Ineptocracy

Ineptocracy   (in-ep-toc’-ra-cy)   - a system of government where the least capable to lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a diminishing number of producers. 

We truly are at the crossroads where the American electorate will decide in November, 2012, for better or for worse, what type of society we will be.   Four more years of Obama will result in a situation where we cannot recover.

The Chicago Way of voting

Attorney general Eric Holder Wednesday called for an end to state laws requiring voters to show identification at polling stations.

Voter identification laws are constitutional and necessary to prevent fraud at the ballot box. Facing an election challenge next year, this administration has chosen to target efforts by the states to protect the democratic process.

The increased pressure on Holder came on the same day that 22 House Republicans proposed a vote of no confidence in him for his handling of the Fast and Furious gunrunning scheme.

First, with the Fast and Furious gunrunning operation, then with the laundering of U.S taxpayers money to Mexican cartels and finally now an attempt to circumvent the states’ rights to promote secure elections, Attorney General Holder has shown that he is completely out of touch with the American people.

Republicans have been increasingly concerned that the administration wants to loosen voter identification laws in states with significant numbers of immigrants, poor and black voters to help Barack Obama win among traditionally-Democratic leaning minorities in the 2012 election.


The attorney general said he was concerned about measures that tended “to restrict in ways that are subtle, and sometimes not so subtle, the ability of the American people to cast their ballots.” He said protecting access to the voting process “must be viewed not only as a legal issue but as a moral imperative.”

“Georgia’s law has been in place for five years,” added von Spakovsky, a Justice Department official in the George W. Bush administration. “Not only did the turnout for African Americans not go down, it went up.”

One wonders why the attorney general refused to prosecute the Black Panthers who stood at the entrance of the polling place in downtown Philadelphia while brandishing clubs.   Was this not subtle enough?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203550604574361071968458430.html

One World Government?

Now that the United Nations has passed a global climate tax on (who else?) the United States and any other nation that has any wealth left, what are we to think of this new UN slush fund?    This is nothing more than another attempt to redistribute our wealth to UN elitists and bureaucrats first and then whatever scraps are left over, to various third-world nations.  The UN is composed of over 100 nations who are run by thugs, dictators, and despots who do not share our values.  The best thing we could do is to give all UN types 48 hours notice to vacate our sovereign land as we are repossessing it under our eminent domain laws.  And by the way, we are confiscating all personal property until you pay up all the parking tickets you have accumulated during your stay here.  And when you are gone, we are turning the real estate over to Donald Trump to develop into condos.  New York City could use some more property tax revenue.
We do not accept your phony "man-made global climate change" hoax.


CLIMATE CHANGE GLOSSARY


PEER REVIEW: The act of banding together a group of like-minded academics with a funding conflict of interest, for the purpose of squeezing out any research voices that threaten the multi-million dollar government grant gravy train.

SETTLED SCIENCE: Betrayal of the scientific method for politics or money or both.

DENIER: Anyone who suspects the truth.

CLIMATE CHANGE: What has been happening for billions of years, but should now be flogged to produce ‘panic for profit.’

NOBEL PEACE PRIZE: Leftist Nutcase Prize, unrelated to “Peace” in any meaningful way.

DATA, EVIDENCE: Unnecessary details. If anyone asks for this, see “DENIER,” above.

CLIMATE SCIENTIST: A person skilled in spouting obscure, scientific-sounding jargon that has the effect of deflecting requests for “DATA” by “DENIERS.” Also skilled at affecting an aura of “Smartest Person in the Room” to buffalo gullible legislators and journalists.

JUNK SCIENCE: The use of invalid scientific evidence resulting in findings of causation which simply cannot be justified or understood from the standpoint of the current state of credible scientific or medical knowledge.

Corzine.... would you buy a used car from this man?

" I honestly do not know what happened to that 1.2 billion dollars.  But don't look in my back pocket."

