Thursday, August 6, 2009

FINAL POST

There are two reasons for this being my final post to Countervailing Truths. First, I feel that the truth is out about Barack Obama. His agenda has been so radical that the vast majority of Americans now know that they made a mistake in electing him. His profligate spending, radical socialist agenda for healthcare and energy, and the certainty that he lied to us about tax increases have contributed to his drop in popularity, and he will be stopped.

The second reason for suspending Countervailing Truths is the amount of time it takes for me to research and publish posts. I have a new job that starts on August 7th, and I want to focus 100% on my new career.

From time to time, however, I will continue to forward emails I receive that are worthy of forwarding.

I am proud to be an American conservative and even prouder of the way we have come together to stop Obama & Co. in their tracks. While we haven't officially stopped him yet, I'm convinced that our collective behind the scenes activities have delivered the truth to millions of Americans, and they will finish the job.

I predict that the U.S. House of Representatives, and maybe even the U.S. Senate, will flip back to the Republicans next November, and that Barack Obama will be run out of town on a rail in November of 2012.

Perhaps this time the Republicans will keep their noses clean and start representing the American people for a change.

~Ron

Monday, July 13, 2009

Obama's Broken Tax Pledge

Click the link below to hear Dick Morris describe how Obama has egregiously violated his presidential campaign tax pledge...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FC4pK5AKS48

The Truth About America's Financial Condition

- The United States is now the most indebted civilization in the history of the world and ground zero for the financial crisis.

- The United States government's national debt has now hit $11.5 TRILLION and is growing at the rate of about $3.88 billion a day. That's $2.7 million per minute, and $44,000 per second!

- The federal budget deficit is exploding higher, now at $1.84 trillion ... equal to almost 13 percent of GDP — hocking our children and grandchildren's lives to an insurmountable mountain of debt that would require more than 80 percent of the world's surplus savings to finance.

- The Federal Reserve, the steward of the nation's dollar, is in hock up to its eyeballs, its balance sheet having ballooned from $860 billion in liabilities in September 2008 to more than $2 trillion today, and likely to rocket even higher as the Fed continues to print money out of thin air like there's no tomorrow.

- Then there are the unfunded government IOUs coming due for Social Security, Medicare, and Federal pension payments — totaling an estimated $104 TRILLION.

When will the Obamamaniacs wake up?

Sunday, July 12, 2009

New Immigration Law

This 2-minute video should be mandatory viewing for every US citizen. It's an immigration law passed by your US House of Representatives. It is so egregious that Minority Leader Boehner called the law "sh*t"...


Politics, Chicago Style

In the January 24th issue of the New York Post was a short column entitled "Replacing Michelle". Here it is, word for word...

"Some employees are simply irreplaceable. Take Michelle Obama: The University of Chicago Medical center hired her in 2002 to run "programs for community relations, neighborhood outreach, volunteer recruitment, staff diversity and minority contracting". In 2005 , the hospital raised her salary from $120,000 to $317,000 -- nearly twice what her husband made as a Senator.

Oh, did we mention that her husband had just become a US Senator? He sure had. Requested a $1 million earmark for the UC Medical Center, in fact. Way to network Michelle! But now that Mrs. Obama has resigned, the hospital says her position will remain unfilled. How can that be, if the work she did was vital enough to be worth $317,000?

We can think of only one explanation: Senator Roland Burris's wife wasn't interested. Let me add that Michelle's position was a half time, 20 hour a week job. And to think they were critical of Blagoyovich's wife for taking $100,000 in fuzzy real estate commission!"

So let me review that for you:

1. While her husband was an Illinois state senator, Michelle Obama was hired for a 20-hour a week job at UC Medical Center for which she was paid $120,000 a year.

2. Her husband became a US Senator and her salary at the UC Medical Center was raised to $317,000.

3. Shortly after becoming a US Senator, her husband got Michelle's employers (UC Medical Center) a $1 Million earmark grant.

4. When her husband became President of the United States, and Michelle moved on to the White House, her position at the hospital was eliminated.

See any connection?

Change the Subject!


Do you actually think, Mssrs. Holder & Obama, that we don't know what you're doing? Obama's popularity is sinking like The Titanic and you need to change the subject...and what better subject than "Blame Bush?

Independent’s Day

Obama doesn't want to look back, but Attorney General Eric Holder may probe Bush-era torture anyway.

By Daniel Klaidman NEWSWEEK
Published Jul 11, 2009

It's the morning after Independence Day, and Eric Holder Jr. is feeling the weight of history. The night before, he'd stood on the roof of the White House alongside the president of the United States, leaning over a railing to watch fireworks burst over the Mall, the monuments to Lincoln and Washington aglow at either end. "I was so struck by the fact that for the first time in history an African-American was presiding over this celebration of what our nation is all about," he says. Now, sitting at his kitchen table in jeans and a gray polo shirt, as his 11-year-old son, Buddy, dashes in and out of the room, Holder is reflecting on his own role. He doesn't dwell on the fact that he's the country's first black attorney general. He is focused instead on the tension that the best of his predecessors have confronted: how does one faithfully serve both the law and the president?

Alone among cabinet officers, attorneys general are partisan appointees expected to rise above partisanship. All struggle to find a happy medium between loyalty and independence. Few succeed. At one extreme looms Alberto Gonzales, who allowed the Justice Department to be run like Tammany Hall. At the other is Janet Reno, whose righteousness and folksy eccentricities marginalized her within the Clinton administration. Lean too far one way and you corrupt the office, too far the other way and you render yourself impotent. Mindful of history, Holder is trying to get the balance right. "You have the responsibility of enforcing the nation's laws, and you have to be seen as neutral, detached, and nonpartisan in that effort," Holder says. "But the reality of being A.G. is that I'm also part of the president's team. I want the president to succeed; I campaigned for him. I share his world view and values."

These are not just the philosophical musings of a new attorney general. Holder, 58, may be on the verge of asserting his independence in a profound way. Four knowledgeable sources tell NEWSWEEK that he is now leaning toward appointing a prosecutor to investigate the Bush administration's brutal interrogation practices, something the president has been reluctant to do.

While no final decision has been made, an announcement could come in a matter of weeks, say these sources, who decline to be identified discussing a sensitive law-enforcement matter. Such a decision would roil the country, would likely plunge Washington into a new round of partisan warfare, and could even imperil Obama's domestic priorities, including health care and energy reform. Holder knows all this, and he has been wrestling with the question for months. "I hope that whatever decision I make would not have a negative impact on the president's agenda," he says. "But that can't be a part of my decision."

Friday, July 10, 2009

The Second Revolution

This guy's video on YouTube has been so popular that Obama called him personally. He said that he was very disturbed with the video and invited him to the White House. Obama also said he wanted the White House to handle the press and not to talk about the video or the White House visit. Watch it now to find out why. This may be the best six minutes you will ever invest in your future and the future of America...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jeYscnFpEyA

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

The Great Con

It's reassuring to see that not everyone falls for Obama's "laying on of hands" routine...

Monday, July 6, 2009

Hypocrisy One

"Do as I say, not as I do," is one of the great admonishments of liberal elites to the great unwashed. Never doubt where the Obama's stand on the small matter of who is whom and who is not...


A Boeing 757 and a fleet of armored cars for Michelle’s sight seeing tour
On Sunday, President Obama flew back to the United States on Air Force One. His wife, two daughters and her mother did a bit of shopping in Paris before taking their own Boeing 757 (C-32) over to London to do some sightseeing. We all remember Obama’s admonishment to corporate CEO’s in February:
“You can’t get corporate jets, you can’t go take a trip to Las Vegas or go down to the Super Bowl on the taxpayers dime.”
Apparently that doesn’t apply to his wife. The London Times opened it’s description of Michelle’s visit this way: "Motorcycle outriders, armoured Chevrolets and bullet-headed men in raincoats criss-crossed London yesterday as Michelle Obama and her daughters spent a second day on an unofficial visit to the capital."
The Times went on to describe that when Michelle and the girls arrived at Westminster Abbey, the building was closed to tourists with people already in told to “wait against the wall.” An American visiting the Abbey said “Right then I knew it was probably someone from our ‘royal family’.”
Michelle’s motorcade shut down a London street as the First Lady of the World and her children had Fish and Chips at a pub in Mayfair. The entourage inside the restaurant was 15 people while dozens more wait outside. Include the dozens of Air Force personnel to fly and service the plane, embassy personnel and other staff and we are talking about a serious expenditure of tax payer dollars.
Meanwhile, millions of Americans have lost their jobs and won’t be able to take their family on a summer holiday. Despite our circumstances, we'll still be expected to fork over the tax dollars to pay for Michelle’s trip.

