Poll also reveals large-scale underemployment in the form of part-time workers who want, but cannot get, full-time employment.
The liberal elite wants it that way
Of course, the liberal establishment pretends not to know why unemployment remains so high. Case in point: NYT: Mystery for White House: Where did the jobs go? [H/T: Rodan]
That conundrum, which reclaims center stage in Washington this week, is this: Why is unemployment so high?
The whodunit has flummoxed economists in both parties for a year. In 2009, as the new Obama administration grappled with the financial crisis, joblessness rose nearly two points beyond customary recession forecasts.
Part of the uncertainty concerns why. More consequential now, as the administration and Congress determine what to do, is whether the unemployment spike reflects a short-term or permanent shift in demand for workers.
But seriously…
I have studied economics and I know this for certain: All they have to do is repeal Obozocare, resume drilling, seal the borders, and end the H-1b program, and unemployment will drop three points within a month. I guarantee it!
But none of that will happen until we somehow muster the political will to force our government to do that. Or until enough States secede and decide to govern themselves in the interest of their own citizens.
One way or another, we need to free ourselves from the predatory liberal elites who flout the will of the people and who serve only their own interests and those of our foreign enemies.
The Obama administration, together with the liberal establishment in academia, the mainstream media, the NGOs, the foundations, the Ivy League, and the UN, all have reason to want unemployment to remain high. Why? Because, though it may make the Obama administration look incompetent in the short run, as it did with FDR, it will create more dependency on the government and increase centralized government power in the long run.
Dependency, the Liberals’ Natural Resource explains how this nefarious system works:
A Heritage Foundation report shows that thanks to multiple government programs, the proportion of Americans in some way dependent on government largess has suddenly jumped by 31.2% since 2001 after decades of much slower increases. Even in inflation-adjusted dollars, America now spends thirteen times more on public welfare than it did in 1965. Dependency has snowballed in health care, public welfare, and housing, and the upward trend seems likely to continue as Obama’s statist polices take hold and baby boomers retire. Indeed, the president plans to spend some $10.3 trillion in welfare over the next decades. In a nutshell, Uncle Sam is replacing the family, the church, private charities, and all other non-government sources of assistance, and this means regular jobs for the new caregivers. And it feels good to work for Uncle Sam: Benefits included, the average federal workers in 2008 earned double what those in the private sector took home. So it is hardly unexpected that since about January 2008, some 7.9 million private sectors jobs have disappeared, while 590,000 public sector jobs were created — and this trend seems to be multiplying. It’s a thoroughly modern ménage à trois of dependent citizens, well-paid government employees ministering to them, and harried taxpayers footing the bill.
Here’s what makes this “new wealth” so attractive: In today’s uncertain economy, it far outshines the old wealth of building things and selling them at a profit. For one, jobs ministering to the dependent are labor-intensive and immune to mechanization. Government jobs are also wonderfully secure. It is inconceivable, for example, that a counselor working with Vietnamese gangs in Los Angeles will be replaced by an industrial robot or that under-employed social workers will also be asked to direct rush hour traffic to trim labor costs. This is not the cost-cutting-obsessed airlines where passengers make their own reservations, print boarding passes, stow their own luggage, and bring their own food. Nor can these interventions be outsourced to foreign competition. Helping the less fortunate has a permanent “Made in USA” label attached — Toyota has no interest in tackling the pathologies of those living in Detroit.
The supply of these jobs-generating assets is also inexhaustible. America will never, never run out of this newly discovered “wealth.” We may deplete our oil and ravage our forests, but what are the odds of drug addicts, the mentally ill, young unwed mothers, and others needing intervention vanishing? Those mired in pathology are a truly renewable natural resource. Social problems do recede, but rest assured, replacements are easily found (e.g., sex addiction). In a pinch, just open the borders and receive a bountiful fresh supply. And compare the ease of setting up an in-school clinic to mentor anorexic, non-English-speaking adolescent girls with low self-esteem versus building a factory. The former is instantly shovel-ready.
In other words, if the government stops the private sector from offering relatively secure, remunerative, full-time employment to American citizens, that will eventually leave the government as the only source of good jobs on American soil. This is how the federal government creates a new class of Soviet-style apparatchiki. Of course, those jobs ONLY go to those who actively support the regime and do their part to enhance the careers of those already in power, while keeping everyone else down.
Now what?
Our goal is to re-empower ourselves and our families, and decentralize and take back control over everything that has been usurped from us. That means we need to go on the attack to discredit the liberal establishment and all its pomps and all its works, anywhere and everywhere it appears.
We must overcome not only economic underemployment, but the underemployment of the human spirit.