Message of the Wall Street Protestors

"Government is corrupted by power and money, and we need more government with more money to run more things and give us free stuff."

Deportation ?

"The United States deported a record number of nearly 400,000 people in fiscal year 2011 than ever before, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) statistics released Tuesday."

As I read the above I visualize trying to empty a bucket of water with a spoon while the bucket is under a tap of running water.  What the ICE did not bother to mention is how many of those 400,000 will be back in the US within a month.

SEAL THE BORDER!!

Wall Street Protestors

Smelly, left-wing hippies reincarnated from the 1960's  protesting against all that is and protesting for all that is not... who don't know
 10% of what they think they know....who hate Capitalism and love Socialism because they are "entitled".....who really should be kissing the ground of the great nation they live in because in all those places they love, they would be shot.... 

I am reminded of Winston Churchill's famous quote:  
"If you are not liberal when young, you have no heart and if you are not conservative when old, you have no brain."

I am not at all surprised to learn that the labor unions and the political Left support these dregs of society.  "Birds of a feather, flock together."

Republicans are Racist?

Janeane Garofalo: "Herman Cain is probably well liked by some of the Republicans because it hides the racist elements of the Republican party. Conservative movement and tea party movement, one in the same.

"People like Karl Rove liked to keep the racism very covert. And so Herman Cain provides this great opportunity say you can say 'Look, this is not a racist, anti-immigrant, anti-female, anti-gay movement. Look we have a black man.'"

Whenever liberals are desperate and are losing the political argument, they always play their trump card, the race card.  Do they realize how silly they appear?  Do they care?

The newest protected class

One of the provisions in Obama's proposed "Jobs Bill" is to establish a NEW category of outlawed discrimination. If the bill is passed, a new legally protected classification would be the "unemployed."   It would be illegal not to hire a person applying for a job if he/she is unemployed.    Yes, you read that right.  So, if unemployed Joe Blow applies for a job and doesn't get that job, he can now sue the company for discrimination.   It seems to me that this would make any employer NOT want even interveiw or give job applications to any unemployed person.  The only jobs this might help would be for the trial lawyers.   The liberals are certifiably insane.

The Difference

To Obama, it's all about Obama:

 

The difference between 'class' and 'ass';

 George W. Bush speech after capture of Saddam Hussein:   The success of yesterday's mission is a tribute to our men and women now serving in Iraq . The operation was based on the superb work of intelligence analysts who found the dictator's footprints in a vast country. The operation was carried out with skill and precision by a brave fighting force. Our servicemen and women and our coalition allies have faced many dangers in the hunt for members of the fallen regime, and in their effort to bring hope and freedom to the Iraqi people. Their work continues, and so do the risks. Today, on behalf of the nation, I thank the members of our Armed Forces and I congratulate them. 

 Barack Hussein Obama speech, Sunday, May 1, 2011:   And so shortly after taking office, I directed Leon Panetta, the director of the CIA, to make thekilling or capture of bin Laden the top priority of my war against al Qaeda, even as I continued our broader efforts to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat his network. Then, last August, after years of painstaking work by my intelligence community, I was briefed ona possible lead to bin Laden. It was far from certain, and it took many months to run this threadto ground. I met repeatedly with my national security team as we developed more information about the possibility that we had located bin Laden hiding within a compound deep inside of Pakistan. And finally, last week, I determined that I had enough intelligence to take action, and I authorized an operation to get Osama bin Laden and bring him to justice.Today, at my direction, the United States launched a targeted operation against that compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan.

 

Marco Rubio for Vice President

Here is an excellent essay (written by a Black conservative female....how rare is that?) that points out the relationship between our fiscal crisis and our cultural rot.