You Remember Goldman Sachs, Don't You?

That's right, we bailed them out...

Goldman Prepares To Pay Biggest Bonuses Ever

John CarneyJun. 22, 2009

Remember the days when the age of excess on Wall Street were over? We were told the new normal would mean smaller bonsues, reduced egos, no more bottle service and a New York City devastated by the loss of income trickling down from investment bankers to the rest of us.

Well, Goldman may have received that memo but it didn't care much for it. Because the big bonus is back at 85 Broad, baby.

From The Guardian:

Staff at Goldman Sachs staff can look forward to the biggest bonus payouts in the firm's 140-year history after a spectacular first half of the year, sparking concern that the big investment banks which survived the credit crunch will derail financial regulation reforms.

A lack of competition and a surge in revenues from trading foreign currency, bonds and fixed-income products has sent profits at Goldman Sachs soaring, according to insiders at the firm.
Staff in London were briefed last week on the banking and securities company's prospects and told they could look forward to bumper bonuses if, as predicted, it completed its most profitable year ever. Figures next month detailing the firm's second-quarter earnings are expected to show a further jump in profits.

Warren Buffett, who bought $5bn of the company's shares in January, has already made a $1bn gain on his investment.

Goldman Sachs: The Villian

This stunning feature story in Rolling Stone Magazine, of all places, is further evidence that we really need to clean out the closet...

The Great American Bubble Machine

From tech stocks to high gas prices, Goldman Sachs has engineered every major market manipulation since the Great Depression - and they're about to do it again

By Matt Taibbi
Rolling Stone Magazine
July 9-23, 2009

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/28816321/the_great_american_bubble_machine/3

Big Brother Has Arrived

He will follow you everywhere you go, and will tax you for every mile you drive...

By-the-mile road tax could replace by-the-gallon federal fuel tax

By STEVE EVERLY
The Kansas City Star

The year is 2020 and the gasoline tax is history. In its place you get a monthly tax bill based on each mile you drove — tracked by a Global Positioning System device in your car and uploaded to a billing center.

What once was science fiction is being field-tested by the University of Iowa to iron out the wrinkles should a by-the-mile road tax ever be enacted.

Besides the technological advances making such a tax possible, the idea is getting a hard push from a growing number of transportation experts and officials. That is because the traditional by-the-gallon fuel tax, struggling to keep up with road building and maintenance demands, could fall even farther behind as vehicles’ gas mileage rises and more alternative-fuel vehicles come on line.

The idea of shifting to a by-the-mile tax has been discussed for years, but it now appears to be getting more serious attention. A federal commission, after a two-year study, concluded earlier this year that the road tax was the “best path forward” to keep revenues flowing to highway and transportation projects, and could be an important new tool to help manage traffic and relieve congestion.

The decision by the 15-member National Surface Transportation Infrastructure Financing Commission was unanimous, which surprised Robert Atkinson, the group’s chairman. But he said it became clear as the commission’s work progressed that a road tax on miles traveled was the best option.

“If you’re committed to the system being improved then it was a no-brainer,” he said.
The commission pegged 2020 as the year for the federal fuel tax, currently 18.5 cents a gallon, to be phased out and replaced by a road tax. One estimate of a road tax that would cover the current federal and state fuel taxes is 1 to 2 cents per mile for cars and light trucks.

The commission said work needed to start soon to prepare for a road tax. But more work has already been done than most people probably realize.

Oregon did a field test in 2007, concluding it was possible to collect a road tax. The University of Iowa’s Public Policy Center — with support from the Federal Highway Administration and 15 states, including Kansas and Missouri — began work a decade ago on how a road tax could be deployed.

Now the University of Iowa, with the help of a $16 million federal grant, is beginning the field test that will eventually include 2,700 vehicles in six states. The vehicles equipped with computers and GPS devices will keep track of the miles traveled and send the data through wireless technology to a billing center that will compute “simulated” tax bills.

“There is a lot of work nationally going on that is beneath the surface,” said Pete Rahn, director of the Missouri Department of Transportation.

Missouri, like the federal government and other states, has been watching revenues from the gas tax decline. Last year that revenue was down more than 3 percent, and so far this year it has declined a similar amount. The state’s highway budget was about to “hit the rocks,” he said, but federal stimulus funds gave it some breathing room.

Even when the economy recovers, the gas tax will remain under pressure.

“The Chevrolet Volt won’t pay a penny of fuel tax,” Rahn said of the electric car that will make its debut next year.

Rahn, past president of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, said some states have considered implementing a road tax without waiting for the federal government to act, but a national system would probably work best.

Quote of the (Next) Century

"My friends, we live in the greatest nation in the history of the world. I hope you'll join with me as we try to change it." - Barack Obama (on the 2008 presidential campaign trail)

CITGO is now PETRO EXPRESS

Announced just recently...

"CITGO", BEING AWARE THAT SALES ARE DOWN DUE TO U.S. CUSTOMERS NOT WANTING TO BUY FROM 'CITGO-CHAVEZ', HAVE STARTED TO CHANGE THE NAME OF SOME OF THEIR STORES TO 'PETRO EXPRESS'.

DO NOT BUY FROM CITGO OR PETRO EXPRESS.

PETRO EXPRESS IS ALSO 100% OWNED BY CHAVEZ.

KEEP THIS MEMO GOING SO THAT EVERYONE KNOWS WHAT IS HAPPENING.

BOTTOM LINE: BOYCOTT CITGO & PETRO EXPRESS!

Sunday, July 5, 2009

The Unmitigated Gall!

This latest legislative travesty by congress is the greatest invasion of privacy in the history of American politics...

Democrats’ Cap-and-Trade Bill Creates ‘Retrofit’ Policy for Homes and Businesses

July 01, 2009
By Matt Cover

(CNSNews.com) – The 1,400-page cap-and-trade legislation pushed through by House Democrats contains a new federal policy that residential, commercial, and government buildings be retrofitted to increase energy efficiency, leaving it up to the states to figure out exactly how to do that.

This means that homeowners, for example, could be required to retrofit their homes to meet federal “green” guidelines in order to sell their homes, if the cap-and-trade bill becomes law.

The bill, which now goes to the Senate, directs the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to develop and implement a national policy for residential and commercial buildings. The purpose of such a strategy – known as the Retrofit for Energy and Environmental Performance (REEP) – would be to “facilitate” the retrofitting of existing buildings nationwide.

“The Administrator shall develop and implement, in consultation with the Secretary of Energy, standards for a national energy and environmental building retrofit policy for single-family and multi-family residences,” the bill reads. It continues: “The purpose of the REEP program is to facilitate the retrofitting of existing buildings across the United States.”

The bill leaves the definition of a retrofit and the details of the REEP program up to the EPA. However, states are responsible for ensuring that the government’s plans are carried out, whatever the final details may entail.

“States shall maintain responsibility for meeting the standards and requirements of the REEP program,” the bill says. States may contract with private agencies to oversee the retrofitting and measuring of improved efficiency and environmental friendliness of houses and other buildings, making sure that private citizens have a variety of choices for retrofitting their homes.

“States and local government entities may administer a REEP program in a manner that authorizes public or regulated investor-owned utilities, building auditors and inspectors, contractors, nonprofit organizations, for-profit companies, and other entities to perform audits and retrofit services,” reads the bill.

It further says, “A State or local administrator of a REEP program shall seek to ensure that sufficient qualified entities are available to support retrofit activities so that building owners have a competitive choice among qualified auditors, raters, contractors, and providers of services related to retrofits.”

In fact, individual homeowners are even allowed to retrofit buildings themselves. The bill gives specific protection to individual owners’ rights to choose who inspects and retrofits their property.

“Nothing in this section is intended to deny the right of a building owner to choose the specific providers of retrofit services to engage for a retrofit project in that owner’s building.” Even though Congress says the states are responsible for carrying out the retrofits, the EPA and the Department of Energy will establish the guidelines and rules for doing so.

“The Administrator, in consultation with the Secretary of Energy, shall establish goals, guidelines, practices, and standards for accomplishing the purpose stated in subsection (c) [the retrofits],” the bill says. The program would involve a system of certified auditors, inspectors, and raters who inspect homes and businesses using devices such as infrared cameras (which measure how much heat a building is giving off) to measure their energy efficiency. The results of these energy audits would then be used to determine what retrofits need to be performed.

