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The Tax Tsunami On The Horizon; In other words, think your taxes are too high now?

by Bob in Breckenridge ( 98 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2010, Financial, Investments, Misery Index, Politics, Progressives, Socialism at July 27th, 2010 - 4:30 pm

It never fails to amaze me how the libs seem to think that our money is actually their money, and that we should feel lucky that they let us keep the paltry sum that they do. From Investors Business Daily…Click on the link to read the whole article.

Fiscal Policy: Many voters are looking forward to 2011, hoping a new Congress will put the country back on the right track. But unless something’s done soon, the new year will also come with a raft of tax hikes — including a return of the death tax — that will be real killers.

Through the end of this year, the federal estate tax rate is zero — thanks to the package of broad-based tax cuts that President Bush pushed through to get the economy going earlier in the decade.

But as of midnight Dec. 31, the death tax returns — at a rate of 55% on estates of $1 million or more. The effect this will have on hospital life-support systems is already a matter of conjecture.

Resurrection of the death tax, however, isn’t the only tax problem that will be ushered in Jan. 1. Many other cuts from the Bush administration are set to disappear and a new set of taxes will materialize. And it’s not just the rich who will pay.

The lowest bracket for the personal income tax, for instance, moves up 50% — to 15% from 10%. The next lowest bracket — 25% — will rise to 28%, and the old 28% bracket will be 31%. At the higher end, the 33% bracket is pushed to 36% and the 35% bracket becomes 39.6%.

But the damage doesn’t stop there.

[...]

The Tax Tsunami On The Horizon

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Posted in Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2010, Financial, Investments, Misery Index, Politics, Progressives, Socialism | 98 Comments »

Why Obama has failed so miserably to deliver

by Speranza ( 180 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Economy, Misery Index, Progressives at July 22nd, 2010 - 2:00 pm

I guess when you have this misplaced faith in the power of big and growing government to create jobs, combined with a cabinet with the lowest levels of private sector experience, the end result is what we have today. As the author points out, Obama may have “inherited a mess” but it was a mess that he contributed to by his support of TARP and substantial hikes in the minimum wage. If you are an employee of state or local government – you benefited from the “stimulus” package and are part of the “jobs saved” statistic that Joe “Plugs” Biden loves to throw around.

by Daniel J. Mitchell

The White House last year released a supposedly scientific analysis that claimed to show that adopting the “stimulus” bill would cut unemployment. Indeed, the report specifically estimated that the unemployment rate today would be down to 7.5 percent.

Something obviously went wrong. The actual unemployment rate is 9.5 percent, a statistic that doesn’t include the millions who’ve given up looking for work or can only find part-time jobs. What were President Obama’s biggest mistakes?

Part of the problem was a misplaced faith in Keynesian economics — that is, in the discredited notion that politicians can borrow money from the economy’s right pocket and increase prosperity by dumping money in the economy’s left pocket.

But the bigger stumbling block is the folks in the White House seem to have no clue how the real-world economy works. Critics have noted that the Obama Cabinet sets the record for the lowest-ever level of private-sector experience. That doesn’t necessarily mean people who don’t understand how and why jobs are created — but that seems to be the case with this administration.

Profit and Investment Are Necessary For Job Creation

LET’S start with two common- sense observations. First, businesses are not charities. They only create jobs when they think that the total revenue generated by new workers will exceed the total cost of employing those workers. In other words, if it’s not profitable to hire workers, it’s not going to happen.

Second, it takes money to create jobs. More specifically, labor isn’t very useful or productive unless investors are providing capital. Truck drivers won’t get jobs unless someone has invested to buy trucks. Software programmers aren’t worth much if their employer doesn’t buy computers for them to work on. Even the green-energy companies the White House favors can’t hire workers unless somebody (ideally venture capitalists rather than taxpayers) provides seed money.

The problem is not a lack of capital. Businesses have plenty of extra cash — with the Federal Reserve reporting this month, for example, that nonfinancial firms are sitting on $1.8 trillion, about a quarter more cash-on-hand than when the recession started.

[.......]

* The new bailout legislation, though labeled “financial reform,” raises costs for financial firms, meaning loans will be more expensive. That is, investing in that truck or computer for that new hire will cost you more.

TO be fair to President Obama, the problem began before his inauguration. President George W. Bush signed a big minimum-wage hike that has hit hard at less-experienced and lower-skilled workers. If a worker is only worth $6.50 per hour, then a required wage of $7.15 is a one-way ticket to the unemployment line.

And Bush was responsible for the TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program) bailout, which has squandered precious capital by steering it to such inefficient firms as Citigroup and General Motors, which are unlikely to create jobs over the long run.

Of course, Obama supported these and other Bush economic policies, so the “mess he inherited” is also a mess he helped to make. All that matters from a jobs perspective, though, is that government has made it more expensive to hire workers and more expensive to provide the capital needed to make workers productive. This is a bad combination — whether politicians call themselves Democrats or Republicans.