To that end, please turn your attention to this excellent article: Read the rest of this excellent article at America’s Ruling Class — And the Perils of Revolution. [H/T: doriangrey]
… Consider: The ruling class denies its opponents’ legitimacy. Seldom does a Democratic official or member of the ruling class speak on public affairs without reiterating the litany of his class’s claim to authority, contrasting it with opponents who are either uninformed, stupid, racist, shills for business, violent, fundamentalist, or all of the above. They do this in the hope that opponents, hearing no other characterizations of themselves and no authoritative voice discrediting the ruling class, will be dispirited. For the country class seriously to contend for self-governance, the political party that represents it will have to discredit not just such patent frauds as ethanol mandates, the pretense that taxes can control “climate change,” and the outrage of banning God from public life. More important, such a serious party would have to attack the ruling class’s fundamental claims to its superior intellect and morality in ways that dispirit the target and hearten one’s own. The Democrats having set the rules of modern politics, opponents who want electoral success are obliged to follow them.
Reducing the taxes that most Americans resent requires eliminating the network of subsidies to millions of other Americans that these taxes finance, and eliminating the jobs of government employees who administer them. Eliminating that network is practical, if at all, if done simultaneously, both because subsidies are morally wrong and economically counterproductive, and because the country cannot afford the practice in general. The electorate is likely to cut off millions of government clients, high and low, only if its choice is between no economic privilege for anyone and ratifying government’s role as the arbiter of all our fortunes. The same goes for government grants to and contracts with so-called nonprofit institutions or non-governmental organizations. The case against all arrangements by which the government favors some groups of citizens is easier to make than that against any such arrangement. Without too much fuss, a few obviously burdensome bureaucracies, like the Department of Education, can be eliminated, while money can be cut off to partisan enterprises such as the National Endowments and public broadcasting. That sort of thing is as necessary to the American body politic as a weight reduction program is essential to restoring the health of any human body degraded by obesity and lack of exercise. Yet shedding fat is the easy part. Restoring atrophied muscles is harder. Reenabling the body to do elementary tasks takes yet more concentration.
The grandparents of today’s Americans (132 million in 1940) had opportunities to serve on 117,000 school boards. To exercise responsibilities comparable to their grandparents’, today’s 310 million Americans would have radically to decentralize the mere 15,000 districts into which public school children are now concentrated. They would have to take responsibility for curriculum and administration away from credentialed experts, and they would have to explain why they know better. This would involve a level of political articulation of the body politic far beyond voting in elections every two years.
If self-governance means anything, it means that those who exercise government power must depend on elections. The shorter the electoral leash, the likelier an official to have his chain yanked by voters, the more truly republican the government is. Yet to subject the modern administrative state’s agencies to electoral control would require ordinary citizens to take an interest in any number of technical matters. Law can require environmental regulators or insurance commissioners, or judges or auditors to be elected. But only citizens’ discernment and vigilance could make these officials good. Only citizens’ understanding of and commitment to law can possibly reverse the patent disregard for the Constitution and statutes that has permeated American life. Unfortunately, it is easier for anyone who dislikes a court’s or an official’s unlawful act to counter it with another unlawful one than to draw all parties back to the foundation of truth.
Tags: Economy, Great Depression, obama
Secessionist! Neo-Confederate!
/Chuckles
Hot off the Fed.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/bernanke-fed-ready-to-take-more-actions-if-needed-2010-07-21-140280?siteid=bnbh
Since Kirly isn’t here…
We’re dooooooooooooomed.
in·sur·rec·tion
[in-suh-rek-shuhn]
–noun
an act or instance of rising in revolt, rebellion, or resistance against civil authority or an established government.
Of some note:
Just took a peek at the swampland blog.
The thread on “Breitbart is sorry for Sherrod” …
The post #7 by teh mantis, any chance that it is a death threat, or what.
seems to need a screen shot for facts sake, History needs a ref. file
IMHO
@1389AD:
Thanks for putting this together!
The H1-B visa program needs to go. It’s destroying American participation in Technology jobs.
Rodan wrote:
Not only that, it’s ruining the usability of software products. Ever wonder why error messages are indecipherable? They’re written by cheap import programmers.
At what point is this fucking administration going to figure out that everything they’re doing sucks?
Gov’t watchdogs: mortgage program is not working
Now they’re talking more stimulus money? Shit, Shit and more Shit!
You have to also look at the “outsourcing” phenom. The more jobs were cut from American coporations, the more the stocks of those corporations went up. Not only did this seem counter-intuitive to me, but U.S. manufacturing and R&D being gutted was never good for the country. Consumers wanted cheaper ‘stuff’ and they got it. It was, however, a rapacious and short-sighted form of economic policy. Wall Street ruled and made billions for a small group of people. The apparent wealth was fueled by the enormous amount of debt Americans were encouraged to take hands. The Fed guy who said “If we all hold hands and buy an SUV” showed the utter vacancy of what the Fed was promoting.
@ yenta-fada:
PIMF. ‘Americans were encouraged to take ON’
snork wrote:
I had not thought of that. Good point.
Jorline wrote:
You do err in assuming that the Obamanation Administration has any goal other than the complete destruction of the American economy.