I agree 100%

Slyfox

 September 5, 2011

 By Star Parker

9/5/2011

Florida’s young Republican Senator Marco Rubio gave an important speech at the Reagan Presidential Library in California that has set off the liberal talking head universe.
He had the temerity to suggest that the huge growth in government’s role in American life over the last century “actually weakened us as a people.”
The resulting onslaught from liberal blogs and cable hosts comes as no surprise because Rubio directly took on the idol at which liberals worship – Big Government.
But his analysis was courageous and profound.
Eighty percent of Americans are not happy with the direction of the country. And, new Gallup polling shows that only 17 percent are positively disposed toward the federal government.
Americans want answers.
Senator Rubio, in this speech, stepped up to the plate to provide answers.
If liberals disagree, they are going to have to get equally serious. They’ve certainly got to do better than MSNBC’s Ed Schultz, calling Rubio “a political hack” who wants “to get rid of social safety nets.”
Our fiscal crisis is undeniable. The trillions in debt we’ve taken on to finance massive government spending has resulted in the unthinkable downgrading in rating of our government’s bonds.
But Senator Rubio took a bold step beyond looking at our problems just as an accountant.
He suggested that we cannot separate our budget from our culture. The culture of government has displaced the culture of personal responsibility.
I have been making the point for years regarding what the welfare state culture has done in our black communities. How it has created a permanent underclass, defined by family breakdown, sexual promiscuity, disease, and crime.
American culture has changed profoundly over these years that Americans have come to increasingly believe that government social engineering can solve life’s problems and challenges.
A snapshot of today’s American family shows how much things have changed, even compared to 1981 when President Reagan took office.
Since 1980, the percentage of babies in America born to unwed mothers has doubled, from 20 percent to 40 percent.
Fifty two percent of Americans over the age of 18 are married today, compared to 72 percent in 1960.
Among blacks, 44% of the population over 18 has never been married, compared to 17% in 1960.
Sixty four percent of American children today live in a home with two married parents, compared with 75 percent in 1980 and 87 percent in 1960.
And, according to the Pew Research Center, 44 percent of those between ages of 18 to 29 “agree marriage is becoming obsolete.”
We used to be a nation, as Senator Rubio pointed out, where parents raised and cared for children, then those children cared for their aging parents. Where neighbors cared for neighbors.
We might note that the welfare state idea is not an American invention but an import from Europe. We also might note that about 20 percent of Europeans attend church regularly, half that of Americans.
Europe is characterized today by low birth rates – so low that they are not replacing themselves – and high unemployment rates. The unemployment rate in France has hovered between 8 and 11 percent over the last 25 years.
We must wonder if even we can take on our fiscal problems, if traditional American family life can be restored, and if we believe it even matters.
It is to Senator Rubio’s considerable credit that he has stood up to argue that we must look at the picture of our nation in its entirety. That we cannot separate our budget matters and our attitude toward government from our overall culture and our personal behavior.
What is before us today is not a battle of competing numbers but a battle of competing visions.
Is America to continue in the direction of welfare state materialism? Or will this be a free nation under God?

Star Parker

Star Parker is founder and president of CURE, the Center for Urban Renewal and Education, a 501c3 think tank which explores and promotes market based public policy to fight poverty, as well as author of the newly revised Uncle Sam's Plantation: How Big Government Enslaves America's Poor and What We Can do About It.

New Orleans

The recent Hurricaine Irene reminds me of Hurricaine Katrina and how people react to pending natural disasters.  Do they evacuate?  Do they rebuild?  What happens to the people?

In New Orleans' Lower 9th Ward, the grasses grow taller than people and street after street is scarred by empty decaying houses, Most buildings are shuttered, "For Sale" signs stuck on their sides. There aren't many buyers. And the businesses that are open are mostly corner stores where folks buy pricey cigarettes, liquor and packaged food.   This is the face of liberalism and generational welfare.  The Left likes to point fingers at greedy Republicans for this misery.  The real villain is the insidious entitlement mentality fostered by 50 years of big government misguided generosity.  If logic and reason were to prevail, no attempts nor money would be spent to rebuild this below-sea-level city where the next big hurricane will flood it yet again.  Better to bulldoze it, fire all Democrat politicians and relocate New Orleans to higher ground.  And instead of welcoming back all the former residents, scatter them around to conservative areas where they just might, as the result of osmosis, absorb better values.   When thousands of children of welfare see no proper role models, they adopt the culture they see.   It is a vicious circle.

