Free kibbles

All total, the US tax payer is on the hook for $23.7 trillion in bailouts. That's nearly 2 years worth of GDP. That's two years of human development. That's two years of our lives stolen from us by government. That's insane. No depression would have cost us that much. Worse yet, all these bailouts are harming our economy and trapping us in recession. If government had done nothing, the economy would have corrected fairly quickly like it did in 1981. But because we've sucked so much money out of the economy for deficit spending and because the Fed has printed so much money, driving inflation (not price inflation, but real inflation, i.e. the a reduction in the value of the dollar), we're trapped in recession. Bush opened this door by allowing Paulson to bailout himself and his buddies on Wall Street, but Obama is using this economic crisis to destroy America as we know it. We will have to pay until our collapses. Obama will make sure of it.

Obama's poll numbers continue to drop. Reagan's poll numbers dropped because he understood that government couldn't fix the economy, the economy had to fix itself. Government interference only hinders the process. Reagan had Volker set interest rates at a reasonable level to wash the malinvestment out of the country. As a result, his poll numbers dropped during the subsequent 81-82 recession. But then the economy rebounded, and so did Reagan's poll numbers. Reagan's popularity rebounded so powerfully, he won 49 states in 1984. Obama isn't allowing the economy to recover. Obama is making our economy worse. The economy won't recover, and his poll numbers won't recover. But it's a little late now. Voters should have been aware of Obama's destructive agenda before the election. Even Democrats are backing away from Obama.

Bernanke says he'll keep interest rates exceptionally low for an extended period, which is exactly what he convinced Greenspan to do in the wake on 9/11, creating the recently popped housing bubble. Bernanke is creating the next, bigger bubble right now. We can all look forward to that one bursting in an even bigger crash in a few years. Text of Bernanke's remarks.

10 year old interview with Mises scholar predicts our current crisis.

How Obama's tax increases are going to harm businesses. Of course Democrats know this. They're doing it on purpose. But the tax increases still aren't enough to pay for health care oppression. They need more.

"And when the most read New York daily newspaper plasters its front page with the new startling fact that the marginal tax rates for small businesses will be jumping from 35% to 58%, we can understand one other important truth. President Obama is hurting working class people."

He's hurting every American. That's his plan, and it's working wonderfully.

New taxes threaten our economic recovery. Duh. That's Obama's plan. And Obama is so stupid, he doesn't realize that he and government will get the blame. Obama may spark a revolution, but it won't be the Marxist revolution he wants.

Just as I pointed out yesterday, it's always about power. Obama wants more power to fight Medicare and Medicaid fraud. But that fraud is directly proportional to the power of government. More power for government inevitably creates more fraud because power corrupts and increased power generates increased corruption. Growth of government is a death spiral. The bigger government gets, the more corrupt it gets, and the more problems it creates. Aristocrats always demand more power to deal the news problems they create, powering a death spiral that must be stopped by taking our back from the two parties or they will destroy our country, and soon.

This article exposes the grotesque corruption that is politics as usual in America. Every issue in Congress is always about power, and the health care issue is about an unprecedented power grab:

"As his committee has taken center stage in the battle over health-care reform, Chairman Baucus (D-Mont.) has emerged as a leading recipient of Senate campaign contributions from the hospitals, insurers and other medical interest groups hoping to shape the legislation to their advantage. Health-related companies and their employees gave Baucus's political committees nearly $1.5 million in 2007 and 2008, when he began holding hearings and making preparations for this year's reform debate.

Top health executives and lobbyists have continued to flock to the senator's often extravagant fundraising events in recent months. During a Senate break in late June, for example, Baucus held his 10th annual fly-fishing and golfing weekend in Big Sky, Mont., for a minimum donation of $2,500. Later this month comes "Camp Baucus," a "trip for the whole family" that adds horseback riding and hiking to the list of activities.

To avoid any appearance of favoritism [not to avoid favoritism itself, just the appearance - LIW], his aides say, Baucus quietly began refusing contributions from health-care political action committees after June 1. But the policy does not apply to lobbyists or corporate executives, who continued to make donations, disclosure records show."

And don't forget Baucus's

""Eighth Annual Ski and Snowmobile Weekend" in Big Sky in February and [...] $10,000-a-table dinner at the Washington Court Hotel later that month."

So by taking on health care, Baucus gets to roll in the dough. Life's great when you have our political power and tax dollars to sell to the highest bidder. It makes you practically a god with the ability to destroy companies or raise them from the dead. But that dough from the lobbyists is our tax dollars already. Those companies are already receiving our tax dollars from subsides, regulations and mandates, and they're using our tax dollars to buy influence with their (and our) aristocrat masters. The companies that pay the most tribute using our tax dollars to the aristocrats will win even more of our tax dollars in the future which they can turn around and use to buy more of our tax dollars in the further future. It's a never ending spiral of destruction.

"The [health care] sector gave nearly $170 million to federal lawmakers in 2007 and 2008, with 54 percent going to Democrats, according to data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks money in politics. The shift in parties was even more pronounced during the first three months of this year, when Democrats collected 60 percent of the $5.4 million donated by health-care companies and their employees, the data show."

This is how it works on every issue, not just health care. It's just that because of the unprecedented money and power involved in health care, there's unprecedented money flowing into the aristocrats' coffers.

"Jerry Flanagan, a health-care analyst with Consumer Watchdog, a California-based advocacy group, said the tide of campaign contributions amounts to "a huge down payment" by companies that expect favorable policies in return. "That is the cold reality of big-money politics," he said.
...
"He's doing all this fundraising right in the middle of this effort to mark up a bill," Holman said. "When you put these events close to matters concerning these lobbyists, clearly it's a signal. You are expected to show up with a check.""