Jorline wrote:
How can all of this stimulus money be anything but inflationary? While your home is depreciating which is deflationary, Ben Bernanke has long declared himself a money printer. He made a statement at one time saying that if the Fed had to drop money out of helicopters, they would do so. That’s why some people call him ‘helicopter Ben’.
OT -- Sherrod nonsense at the end of last thread. Must be what’s keeping Bobby from his presser.
Back onT -- @ Jorline:
They also put a gold tax in the health care bill, so I’m looking for a blood tax in the finance bill.
Bumr50 wrote:
Baghdad Gibbs is lying his ass off right this second, trying to get the Obamanation Administrations feet out of their mouth, meanwhile Andrew Breitbart is laughing his ass off…
@ doriangrey:
It looks like they stepped in it, as her appointment seems questionable in light of the awards given to her.
Bumr50 wrote:
I read about the gold coin tax.
Funny, doesn’t Glenn Beck invest in gold coins?
@ taxfreekiller:
You get your first DOD hat tip!
LGF Death threat against Andrew Breitbart
@ taxfreekiller:
Here’s another goodie
doriangrey wrote:
I haven’t gone that far……………….yet!
Someone needs to grab both of his ears and start pulling.
@ Jorline:
Yup, they put that tax their for political reasons.
Rodan wrote:
A voice in the wilderness has hit it’s mark.
Isn’t Gold Line under federal investigation now?
Rodan wrote:
They must be worried.
I thought the left thought GB was some crazy wild man who ate locust and barked at the moon.
Jorline wrote:
That’s Pelosie Galore…
This is Recovery Summer 2010!
Bumr50 wrote:
Sadly you can be assured that absolutely no one, not even FoxNews will report that little fact.
There was a thread released early. Sorry about that.
wow- what happened there. A little to much cheese cake maybe?
Rodan wrote:
Saw that, figured it was the case, but… Do I still have my first???
This thread could have been a companion piece to the one I posted earlier.
@ doriangrey:
Sherrod was given her job as a reparation. That’s why all the eggshells.
Look at the timing! You can’t tell me that she won this massive suit AND was the best qualified candidate staring at Vilsack.
@ Jorline:
Yup they are investigating.
@ Speranza:
Too much information for one thread and this is 1389′s debut.
Bumr50 wrote:
I wonder what she’s going to get after she sues over this incident?
lobo91 wrote:
Well she and her husband got 13 million last time, $150,000.00 each just in pain and suffering, which is double the $72,000.00 that any of the other 24,000 plaintiffs got.
@ Nevergiveup:
It was relased early.
@ lobo91:
Hey my dental assistant down here is married to a DI, Staff Sargent, and with out any prompting and actually out of no where, since I have not mention one word of politics, let loose with a all barrels on Obama. I was kinda impressed.
Bumr50 wrote:
Here’s the batshit crazy legislation, which requires a gazillion forms for EVERYTHING, not just gold coins. While they are after coin buyers and sellers, they just made all transactions over $600 taxable.
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/gold-coin-dealers-decry-tax-law/story?id=11211611
Forgot the linky
@ lobo91:
OUGHT to get incarceration for fraud, a fair trial, and either a very long prison sentence or execution for stealing over a billion dollars in taxpayer funds (OUR MONEY).
Goddamn race hustling marxist reparation whore.
doriangrey wrote:
Was part of the pain and suffering the cushy government job?
Jorline wrote:
And that ain’t all. That wonderful, warm human bean, Rep. Pete Stark, D-California, is introducing a tax on currency trading. Currency tax: A way to invest in our future.
How do you like them apples?
savage wrote:
That post has to go under the “tell us what you really think” category.
Bumr50 wrote:
It doesn’t matter, recent revelations have proven that the Fifth Column Propaganda Organ decides which stories to kill. Just as one of the subject of this treads is the intentional fraudulent reporting of unemployment statistics is maintained by the Fifth Column Propaganda Organ to protect the Obamanation Administration so the Fifth Column Propaganda Organ will do everything humanly possible to kill any investigation into the Sherrod involvement in Pigford vs Vilsack.
@ yenta-fada:
That’s ominous. That means they expect that gold purchases are going to become commonplace.
@ yenta-fada:
And:
” Charles appears to be Charles Sherrod, who was a big player in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in the early 1960s. The SNCC was the political womb that nurtured the Black Power movement and the Black Panthers before it faded away.”
These ain’t innocent bystanders. As are most of the Obama Admin, these are radical left wing hate America progressive leftist commie bastards
Nevergiveup wrote:
Which is of course another one of the reasons that whatever the new Journolist is you can bet your life the screaming throbbing memo circulating amongst the Fifth Column Propaganda Masters is KILL the Sherrod story Now, right now, what every you do do not allow it to grow legs…
Nevergiveup wrote:
BUT. They’ve successfully changed the subject. I think people should stop chasing the Sherrod rabbit, because the subject WAS racism at the NAACP, and they’ve managed to turn it around into the crucifixion of this poor civil servant. The subject is NAACP racism. Sharrod is a nobody. Breitbart should have seen this ambush coming.