Tale of Two Busses

Washington Monument

The recent earthquake near Washington D.C. resulted in some damage to the iconic landmark, the Washington Monument.  Several cracks in the exterior masonry are visible and debris fell to the floor of the observation platform at the top.  I could not help but ponder the symbolism.   Our nation is cracking up too.  The monument can and will be repaired.  The damage to our nation is far more serious and unlike the monument, is getting worse by the hour.   We are experiencing a 24 hour per day earthquake.  Hold on and pray the shaking stops soon.

Un-freakin’-believable: Obama puts Israel on list of countries that support terrorism

June 30, 2011

Can someone please explain to us why there is a single Jew left in America who supports Obama and the Democrats? No, seriously. Someone explain, because It is a complete mystery to us.
Especially now that the Obama administration has used the most twisted logic imaginable to justify listing Israel as a nation that supports terrorism.

So says the Obama administration

CNS News has the bizarre details:

In an implicit admission that Israel is so threatened by terrorism that it is not only surrounded by countries and territories that produce terrorists but also unwillingly harbors terrorists within its own territory in a way the most other nations in the world do not, the Obama administration is currently listing Israel among 36 “specially designated countries” it believes “have shown a tendency to promote, produce, or protect terrorist organizations or their members.”

To review, Israel is threatened by terrorism. Israel unwillingly harbors terrorists. Therefore, Israel promotes terrorism.
It’s going to take someone much smarter than us to figure out the serpentine logic in that statement.
Source: CNS News

Elmer Fudd

I am not impressed with any Republican candidate (Huntsmann) who attempts to marginalize the Tea Party.   Our nation does not need, nor can the Republican Party survive, another RINO (Republican-In-Name-Only).   Whenever you hear liberals moan and groan about the Tea Party, you can be sure that the reason is they are scared of them.  The Tea Party is not just Republicans, but includes Independents and moderate Democrats who have finally realized that the USA simply cannot survive with the current level of government spending resulting in an unsustainable debt load.  Just think what we could do if we did not have to spend so much just to service the interest on the debt?  The social issues advocated by conservatives are also important as the cultural rot the US has experienced in the past 50 years is a huge factor in our nation's decline.   I like Perry.  I like Mitt Romney.   I like Michelle Bachman.   I just want the most conservative candidate that has the best chance of actually winning the election.   But I would vote for Elmer Fudd over Obama. 

Lybia and Syria

I don't get too excited about the unrest in Arab nations that result in the overthrow of entrenched despots.   I see no evidence that the replacement governments will be any more democratic or peaceful than the orginal ones.   I suspect they will hate Israel and the USA just as much.  Women still will be second-class citizens with few, if any, rights.  They will continue to practice Sharia Law and Islam will continue to be incompatible with Western civilization.    Not much will change.  

In a nutshell.....

 The problems we face today exist because the people who work for a living are outnumbered by those who vote for a living.

Finally...

FINALLY!!    OBAMA HAS A JOBS PLAN....
(for illegals)

London on Fire

The recent riots in Great Britain are an ominous preview of what we may expect here.  The generational welfare state there has a population dependent on government.  When, due to budgetary problems certain entitlements have to be cut back, the result is ugly and predictable.  