Read the rest: O’s jobs errors

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Posted in Barack Obama, Economy, Misery Index, Progressives | 180 Comments »

Comparisons to the Great Depression are growing

by Speranza ( 53 Comments › )
Filed under Economy, Misery Index at July 21st, 2010 - 8:30 am

I think USA Today (a very liberal newspaper by the way) has been smoking some heavy weed if it thinks that the U.S. economy is growing.  The key statistic is private sector job growth and in that area this administration has been awful! However the final paragraph is pretty much spot-on (Some advice for investors).  The way to jump start  private jobs growth – cut business taxes,  each state should reduce its payroll taxes, and cut spending.

by Adam Shell

The images of bread lines, dust storms and squatters’ camps are missing in the aftermath of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Stocks have rebounded sharply from the 12-year low hit in March 2009 during the Great Recession. The U.S. economy, while still sluggish, is growing again. And fears of financial Armageddon have mostly faded.

Yet comparisons to the woeful 1930s continue to pop up in Wall Street research reports, newspaper op-ed pieces, doomsday books and the financial blogosphere. There is a nagging sense that the roller coaster ride investors have been on since the 2008-09 financial meltdown may not be over — and that a ’30s-style boom-bust, boom-bust cycle can’t yet be ruled out — as the economy and markets muddle through the difficult post-bubble workout period.

The Dow Jones industrials’ 261-point plunge Friday sparked by a sharp drop in consumer sentiment in July highlights that gloominess persists.

Fueling the angst is fear that the still-fragile, jobs-starved economy will suffer a relapse, or double dip, as government stimulus is phased out. Consider:

•In a recent note to clients, David Rosenberg, chief strategist at Gluskin Sheff, ticks off a slew of similarities between then and now under the heading, “Daring to Compare Today to the ’30s.”

•Donald Luskin, chief investment officer at Trend Macrolytics, penned an op-ed piece, “Why This Isn’t Like 1938 — At Least Not Yet.”

•In late June, Paul Krugman, professor of economics and international affairs at Princeton University and an op-ed columnist for The New York Times, zeroed in on the issue twice under provocative headlines: “That ’30s Feeling” and “The Third Depression.”

Why all the hand-wringing over the ’30s? “To focus people on risk and remind them that it is way too early to declare victory,” Luskin says. “It is prudent to learn from past errors so we don’t repeat them.”

Stock charts that overlay current stock-price action to that of the 1930s look very much the same at similar stages of the recovery. The difference is 80 years ago the market suffered another major down leg. The future will show if the market suffers a similar fate, or whether it stabilizes and powers higher.

“The similarities are scarily similar,” says Richard Suttmeier, chief market strategist at ValuEngine.com. “Essentially, in the ’30s we were in unchartered waters, and we have been in unchartered waters since 2008.”

[..]

Some advice for investors

So how should one manage money in an era of unpredictability and volatility?

Rosenberg advises investors to stay liquid, keep debts low, save more and invest less in risky assets like stocks. He doesn’t advise 100% cash. Buy some gold, high-quality bonds and assets that don’t go up or down with stocks, he says.

“If you were putting a dime in a cookie jar, maybe stick in 20 cents,” Rosenberg says. “If you have the capacity to live a frugal life, do so.”

In periods of great volatility, where stocks have the potential to post huge gains — and huge losses — it makes sense to put only half the money you would normally devote to stocks in the market, Luskin says. Thus, you will be able to book gains if stocks rally. And you will lose half as much if stocks plunge.

Read the rest Comparisons to the Great Depression keep popping up

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Posted in Economy, Misery Index | 53 Comments »

Obama’s dog “Bo” flew on a “small” Air Force private jet to Maine before the Obamas arrived

by Bob in Breckenridge ( 105 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Economy, Media, Misery Index at July 18th, 2010 - 3:00 pm

It’s bad enough that the arrogant America-hating jerk is taking his 7th vacation in just 17 months.

But just when we thought the narcissistic POS in the White House couldn’t be more out of touch with real Americans, what with 17% actual unemployment, trillions of dollars in new debt, unchecked illegal immigration, the stock market tanking, confidence in the moron’s ability to run the country at an all-time low, and recession almost certainly heading toward double recession or possibly depression, we find out he had his dog Bo flown to Maine on a separate “small” jet before the incompetent imbecile and his family arrived in Maine.

And of course, there’s not a peep about this from the Obama-loving state-controlled media lapdogs.

Let’s go back to yesteryear and imagine if President George W. Bush was going on vacation to his dad’s house in Kennebunkport, Maine, and had sent his two dogs, Barney and Mrs. Beasley, on a private jet ahead of his family. Think the LSM would have not reported this? Me neither.

Oh, and have I told you I hate these America-hating pieces of crap more each day?

White House wanderers tour Acadia

Arriving in a small jet before the Obamas was the first dog, Bo, a Portuguese water dog given as a present by the late U.S. Sen Ted Kennedy, D-Mass.; and the president’s personal aide Reggie Love, who chatted with Baldacci.

“We’re ready. We’re going to do it all,” Love said with a big smile.

Air traffic at the small Hancock County-Bar Harbor Airport in Trenton was shut down for the presidential arrival. A U.S. Coast Guard helicopter patrolled the air in anticipation of the first family’s touchdown, and a pair of local fire and rescue trucks stood ready on an otherwise empty tarmac at the private air hangar.

The Obamas then traveled onto Mount Desert Island in a motorcade of at least 16 vehicles. It was led by two Maine State Police cruisers and included five black Chevrolet Suburbans.

The early-morning fog quickly burned off, and the sky was bright blue for the arrival of Air Force One, which in this case was a G3 Gulf Stream.

Technically, Air Force One is whatever aircraft the president is traveling on. It usually is a 747, but a plane of that size would be too large for the Trenton airport runway to accommodate.