@ huckfunn:
Pete fucking Stark needs to fucking rot in a Siberian Gulag. Fuck that motherfucking Communist cocksucking piece of shit.
@ yenta-fada:
Oh, I got a whole lot of invective all ready to go.
Interesting little piece from Jim Grant (Grant’s Interest Rate Observer) on economic groupthink. I see much more malevolence than he does, nevertheless, he makes good points.
http://jessescrossroadscafe.blogspot.com/2010/07/jim-grant-on-new-federal-reserve.html
Shepard Smith is attacking Breitbart now.
@ savage:
#50 was a primer?
@ snork:
They also want to make sure that there is a cost to going to gold as a place to store money. They want to discourage that for us proletariate. If we have savings in gold, how will they be able to devalue our savings to nothing? They can’t, so they’ll tax it away instead. I wonder if they’ll keep a registry of gold owners from those who pay the tax? That would make it easier to expropriate the gold later if economic conditions merit it.
snork wrote:
Oh, dont think for one second he didnt.
Context Is Everything. NAACP’s Jealous ‘Snookered’ Himself
@ savage:
You fuck him. I wouldn’t pollute my chainsaw…
savage wrote:
Quel surprise.
@ m:
maybe.
snork wrote:
Not really. They are turning it into the incompetence of the Obama admin which is ok by me
lobo91 wrote:
And he is wrong of course. I turned shep off. I hate the prick
@ savage:
I take it you’re not a Pete fan. I agree. He should be cast down with the double-muslim sodomites.
lobo91 wrote:
No he didnt, he said Andrew didnt edit this tape and the responsibility for the Whitehouse response is solely the Whitehouses responsibility.
snork wrote:
I certainly think so. The trouble for the average person is that, when the true value of gold becomes readily apparent, there WILL NOT BE ANY AVAILABLE. Its scarcity is part of what makes it valuable. Plus the 5,000 years of history where gold has been used as money. And silver, especially in China. Also in GB, a pound sterling used to be just that. Sterling silver.
Iron Fist wrote:
ROTFLMAO… You remember that one eh?
@ huckfunn:
Double muslim? Are those the ones with two humps?
doriangrey wrote:
Is that from U.S. Department of Redundancy Department?
Knesset Member Ahmad Tibi (United Arab List-Ta’al) told the American Arabic television station Al Houra that Israel has 254 atomic bombs.
Is that all?
Nevergiveup wrote:
Like we need any more of that?
yenta-fada wrote:
I’m pretty sure they still mint a .999 fine Silver One Pound Coin.
@ huckfunn:
He is the enemy. See for yourself.
huckfunn wrote:
Umm, yes, why yes it is…
Iron Fist wrote:
That was a Richard Pryor line from Silver Streak. He and Gene Wilder (in blackface) were thrown in jail and Pryor was worried about getting locked up with those “double muslims”.
@ yenta-fada:
Copper, lead, and brass may become more valuable than gold if the situation becomes as dire as I am afraid it might. What is the value of a single round of ammunition if there is no ammunition to be had? An ounce of gold? How much for a full magazine? Society is unlikely to become less violent if the economic times become truly desperate.
As far as underemployment goes, I don’t think Obama really cares about people who aren’t union and don’t draw a government check.
Shep Smith going to great pains to point out how Glen Beck did not fall for the Obamanation Administrations attempt to cast him as a villain. Juan Williams, he is throwing the Obamanation Administration 100 percent under the bus…
@ Nevergiveup:
Shep is a Progressive.
Iron Fist wrote:
How many bullets can you melt that ounce down into?
@ Bumr50:
The more people on the dole, the better the Democrats like it. And there are a lot of people who would sell themselves into slavery for cash, as long as they thought Master would be good to them. A lot of people like that these days…
thanks 1389ad!
nice post.
Rodan wrote:
Probably, but maybe not. He is more likely FoxNew’s Ted Baxter. In this case he is very firmly standing up for Glen Beck.
Obama signs Wall Street reform bill: Market down 135 points since. This douchebag just never gives us a break.
@ doriangrey:
He said he didn’t know who edited the tape, and referred to Breitbart’s site as one that had been “frequently discredited” and that had previously posted “heavily edited” videos.
Let me say one more time that the fog that’s been created by this Sherrod affair has, intentionally or otherwise, changed the subject from NAACP racism. Let that rabbit go. Stay on the NAACP trail.
Again, Andy should have had the horse sense to see this coming. It doesn’t matter what happens with Sherrod, the NAACP successfully escaped.
doriangrey wrote:
Not my area of expertise.
Now, if you want to talk JEWELRY, I got lots of info and time for that subject.
They are also less likely to care about those employees, as they aren’t as invested in them and view them as replaceable.
I also have experience here, as it was stated plainly to me last year that if I left my job they’d just hire two or three kids to take my shifts.
