Jul 29 2011
Another of the Powerline Prize entries, this one a music video called “Shovel Ready, Not Shovel Ready Enough”. Very funny, and very effective… and very sad. A TRILLION dollars for essentially nothing very helpful….
Somebody was shoveling something, alright.
Jul 26 2011
14 trillion and a few hundred billion change is what the federal government owes, right now. It’ll be more like 15 billion by the end of 2011.
Guess who gets to pay it back? Not me. Maybe not you, if you’re middle aged or so. Here’s who will be paying it back, in cash, in kind, in trade, or in economic disaster and unemployment.
Another entry in the Powerline Prize contest.
Jul 26 2011
Another high placing (but not quite winning) entry in the Powerline Prize competition for a media product to illustrate the danger of our national debt.
Jul 25 2011
Obama calls for compromise on debt
President Barack Obama said on Monday a temporary six-month extension of debt ceiling does not solve the problem and might not be enough to avoid credit downgrade.
Obama said he has told leaders of both parties they must come with a fair compromise in the news few days that can pass Congress.
The President wants to be able to pin the blame on big spending and higher borrowing, increasing the national debt, on Republicans. He doesn’t want it to still be on the table for the 2012 election cycle, which is the real reason he doesn’t want only a six month extension…. he knows that in six months, he’ll look even worse.
The truth, of course is that a six month extension that matches debt ceiling raises to REAL, RIGHT NOW CUTS, not future pie-in-the-sky maybe cuts, is ITSELF a compromise between the Republicans and the Democrats.
But compromising with Democrats is usually a one way street. You compromise. They don’t. Then they insist you compromise some more, taking your compromised position as the new bargaining starting point.
As Erick Ericson points out, we’ve had 17 debt commissions, and innumerable promises to study future cuts in the last decades. It’s ALWAYS a smokescreen to pretend something is being done while protecting the status quo, or taxing/spending/borrowing even more.
In Washington speak, a CUT is simply a reduction in spending INCREASES planned for the future. Get it? If you planned to increase your spending by 20% next year, and only increase it by 10%, you get to call THAT a CUT in the beltway…. when in fact it is an INCREASE, still.
Liar, liar, pants on fire, Mr. President.
May 01 2011
Osama Bin Laden is dead. And If we are to believe the Narcissist-In-Chief he is the one responsible. What shamelessness!
And so shortly after taking office, I directed Leon Panetta, the director of the CIA, to make the killing or capture of bin Laden the top priority of our war against al Qaeda, even as we continued our broader efforts to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat his network.
Feb 09 2011
Obama to call for $53B for high-speed rail
President Barack Obama is calling for a six-year, $53 billion spending plan for high-speed rail, as he seeks to use infrastructure spending to jumpstart job creation.
An initial $8 billion in spending will be part of the budget plan Obama is set to release Monday. If Congress approves the plan, the money would go toward developing or improving trains that travel up to 250 miles per hour, and connecting existing rail lines to new projects. The White House wouldn’t say where the money for the rest of the program would come from, though it’s likely Obama would seek funding in future budgets or transportation bills.
Obama’s push for high-speed rail spending is part of his broad goal of creating jobs in the short-term and increasing American competitiveness for the future through new spending on infrastructure, education and innovation. During last month’s State of the Union address, Obama said he wanted to give 80 percent of Americans access to high-speed rail within 25 years.
At the same time he’s calling for new spending on sectors like high-speed rail in the upcoming budget, Obama also has pledged to cut overall spending as he seeks to bring down the nation’s mounting deficit.
Well, to be clear, Obama only called for a “freeze in spending”… a freeze at the ridiculously high levels he set in his first two years. Only his sycophants in the press would call not raising spending even further “a cut.”
In any case, America is not Europe, nor is it Japan. There is not now a demand for high speed rail, nor will there be anytime soon. If there was a demand for it, private interests would be busy investing in it, expecting to make money from it. Obama seems to have learned nothing from the subsidy infested mess that is Amtrak.
I propose a better way to spend the money. He should invest in research in alchemy. Turning lead into gold is probably impossible…. but maybe not. And along the way, spending 50 billion dollars is likely to accidentally result in some real science getting done, something with at least “spin off” benefits, technologically and economically.