Dozens of members of local and national news media were on the tarmac to capture the Obamas’ arrival in Maine.

Click on the link above to read the whole story.

Now, with all that being said, those of you imbeciles who voted for this socialist POS need to order this:

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Posted in Barack Obama, Economy, Media, Misery Index | 105 Comments »

The Obama-Pelosi Lame Duck Strategy

by Bob in Breckenridge ( 262 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2010, Misery Index, Politics, Progressives, Socialism at July 9th, 2010 - 9:00 pm

After the libtards get their clocks cleaned in November, which will happen, regardless of what a certain fat ass egomaniacal washed-up ukulele playing, comic book reading, tricycle riding, pony-tailed douchebag who thinks he’s still relevant and runs a maggot-infested (and you maggots know who you are) shithole of a blog and actually believes he can change the outcomes of the election, says.
Pardon my rant.
There’s an interesting article in today’s Wall Street Journal by our good friend John Fund about what the POS in the White House and the liberal swine in Congress, led by Pelosi and Reid, have planned for their swan song before a lot of them get thrown out on their asses, and the Republicans take control. And it’s not going to be pretty, if it’s allowed to happen.
The libtards are going to try to ram down our throats just about every one of their “I hate America” schemes that they haven’t been able to pass, even though they had filibuster-proof majorities in both the House and Senate.

Union ‘card-check,’ cap and trade, and so much more.
By JOHN FUND

Democratic House members are so worried about the fall elections they’re leaving Washington on July 30, a full week earlier than normal—and they won’t return until mid-September. Members gulped when National Journal’s Charlie Cook, the Beltway’s leading political handicapper, predicted last month “the House is gone,” meaning a GOP takeover. He thinks Democrats will hold the Senate, but with a significantly reduced majority.

The rush to recess gives Democrats little time to pass any major laws. That’s why there have been signs in recent weeks that party leaders are planning an ambitious, lame-duck session to muscle through bills in December they don’t want to defend before November. Retiring or defeated members of Congress would then be able to vote for sweeping legislation without any fear of voter retaliation.

“I’ve got lots of things I want to do” in a lame duck, Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D., W. Va.) told reporters in mid June. North Dakota’s Kent Conrad, chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, wants a lame-duck session to act on the recommendations of President Obama’s deficit commission, which is due to report on Dec. 1. “It could be a huge deal,” he told Roll Call last month. “We could get the country on a sound long-term fiscal path.” By which he undoubtedly means new taxes in exchange for extending some, but not all, of the Bush-era tax reductions that will expire at the end of the year.

In the House, Arizona Rep. Raul Grijalva, co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, told reporters last month that for bills like “card check”—the measure to curb secret-ballot union elections—”the lame duck would be the last chance, quite honestly, for the foreseeable future.”

[...]

Conservative groups such as FreedomWorks are alarmed at the potential damage, and they are demanding that everyone in Congress pledge not to take up substantive legislation in a post-election session. “Members of Congress are supposed to represent their constituents, not override them like sore losers in a lame-duck session,” Rep. Tom Price, head of the Republican Study Committee, told me.

Read the rest by clicking here

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Posted in Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2010, Misery Index, Politics, Progressives, Socialism | 262 Comments »

The Obama stagnation

by Rodan ( 215 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Economy, Misery Index, Progressives at July 5th, 2010 - 5:30 pm

We are 16 months into the presidency of Barack Hussein Obama or as I call him the Viceroy of the Global Progressive-Islamic Axis of these Progressive Occupied States. He promised that if the stimulus was implemented, our economy would boom. In the beginning of this year some economic signs showed an uptick. Immediately the Progressive Propaganda media declared an economic boom of historic proportions. As we know reality set in and that uptick was just a mirage. In fact his policies have been job killers since his stimulus was really a hand out to unions, state governments and Unions. The Stock Market was artificially going up due to investors buying into the Obama boom lie. Now it is reiterating and repeating a pattern seen during the great depression. In short Obama’s 3rd World style policies have failed and put us deeper in debt and has put this nation at risk for more economic stagnation.

Roughly a million Americans have dropped out of the jobs market altogether over the past two months. That is the only reason why the headline unemployment rate is not exploding to a post-war high.

Let us be honest. The US is still trapped in depression a full 18 months into zero interest rates, quantitative easing (QE), and fiscal stimulus that has pushed the budget deficit above 10pc of GDP.

The share of the US working-age population with jobs in June actually fell from 58.7pc to 58.5pc. This is the real stress indicator. The ratio was 63pc three years ago. Eight million jobs have been lost.

The average time needed to find a job has risen to a record 35.2 weeks. Nothing like this has been seen before in the post-war era. Jeff Weninger, of Harris Private Bank, said this compares with a peak of 21.2 weeks in the Volcker recession of the early 1980s.

“Legions of individuals have been left with stale skills, and little prospect of finding meaningful work, and benefits that are being exhausted. By our math the crop of people who are unemployed but not receiving a check amounts to 9.2m.”

Republicans on Capitol Hill are filibustering a bill to extend the dole for up to 1.2m jobless facing an imminent cut-off. Dean Heller from Vermont called them “hobos”. This really is starting to feel like 1932.

Read the rest: With the US trapped in depression, this really is starting to feel like 1932

The mirage of the much hyped Obama Boom is over. Welcome to the cold reality of the Obama stagnation at best, depression at worst. Barack Hussein Obama is really turning this nation into 3rd world status. Then again, this was probably the plan all along.