It didn’t matter how hard I worked or how well I did my job. I would never be rewarded.
Iron Fist wrote:
Last night at dinner, my friend said if all a person had was gold and bullets, how much gold or bullets might one offer for a can of Spam. Don’t forget the canned goods.
yenta-fada wrote:
when there is no velocity to the money, there is no inflation.
helicopter money is a Milton Friedman phrase
snork wrote:
Not yet they havent and if they do it will only be because the Obamanation Administration dove in front of the bullet.
helicopter money is a Milton Friedman phrase where he meant that it would be more efficient to drop money out of a helicopter directly to the people than play with interest rates and other govt levers to stimulate the economy.
huckfunn wrote:
Exactly one bullet.
coldwarrior wrote:
It would be more efficient, but it wouldn’t allow the administration to target who they want the money to go to as well, which is the real point.
@ huckfunn:
With men and guns, I’ll take the Spam. But, yeah, I see your point. I just don’t see America sliding back into a rural, agrarian society gently just because the Obama Administration collapses the capitalist economy. If I had the money, I’d build a fortress, and stock it to the gills. That might happen if it goes slowly, the way Detriot is slowly going away, but I don’t think that is Obama’s plan.
doriangrey wrote:
Dunno for sure. The U.S. equivalent is the Silver eagle which is 999
silver. We have an equivalent Silver maple leaf coin. The cheapest coins are “junk silver” which used to be standard U.S. coinage at 90% silver. A great place to look at prices and types of coins is the online dealer: tulving.com. He used to sell smaller amounts/transaction, but now they are large. That’s what keeps the premiums smaller on each coin.
The Osprey wrote:
Not ashamed of being either one!
doriangrey wrote:
Ouch! Ya got me.
coldwarrior wrote:
I did not know that. Interesting.
yenta-fada wrote:
You’re very welcome!
Iron Fist wrote:
I see that as the likely outcome. Sadly.
coldwarrior wrote:
True enough and there’s been beau coup money dumped. However, the helicopters seem to have overshot the people and dumped the the money into the ocean or some bottomless pit. Where’d it all go?
Iron Fist wrote:
Obama doesn’t give a rat’s ass what about what happens to anybody but himself. He’d be fine with a police state.
lobo91 wrote:
It’s Chicago-style patronage politics writ large, which amounts to funding a Soviet-style class of apparatchiki.
coldwarrior wrote:
I think that’s called stagflation.
Oh, wow, this is interesting:
I’m not up on all the ins and outs of the financial world, but I think this is bad. No more ratings, means people don’t have any idea about the credit-worthiness of any particular bond issuer. Private ratings for the rich will alleviate some of that risk, but it basically shuts the middle-class investor out of the bond market. Just another way Obama is helping all the little people…
coldwarrior wrote:
You are correct.
People are afraid to spend their money, or even to invest it anywhere.
@ Iron Fist:
@ yenta-fada:
I don’t think O-hole is looking for the agrarian Pol Pot thing. Probably something somewhere between Stalin and Chavez.
yenta-fada wrote:
that is stagnated econ and inflation caused by a supply side shock.
we aint there
@ 1389AD:
That’s why they’re taxing gold. They can’t get their hands on it (yet) if it’s buried in the back yard.
@ yenta-fada:
Post-racial!
coldwarrior wrote:
Thank you!
@ huckfunn:
Into the pockets of the backers of the DNC, for the most part. Any part of the stimulus that stimulated anything other than the unions, gangsters, thugs, and other assorted Democrat backers was purely unintentional and no doubt is viewed as waste by the Obama Administration. When Obama came in, he enacted the greatest bank heist in history. He looted the treasury to the tune of about one third of our GDP. He makes every other robber on any other scale look like an amature. And he isn’t even remotely finished.
lobo91 wrote:
well, yeah…
@ huckfunn:
That may not be Obama’s wildest wet dream, but that is exactly where the Environut whackos want to take us. How much red meat Obama will throw to them, I really don’t know. Obama wants the bulk of us to be penniless serfs or semi-slaves. That is certain.
Iron Fist wrote:
Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?
snork wrote:
That’d be good material for a thread or two or three…
huckfunn wrote:
petulant priest? wasnt it?
Bumr50 wrote:
He wants to DESTROY anybody who isn’t union and doesn’t draw a government check.
Unless they’re Muslims, of course.
Bumr50 wrote:
Yep. Definitely post racial and shows no bigotry on account of the
‘encolorment’ of said person.
@ coldwarrior:
Wiki says “turbulent” and of course, they’re never wrong
coldwarrior wrote:
meddlesome, I think.
Bumr50 wrote:
Could you possibly submit a post on the Sherrod/NAACP/Breitbart thing? You seem to have a lot of info on that.
huckfunn wrote:
good enough for me, i aint up on my ‘ye olde english royalty quotes’
huckfunn wrote:
Human nature is what it is. I discussed this in my blog post “The awful Truth” Even a pacifist has a point where he will resort to violence. He may not accept violence to protect his own life, but threaten his young children and watch him act.