Let Them Eat Cake

Remember when the Left used to criticize GW Bush for going to his ranch in Texas to chop wood?   What a waste of taxpayer's money, we were told. But I don't hear anything about the present administration.
First Lady Michelle (My Belle) Obama slipped out of Washington unnoticed Monday for a secret trip to visit her brother, Oregon State University men’s basketball coach Craig Robinson, at his home on Corvallis, Ore.
Mrs. Obama jetted into the Eugene Airport, landing at about 11 am PDT. She and family members then headed out in a 11 vehicle motorcade (so much for 'secrecy')  for the ride to Corvallis.
Mrs. Obama and family members flew on a Boeing C-40B, the military version of a 737 that serves as Air Force 2.
Mrs. Obama has in the past indulged herself for an early departure for her most recent Hawaiian vacation and a luxurous 2010 trip to Spain.  Most of the costs of her travel are borne by taxpayers.  (But of course!)
The C-40B included a flight crew of eight to 10 people.  Mrs. Obama is traveling with one of her daughters and her mother.  Maybe this is one reason Barack stayed home this time.    Wouldn't it be easier and cheaper to fly her brother to Washington for a visit? 

What's a trillion?

Our national debt is over 14 Trillion dollars.   Few have any idea just how big a number that is... otherwise they might be more concerned. 
So, do YOU have any idea how much one trillion is?  Suppose you live about 89 years, a nice long life span.  You would have lived about 2.8 billion seconds.  If you were approaching your one trillionth second of life, you would have been born in 29,000 B.C.

Our national debt is now over 100% of our gross national product.  We are not taxed too little, we spend too much.  It is so obvious.

Why Not?

All the fuss over raising the national debt limit is silly and unnecessary.  We ALL know that eventually the new debt limit will be reached.  At that point, there will be the usual hand-wringing and gnashing of teeth among politicians until the very last minute.... then a new, higher debt limit will be agreed upon.  After all, without the higher debt limit, the government will default, creditors will not be paid, the stock market will crash, and the sky will fall.   We have heard all this before.
The solution is simple.  Instead of "mere" billions or even trillions of a new debt limit, why not just skip all the intermediary theater and raise the debt limit by $999 Quadrillion.   That way we won't have to have this debate for about 3 or 4 years.

Birds of a Feather, Flock Together

It may be early in the campaign season, but the Communist Party USA already has seen fit to endorse Barack Obama for the 2012 election.

Sam Webb, chairman of the Communist Party USA, threw his support behind Obama's re-election bid.

In an article last week at People's Weekly World, the official newspaper of the Communist Party USA, Webb discussed the need for a third party consisting of the so-called working class and labor as well as "racially and nationally oppressed people, women, youth, immigrants, seniors, gay and straight."

You can tell much about a man from the company he keeps... and from who supports him.

Occasionally, I come across an essay that expresses exactly what I have been saying for years.   This is such an essay.   I had to pinch myself to make sure my name was not on the byline.  Enjoy....