The audits would examine things like water usage, infrared photography, and pressurized testing to determine the efficiency of door and window seals, and indoor air quality. Those retrofits would be performed by licensed retrofit contractors using government-approved methods and resources including roofing materials that reflect solar energy.

“[B]uilding retrofits conducted pursuant to a REEP program utilize, especially in all air-conditioned buildings, roofing materials with high solar energy reflectance,” the legislation states. After the retrofitting is complete, the government – state, local, or federal – will come back and re-inspect the house to determine how much energy has been saved and whether the retrofit is up to federal government standards.

“Determination of energy savings in a performance-based building retrofit program through — (A) for residential buildings, comparison of before and after retrofit scores,” the proposal states. To help pay for the cost of these retrofits, states and localities may provide loans, utility rate rebates, tax rebates, or implement retrofit programs on their own. In fact, the government will even pay up to 50 percent of the cost of a retrofit through financial awards to individual home and building owners.

“PERCENTAGE.—Awards under clause (i) shall not exceed 50 percent of retrofit costs for each building,” reads the bill.

The Signers of the Declaration of Independence

Read this and remember: Freedom isn't free...

4TH OF JULY

Have you ever wondered what happened to the 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence?

Five signers were captured by the British as traitors, and tortured before they died.

Twelve had their homes ransacked and burned.

Two lost their sons serving in the Revolutionary Army; another had two sons captured.

Nine of the 56 fought and died from wounds or hardships of the Revolutionary War.

They signed and they pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.

What kind of men were they?

Twenty-four were lawyers and jurists. Eleven were merchants, nine were farmers and large plantation owners; men of means, well educated, but they signed the Declaration of Independence knowing full well that the penalty would be death if they were captured.

Carter Braxton of Virginia, a wealthy planter and trader, saw his Ships swept from the seas by the British Navy. He sold his home and properties to pay his debts, and died in rags.

Thomas McKeam was so hounded by the British that he was forced to move his family almost constantly. He served in the Congress without pay, and his family was kept in hiding. His possessions were taken from him, and poverty was his reward.

Vandals or soldiers looted the properties of Dillery, Hall, Clymer, Walton, Gwinnett, Heyward, Ruttledge, and Middleton.

At the battle of Yorktown , Thomas Nelson, Jr., noted that the British General Cornwallis had taken over the Nelson home for his headquarters.

He quietly urged General George Washington to open fire. The home was destroyed, and Nelson died bankrupt.

Francis Lewis had his home and properties destroyed. The enemy jailed his wife, and she died within a few months.

John Hart was driven from his wife's bedside as she was dying. Their 13 children fled for their lives. His fields and his gristmill were laid to waste. For more than a year he lived in forests and caves, returning home to find his wife dead and his children vanished.

Some of us take these liberties so much for granted, but we shouldn't.

So, take a few minutes while enjoying your 4th of July holiday and silently thank these patriots.

It's not much to ask for the price they paid.

Remember: freedom is never free!

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Photo of the Year!


Your New Senator!

Gangster Government

Is this the change America voted for...?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHP5UM6WgZM

Quote of the Week

“Should we buy gold or U.S. Treasuries? The U.S. is printing dollars on a massive scale ... there is no doubt that the dollar will fall. So gold should be a better choice.”

-Top Communist party bureaucrat Li Lianzhong, People's Republic of China

Suppressing the Truth

When the truth contradicts your strongly held false beliefs, suppress it...

Sen. Inhofe Calls for Inquiry Into 'Suppressed' Climate Change Report

Republicans are raising questions about why the EPA apparently dismissed an analyst's report questioning the science behind global warming.

By Judson Berger
FOXNews.com
Monday, June 29, 2009

A top Republican senator has ordered an investigation into the Environmental Protection Agency's alleged suppression of a report that questioned the science behind global warming.

The 98-page report, co-authored by EPA analyst Alan Carlin, pushed back on the prospect of regulating gases like carbon dioxide as a way to reduce global warming. Carlin's report argued that the information the EPA was using was out of date, and that even as atmospheric carbon dioxide levels have increased, global temperatures have declined.

"He came out with the truth. They don't want the truth at the EPA," Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., a global warming skeptic, told FOX News, saying he's ordered an investigation. "We're going to expose it."

The controversy comes after the House of Representatives passed a landmark bill to regulate greenhouse gas emissions, one that Inhofe said will be "dead on arrival" in the Senate despite President Obama's energy adviser voicing confidence in the measure.

According to internal e-mails that have been made public by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, Carlin's boss told him in March that his material would not be incorporated into a broader EPA finding and ordered Carlin to stop working on the climate change issue. The draft EPA finding released in April lists six greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, that the EPA says threaten public health and welfare.

An EPA official told FOXNews.com on Monday that Carlin, who is an economist -- not a scientist -- included "no original research" in his report. The official said that Carlin "has not been muzzled in the agency at all," but stressed that his report was entirely "unsolicited."

"It was something that he did on his own," the official said. "Though he was not qualified, his manager indulged him and allowed him on agency time to draft up ... a set of comments."

Despite the EPA official's remarks, Carlin told FOXNews.com on Monday that his boss, National Center for Environmental Economics Director Al McGartland, appeared to be pressured into reassigning him.

Carlin said he doesn't know whether the White House intervened to suppress his report but claimed it's clear "they would not be happy about it if they knew about it," and that McGartland seemed to be feeling pressure from somewhere up the chain of command.

Carlin said McGartland told him he had to pull him off the climate change issue.

"It was reassigning you or losing my job, and I didn't want to lose my job," Carlin said, paraphrasing what he claimed were McGartland's comments to him. "My inference (was) that he was receiving some sort of higher-level pressure."

Carlin said he personally does not think there is a need to regulate carbon dioxide, since "global temperatures are going down." He said his report expressed a "good bit of doubt" on the connection between the two.

Specifically, the report noted that global temperatures were on a downward trend over the past 11 years, that scientists do not necessarily believe that storms will become more frequent or more intense due to global warming, and that the theory that temperatures will cause Greenland ice to rapidly melt has been "greatly diminished."

Carlin, in a March 16 e-mail, argued that his comments are "valid, significant" and would be critical to the EPA finding.

McGartland, though, wrote back the next day saying he had decided not to forward his comments.

"The administrator and the administration has decided to move forward on endangerment, and your comments do not help the legal or policy case for this decision," he wrote, according to the e-mails released by CEI. "I can only see one impact of your comments given where we are in the process, and that would be a very negative impact on our office."

He later wrote an e-mail urging Carlin to "move on to other issues and subjects."

"I don't want you to spend any additional EPA time on climate change. No papers, no research, etc., at least until we see what EPA is going to do with climate," McGartland wrote.

The EPA said in a written statement that Carlin's opinions were in fact considered, and that he was not even part of the working group dealing with climate change in the first place.

"Claims that this individual's opinions were not considered or studied are entirely false. This administration and this EPA administrator are fully committed to openness, transparency and science-based decision making," the statement said. "The individual in question is not a scientist and was not part of the working group dealing with this issue. Nevertheless the document he submitted was reviewed by his peers and agency scientists, and information from that report was submitted by his manager to those responsible for developing the proposed endangerment finding. In fact, some ideas from that document are included and addressed in the endangerment finding."

The e-mail exchanges and suggestions of political interference sparked a backlash from Republicans in Congress.

Reps. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., and Darrell Issa, R-Calif., also wrote a letter last week to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson urging the agency to reopen its comment period on the finding. The EPA has since denied the request.

Citing the internal e-mails, the Republican congressmen wrote that the EPA was exhibiting an "agency culture set in a predetermined course."

"It documents at least one instance in which the public was denied access to significant scientific literature and raises substantial questions about what additional evidence may have been suppressed," they wrote.

In a written statement, Issa said the administration is "actively seeking to withhold new data in order to justify a political conclusion."

"I'm sure it was very inconvenient for the EPA to consider a study that contradicted the findings it wanted to reach," Sensenbrenner said in a statement, adding that the "repression" of Carlin's report casts doubt on the entire finding.

Carlin said he's concerned that he's seeing "science being decided at the presidential level."
"Now Mr. Obama is in effect directly or indirectly saying that CO2 causes global temperatures to rise and that we have to do something about it. ... That's normally a scientific judgment and he's in effect judging what the science says," he said. "We need to look at it harder."