Gold has a historical track record as a valued and accepted medium of exchange, however there does come a point when even gold looses it’s value, and that point is any individuals recognition of eminent mortality.
Run out of lead for bullets before the fight is over and gold suddenly looses it value as a monetary unit and becomes an acceptable substitute. Nothing trumps living except protecting the lives of those you love.
@ yenta-fada:
“Troublesome” is how I remember it. Any of the above will suffice, though. Obama is only a priest to Himself, though, which makes Him the diety and the priest combined. He still hasn’t proven he can come back from the dead, yet, so his Messiah cred is a little lacking.
coldwarrior wrote:
However, you know the context. If O-hole’s web minders were educated enough, they’d have me up on charges.
huckfunn wrote:
They may yet…
@ 1389AD:
I will try, and I apologize greatly for polluting your wonderfully written post with it.
I’m a bit ADHD at times, and I got really worked up about it.
doriangrey wrote:
… and your Spam stash.
@ Iron Fist:
More and more he resembles an Imam. Fatwas on all Americans
@ Bumr50:
That’s sick.
huckfunn wrote:
meh…its just words from an old krakah, they dont mean nothin now.
Swamp News
Where does she come up with this bullshit. Me thinks her, “past”, stink’n think’n is coming back to roost.
Speranza wrote:
I noticed that. The point is that the Obaminators are doing many of the same things now that the FDR administration did in the 1930s, and Peron, Chavez, and other commie dictators have done at other times. They are deliberately producing economic ruin, so as to cement themselves in power.
@ huckfunn:
Yeah, you have to be careful what you say, or unamused men in unamusing suits (with even more unamusing guns) will come and visit you. You have to remember, too, that the stalkers’ hostile eyes are always upon you. I have no doubt that they’ve already reported Blogmocracy to the Feds any number of times, so they may not even bother to look when Ludwig von Quack Quack , um, quacks at them, but they might. Never say anything you don’t want to defend.
Totally OT and airy fairy. A friend of mine does Tibetan astrology and she sent me this general reading of the upcoming period:
RULER #6 -- Retrogrades from July 23, 2010 through November 18, 2010
“This retrograde focuses on close, personal relationships and, as such, can take its place as the most emotional of all the retrogrades of the summer.
On a global scale it tends to pull attention away from large national issues and involve the individual in personal matters of the heart. On the surface, that is not too dangerous, but if we are depending upon world leaders to be WORLD leaders, we can’t be too comfortable knowing that they are struggling through bouts with their mate or ordeals with their mistress. But then humans are human and we are all in the same boat. A pity that there isn’t some global valentine that we could send them to make them happy.
Personally, issues can be very difficult. If you’re in a relationship you need to tread lightly. Feathers can be ruffled in the slightest breeze and misunderstanding is commonplace. Take a long look at timing. Many confrontations can be avoided if you will just delay your comments an hour or so. Remember that the distance between one’s lips and their ear is only about 6 inches. A hasty word however can dig a chasm so wide it can’t ever be filled.
Creative endeavors suffer somewhat under this retrograde. Give yourself more space to do the things you want to do and be kind to yourself. Creative stress can be devastating because it often promotes self destructive tendencies. When making purchases for yourself don’t buy on impulse. Sleep on it because it may not look at all enticing the next day. Patience. Rome wasn’t built in a day but Pompeii was destroyed overnight”
Take with many grains of salt and scotch. You don’t have to believe a word of it, but it’s generally good advice anyway
huckfunn wrote:
Ahhhh, maybe not… I’m not exactly partial to spam, however, change spam to beer… and your point is well taken…
Dead thread? Ohwell, here goes. Pay close attention to the one (I forget which) cash for gold commercial. It is the one with the black woman. See mentions about the gold going to government refineries. So the government want you to send them your gold and they will give you cash. Are they trying to take everyone’s gold or am I just reading too much into this?
1389AD wrote:
both of these and other econ threads will be listed on my friday econ thread,
ok.
thaqt way they are all sorta in one place
@ Jorline:
That quote was from mediamatters.
@ NoThreat2U:
hmmmm…i’ll need to see the ad
yenta-fada wrote:
There isnt enough salt or scotch in all of creation for me to consider any kind of astrology in a serious manner.
@ savage:
Obama is a 3rd World style Demagogue.
Jorline wrote:
I’m glad she’s finally gotten that chip off her shoulder.//
I’ll see if it is on youtube…………..
coldwarrior wrote:
I could always use the old-lib jive “you’ve taken me, and King Hank out of context”.
doriangrey wrote:
I would never dream of making a decision based on any kind of astrology. I just posted it for fun and because I got it today.
Bumr50 wrote:
You are not polluting this post at all. It’s all part of the same thing: the Obama administration’s takeover of every part of the economy (including agriculture, in this case) on behalf of the politically favored, at the expense of everyone who is not.