August 2, 2011

7 Examples Of Liberal Unfairness

By John Hawkins

8/2/2011

If one child complains that he didn't get as much food as his brother because his frankfurter was cut into four pieces, while his brother's hot dog was cut into five pieces, we laugh. What we often don't realize is that the definitions of "fairness" that adults use are often every bit as arbitrary as those of children. This is why politicians are so in love with the word "fairness." Using that word justifies their attempt to swoop in, ignore merit, overrule the market, and take something from one group of people to give it to another group of people who are more likely to vote for them. So next time someone starts talking about "fairness," put your hand over your wallet, put on your thinking cap, and consider that what liberals define as "fairness" could look extremely "unfair" if you're open minded enough to take a look at it from another perspective.
1) Affirmative Action's only "fair?" The idea here is that we're going to discriminate against white Americans who have not done anything wrong in order to help black Americans who may not have been discriminated against so that we can make up for past discrimination against black Americans. That begs the question: Do we flip this around at some point and start deliberately discriminating against black Americans again to make up for the government's discrimination against white Americans? It may sound outrageous, but that ridiculous idea would be every bit as "fair" as Affirmative Action.
2) Making losers pay for legal costs would be "unfair" to the little guy! Because liberals get a lot of money from trial lawyers, they oppose a "loser pays" rule for lawsuits. They justify this by saying that system would be "unfair" to the people suing. Why, what if they couldn't afford to sue because their opponents’ legal fees would be too high? Of course, that's a really backward way to look at it. After all, how fair is it for someone to have to spend countless hours of their time and tens of thousands of dollars defending themselves from a meritless lawsuit without compensation? Surely, if it's "fair" for the plaintiffs to get money if they win, then it should be "fair" for the defendants to at least have their expenses covered if they triumph.
3) The rich aren't paying their "fair" share. It's easy to take shots at rich people. There usually aren't enough of them to swing an election with their votes, nobody really feels sorry for people who have a lot of money, and as often as not, they give contributions to both parties as "protection money." But here's a thought: How can the rich not be paying their "fair share" when the top 10% of Americans pay 69.9% of the money we take in from the income tax while 47 percent of Americans don't even pay a single dollar a year? Arguing that people -- who probably pay for all the services they'll get from the government in an entire lifetime over any given month -- aren't paying their "fair share" while so many people pay nothing at all, seems more than a bit....."unfair."
4) Cutting spending would be "unfair!" Any time you try to cut something from the budget, there are aliens in other galaxies who can undoubtedly hear the screams from space. We get rants about cruelty, Tea Party "terrorists," pushing old people off cliffs, balancing the budget on the backs of the less fortunate -- it goes on and on. However, there's no such thing as "free" government money. So, what we're actually doing is selling our children into debt slavery so that liberal politicians can borrow more money to buy votes today. What could be crueler or more "unfair" than a child who's born starting his life more than $176,000 in debt before he's ever opened his eyes for the first time?
5) Minimum wage laws make sure people get a "fair" wage. If you're making the minimum wage right now, it's entirely possible that the law benefits you by insuring that you get paid a higher wage than you otherwise would. Liberals would call this "fairness." But, how about all the people with low skills who either aren't worth the minimum wage or who could be hired for jobs that don't merit the minimum wage? It's all well and good to say that a job's not worth someone's time if it doesn't pay the minimum wage, but there are probably a lot of unemployed Americans who'd be grateful to make $7 an hour while they look for a better job. What's "fair" to those people about putting a law in place that prevents willing businesses from hiring willing workers who desperately need the money?
6) Not allowing illegal aliens to become American citizens is "unfair!" If we allow people who sneak across the border or overstay their VISA to become American citizens, then doesn't that make legal immigrants look like complete idiots? There are people who spent years in their home countries, paying thousands of dollars, and filling out endless paperwork while liberals want to give people who broke the law the gift of American citizenship? What's the message to people who became citizens the right way supposed to be other than, "You are a moron for following the rules?" How can it be anything other than grossly "unfair" to legal immigrants to give illegals a break? Additionally, how about all the American workers, including legal immigrants, who have less money to bring home in their paychecks each week or no jobs at all because illegal aliens who pay no car insurance, health insurance, or taxes can afford to do the job at a cheaper price and drive down wages? How "fair" is it to hurt American citizens to help people who didn't even come to this country legally?
7) Wal-Mart isn't "fair" to its employees. Liberals generally don't like big corporations and they especially don't like Wal-Mart because it's an enormous company that has successfully fought off unionization. This leads to cries that Wal-Mart's "unfair" because it doesn’t pay its employees enough or allow its employees to buy fancy health care plans. Of course, if Wal-Mart could be perfectly honest, its response would probably be, “We don't force our employees to work for us and if they decide they’re unhappy, they can always go somewhere else.” That being said, there's another group of people who aren't being "fairly" treated by the liberal push to unionize Wal-Mart – Wal-Mart customers. Wal-Mart employs more than 2.1 million people in America, but roughly 82% of American households shop at Wal-Mart each year. If Wal-Mart is forced to pay its employees more, then you're taking money out of the pockets of everyone who shops there to pay for it. Why should a dirt-poor widow with four kids who buys her groceries at Wal-Mart be forced to pay more money than she would otherwise to subsidize union salaries? That seems more than a little "unfair."