The controversy is similar to one under the Bush administration -- only the administration was taking the opposite stance. In that case, scientist James Hansen claimed the administration was trying to keep him from speaking out and calling for reductions in greenhouse gases.

Click here to read Carlin's report.

Monday, June 29, 2009

Total Insanity

There's no other way to describe the House of Representatives passing the Waxman-Markey Bill. And if the Senate passes it, there will be a lot of Senators out of work the next time they come up for re-election...

Waxman's Economy Killer
by Steven Milloy
06/25/2009

The House of Representatives will vote Friday on the so-called “American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009” -- a.k.a the “Waxman-Markey” global warming bill. But whatever you want to call this legislative atrocity, if enacted into law, it will go down in history as the death knell of the American standard of living and way of life. If you hate America, this bill is for you.

After decades of fierce battling between rabid greens -- that is, left-wingers masquerading as “environmentalists” -- and the global warming skeptics, few Americans seem to have bought into the bill’s premise ­ that manmade emissions of carbon dioxide are causing the planet to run a fever, as Al Gore is fond of saying. Just this week, a public relations firm advising House Democrats recommended that the notion of “global warming” be dropped as a primary message since “almost no one in our focus groups expressed such concern.”

So despite all the frantic global warming alarmism and the vicious smears of skeptics by Gore and his fanatic green activists (they liken skeptics to Holocaust-deniers and many in the media repeat the smear) -- the out-manned and out-gunned skeptics have largely succeeded in being heard by Americans and in changing their minds.

Yet that is not stopping House Democrats who are under pressure not only from the greens who see the bill as the best way to advance their political agenda (Marxist? Socialist? Venezuelan?), but also big businesses who have given up on capitalism in favor of federal laws requiring that taxpayers and consumers pay through the nose for products and services they don’t need or want.

What would Waxman-Markey mean to you? It starts with much higher cost of living, less personal freedom and a less comfortable, convenient, dignified and hopeful existence.Waxman-Markey is fundamentally anti-economic growth in nature. If you don’t yet grasp the significance of national economic growth, just look around at the recession we and the rest of the world are now enduring. Waxman-Markey would be a permanent clampdown on economic growth. The bill does this by making energy, the life blood of our economy, much more expensive and scarce.

Waxman-Markey will add $9 trillion in costs to the production of energy between 2012 and 2050 -- that works out to almost $800 per American per year for the next 38 years. Those are just the direct costs imposed by the bill’s cap-and-trade regime. These costs will ripple throughout the American economy -- everyone uses energy -- making all goods and services more expensive.

Electric utilities will be required to produce 20 percent of their power through so-called “renewable” energy sources, like wind and solar, by 2020. But such technology is incredibly expensive and requires heavy taxpayer subsidies -- 100 times greater than for fossil fuels. At the scale required by Waxman-Markey, such energy is more imaginary than renewable.Worse than the increased cost of energy, perhaps, is that the Waxman-Markey bill will essentially result in artificial limits on electricity production and, ultimately, electricity rationing. The bill will create a permanent energy crisis.

In addition to the limits imposed by the renewable energy requirement, Waxman-Markey essentially phases out coal-generated electricity (50% of our current supply) while failing to guarantee the construction of the only realistic substitute for coal -- nuclear power. In the end, what we’ll have is an energy grid constrained by the supply of natural gas -- much of which will have to be imported. Even so, there’s simply not enough natural gas to affordably meet all our energy needs, so supplies will have to be rationed somehow.

Waxman-Markey tries to head-off the path to rationing by requiring that everything from cars to new buildings to appliances become dramatically more energy efficient. This may sound good, but it’s a fool’s errand that can only end in higher prices for inferior products. The only way to make cars get better gas mileage is to shrink them, making them more dangerous, less useful and less comfortable. New buildings will have to be more 50% more efficient by 2016; if it can be done, it will be very, perhaps prohibitively, expensive. All of this ignores the fact that, since the 1970s and despite all out leaps forward in technology, we’ve only increased energy efficiency on a societal basis by about 7% or so, according to the Congressional Research Service.

What will you get for all the pain associated with Waxman-Markey? The bill will not improve the environment one iota. For those who insist that carbon dioxide emissions are somehow bad for the climate, even if the U.S. cuts its emissions as prescribed by Waxman-Markey, China, India and other developing countries will not cut their emissions as they refuse to sacrifice vital economic growth. If you plug this scenario into the existing climate models, their gloom-and-doom forecasts don’t change.

Moreover, since it is the wealthiest nations that have the cleanest environments -- consider the dirty China and India, for example -- Waxman-Markey is more likely to damage the environment as it retards U.S. economic growth and wealth creation, and saps funding for environmental protection on an individual and societal basis.

Waxman-Markey necessarily supersizes government and increases its intrusiveness. In addition to expanded authorities and budgets for the Environmental Protection Agency, Department of Energy and other existing federal behemoths, the bill creates a whole new bureaucracy of government agencies and boards that will dictate who can use how much energy. There’s the Offsets Integrity Advisory Board, Natural Resources Climate Change Adaptation Panel, National Climate Service, and the Centers for Energy and Environmental Knowledge and Outreach to name a few.

America under the 1,200-page-long Waxman-Markey bill -- and the hundreds of thousands of pages of regulations that would necessarily follow it -- would be a fantasy world for central planners and their oppressive tendencies. Given the 20th century’s horrific experience with central planning, that should be enough reason for House members to vote ‘NO’ on Friday.

Editor's Note: the House voted 'YES' on Friday.
***********

Mr. Milloy is the founder and publisher of JunkScience.com, co-founder of the Free Enterprise Action Fund, and co-director of the Free Enterprise Project at the National Center for Public Policy Research. His columns and op-ed pieces have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Financial Times, and Los Angeles Times. He is the author of "Green Hell," a new book from Regnery Publishing.

Thursday, June 25, 2009

The Biggest Tax in American History

The Cap and Tax Fiction

The Wall Street Journal
June 25, 2009

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has put cap-and-trade legislation on a forced march through the House, and the bill may get a full vote as early as Friday. It looks as if the Democrats will have to destroy the discipline of economics to get it done.

Despite House Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman's many payoffs to Members, rural and Blue Dog Democrats remain wary of voting for a bill that will impose crushing costs on their home-district businesses and consumers. The leadership's solution to this problem is to simply claim the bill defies the laws of economics.

Their gambit got a boost this week, when the Congressional Budget Office did an analysis of what has come to be known as the Waxman-Markey bill. According to the CBO, the climate legislation would cost the average household only $175 a year by 2020. Edward Markey, Mr. Waxman's co-author, instantly set to crowing that the cost of upending the entire energy economy would be no more than a postage stamp a day for the average household. Amazing. A closer look at the CBO analysis finds that it contains so many caveats as to render it useless.

For starters, the CBO estimate is a one-year snapshot of taxes that will extend to infinity. Under a cap-and-trade system, government sets a cap on the total amount of carbon that can be emitted nationally; companies then buy or sell permits to emit CO2. The cap gets cranked down over time to reduce total carbon emissions.

To get support for his bill, Mr. Waxman was forced to water down the cap in early years to please rural Democrats, and then severely ratchet it up in later years to please liberal Democrats. The CBO's analysis looks solely at the year 2020, before most of the tough restrictions kick in. As the cap is tightened and companies are stripped of initial opportunities to "offset" their emissions, the price of permits will skyrocket beyond the CBO estimate of $28 per ton of carbon. The corporate costs of buying these expensive permits will be passed to consumers.

The biggest doozy in the CBO analysis was its extraordinary decision to look only at the day-to-day costs of operating a trading program, rather than the wider consequences energy restriction would have on the economy. The CBO acknowledges this in a footnote: "The resource cost does not indicate the potential decrease in gross domestic product (GDP) that could result from the cap."

The hit to GDP is the real threat in this bill. The whole point of cap and trade is to hike the price of electricity and gas so that Americans will use less. These higher prices will show up not just in electricity bills or at the gas station but in every manufactured good, from food to cars.

Consumers will cut back on spending, which in turn will cut back on production, which results in fewer jobs created or higher unemployment. Some companies will instead move their operations overseas, with the same result.

When the Heritage Foundation did its analysis of Waxman-Markey, it broadly compared the economy with and without the carbon tax. Under this more comprehensive scenario, it found Waxman-Markey would cost the economy $161 billion in 2020, which is $1,870 for a family of four. As the bill's restrictions kick in, that number rises to $6,800 for a family of four by 2035.