Didn’t FDR start the massive intervention into agriculture back in the 1930s?
Any American who wants to eat in the future, and who wants the US (not long ago the world’s breadbasket) to have an economy in the future, needs to pay attention to what is going on with agriculture.
On a similar topic, let’s not forget how much the drilling moratorium and the increase in oil prices (and importation of foreign oil) will affect the price of the fuel and chemicals needed for agriculture, not to mention the cost of getting those products to market.
And then there’s the credit boom/bust cycle, which hurts those who want to buy farmland and equipment … unless they are politically connected, like Sherrod and her cronies.
NoThreat2U wrote:
Glen Beck covered this when he refuted Weasels attack on him and Gold Line.
doriangrey wrote:
Same with me. I don’t believe in superstitions. They’re bad luck.
@ Jorline:
She just revealed her racist colors right there.
1389AD wrote:
Of that there can be no doubt. This is something that we’ve never seen in the history of this country. During the first Civil War, there were competing visions for what the sides wanted America to be, but neither side started out with the intent of ruining the other (no matter what the South thought). FDR didn’t create the Depression, though he used it to expand government power greatly and in the process lengthened and deepened it. I don’t think that that was his intent. Obama’s intent is clear. He wants to wreck America so he can rule the ruins.
1389AD wrote:
You mean like California shutting off the water to the San Joaquin and Fernando valleys where between 40 and 60 percent of America’s produce is/was grown?
NoThreat2U wrote:
Cash 4 gold is the sleaziest company around. They give you a fraction of the value. There have also been complaints that this ‘company’ has kept the gold and denied receiving it. Run away from those crooks.
Maybe you are thinking of another company. I wouldn’t believe much of what any of these companies advertise. There are coin dealers all over the country who have been around for years and give fair value. Some jewelers deal in scrap as well. Check and see what the locals offer before even considering one of those large touts.
huckfunn wrote:
LOL…I have a black cat. Sometimes I wonder if he’s afraid of having humans cross his path.
huckfunn wrote:
ROTFLMAO…..
huckfunn wrote:
That was a joke, right?
@ yenta-fada:
@ doriangrey:
Small correction. They haven’t had farming in the San Fernando Valley since around 1958. I grew up in the SFV so I know that’s not true.
Piece of shit Richard Luger has said he’ll vote to confirm Kagan. Remind me again why we have to tip-toe around these RINOs lest they leave the Party?
@ coldwarrior:
Nothing on YouTube. Damn I iknow I heard it! I will pay closer attention later tonite to see which one said that. I swear she said that.
coldwarrior wrote:
It’s also an indication of an unbalanced economy. With “business” booming in the government sector, and the private sector on life support, we’re closer to “there” than you think. We do have “two Americas”. The government employees and the rest of us.
doriangrey wrote:
I’m not familiar with California.
I forgot to mention; if you look at Savage’s recent thread about the new and wrongheaded regulations that will be crippling the trucking business, you’ll see another factor that will increase the cost and difficulty of getting farm products to market.
Obozo is making sure to strangle EVERY sector of the economy, from multiple directions at once.
1389AD wrote:
Rodan wrote:
I agree
Jorline wrote:
Oh, cheese and cracker got all muddy. This was a gift, and they’re playing it for all they can.
Not going to chase that rabbit. No. Not going to do it.
@ yenta-fada:
Oh I am not interested in participating. I just remember hearing “government owned gold refinery” (of whatever it is called). THAT gave me pause.
@ snork:
+1
You are right there. That can’t last. They are going to raise everybody’s taxes Jan. 1 so that we can continue to over-pay people who sit around and count rat sperm all day (and other equally substantive tasks). That isn’t going to fly much longer. If the Republicans would actually make an issue of it, people would be mad enough to start hanging some of these motherfuckers, but too many RINOs are pilliaging the same system for the Republicans to do anything about it. Sometimes I think I am stupid for working in the private sector.
snork wrote:
lmao…did you just say cracker?
@ Iron Fist:
http://blog.taragana.com/politics/2010/07/21/indiana-republican-sen-lugar-to-back-kagan-for-supreme-court-2nd-in-gop-to-announce-support-49906/
@ Iron Fist:
Meanwhile, they’re trying to keep me from deploying to Afghanistan, because I’ll be eligible for retirement when I get back.
@ snork:
Yup Governmnet work is paying well.
@ Rodan:
Yes, you ought to come out to LA and get a job as the city manager of Bell. Starting pay 787 thousand a year. Good gig.
NoThreat2U wrote:
Ah. I forgot your original point. (I do get carried away). To my knowledge, the government owns the Mint and gets the blanks to stamp out coins which they then sell. I am not aware of a government owned refinery. News to me. Maybe they started one. I still tend to shy away from a lot of what they say in gold ads, but I’m a cynic.