John Hawkins

John Hawkins is a professional blogger who runs Right Wing News, Linkiest, and Viral Footage.

Washington-Speak "How to cut the budget"

They say, "beauty is in the eye of the beholder."   And a "budget cut" means different things to different people.   If someone takes a cut in pay, we generally believe that he now earns $25,000 instead of $30,000.   That's a real cut.
But in the hallowed halls of Congress, "cut" means something else when referring to the budget.   Instead of spending $10 Trillion in the next 10 years, we agree to spend "only" $7 Trillion, a "cut" of $3 Trillion.  We don't cut spending by $3 Trillion.... no, we continue to spend more every year than the year before but just less of an increase than we planned to spend.  The debt continues to grow larger every year and the interest on the debt grows larger every year.  Instead of sprinting to bankruptcy, we merely are jogging to bankruptcy.

A wife proudly tells her husband that she found a real bargain and she bought a new coat for $500 that had been marked down from $700.  "Gee, honey, I saved you $200 today.  Isn't that great?"

The argument over the budget is not about freezing spending at a certain level and then reducing it from there.  No, it is reducing the rate of increase of the spending.  We call that little slight of hand 'baseline budgeting.'   For instance, a 10% annual increase would be budgeted for a 5% increase if the full 10% had not been spent the year before.  So, a 5% increase becomes a 50% cut.  Nice.

Definition of a deal:
A deal is an agreement where each party thinks he has outwitted the other.

Econ 101

 

1. You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity.

 

2. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving.

 

3. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.

 

4. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it.

 

5. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my friend is the beginning of the end of any society.

New Deal or Raw Deal?

President Obama's agenda and modus operandi looks much the same as FDR's.

Burton Folsom Jr. is an economic historian and the author of New Deal or Raw Deal?: How FDR's Economic Legacy Has Damaged America.  


      
       By Burton Folsom, Jr.

The idyllic legend of Franklin D. Roosevelt is a myth of epic proportions. With questionable moral character and a vendetta against the business elite, Roosevelt created New Deal programs marked by inconsistent planning, wasteful spending, and opportunity for political gain -- ultimately elevating public opinion of his administration but falling flat in achieving the economic revitalization that America so desperately needed from the Great Depression. This book takes a critical, revisionist look at Roosevelt's presidency, his economic policies, and his personal life.

Elected in 1932 on a buoyant tide of promises to balance the increasingly uncontrollable national budget and reduce the catastrophic unemployment rate, the charismatic thirty-second president not only neglected to pursue those goals, he made dramatic changes to federal programming that directly contradicted his campaign promises. Price fixing, court packing, regressive taxes, and patronism were all hidden inside the alphabet soup of his popular New Deal, putting a financial strain on the already suffering lower classes and discouraging the upper classes from taking business risks that potentially could have jostled national cash flow from dormancy. Many government programs that are widely used today have their seeds in the New Deal. Farm subsidies, minimum wage, and welfare, among others, all stifle economic growth--encouraging decreased productivity and exacerbating unemployment.

Roosevelt's imperious approach to the presidency changed American politics forever, and as he manipulated public opinion, American citizens became unwitting accomplices to the stilted economic growth of the 1930s. More than sixty years after FDR died in office, we still struggle with the damaging repercussions of his legacy.