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Posted in Barack Obama, Economy, Misery Index, Progressives | 215 Comments »

The question being “Is Obama a Socialist?”

by Speranza ( 74 Comments › )
Filed under Economy, Media, Misery Index at July 3rd, 2010 - 11:00 am

To me the answer would be a resounding “Yes!”. Even Jeffrey Immelt, the CEO of General Electric (which owns Obama loving NBC and MSNBC) claims that Obama hates Business (not a good attitude to have if you value an employed nation). James Taranto points out (in his usual clarifying way) the verbal gymnastics that the MSM employs to cover up the grim economic news of Democratic administrations in general (“unemployment claims rose unexpectedly last month”) and Obama specifically (always giving it a glass half-full spin and refraining to use the term”jobless recovery” that was so often used during Bush’s presidency). They throw thee term “recovery” around promiscuously when there is no indication at all about us being in a “recovery”.  Also you will notice that when they report a slight dip in unemployment they will not differentiate about how many  government workers  were hired as opposed to private sector workers -the  key indicator regarding a “recovery”  should be private sector full-time jobs.

by James Taranto

Here’s a pair of questions that some people are, surprisingly, asking: “Is Obama Really a Socialist? Some Say So, but Where’s the Evidence?” That’s a Christian Science Monitorheadline, and while the second question is entirely rhetorical, suggesting the paper (or is it just a website now?) comes down on the negative side, the story is actually inconclusive:

Neither dispatch uses the phrase “jobless recovery,” which was a staple of economic coverage during the Bush years–even though, before the last few months of 2008, unemployment seldom topped 6%.

The assertion is getting louder: President Obama is a socialist, a wealth-redistributing wolf in Democrat’s clothing gnawing at America’s entrepreneurial spirit.

It’s easy to buy “Obama is a socialist” bumper stickers on the Internet. Political commentator Dick Morris said, in a column circulated on GOPUSA.com, that conservatives are “enraged at Barack Obama’s socialism and radicalism.” Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich titled his new book “To Save America: Stopping Obama’s Secular-Socialist Machine.”

So, is Mr. Obama trying to form The Socialist Republic of America? Or are the accusations mainly a political weapon, meant to stick Obama with a label that is poison to many voters and thus make him a one-term president?

As is often the case in politics, the answer is in the eye of the beholder.

Well, “Answer Is in Eye of Beholder” is about the dullest headline one could write without mentioning Canada, so we can see why the Monitor went for something with an ever so tiny bit more sex appeal. Still, what’s interesting here is that the Monitor is treating the question even as a legitimate one.

The left has portrayed the assertion “Obama is a socialist” as the product of hallucinogenic tea. Polls attempting to show that Republicans are crazy–both the one Markos Moulitsascommissioned and the one John Avlon inspired, helped design and touted but did not commission–have included it along with such genuinely insane claims as “Obama was not born in the U.S.” and “Obama may be the Antichrist.” Yet you won’t see a mainstream publication weigh the pros and cons of those claims and conclude that “the answer is in the eye of the beholder.”

What’s more–and this was our first thought on seeing the Monitor story–we’re pretty sure we never saw a similar story during George W. Bush’s time in office seriously pondering the question of whether he was a fascist, though left-wingers called him that all the time.

We suppose this is in part because the left has so cheapened the term “fascism” as to leave it with little meaning other than as a term of abuse. Socialism also has better PR than fascism does, and hence is more respectable: Some European countries have socialist parties that are part of mainstream politics, and although Obama does not call himself a socialist, one member of the Senate Democratic Caucus, Bernie Sanders of Vermont, wears the label with pride.

These days “fascism” is less often associated with Mussolini’s party, which was its namesake, than with the Nazis, even though Nazi is an abbreviation for National Socialist. And somehow the socialist label seldom gets applied to the other defunct totalitarian state, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

If the media take somewhat more seriously the claim that Obama is a socialist than the claim that Bush was a fascist, it certainly isn’t because they’re biased in favor of Bush. Rather, it has to do with the merits of the assertions.

[...]

Lagging Indicator
When a Democrat is in the White House, media coverage of the economy tends to be a lagging indicator of bad news and a leading indicator of good news–which is another way of saying that, as we noted yesterday, reporters’ usual approach can be summed up as “always look on the bright side of life.”

Things must be really getting bad, because the lagging indicator seems to be catching up. In yesterday’s column we analyzed a dispatch by Christopher Rugaber of the Associated Press that previewed today’s jobs report and tried to explain away the expected bad news. Later yesterday, though, Rugaber filed another dispatch that was far dourer, including its title, “Evidence Mounts That Recovery Is Hitting the Skids.”

Rugaber weighs in again today with a story on the actual jobless numbers, and his mood hadn’t improved overnight. The title gave the bad news first: “Payrolls Drop by 125K, Jobless Rate Falls.” The story, too, begins with the bad news, and swiftly explains why the good news isn’t so good:

A weak June jobs report offered the latest evidence that the economic recovery is slowing.

Employers cut 125,000 jobs last month, the most since October, the Labor Department said Friday. The loss was driven by the end of 225,000 temporary census jobs. Businesses added a net total of 83,000 workers, the sixth straight month of private-sector job gains but not enough to speed up the recovery.