Note also that the CBO analysis is an average for the country as a whole. It doesn't take into account the fact that certain regions and populations will be more severely hit than others -- manufacturing states more than service states; coal producing states more than states that rely on hydro or natural gas. Low-income Americans, who devote more of their disposable income to energy, have more to lose than high-income families.

Even as Democrats have promised that this cap-and-trade legislation won't pinch wallets, behind the scenes they've acknowledged the energy price tsunami that is coming. During the brief few days in which the bill was debated in the House Energy Committee, Republicans offered three amendments: one to suspend the program if gas hit $5 a gallon; one to suspend the program if electricity prices rose 10% over 2009; and one to suspend the program if unemployment rates hit 15%. Democrats defeated all of them.

The reality is that cost estimates for climate legislation are as unreliable as the models predicting climate change. What comes out of the computer is a function of what politicians type in. A better indicator might be what other countries are already experiencing. Britain's Taxpayer Alliance estimates the average family there is paying nearly $1,300 a year in green taxes for carbon-cutting programs in effect only a few years.

Americans should know that those Members who vote for this climate bill are voting for what is likely to be the biggest tax in American history. Even Democrats can't repeal that reality.

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Warren Buffett: U.S. Economy In "Shambles"

In a live interview on CNBC today, Warren Buffett said there has been little progress over the past few months in the "economic war" being fought by the country. "We haven't got the economy moving yet," he told Becky Quick.

While the economy is a "shambles" and likely to stay that way for some time, he remains optimistic there will eventually be a recovery over a period of years.

BECKY: The last time we sat down to talk to you was on May 4, and at that point you told us that you think we're in an economic war right now. How much progress do you think we've made in that war?

BUFFETT: Well, it's been pretty flat. I get figures on 70-odd businesses, a lot of them daily. Everything that I see about the economy is that we've had no bounce. The financial system was really where the crisis was last September and October, and that's been surmounted and that's enormously important. But in terms of the economy coming back, it takes a while. There were a lot of excesses to be wrung out and that process is still underway and it looks to me like it will be underway for quite a while. In the (Berkshire Hathaway) annual report I said the economy would be in a shambles this year and probably well beyond. I'm afraid that's true.

Taking a firm position in an ongoing debate in the financial markets, Buffett says he's not concerned about deflation, but thinks inflation will be a problem in coming years.

Buffett repeated his criticism of "cap and trade" as a method to control pollution, saying it would be a huge, regressive tax.

Can You Imagine a Male Nominee Getting Away with This?

WASHINGTON (AP) - Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor resigned Friday from an elite all-women's club after Republicans questioned her participation in it. Sotomayor said she resigned from the Belizean Grove to prevent the issue from becoming a distraction in her confirmation hearings.

In a letter to Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont and Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama, the federal appeals court judge said she is convinced that the club does not practice "invidious discrimination" and that her membership in it did not violate judicial ethics.

But she said she didn't want questions about it to "distract anyone from my qualifications and record."

Federal judges are bound by a code that says they shouldn't join any organization that discriminates by race, sex, religion or nationality.

The Belizean Grove bills itself as women's answer to the 130-year-old all-male Bohemian Club in California. The club owns a 2,500-acre camping area in northern California called the Grove.

Chief Justice Earl Warren belonged to the Bohemian Club beginning in the 1940s, before he joined the court and long before the federal judiciary adopted a code of conduct.

"The Belizean Grove is a constellation of influential women who are key decision makers in the profit, non-profit and social sectors; who build long term mutually beneficial relationships in order to both take charge of their own destinies and help others to do the same," the group says on its Web site. There are about 115 members, the club says.

Earlier in the week, Sotomayor defended her participation in the group, telling senators that it involves men in some of its events and that she was unaware of any man who had tried to become a member.

Sotomayor's backers noted that the court's only current woman, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, belongs to the membership-only International Women's Forum. So did former Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who defended her involvement in all-women groups during her Senate confirmation hearings in 1981.

Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy faced similar questions over his longtime membership in the all-male Olympic Club in San Francisco. Kennedy resigned his membership in October 1987, as he was under consideration for the high court.

Government Math

Louisiana Senator, Mary Landrieu (D), is presently asking the Congress for $250 BILLION to rebuild New Orleans. Interesting number, what does it mean?

A. Well, if you are one of 484,674 residents of New Orleans (every man, woman and child), you each get $516,528.

B. Or, if you have one of the 188,251 homes in New Orleans , your home gets $1,329,787.

C. Or, if you are a family of four, your family gets $2,066,012.

Earth to Washington, D. C: HELLO!

Are all of your calculators broken??

Canadian Healthcare

Is this what you want...?

* A 16% higher cancer death rate in Canada

* An eight week wait for radiation therapy for cancer patients

* 42% of Canadians die of colon cancer vs. 31% in the US

* Cutbacks in diagnostic testing

* The best meds for chemo therapy are not available

* No way out of the system; you can't even pay for services yourself

Why is health care so bad north of the border? Because there are too few doctors to treat everybody, and cost savings -- which slice medical incomes -- drive doctors out of the profession.

When Obama calls for a 21% cut in Medicare fees to physicians and a $2500 cut in health costs per capita, that is exactly the kind of downward spiral in medical care quality he will bring to the United States.

By making too few doctors cover too many patients, he will cut the quality of care to everybody.

Say "No!" to ObamaCare!

Commander In Chief, My A**!

For those who do not know Dave Borden, he is a former Black & Decker employee who lives in Hanover, MA. His son, Dave Jr., was serving in Iraq and was badly injured from a bomb explosion. Dave Jr. has had over 38 surgeries to date. The email below is from Dave Borden about a recent visit to his son by President Obama. The email speaks for itself...

Since Dave Jr. has been injured he has met and been overwhelmed by many, many political and military celebrities. The list includes Secretary of State Bob Gates, who came into his room and told him 3 or 4 times that if Dave Jr. had any issues to call his cell phone number.

It includes General Petraeus who sat and talked with Dave Jr. for almost 45 minutes. The general recalled vividly all of the circumstances around the events that led to fighting that Dave was involved in.

It includes Sen. McCain who arrived late on a Saturday afternoon during a thunderstorm, unannounced, and talked to Dave Jr. about how similar their experiences with fate were.

It includes George Bush when Dave Jr. was invited to attend the very last Christmas party at the White House for the White House Staff. President Bush and his wife entered the ballroom and immediately went to Dave Jr. President Bush knew Dave Jr.'s name as well as when and how he was injured. Dave Jr. had a picture taken with Laura and the President that he has framed and will cherish forever.

The list goes on and on of people coming in to meet Dave Jr. and the other wounded warriors at Waler Reed and Bethesda. Yesterday, Dave Jr. was ordered to be at the National Naval Hospital with another 12 soldiers and Marines to meet with Obama. Obama was supposed to arrive at 11:30 a.m. He finally got there at 3:00 p.m. He entered the room with the wounded warriors and quickly shook each of their hands. He never asked their names, where they were from, or how they were injured. Then he left.

Dave Jr. has met the people who really care about the military. All he remembers from Obama is a weak handshake. The others in the room, younger and less exposed to the people that Dave Jr. has met, were so disappointed.

Word about Obama's "insensitive" visit has spread to the MATC (the rehab facility) at Walter Reed and throughout Bethesda. The military sees through his phoniness. All I can say is that it is such a disappointment that this man is Commander in Chief of our Armed Forces. He is an embarrasment to our nation.

Regards,

Dave Borden, Sr.

Quote of the Week


"If George W. Bush had proposed to double the national debt, which had taken more than two centuries to accumulate, in one year, would the media have approved? And if George W. Bush then proposed to double the debt again within 10 years, would the media have approved?"

Tuesday, June 23, 2009

California: A Glimpse Into America's Future


Thanks to runaway liberalism, California is going bankrupt...


California Collapsing


Washington and Wall Street seem to be treating California as if it were a sideshow in the financial circus of these turbulent times.

It's not.

California is home to the largest manufacturing belt in the United States and to Silicon Valley, the nation's largest high-tech center.

California is America's most populous state with 38 million people. Its GDP of $1.8 trillion is the largest in the U.S. Its economy is bigger than those of Russia, Brazil, Canada, or India.

And it's collapsing.