Truth

One of many differences between the typical liberal and the typical conservative is their understanding of what is "truth."   To the liberal mind (as far as any sane person can perceive the liberal mind), truth is relative and changing.  There is no absolute truth because, to the liberal, truth is pretty much what an individual thinks it is.  It is almost as if liberals live in a parallel universe where perception and opinion are reality.  This mindset explains the liberal view of our Constitution as a "living, breathing document,"  and where that precious document can be interpreted to mean anything a liberal judge or liberal Supreme Court Justice says it means according to the current fashion of the day.   Right now, we have four out of nine Supreme Court Justices who subscribe to this heresy along with four who do not and one swing vote, Justice Kennedy, who can go either way as the spirit moves him. 
In other words, we are just one vote from a majority liberal Supreme Court that most certainly would repeal several laws that they do not like, such as the Constitutionally-protected right of individuals to own and use firearms.   If only one conservative Justice is replaced by Obama, the judicial mischief that would result would take generations to fix, if ever. 
The current debate over the national debt is serious and has long-range ramifications but pales in comparison to the problems our republic faces should the Supreme Court become majority liberal.  This is, in my view, the #1 reason Obama must never be re-elected.

It's All Bush's Fault

The Washington Post recently babbled  about Obama inheriting a huge deficit from Bush. Amazingly enough, a lot of people swallow this nonsense. So once more, a short civics lesson . 

Budgets do not come from the White House. They come from Congress and the party that controlled Congress since January 2007 is the Democratic Party. 

The Democrats controlled the budget process for FY 2008 and FY 2009 as well as FY 2010 and FY 2011 . 

In that first year, they had to contend with George Bush, which caused them to compromise on spending, when Bush somewhat belatedly got tough on spending increases. 

For FY 2009 though, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid bypassed George Bush entirely , passing continuing resolutions to keep government running until Barack Obama could take office. At that time, they passed a massive omnibus spending bill to complete the FY 2009 budgets. 

And where was Barack Obama during this time? He was a member of that very Congress that passed all of these massive spending bills, and he signed the omnibus bill as President to complete FY 2009.

If the Democrats inherited any deficit, it was the FY 2007 deficit, the last of the Republican budgets.. That deficit was the lowest in five years, and the fourth straight decline in deficit spending. After that, Democrats in Congress took control of spending, and that includes Barack Obama, who voted for the budgets. 

In a nutshell, what Obama is saying is I inherited a deficit that I voted for And then I voted to expand that deficit four-fold since January 20th .

Another Bright Idea

Thomas Edison must be rolling over in his grave.

In 2005, Congress passed a law banning outdoor mercury vapor streetlights – two years before it banned indoor incandescent light bulbs in favor of mercury vapor compact florescent bulbs.

Here is a classic case of the government working at cross purposes. Washington is forcing residents across the country to install mercury lighting inside their homes while phasing out mercury lighting outside homes to protect the environment.

  
We're removing mercury from outside the home while adding it inside.  

What we should get rid of is liberalism that fosters such nonsense.  

Terror in Norway

Does anyone remember back in November, 2009, when a US Army Major Nidal Hasan went on a rampage and killed 13 fellow soldiers and wounded 30 others?   As he fired on unarmed soldiers he yelled the traditional Islamic, "Allahu Akbar!"   Major Hasan was an Islamic terrorist in every sense of the word, yet the mainstream media, Attorney General Holder, President Obama, and even the Pentagon went out of their way to insist that he was not a terrorist, just a misguided lone wolf.   It was forbidden even to mention that he was a Muslim.
Fast forward to July 22, 2012..........
Yesterday, a deranged Norwegian went on a rampage shooting 80 or so people at a youth camp.  The first thing I heard on the radio this morning was a description that he was a "fundamentalist Christian."
Anyone care to comment on this obvious double standard?

Not enough taxes or too much spending?

The current stalemate over the budget issue demonstrates the fundamental difference between liberals and conservatives.    Liberals want an all-powerful government who takes care of everyone... income redistribution, equal outcomes instead of equal opportunity, less military and more "social justice."  It is a philosophy that once entrenched is almost impossible to dislodge.   Never mind the historical failure of liberalism every time and everywhere it is tried.  Is the grand experiment of representative government doomed to fail?   We have perhaps one and only one small window of opportunity to reverse the insidious trends we now see in the United States.   For lovers of freedom and liberty the national elections of 2012 will determine the direction our nation will take FOREVER.   We stand at the intersection of the Yellow Brick Road.