Unemployment dropped to 9.5 percent–the lowest level since July 2009–from 9.7 percent. But the reason for the decline was more than 650,000 people gave up on their job searches and left the labor force. People who are no longer looking for work aren’t counted as unemployed.

Read the rest here: Is Obama a Socialist?

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Posted in Economy, Media, Misery Index | 74 Comments »

The stupidity of liberals- Pelosi: Unemployment creates jobs; Academics: Obama better President than Reagan

by Bob in Breckenridge ( 188 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Misery Index, Politics, Progressives at July 2nd, 2010 - 9:00 pm

Just looking at this America-hating bitch with all those American flags behind her makes me want to puke. Yeah, I could go on and on and on about this topic, but we all know that to be a liberal, you have to lose all sense of reality, sanity, and intelligence. For yet more proof that libs are imbeciles, let’s listen to that moron from San Francisco, Nancy Pelosi.

This f**King dolt actually said that unemployment creates jobs. Listen to this libtard explain it, and while you’re listening to this stupidity, ask yourself, over and over, “Who in God’s name would ever vote for this f**king idiot?”…

I was, at first, just going to talk about Pelosi. Then I read this article this morning in the Washington Times, you know, the paper that a certain FAT ASS, washed-up ukulele playing, tricycle riding, comic book reading, pony-tailed douchebag, who runs a shithole far left blog, says is rooted in white supremacy.

This will definitely prove, yet again, that liberals are so seriously ignorant, insane, or delusional, that the assholes actually believe that the bungler-in-chief Obama, who, after only 18 months in office, has f**ked up our and most of the world’s economies, our standing in the world, and our country, is a better President than Ronald Reagan…

Obama trumps Reagan, academics say in survey

Franklin D. Roosevelt again topped the Siena College survey of the best U.S. presidents, but the man sitting in the White House fewer than 18 months has cracked the Top 15.

While the New Deal icon still enchants, and even bested the faces on Mount Rushmore, President Obama ranks 15th among the 44 U.S. presidents -- ahead of, among others, Ronald Reagan.

For the fifth time in the five editions of the Siena College Research Institute Survey of U.S. Presidents, Roosevelt tops the list of best U.S. presidents, the school said Thursday.

Theodore Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson -- the four faces of Mount Rushmore -- finished behind the president who led America through World War II and the Great Depression, according to 238 historians, presidential scholars and political scientists who participated.

“In nearly 30 years, the same five presidents have occupied the first five places, with only a slight shuffling,” said Douglas Lonnstrom, a professor of statistics at  and co-founder of the study.

The 2010 survey included Mr. Obama and gave him a surprisingly strong showing -- in the top third of the pack and ahead of the 18th-ranked Reagan. And Mr. Obama wasn’t even tops among living Democrats -- that honor went to 13th-ranked Bill Clinton, one of only two presidents ever to be impeached.

The other was the nation’s 17th president -- Andrew Johnson -- who finished last in the survey.

But it was Mr. Obama’s placement above Reagan that immediately prompted criticism and/or derision from conservatives and Reagan devotees.

Melissa Giller, director of the Reagan Foundation, which runs the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum in Simi Valley, Calif., downplayed the results’ importance, saying, “We see a lot of presidential polls and find they can be very subjective.”

None of the Siena surveys have ever placed Reagan in the Top 10.

Read the whole article here…

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Posted in Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Misery Index, Politics, Progressives | 188 Comments »

Why the Obama Boom never materialized

by Rodan ( 131 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Misery Index, Progressives at June 30th, 2010 - 2:00 pm

The Progressive Propaganda Media had been pushing the theme of an Obama Boom since last summer. When the GDP stopped declining and job losses stemmed, the Media declared we were entering a Boom. Magazines and newspapers were heralding the success of the Stimulus Bill and claiming that Obama had saved America. Article after article was coming out trumpeting this so called Boom and they were comparing it to the 90′s boom. Reality however has unmasked it as a lie. The stock market has tanked, consumer confidence has collapsed, home sales have crashed, private sector job growth has stagnated and our debt keeps rising. Indications are that the economy is slowing down again, thus increasing the likelihood of a double dip recession. The Progressive economic policies of Barack Hussein Obama have failed!

The administration’s stimulus program has failed. Growth is slow and unemployment remains high. The president, his friends and advisers talk endlessly about the circumstances they inherited as a way of avoiding responsibility for the 18 months for which they are responsible.

But they want new stimulus measures—which is convincing evidence that they too recognize that the earlier measures failed. And so the U.S. was odd-man out at the G-20 meeting over the weekend, continuing to call for more government spending in the face of European resistance.

The contrast with President Reagan’s antirecession and pro-growth measures in 1981 is striking. Reagan reduced marginal and corporate tax rates and slowed the growth of nondefense spending. Recovery began about a year later. After 18 months, the economy grew more than 9% and it continued to expand above trend rates.

Two overarching reasons explain the failure of Obamanomics. First, administration economists and their outside supporters neglected the longer-term costs and consequences of their actions. Second, the administration and Congress have through their deeds and words heightened uncertainty about the economic future. High uncertainty is the enemy of investment and growth.

Read the rest: Why Obamanomics Has Failed

The Obama boom was a mirage invented by the media to create false confidence and this lead to growth. However it didn’t work as teh public saw no improvement and are now again saving money. Barack Hussein Obama’s economic policies are a failure and at the G20, his suggestion to continue deficit spending where ridiculed.