Major California counties are ground zero in the continuing mortgage meltdown:

Los Angeles County with 5.32 percent of mortgages 90 days past due ... Monterrey County, 8.02 percent ... Imperial, 8.13 ... San Bernadino, 8.66 ... Madeira, 9.21 ... San Joaquin, 9.53 ... Riverside, 10.2 ... Merced, 10.57 ... and more!

California's inventory of foreclosed homes is skyrocketing. Home prices are plunging. And the impact of surging unemployment is just beginning to show up in the data ...

Worst Unemployment in 64 Years

The state's unemployment rate has surged to 11.5 percent, the worst since World War II.


Last month, California lost 68,900 jobs. And since July 2007, it has lost 859,000 jobs, including 739,500 just in the past 12 months.

Even if the economy recovers, an unlikely scenario in my view, economists agree that California will continue to be slammed by layoffs, at least through the end of this year and probably well into 2010.

And even assuming a national recovery, UCLA's Anderson Forecast projects an average unemployment rate of 12.1 percent from this fall through next spring.

What about without a national recovery? California's jobless could go beyond 15 percent.

Worse, if you include part-time workers seeking full-time work plus workers who have given up looking entirely, it could reach 25 percent, exceeding the worst national unemployment levels of the Great Depression.

"Our wallet is empty.Our bank is closed. Andour credit is dried up."

These are not the words of a Dr. Doom in New York or a forlorn banker in Georgia. They represent the confession of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger before a rare joint session of the California legislature ... and with no exaggeration!

The state faces a stunning $24.3 billion budget deficit, even assuming no significant deterioration in the economy from this point onward. And the state has lost virtually all hope of President Obama declaring, "California is too big to fail."

California State Treasurer Bill Lockyer tried to make that argument to Washington, and did so with great vigor. But he was rejected. After the long line-up of failed companies with hat in hand in recent months — on the steps of Congress or the White House lawn — some folks in government finally appear to have learned how to just say "no."

"You're on your own," is the message from the president to the governor. "Beyond your share of the stimulus package, that's it! No more!"

Result: The inevitability of massive state cutbacks, including large numbers of state jobs getting axed — all while the California jobless rate is already 11.5 percent.

How many state jobs are in jeopardy? Right now, Schwarzenegger is proposing laying off 5,000 state employees, as well as slashing education and social welfare programs. But the Anderson Forecast projects that Schwarzenegger's budget cuts will eventually result in 64,000 job cuts from state government plus countless private-sector and local government jobs.

Massive Downgrades Coming

California's credit rating is already the lowest among all U.S. states.

But with Moody's, S&P, and Fitch still greatly influenced by massive conflicts of interest, it's not nearly low enough.

And sure enough, on Friday, Moody's tacitly admitted as much, announcing that it may have to cut California's rating by several notches in one fell swoop!

Standard & Poor's put California on watch for a possible downgrade a few days earlier. Fitch did the same May 29.

The big problem: Once downgraded, California's rating is likely to fall below the minimal level legally required for most money market funds, forcing these funds to dump California paper posthaste.

Moody's wrote:

"If the Legislature does not take action quickly, the state's cash situation will deteriorate to the point where the controller will have to delay most non-priority payments in July. ... Lack of action could result in a multi-notch downgrade."

But lack of action is precisely what Sacramento is now becoming most famous for. In fact, in their latest scuffle, Democrats proposed a budget that would raise $2 billion from cigarette taxes and oil companies. But the governor promptly vetoed the plan. So now Sacramento is in a new, escalating battle over the deficit just weeks before the state is expected to run out of cash to meet payroll and other bills.

State officials continue to insist that a state default is unthinkable ... much like GM executives said their bankruptcy could never happen.

In my view, there is a very HIGH probability that California will default.

It's obvious its debt merits a junk bond rating from every Wall Street rating agency.

And it's equally obvious that the ratings agencies are artificially inflating the rating, stalling downgrades, and grossly understating the risk to investors.

My recommendations:

1. If you wait for Moody's or S&P to act, it could be too late. Even if you can't get what you might consider a good price, sell all California paper now!

2. Seriously consider dumping all tax-exempt bonds. I know the income is better than equivalent Treasuries. But if California defaults, it could set off a chain reaction of bond price plunges and defaults throughout the municipal bond market.

3. Don't underestimate the impact California's depression is having — and will continue to have — on the rest of the U.S. economy. At $1.8 trillion, the state's GDP is so large, any further deterioration could wipe out every so-called "green shoot" in the national economy seen to date.

4. Stay safe, with a big portion of your nest egg in cash, tucked away in short-term Treasury bills ... and with a very modest portion in gold, as an insurance policy against a dollar decline.

Good luck and God bless!

Monday, June 22, 2009

Rebranding ACORN

That's what liberals do...they just rebrand themselves. Homosexuals became "gays", global warming became "climate change", and even liberals themselves became "progressives". But it's all a ruse. They never change their behavior. They're still liberals, with liberal views.

Tarnished by Vote-Fraud Investigations, Liberal ACORN Launches Re-Branding Effort

ACORN's entanglements with vote-fraud allegations have grown so radioactive that the organization may jettison the ACORN name altogether.

ACORN's global entity, ACORN International, announced June 17 that it has changed its name to "Community Organizations International."

Speculation is rampant that the parent ACORN organization, whose formal name is the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, is considering a name-change as well.
The rebranding is seen as an indication that mounting fraud allegations are taking a heavy toll.

"This may indeed be the beginning of an ACORN network-wide rebranding, but a rotten ACORN by any other name still stinks," Matthew Vadum, a staunch ACORN critic at the Capital Research Center think tank, tells Newsmax.

Vadum describes ACORN International as "a nonprofit group that aspires to spread the gospel of [radical community organizer] Saul Alinsky across the globe."

Criminal prosecutions and investigations pending against ACORN and its former workers include:

An ongoing FBI probe.

Fourteen states are looking into vote-fraud allegations against ACORN.

In Las Vegas and Pittsburgh, prosecutors have filed indictments against several former ACORN operatives. Charges focus on the organization's alleged practice of establishing quotas specifying the number of registrations workers were required to submit each day. Many states outlaw such quotas, for fear they may pressure canvassers into encouraging fraudulent registrations.

Ohio's Cuyahoga County has indicted Darnell Nash, an ACORN-registered voter, for voting illegally. Nash registered to vote on nine occasions, using different names and addresses each time.

Investigators have said that as many as 4,000 ACORN voter registrations in Ohio could be fraudulent.

ACORN International has stated that its mission is to "sustain grassroots organizing throughout the world."

ACORN and ACORN International have interlocking directorates. In its 2007 tax filing, ACORN International listed its president as Maude Hurd, who also serves as president of the parent ACORN organization. Both organizations are based in New Orleans.

"ACORN's brand has been damaged through their own actions. It would certainly be understandable if they decided to change their name,” Marcel Reid, a former ACORN board member who now serves as chairman of ACORN 8, tells Newsmax.

ACORN 8 is a group of former ACORN reformers who concluded that what really needs reform is ACORN.

On June 11, ACORN attorneys wrote a letter to ACORN 8 alleging its name "has confused third-parties into believing that you are part of, you speak for, or have been endorsed by ACORN."

The letter threatens "monetary damages and injunctive relief" if ACORN 8 does not "cease and desist from using the ACORN name."

Reid counters that while ACORN is an acronym, ACORN 8 is her group's actual name. "We have no intention of changing our name unless required to do so," Reid tells Newsmax.

Reid adds: "ACORN's brand has been damaged through their own actions. It would certainly be understandable if they decided to change their name.”

ACORN's attorneys wrote in their letter to ACORN 8: "It appears you are benefiting from the goodwill established by ACORN at great expense to ACORN."

Last fall, then-presidential candidate John McCain charged that ACORN was “on the verge of maybe perpetrating one of the greatest frauds in voter history in this country.”

At the time, media critics suggested McCain was overreacting.

This Doesn't Pass the Smell Test

The very companies that caused the worldwide financial crisis are about to announce record Q2 profits and record bonuses for their employees, but wait 'til you read WHY...

Goldman to make record bonus payout

Phillip Inman
The Observer
June 21, 2009

Staff at Goldman Sachs staff can look forward to the biggest bonus payouts in the firm's 140-year history after a spectacular first half of the year, sparking concern that the big investment banks which survived the credit crunch will derail financial regulation reforms.

A lack of competition and a surge in revenues from trading foreign currency, bonds and fixed-income products has sent profits at Goldman Sachs soaring, according to insiders at the firm.