Duh. It's massive corruption.

Blogger asks Obama,

""Will people be able to keep their insurance and will insurers be able to write new policies even though H.R. 3200 is passed?” President Obama replied: “You know, I have to say that I am not familiar with the provision you are talking about.”"

This is the fatal flaw of central planning.

Another great video from Pajamas Media takes an under cover and entertaining look at Canada's health care system. How about waiting three years for a family doctor? And all the government employees suggest the patient go pay for really expensive private care. How much you wanna bet they're getting kickbacks? Government creates corruption.

Robert Reich says "Tax the wealthy to keep everyone healthy" because it's worked so well in Canada and Great Britain.

Thomas Sowell asks the only pertinent health care question: Will health care be better or worse under Obama's plan? We can expect government run health care to be worse than Medicare, Medicaid and the VA because it's a tremendously bigger, more politically powerful, program. Therefore it will be tremendously more corrupt.

Ron Paul explains that health care is a good, not a right, and it's dangerous to consider it a right.

California government finally agrees to $15 billion in spending cuts to get their budget under control. About time. About time Schwarzenegger got some spending cuts. It's about time Democrats agreed. But there are no tax cuts. Onerous taxes will continue pushing people and businesses out of California. California is suffering from increasing energy taxes.

Obama's science czar, the climate alarmist I've already pointed out, considered mass sterilizations and forced abortions under one world government to save the planet. That's change leftists push and liberals believe in. Hitler would have had this guy as his chief scientist too. Along with everything else Obama's election has exposed about liberals like support for leftist terrorism, it's also exposed their hatred of humanity and their monstrous willingness to destroy to achieve their goals. Liberals follow the same belief system that murdered over 100 million people in the 20th century.

Naturally we won't get to experience the full solar eclipse.

Voters don't like deficits or debt.

Hillary Clinton has an impossible job, and she's the worst person in the world for it. She's about the most undiplomatic person in the world. She's in India apologizing for global warming in a futile attempt to get India to agree to punitive CO2 taxes like the Democrats are pushing here. The Indians aren't stupid. They are not going to forgo US-style wealth because of the great global warming scam. Poor Hillary has to run around bashing America to please her boss, and everything he does makes foreign policy impossible to conduct. Nobody hitches their wagon to a loser, and Obama is accelerating America's transformation into a loser.

Isn't the CIA terrorist interrogation unit a special unit to interrogate terrorists? I bet he wants a new unit to report directly to him. This has got to be all about solidifying more power in the White House.

How come the press is telling us about this cash for clunkers program after it's law? Rhetorical question. They should have been telling us about it before it was law and before it was voted on so we could stop it. The first of I heard of this was being formally debated in Congress was after it was passed.

Ousted Honduras President Zelaya had "certified" results supporting his constitutional change to stay in power even though the election was never held because of the reverse coup. What a crook. No wonder Obama loves this guy.

Isn't politicized capitalism just a euphemism for fascism? This article blames Obama for ushering it in, and I bet common knowledge will blame it on Obama because he's taken it to phenomenal new heights, but we can't forget that Bush's Treasury Sec. Paulson and Ben Bernanke threated to remove Bank of America's CEO, management and board if B of A didn't buy Merril Lynch like Paulson ordered. We must never forget how evil Bush and Republicans were even though Obama and Democrats are more evil. The inevitable result of voting for the lesser of two evils is evil.

Government is using government stimulus money to advertise government stimulus.

US food aid and farm policies (subsidies) hurt African development.

This article has it backwards. Both parties in the Senate should get together and agree to vote down any Federal judge nominee who refuses to answer questions. They should be asked specific questions about historical votes such as how they would have voted on Roe v Wade and other cases if they had been on the Supreme Court at that time. If they refuse to answer, they should be unanimously rejected.

Stimulus a scam for ham.

A little insight into the Lincoln and the horrors of Civil War:

"If we standardize for today’s population, Lincoln’s killing machine would lead to the death of more than 6 million Americans."

How did we ever lionize this guy? The victors write the histories.

"In a biography of Lincoln Herndon wrote of how Lincoln was either an atheist or an agnostic. As a young man, said Herndon, Lincoln even wrote a book that argued that the Bible was not the word of God and that Jesus was not the son of God. When he decided to get into politics, the book was burned."

Not that I care about Lincoln's religion, but that's the first I heard of book burning. The consumate politican for sure.

This guy claims Congress never declared war against al Qaeda, but this resolution is a declaration of war. I wish the anti-war people would quit attacking the tactics used in the war and honestly dispute the declaration of war. Their attacks are dishonest.

Verizon customer finds personal information of Verizon CEO and pays him a visit to ask for better privacy. Too funny.

Don't you just love when authoritarians get frustrated that people don't do what they want? Mark Sanford tells the people of South Carolina to stop talking about his affair and move on, but they won't do it. Maybe he should lead by example and move on out of the governor's office. Hypocrite. The only person he's helping by staying in office is himself. He's being selfish and power hungry like every other aristocrat.

This ethics attack on Sarah Palin is absurd. Because she's a target of irresponsible probes, and by law she has to defend them with private funds, people all over the country are supporting her defense. This probe says that's unethical. Give me a break. These attacks on Palin are a travesty. But liberals, who support entertaining forced sterilization to support their fradulent causes, don't care.

California Public Employees Retirement System looses $55 billion this fiscal year. Pension fund bailouts will be the next trillion dollar boondoggle we have to resist.