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Posted in Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Misery Index, Progressives | 131 Comments »

Caption This!

by Macker ( 134 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Caption This, Communism, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2010, Financial, Guest Post, Investments, Misery Index, Progressives at June 26th, 2010 - 10:30 am

This, in light of the 2,000-page bill regulating the financial services industry, which may be headed for Президент Оба́ма’s desk for signature on the 4th of July:How apopos, they’re thinking. Have at it!

Addendum by m ~ There was a guest post submitted along the same lines, so I am combining them ~ Caption this AND discuss this ~:)

We now return to your program…

Blogmocracy in Action!
Guest post by: MacDuff!

Barney Frank (trying to hold up his pants) and Christopher Dodd emerge after an all nighter.

House, Senate leaders finalize details of sweeping financial overhaul

Key House and Senate lawmakers approved far-reaching new financial rules early Friday after weeks of division, delay and frantic last-minute dealmaking. The dawn compromise set up a potential vote in both houses of Congress next week that could send the landmark legislation to President Obama by July 4.

The final and most arduous compromise began to fall into place just after midnight. Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) agreed to scale back a controversial provision that would have forced the nation’s biggest banks to spin off their lucrative derivatives-dealing businesses.

The panel also reached accord on the “Volcker rule,” named after former Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker. That measure would bar banks from trading with their own money, a practice known as proprietary trading.

Lawmakers pulled an all-nighter, wrapping up their work at 5:39 a.m. — more than 20 messy, mind-numbing hours after they began Thursday morning.

I must stipulate that I’m no financial expert and I have no projections to offer as to how this legislation will effect the financial structure of the country. I do know that it contains a lot of govenment oversight and control.

That said, when Democrats stay up all night drafting legislation called a “sweeping financial overhaul”, I become worried. And when I read:

Despite myriad changes in recent days, Democrats appear poised to deliver a final bill that largely reflects the administration’s original blueprint unveiled almost precisely a year ago. (“almost precisely”??)

I become very worried, but when I read:

“We’ve put in the hands of the president a very powerful set of tools for him to reassert American leadership in the world,” Frank said.

I begin to wonder just what the hell it is they are trying to foist upon us.

Remember when Nancy Pelosi said of the Health Care overhaul; “We have to pass the bill so you can find out what is in it”? Well, here’s Christopher Dodd on the 2,000 page financial overhaul crafted last night:

“It’s a great moment. I’m proud to have been here,” said a teary-eyed Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.), who as chairman of the Senate Banking Committee led the effort in the Senate. “No one will know until this is actually in place how it works. But we believe we’ve done something that has been needed for a long time. It took a crisis to bring us to the point where we could actually get this job done.”

This is becoming a disturbing theme with Democrats; we really don’t know how it’s going to work until it’s in place, but it’s something that we’ve needed for a long time. What could go wrong?

Yeah, I’ve got a real bad feeling about this.

-MacDuff

(MacDuff addendum cross posted at The Week’s Review)

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Posted in Barack Obama, Caption This, Communism, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2010, Financial, Guest Post, Investments, Misery Index, Progressives | 134 Comments »

A book review- “Whiny Little Bitch: The Excuse-Filled Presidency of Barack Obama”

by Bob in Breckenridge ( 137 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Communism, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2010, Misery Index, Progressives at June 25th, 2010 - 9:00 am

First of all, believe it or not, this is an actual book! But, if you’d like to order a copy ($14.95), please note that it will not be released until June 29th. I hope that a lot of other people will also want to read about the Whiny Little Bitch in the White House, and it becomes a New York Slimes #1 best-seller, but I digress.

It’s written by Mike Cullen, and it’s about the total incompetency of the America-hating POS that occupies 1600 Pennsylvania Av. NW, the man-child bungler-in-chief himself, and the other America-hating scumbags, that, like cockroaches, infest his pathetic, inept socialism-loving administration.

Here’s the introduction, and it’s excellent, because it is spot-on…

I had never seen anything like it. Only 44 men have held the office of President of the United States. This guy gets into office, and even one year later, he still can’t stop sniveling about the man who held the position before him. Can you picture Abraham Lincoln engaging in a year-long whine about James Buchanan? I inherited this slavery problem, you know. So don’t get your hopes to high.

Touché! Beautifully written, huh? I thought so, also!

But I know, you want more, huh? I’ve got more!!!

About Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Incompetano, Cullen writes:

She’s proof that there is at least one person in Washington who is less qualified for her job than Barack Obama is for his.

Bwahahahaha!!!

Then there’s a chapter called “The 7 Habits of a Highly Ineffective President”. BTW, habit #7 is priceless!

1. I Didn’t Explain it Right- There’s nothing wrong with the policy. You yokels are too stupid to understand it.

2. Let Me Be clear- Let me be clear is the rhetorical equivalent of an exploding dye pack in a bag of cash. It indelibly marks all words that follow as false. “Let me be clear” pegs my bullshit meter.

3. Conflation – Treating two different concepts as if they were one: In an attempt to marginalize the Tea Party movement, Obama described them as people who question whether he is a US citizen and believe he’s a socialist. Two totally unrelated things.

4. The False Choice- When Americans look to their government for responsible solutions, Barack Obama lives to offer us the false choice. We can either support his stale brand of socialism or we can do nothing.