Staff in London were briefed last week on the banking and securities company's prospects and told they could look forward to bumper bonuses if, as predicted, it completed its most profitable year ever. Figures next month detailing the firm's second-quarter earnings are expected to show a further jump in profits. Warren Buffett, who bought $5bn of the company's shares in January, has already made a $1bn gain on his investment.

Goldman is expected to be the biggest winner in the race for revenues that, in 2006, reached £186bn across the entire industry. While this figure is expected to fall to £160bn in 2009, it will be split among a smaller number of firms.

Barclays Capital, Credit Suisse and Deutsche Bank are among the European firms expected to register bumper profits, along with US banks JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley following the near collapse and government rescue of major trading houses including Citigroup, Merrill Lynch, UBS and Royal Bank of Scotland.

In April, Goldman said it would set aside half of its £1.2bn first-quarter profit to reward staff, much of it in bonuses. It is believed to have paid 973 bankers $1m or more last year, while this year's payouts are on track to be the highest for most of the bank's 28,000 staff, including about 5,400 in London.

Critics of the bonus culture in the City said the dominance of a few risk-taking investment banks is undermining the efforts of regulators to stabilise the financial system.

Vince Cable, the Liberal Democrat treasury spokesman, said: "The investment banks more than any other institutions created the culture of excessive leverage, excessive risk and excessive bonuses that led to the downfall of the financial system. Now they are cashing in and the same bonus culture has returned. The result must be that we are being pushed to the edge of another crash."

Goldman Sachs said it reviewed its bonus scheme last year and switched from a system of guaranteed rewards that were paid over three years to variable payments that tied staff to the firm. It told employees last year that profit-related bonuses would be delayed by 12 months.
Until the release of its first quarter profits in April, it seemed inconceivable that a firm owing the US government $10bn would be looking to break all-time records in 2009.

David Williams, an investment banking analyst at Fox Pitt Kelton, said: "This year is shaping up to be the best year ever for investment banks, or at least those that have emerged relatively unscathed from the credit crisis.

"These banks are intermediaries in the bond markets where governments and companies are raising billions of pounds of new money. There is also a lack of competition that means they can charge huge sums for doing business."

Last week, the firm predicted that President Barack Obama's government could issue $3.25tn of debt before September, almost four times last year's sum. Goldman, a prime broker of US government bonds, is expected to make hundreds of millions of dollars in profits from selling and dealing in the bonds.

Thursday, June 18, 2009

DISGUSTING!

Here is yet another reason to hate arrogant, pompous, liberals...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TBnbv4rmOmg&feature=email

Talk about disrespecting our military!

WE ARE COMING!

This woman speaks for me...she lives in Arizona, and she recently sent the following letter to the president and congress. Does she speak for you?

"I'm a home grown American citizen, 53, registered Democrat all my life. Before the last presidential election I registered as a Republican because I no longer felt the Democratic Party represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me.

Now I no longer feel the Republican Party represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me. The fact is I no longer feel any political party or representative in Washington represents my views or works to pursue the issues important to me. There must be someone.

Please tell me who you are. Please stand up and tell me that you are there and that you're willing to fight for our Constitution as it was written. Please stand up now. You might ask yourself what my views and issues are that I would feel so horribly disenfranchised by both major political parties. What kind of nut job am I? Will you please tell me?

Well, these are briefly my views and issues for which I seek representation:

One, illegal immigration. I want you to stop coddling illegal immigrants and secure our borders. Close the underground tunnels. Stop the violence and the trafficking in drugs and people. No amnesty, not again. Been there, done that, no resolution. P.S., I'm not a racist. This isn't to be confused with legal immigration.

Two, the TARP bill, I want it repealed and I want no further funding supplied to it. We told you no, but you did it anyway. I want the remaining unfunded 95% repealed. Freeze, repeal.

Three, Czars, I want the circumvention of our checks and balances stopped immediately. Fire the czars. No more czars. Government officials answer to the process, not to the president. Stop trampling on our Constitution and honor it.

Four, cap and trade. The debate on global warming is not over. There is more to say.

Five, universal healthcare. I will not be rushed into another expensive decision. Don't you dare try to pass this in the middle of the night and then go on break. Slow down!

Six, growing government control. I want states rights and sovereignty fully restored. I want less government in my life, not more. Shrink it down. Mind your own business. You have enough to take care of with your real obligations. Why don't you start there.

Seven, ACORN. I do not want ACORN and its affiliates in charge of our 2010 census. I want them investigated. I also do not want mandatory escrow fees contributed to them every time on every real estate deal that closes. Stop the funding to ACORN and its affiliates pending impartial audits and investigations. I do not trust them with taking the census over with our taxpayer money. I don't trust them with our taxpayer money. Face up to the allegations against them and get it resolved before taxpayers get any more involved with them. If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, hello. Stop protecting your political buddies. You work for us, the people. Investigate.

Eight, redistribution of wealth. No, no, no. I work for my money. It is mine. I have always worked for people with more money than I have because they gave me jobs. That is the only redistribution of wealth that I will support. I never got a job from a poor person. Why do you want me to hate my employers? Why ‑‑ what do you have against shareholders making a profit?

Nine, charitable contributions. Although I never got a job from a poor person, I have helped many in need. Charity belongs in our local communities, where we know our needs best and can use our local talent and our local resources. Butt out, please. We want to do it ourselves.

Ten, corporate bailouts. Knock it off. Sink or swim like the rest of us. If there are hard times ahead, we'll be better off just getting into it and letting the strong survive. Quick and painful. Have you ever ripped off a Band‑Aid? We will pull together. Great things happen in America under great hardship. Give us the chance to innovate. We cannot disappoint you more than you have disappointed us.

Eleven, transparency and accountability. How about it? No, really, how about it? Let's have it. Let's say we give the buzzwords a rest and have some straight honest talk. Please try ‑‑ please stop manipulating and trying to appease me with clever wording. I am not the idiot you obviously take me for. Stop sneaking around and meeting in back rooms making deals with your friends. It will only be a prelude to your criminal investigation. Stop hiding things from me.

Twelve, unprecedented quick spending. Stop it now.

Take a breath. Listen to the people. Let's just slow down and get some input from some nonpoliticians on the subject. Stop making everything an emergency. Stop speed reading our bills into law. I am not an activist. I am not a community organizer. Nor am I a terrorist, a militant or a violent person. I am a parent and a grandparent. I work. I'm busy. I'm busy. I am busy, and I am tired. I thought we elected competent people to take care of the business of government so that we could work, raise our families, pay our bills, have a little recreation, complain about taxes, endure our hardships, pursue our personal goals, cut our lawn, wash our cars on the weekends and be responsible contributing members of society and teach our children to be the same all while living in the home of the free and land of the brave.

I entrusted you with upholding the Constitution. I believed in the checks and balances to keep from getting far off course. What happened? You are very far off course. Do you really think I find humor in the hiring of a speed reader to unintelligently ramble all through a bill that you signed into law without knowing what it contained? I do not. It is a mockery of the responsibility I have entrusted to you. It is a slap in the face. I am not laughing at your arrogance. Why is it that I feel as if you would not trust me to make a single decision about my own life and how I would live it but you should expect that I should trust you with the debt that you have laid on all of us and our children. We did not want the TARP bill. We said no. We would repeal it if we could. I am sure that we still cannot. There is such urgency and recklessness in all of the recent spending.

From my perspective, it seems that all of you have gone insane. I also know that I am far from alone in these feelings. Do you honestly feel that your current pursuits have merit to patriotic Americans? We want it to stop. We want to put the brakes on everything that is being rushed by us and forced upon us. We want our voice back. You have forced us to put our lives on hold to straighten out the mess that you are making. We will have to give up our vacations, our time spent with our children, any relaxation time we may have had and money we cannot afford to spend on you to bring our concerns to Washington. Our president often knows that the right buzzword is "unsustainable". Well, no kidding. How many tens of thousands of dollars did the focus group cost to come up with that word? We don't want your overpriced words. Stop treating us like we're morons.

We want all of you to stop focusing on your reelection and do the job we want done, not the job you want done or the job your party wants done. You work for us and at this rate I guarantee you not for long because we are coming. We will be heard and we will be represented. You think we're so busy with our lives that we will never come for you? We are the formerly silent majority, all of us who quietly work, pay taxes, obey the law, vote, save money, keep our noses to the grindstone and we are now looking up at you. You have awakened us, the patriotic spirit so strong and so powerful that it had been sleeping too long. You have pushed us too far.