Rodan wrote:
Nothing wrong with fair pay. But the traditional covenant was that government workers got lower salaries in exchange for job security and luxurious bennies. Now, they get paid more, too. Private sector workers are getting pissed on.
@ savage:
That’s insane.
The president gets paid $400,000 a year. Why the hell would they pay a city manager of a two-bit town like that $787,000?
Well, actually, not so much. Americans that are forced to take positions overseas do it because they need the financial gain. Been there, done that, got the T-shirt. Most Americans that travel overseas do it because they can make more by doing so, or at least hold level and satisfy a bit of wanderlust. I know literally hundreds of expats, both American and otherwise, simply by the nature of my business, so I’m not speaking from hypotheticals or web searches here.
@ lobo91:
well, people in Bell are absolutely livid over this. The City Council meeting down there last night was SRO. Adn everyone was screaming like banshees (as well they should) They rescheduled the meeting for next week in a larger building.
If I have time, I am going to take my vidcam down there and film as much as I can. And if anyone tells me I don’t belong there, I will tell them my ancestors settled in Bell in the 1920′s. The old house on Otis is still there.
Doh… Tom Vilsack diving head first on the Obamanation Administrations sword…
huckfunn wrote:
Huck-- The other night we toyed with the idea of a tracking excercise on you. I think I got you sussed.
Mike C. wrote:
That was then, this is now. I personally know people whose skills were formerly marketable in the US, and who have left or are planning to leave because they can no longer make a living here. Those who have any property here have to sell it in a bad market, and they have to start all over from scratch.
1389AD wrote:
Excellent thread!
@ Speranza:
Thank you!
Bunk X wrote:
Uh-oh! How bad is it?
@ 1389AD:
That was then, this is now ? I still earn the vast majority (by time or money, your choice) of my income working overseas, as do many, many other people I know who have been doing so for many years.
As I mentioned before, this is not hypothetical -- this is personal knowledge and first-hand knowledge I have gathered from friends and colleagues, some of decades standing. From highly-paid corporate executives in Singapore to Mennonite farmers in Bolivia to English teachers in the Middle East, although I will admit, most of the expats (American and otherwise) I know are at least remotely connected to the hydrocarbon business -- that’s how I met many of them. I also know a slew of people who have retired to places ranging from Mexico to Costa Rica to Thailand to Portugal, but since they’re retired, I don’t really count them.
[...] You must read this! Amplify’d from http://www.theblogmocracy.com [...]
Mike C. wrote:
I agree that, before the crash, people who could still make a living in the US might have chosen to work overseas because the jobs paid better and/or they’d get a chance to see the rest of the world. Either way, it was their choice.
But the crash has dislodged some Americans who would otherwise have stayed close to home. Some of my husband’s friends (true, not in the hydrocarbon business, so YMMV) have already left the US or are making plans to do so, because even though they made a decent living in the US before the crash, they cannot make a go of it in the current business climate.
As you know from the oil business, if the drilling moratorium continues, and more rigs go overseas to places like the Congo, some workers will follow because they don’t want to be unemployed, even if that is not a particularly desirable place to be.
@ 1389AD:
Yes, I understand all that since I have done the very same thing myself. In my business, when somebody mentions “the crash”, they are most likely referring to 1985/86 or 1999. After almost two years of trying to srounge up enough money to make ends meet, I dragged my wife and two young children off to the Middle East, in the middle of one hot war, and we stayed through yet another war where we actually had scuds fired at us and my children had gas mask drills in school. And I went for roughly half my former salary. Of course, it was primarily the oil industry that got hit, so the average American didn’t give a shit. Well, people in other businesses (auto sales, real estate, restaraunts, etc.) in places like Houston and OKC and Denver gave a shit once they saw their customer base drop like a rock.
My point here is that this is nothing new, and it’s a 25 year old story to me. People who find themselves in this situation are actually pretty lucky in my eyes, because they have an alternative to just going broke. That’s certainly the way I viewed it. Maybe not the ideal alternative, but an alternative nonetheless. I know people who went broke because they wouldn’t move from OKC to Houston, much less overseas. Well, that’s a personal choice -- so be it. There are other factors, but my income for years has depended largely upon the fact that a lot of people won’t even consider taking the contracts I take because they can’t be home every weekday for dinner or have their weekends back at their home. Well, okay, more work for me. Sometimes (like currently), I’m only 1400 miles from home and still in the US when I’m working, but most of the time I’m in China or Pakistan or Kuwait or some other Third World dump (okay, China isn’t a dump.)
In any case, this sort of thing does not affect most US workers. When those deep water rigs sail out of the GoM, a few Americans will accompany them. But not the entire crew, or even most of the crew. They will be replaced by local staff in Brazil, Egypt, The Congo, wherever. And almost none of the support staff, like supply boat crews, caterers, etc. will be following the rigs. To my way of thinking, the folks that find themselves faced with this decision are lucky -- they have an alternative. Whether or not it’s an acceptable alternative is a personal matter, but at least they have it.