So lets hear it for alchemy in the federal budget. That makes a LOT more sense, and is probably a better way to spend large amounts of money, than high-speed rail, which will continue to be a sinkhole for money even after it’s built, which will probably cost a lot more than anyone now projects.
Of course, we all know Obama has no actual hope of doing this. He just brought it up to play to his lefty audience, who love anything that makes people get in lines and wait somewhere. But Obama knows he has no chance of getting this through a Republican House of Representatives. He’s just talking for effect, and public relations with his base.
Still… maybe in trying to turn lead into gold, the scientists would finally discover cold fusion.
Jan 26 2011
OBAMA: (bowing) Welcome Chairman Hu. We welcome a new season of cooperation between our countries.
HU: Your country is washed up. You are all a bunch of has-beens.
OBAMA: We are here to make your visit as special as we can. Just ask and it is yours.
HU: I want no questions from the media
OBAMA: We’d really like China to buy a bunch of our stuff.
HU: Sure, We’re buying it with your money anyway.
OBAMA: China needs to improve in the area of human rights.
HU: Yeah, so….?
OBAMA: China is unfairly manipulating the value of its currency.
HU: Yeah, so…?
OBAMA: this has been an historic visit.
HU: You really don’t know who you are dealing with, do you?
Jan 12 2011
Media Malpractice, the movie linked to the right, is now available on Netflix. It has some new content and is more relevant than ever, given the continuing bias displayed in media coverage of Obama, Palin, et. al.
In the audio linked here, you’ll hear the suggestion that Media Malpractice is worth including in political science classes (and communications classes, too).
I hope you’ll go to Netflix and add it to your queue. If you haven’t tried Netflix yet, it’s a great deal for anyone who watches either TV or movies.
Sep 15 2010
Lessons learned from the mildly idiotic plans of one Rev. Jones to publicly burn a Koran, regardless of the eventual shakeout (he’s been changing his mind a lot lately), the plan to build a mosque at Ground Zero, and remaining unanswered questions:
1) Muslims expressing deep outrage over this have no sense of proportion. Death threats? Insinuations that US national security is at stake? Compare to the reaction of Christians to the “Piss Christ” “artwork”.
2) Virtually everyone seems to be afraid of making Muslims angry. Could that be because they know this represents a real danger? Why is no one afraid of making Christians angry?
3) Americans have largely forgotten 9/11, despite the many reminders in the press and news coverage recently. They have forgotten how they felt on 9/12. Sadly.
4) Christianity and Islam are not on equal footing as “religions of peace.” Not even close. Not by a country mile. They don’t inhabit the same galaxy.
5) Where is the “moderate” Muslim outrage AT the Muslims who expressed such virulent outrage and threatened violence against Rev. Jones?
6) Why does the mainstream media stress the great patience and understanding that Americans should have for the Muslim ambition to build a Mosque at Ground Zero (!), without also suggesting that Muslims should really just ignore nitwits like Rev. Terry Jones, and not get so excited about his loony plans?
7) Why doesn’t our president make the same connection? Where does he get off telling Rev. Jones how destructive his plan is, but still telling Americans they should be accepting of the Ground Zero mosque, as if that plan represents some great sensitivity to American feelings?
8) Obama’s great political insight and wisdom, his deep connection to the American people, his smooth way with an audience…. all of this is a crock, a media made-up just-so story, which the media got away with in order to get their Annointed One elected, but which the American people have largely seen through.
The biggest loser over the Ground Zero Mosque and Terry Jones stories?
Obama, I think.
Aug 24 2010
Drug war sends bullets whizzing across the border
The first bullets struck El Paso’s city hall at the end of a work day. The next ones hit a university building and closed a major highway. Shootouts in the drug war along the U.S.-Mexico border are sending bullets whizzing across the Rio Grande into one of the nation’s safest cities, where authorities worry it’s only a matter of time before someone gets hurt or killed.
Mr. President Obama, sir….. what do you think is your responsibility in this? Do we have to wait until an American citizen is actually killed by bullets coming across the border? Or might you find it in your imperial wisdom to consider doing something about it NOW, before lives are taken?
I wish I believed you took this seriously. But given your reluctance to do anything about it when Mexican nationals come into the USA and directly kill people after entering illegally, I don’t suppose you think think playing Russian roulette across the border is any big deal.