Our numbers are great. They may surprise you. For every one of us who will be there, there will be hundreds more that could not come. Unlike you, we have their trust. We will represent them honestly, rest assured. They will be at the polls on voting day to usher you out of office. We have cancelled vacations. We will use our last few dollars saved. We will find the representation among us and a grassroots campaign will flourish. We didn't ask for this fight. But the gloves are coming off. We do not come in violence, but we are angry. You will represent us or you will be replaced with someone who will. There are candidates among us who will rise like a Phoenix from the ashes that you have made of our Constitution.

Democrat, Republican, independent, libertarian. Understand this. We don't care. Political parties are meaningless to us. Patriotic Americans are willing to do right by us and our Constitution and that is all that matters to us now. We are going to fire all of you who abuse power and seek more. It is not your power. It is ours and we want it back. We entrusted you with it and you abused it. You are dishonorable. You are dishonest. As Americans we are ashamed of you. You have brought shame to us. If you are not representing the wants and needs of your constituency loudly and consistently, in spite of the objections of your party, you will be fired. Did you hear?

We no longer care about your political parties. You need to be loyal to us, not to them. Because we will get you fired and they will not save you. If you do or can represent me, my issues, my views, please stand up. Make your identity known. You need to make some noise about it. Speak up. I need to know who you are. If you do not speak up, you will be herded out with the rest of the sheep and we will replace the whole damn congress if need be one by one. We are coming. Are we coming for you? Who do you represent? What do you represent? Listen. Because we are coming. We the people are coming."

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Congressional Medal of Honor Winner Talks About Real Torture

I'll take Bud Day's word over Barack Obama's on the subject of torture any day...

Medal of Honor Recipient Bud Day Talks of Torture

I got shot down over North Vietnam in 1967 as a squad commander. After I returned in 1973, I published two books that dealt a lot with "real torture" in Hanoi. Our make believe president is branding our country as a bunch of torturers when he has no idea what torture is.

As for me..put thru a mock execution because I would not respond...pistol whipped on the head...same event..

Couple of days later...hung by my feet all day. I escaped and got recaptured a couple of weeks later.. I got shot and recaptured. Shot was OK...what happened after was not.

They marched me to Vinh..Put me in the rope trick..almost pulled my arms out of the sockets. Beat me on the head with a little wooden rod until my eyes were swelled shut, and my unshot, unbroken hand a pulp.

Next day hung me by the arms...rebroke my right wrist...wiped out the nerves in my arms that control the hands..rolled my fingers up into a ball. Only left the slightest movement of my left forefinger. So I started answering with some incredible lies.

Sent me to Hanoi strapped to a barrel of gas in the back of a truck.

Hanoi ..on my knees..rope trick again. Beaten by a big fool.

Into leg irons on a bed in Heartbreak Hotel. Much kneeling--hands up at Zoo. Really bad beating for refusing to condemn Lyndon Johnson. Several more kneeling events. I could see my knee bone thru kneeling holes.

There was an escape from the annex to the Zoo. I was the senior officer of a large building... because of escape they started a mass torture of all commanders. I think it was July 7, 1969.

They started beating me with a car fan belt. In first 2 days I took over 300 strokes..then stopped counting because I never thought I would live thru it. They continued day-nite torture to get me to confess to a non-existent part in the escape.

This went on for at least 3 days. On my knees..fan belting.. Cut open my scrotum with fan belt stroke. Opened up both knee holes again. My fanny looked like hamburger..I could not lie on my back.They tortured me into admitting that I was in on the escape..and that my 2 roommates knew about it.

The next day I denied the lie.They commenced torturing me again with 3-6-or 9 strokes of the fan belt every day from about July 11 or 12 to 14 October 1969. I continued to refuse to lie about my roommates again.

Now, the point of this is that our make-believe president has declared to the world that we ( U.S. ) are a bunch of torturers. Thus it will be OK to torture us next time when they catch us....because that is what the U.S. Does.

Our make-believe president is a know nothing fool who thinks that pouring a little water on someone's face, or hanging a pair of women's pants over an Arab's head is TORTURE. He is a meathead.

I just talked to MOH holder Leo Thorsness who was also in my squad in jail...as was John McCain...and we agree that McCain does not speak for the POW group when he claims that Abu Ghraib was torture orr that "water boarding" is torture.

Our president and those fools around him who keep bad mouthing our great country are a disgrace to the United States.

Please pass this info on to Sean Hannity. He is free to use it to point out the stupidity of the claims that water boarding...which has no after effect...is torture. If it got the Arab to cough up the story about how he planned the attack on the twin towers in NYC ... hurrah for the guy who poured the water.

Bud Day,
MOH
*********
George Everett "Bud" Day (born February 24, 1925) is a retired U.S. Air Force Colonel and Command Pilot who served during the Vietnam War. He is often cited as being the most decorated U.S. Service member since General Douglas MacArthur, having received some seventy decorations, a majority for actions in combat. Day is a recipient of the Medal of Honor.
Click here for the full story of Bud Day: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bud_Day

Change?

Here's a recycled idea that just came across my desk...

Not long ago I read a joke ... It said all the politicians running for president are promising change to the American people. We send them billions and billions of tax dollars and they send us the change.

Funny? Not really; there is too much truth in it to be funny. That got me to thinking ... They all promise change. How about if they run on a promise of restoration rather than change. A restoration that would take us back in time to a place where things ran better, smoother and life was more enjoyable.

Change? That, in truth, is what they have been giving us all along.

We used to have a strong dollar ... Politicians changed that.

Marriage used to be sacred .. Politicians are changing that.

We used to be respected around the world ... Politicians changed that.

We used to have a strong manufacturing economy ... Politicians changed that.

We used to have lower tax structures ... Politicians changed that.

We used to enjoy more freedoms ... Politicians changed that.

We used to be a large exporter of American made goods ... Politicians changed that.

We used to teach patriotism in schools ... Politicians changed that.

We used to educate children in schools ... Politicians changed that.

We used to enforce LEGAL citizenship ... Politicians changed that.

We used to have affordable food & gas prices ... Politicians changed that, too. ... and one could go on and on with this list.

What hasn't been changed, politicians are promising to change that as well, if you will elect them.

When, oh when, is America going to sit back with open eyes and look at what we once were and where we have come and say, enough is enough? The trouble is, America 's youthful voters today don't know of the great America that existed forty and fifty years ago.

They see the world as if it has always existed, as it is now . When will we wake up? Tomorrow may be too late. When will America realize ... Politicians are what is wrong with America ?
What is needed is for the constitution to be amended to limit all Senators and Representatives to TWO terms in office like the president. No big pension either. Social Security just like the rest of us.

Being a politician shouldn't be a persons life work but rather a call to service then back to being an honest hard working citizen.

Government Land Grab

Watch out for this bill: The Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA) (S787). It is NOT about clean water. Here is what it will do...

Besides private property, the Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA) (S 787) threatens businesses, agriculture, small communities, grazing, forestry, mining and many other uses on private and Federal land. It will affect many kinds of manufacturing companies and businesses.

The Real Goal of the Clean Water Restoration Act (S787) is to give Corps and EPA Control over your water and all your watersheds. That means National Land Use Controls as well as control over all your water and land. That’s because all land is in a watershed. The proposed Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA) (S787), which has no House bill number yet, will give the Corps and EPA jurisdiction and control over your property and water.

It will redefine what the term “wetlands” means in the law. It will eliminate the requirement that the Corps and EPA limit their jurisdiction to “Navigable” waters and give those agencies control over all waters of the US or “activities” affecting those waters.

Congress is considering expanding the jurisdiction of the Clean Water Act of 1972 to include “all waters of the United States” and not limit it to “navigable waters” as is currently the law under two Supreme Court Decisions, the Rapanos and SWANCC Supreme Court Decisions of 2006 and 2001.

Congress is also considering expanding Clean Water Act jurisdiction to include “all activities affecting these waters.” In other words, the bill is a double whammy: It expands the definition of waters and gives the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Corps of Engineers (Corps) and other Federal agencies control over activities that affect waters—any land use activities.

We need to stop this in its tracks. There must be an all out call of outrage to the Senators on the Committee opposing a vote until they hold a hearing this year on the new bill S 787. You can call any Senator at (202) 224-3121. Make sure they know you oppose S 787 and urge them to vote against it. Remind them that a "Yes" vote on this bill could cost them their jobs!