5. The False Promise- Closing Gitmo. Broadcasting the health care debate on CSPAN.

6. Blaming Your Opponents- Even more bizarre were his repeated attempts to blame Republicans for his own failures. With an overwhelming Democrat majority in the House and a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, he still didn’t sign a single piece of major legislation in 2009.

7. Talking out of Your Ass- In situations that require a careful, measured (Let’s say presidential) response, Barack Obama comes across like the barroom drunk who thinks he’s an expert on everything. Facts are not important. Barry’s got something to say, and it’s a free country, dammit.

Examples: Skip Gates. Comments about Las Vegas.

This thread also ties in, rather nicely, to what former Florida governor Jeb Bush said Wednesday about Obama:

Jeb Bush tells President Obama: Stop blaming George W. Bush

Former Florida GOP Gov. Jeb Bush has grown tired of listening to Barack Obama blame his brother, telling Matt Bai, the “Political Times” columnist for The New York Times, that he finds the president’s behavior “childish.”

In an interview with Bai, Bush said that he has had enough of Obama frequently pointing back to his brother George W. Bush’s tenure to explain economic and budget problems, as well as failed oversight of the oil industry.

“It’s kind of like a kid coming to school saying, ‘The dog ate my homework,’” the former governor said of the president. “It’s childish. This is what children do until they mature. They don’t accept responsibility.”

“He apparently likes to act like he’s still campaigning, and he likes to blame George’s administration for everything,” Bush added.

Bush went on to criticize the president’s own stewardship of the economy, calling Obama “Hubert Humphrey on steroids.”

Read the whole piece here.

A tip o’ the hat to Denny!

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Posted in Barack Obama, Communism, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2010, Misery Index, Progressives | 137 Comments »

Geithner admits there is no Obama Boom!

by Rodan ( 168 Comments › )
Filed under Economy, Liberal Fascism, Media, Misery Index, Progressives at June 22nd, 2010 - 1:30 pm

Just a month ago the US media was singing the praises of the Obama economic boom. They were claiming an unprecedented era in economic prosperity was emerging in America. Well a disappointing jobs report, fall in housing sales and increasing health-care premiums due to Obamacare have ended this talk. In a shocking revelation of the truth, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner admits the US economy is fragile!

US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner on Tuesday said the US economy was “still going through an incredibly difficult period,” as he warned the impact of the crisis would be “lasting.”

“Millions of Americans are still looking for work and are suffering from the damage of a deep recession. The impact of this crisis will be lasting,” he said in prepared testimony to Congress.

While heralding progress in unwinding government stimulus spending, Geithner stressed the United States was still not out of the woods.

Read the rest: US economy still in ‘difficult period’: Geithner

As much as Joe Biden wants to promote the recovery, the truth says otherwise. There is NO Obama Boom. It was a lie started by Newsweek to help the Democrats in the fall.

In other news the US spent $2 million promoting condom use among drug addicts in Kazakhstan. Your tax money at work… for other nations.

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Posted in Economy, Liberal Fascism, Media, Misery Index, Progressives | 168 Comments »

Why Obama’s job approval here and worldwide is sinking to historic lows after only 1½ years

by Bob in Breckenridge ( 105 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2010, Misery Index, Progressives, Socialism, UK at June 20th, 2010 - 10:00 am

Of course, we, meaning those of us with functioning brains, which excludes liberals, leftists and other various losers and miscreants, knew that most of America and the world would eventually WTFU and come to realize what we’ve known all along- That the incompetent bungler-in-chief Barack Hussein Obama will end up being the worst President in the history of our country.

Think about that for a minute.

He’s even more incompetent than that anti-Semitic ignoramus Jimmy Carter. Voters are getting buyer’s remorse, and the morons that bought this America-hating POS’s hope and change bullshit are starting to finally “get it”.

Well, not only most Americans, but also in Britain (and around the world, for that matter). Most Americans and Brits are finally realizing that this buffoon is not qualified to manage their local 7-11, much less our country, and that he is screwing up the relationships we’ve worked for years to build with our friends around the world, while coddling our enemies.

The amazing thing is that the bungler-in-chief and his band of lib losers have managed to do this in less than 18 months. This is what happens when an inexperienced and incompetent snake oil salesman fools 53 million dolts into voting for him.

This arrogant, ignorant asshole actually had the audacity (and not of hope) to send a letter to the leaders of the G20 nations lecturing them and almost demanding that they keep spending money that they (and we) don’t have to try to stimulate the world’s economies, even though most countries already are basically bankrupting their future by this out of control spending. This result is what happens when brain-dead liberals like Obama, Pelosi, Schumer, Frank, and Reid have unfettered control of the government.

Every policy or idea these idiot libs have enacted or propose to enact has already been tried and failed miserably numerous times, and these will fail also. The one thing that we know that will work at stimulating the world’s and our economies is cutting taxes and cutting spending. But mentioning tax cuts and spending cuts to these moronic libs is like offering kryptonite to Superman.

As usual, Nile Gardiner hits it out of the park it in his June 17th op-ed in the London Daily Telegraph-

Barack Obama: the most unpopular man in Britain?

What a difference 18 months and an oil spill makes. In January 2009 Barack Obama was hugely popular on this side of the Atlantic, and could have walked on water in the eyes of the British media, the political elites, and the general public. In June 2010 however he probably qualifies as the most despised US president since Nixon among the British people. In fact you can’t open a London paper at this time without reading yet another fiery broadside against a leader who famously boasted of restoring “America’s standing” in the world.

When even Obama’s most ardent political supporters in Britain, including Boris Johnson, are on the offensive against the White House, you know the president’s halo has dramatically slipped. It’s hard to believe that any politician could become more disliked in the UK than Gordon Brown, but Barack Obama is achieving that in spades. And as Janet Daley noted of the British press, the love affair with Barack is well and truly over.

[...]

We are witnessing one of the worst exercises in public diplomacy by a US government in recent memory, one that could cause significant long-term damage to the incredibly important economic and political partnership between Great Britain and the United States. And for those who say this is minor storm in a tea cup, I would point out that it is highly unusual for a British Prime Minister to have to stand up to an onslaught against British interests by an American president, as David Cameron has just done. In fact the prospect of a major confrontation between Downing Street and the White House grows stronger by the day.

But this is not the whole picture. President Obama’s handling of BP is part of a far bigger problem. This is an administration that has consistently insulted Britain, and has even sided with her foes in some cases, most notably in its wholehearted support for Argentina’s call for negotiations over the sovereignty of the Falklands, a position that has been strongly backed by Venezuelan tyrant Hugo Chavez.

Read the whole article here

BTW, hat tip to Denny

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Posted in Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2010, Misery Index, Progressives, Socialism, UK | 105 Comments »

Retail sales decline as Obama Boom continues.

by Rodan ( 71 Comments › )
Filed under Ahmadinejad, Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2010, Iran, Leftist-Islamic Alliance, Media, Misery Index, Progressives at June 11th, 2010 - 10:30 am

The greatest economic recovery since the Carter years continues. Retail sales declined in May, supposedly unexpectedly, as the Progressive Propaganda Media’s spin of a booming economy is falling apart. This is the second report in a week, including last week’s job numbers that is exposing the made up Obama boom.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Sales at retailers unexpectedly fell in May for the first time since September following a record slump in purchases of building materials, adding to fears the economic recovery was losing some steam.

The Commerce Department said total retail sales dropped 1.2 percent, the largest decline since September, after rising by an upwardly revised 0.6 percent in April. Sales in April were previously reported to have increased 0.4 percent.

Read the rest: Unexpected decline in retail sales fans recovery fears

Here’s what the media is really worried about and it’s not the stagnant US economy.

Restoring the economy to health is a key priority for President Barack Obama and voter anguish over the slow pace of the recovery could inflict heavy losses on the Democratic Party in November’s Congressional elections.

It’s all about Obama and the Democrats electoral situation the media is concerned with. Clearly Obama’s economic policies are failing. The problem with the US economy was too much debt, outsourcing of good jobs and stagnant wages. Obama has addressed none of these and until they are addressed the US will continue its descent into economic has been status. The Stimulus put us in more debt and this is capital sucked out of the private markets that should be going to investments.

The Obama Boom is over and we hardly knew it!

Update:In other news, Barack Hussein Obama  is pressuring Congress to weaken the Iran sanctions bill that is being worked on. The fact Ahmadinejad once again called for Israel’s extermination doesn’t matter to the Obama regime.

The Obama administration, which labored for months to impose tough new United Nations sanctions against Iran, now is pushing in the opposite direction against Congress as it crafts U.S. sanctions that the White House fears may go too far.

Administration officials have begun negotiations with congressional leaders, who are working on versions of House and Senate bills that would punish companies that sell refined petroleum products to Iran or help the country’s oil industry.

As always the Obama regime rides to the rescue of the Ayatollahs.

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Posted in Ahmadinejad, Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Elections 2010, Iran, Leftist-Islamic Alliance, Media, Misery Index, Progressives | 71 Comments »

Zogby poll: Most self-described democrats and/or liberals flunk basic economics badly

by Bob in Breckenridge ( 90 Comments › )
Filed under Barack Obama, Democratic Party, Economy, Misery Index, Polls, Progressives, Republican Party at June 10th, 2010 - 9:00 am

No wonder we’re f**ked. These are the friggin’ ignorant morons who are “leading” us right down the economic crapper. From the Wall Street Journal-

Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?
Self-identified liberals and Democrats do badly on questions of basic economics.

By DANIEL B. KLEIN

Who is better informed about the policy choices facing the country—liberals, conservatives or libertarians? According to a Zogby International survey that I write about in the May issue of Econ Journal Watch, the answer is unequivocal: The left flunks Econ 101.

Zogby researcher Zeljka Buturovic and I considered the 4,835 respondents’ (all American adults) answers to eight survey questions about basic economics. We also asked the respondents about their political leanings: progressive/very liberal; liberal; moderate; conservative; very conservative; and libertarian.

Rather than focusing on whether respondents answered a question correctly, we instead looked at whether they answered incorrectly. A response was counted as incorrect only if it was flatly unenlightened.

[...]

How did the six ideological groups do overall? Here they are, best to worst, with an average number of incorrect responses from 0 to 8: Very conservative, 1.30; Libertarian, 1.38; Conservative, 1.67; Moderate, 3.67; Liberal, 4.69; Progressive/very liberal, 5.26.

[...]

The survey also asked about party affiliation. Those responding Democratic averaged 4.59 incorrect answers. Republicans averaged 1.61 incorrect, and Libertarians 1.26 incorrect.

Read the rest: Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?

And on a somewhat related note, Obama gets pwned by Sgt. Joe Friday…

A tip of the hat to Denny, the grouchy old cripple himself!

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