03.25.08
Posted in Economic at 8:35 pm by
If history has shown us one thing, its that an ever-expanding federal government financed by an ever-increasing tax agenda is absolutely the wrong way to grow our economy and create new jobs. But now almost a year into this new majority, weve seen time and again that Democrats are willing to impose that reckless agenda on the taxpaying public at the risk of surrendering tens of millions of good-paying American jobs.
This week, House Republicans unveiled a report (Death by a Thousand Cuts: Democrats War on American Jobs) that demonstrates the real cost of these misguided policies costs that represent a real threat to hard-working families. According to this analysis, this year alone, this Congress has passed $203.9 billion in tax increases that could threaten 16 million American jobs.
Read on . . .
Just look at the Democrats proposed energy bill, which was pushed through the House on a party-line vote yesterday. An independent study released in November found that the combined effect of this legislation would be to both decrease the supply of available energy, and increase the cost of energy supplies essential to our economy. This legislation alone, according to the report, could precipitate a loss of five million American jobs, and a $1 trillion decrease in U.S. economic output.
On top of all that, the chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee felt it necessary last month to put forward legislation thats being dubbed the Mother of All Tax Hikes, or MATH for short. On this bill, the majoritys math is stunningly simple: By increasing taxes on working families by a staggering $1.3 trillion the largest income tax hike in American history Democrats have found a way to outdo even their most historic tax-raising schemes of the past.
If this plan were to become law, the effective top marginal tax rate in this country would be the same as it is in Germany not exactly a good example of economic growth. In producing this tax hike, what Democrats fail to understand is that, when you adopt European-style tax rates, European-style growth rates cant be far behind. And the slower were able grow our economy, the fewer jobs will be available for American workers and the less able we will be to compete in a 21st century, global marketplace.
After the bill was formally released, Larry Kudlow, a respected economist and host of the CNBC program Kudlow and Company, noted that Wall Street and Main Street are worried about recession. He then appropriately asked, Is this the right time to be talking tax hikes for anyone?
The chairman of the powerful Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke, doesnt seem to think so. He recently warned that a massive tax increase would be a drag on the economy and as a result would probably not be advisable. For a institution like the Federal Reserve known for its circumspection thats tantamount to climbing Mt. McKinley and screaming a message of warning to anyone that will listen.
And what about the American people what do they think? According to a recent poll conducted by David Winston, 62 percent of the American people believe that now is not the time to raise taxes, while only 34 percent seem to think it is. A very generous lot, indeed especially when it comes to seizing other peoples money.
Already struggling with the high costs of living, made worse by high energy costs and a troublesome situation in our housing market, the middle class shouldnt be burdened with another $200 billion in new taxes, new regulations, and frivolous litigation. We should be doing everything in our power to strengthen our economy, as opposed to threatening its long-term health with ill-advised policies that threaten jobs and close the door to much needed investment.
It was Oscar Wilde, who knew a little bit about the importance of being earnest, who once remarked that the best way to appreciate your job is to imagine yourself without one. If Democrats continue down the path theyve already established this Congress, it might not take much of an imagination for millions of Americans to appreciate the job they once had.
![]()
Originaly from Source
Permalink
03.24.08
Posted in Economic at 10:05 pm by
Some good news to go into the weekend with:
Employers added a modest 94,000 jobs to their payrolls in November, the unemployment rate held steady at 4.7 percent and wages grew briskly, encouraging signs the nation’s employment climate is holding up in the face of turbulence in the housing and credit markets.
The fresh snapshot of the labor market, released by the Labor Department on Friday, showed that hiring was brisk in education and health services, retail, professional services, the government and elsewhere. That helped to offset job losses in construction, manufacturing and financial services — casualties of the housing slump and credit crunch.
The 94,000 new jobs in November came after a surprisingly strong payroll gain of 170,000 in October. The unemployment rate stayed at a relatively low 4.7 percent for the third straight month.
“This is reassuring. The pillar continuing to support the economy is job creation,” said Carl Tannenbaum, chief economist at LaSalle Bank. “This should provide reassurance to those who worry that a recession is imminent,” he said.
The performance was better than economists were expecting. They were forecasting that the unemployment rate would nudge up to 4.8 percent and they also said they thought employers would boost payrolls by around 70,000.
I am still waiting to see how we do in December and January before I can feel safe about pronouncing that recessionary pressures have substantially eased. But this is very good news and if we get similar news for December and January, we should consider ourselves very lucky and blessed indeed.
![]()
![]()
Originaly from Source
Permalink
Posted in Economic at 9:15 pm by
Skipping all introductions, let’s get the heart of the matter. Right wing pundits and campaigns are citing Murray Waas’s reporting to attack Mike Huckabee. More accurately, people are quoting people Murray Waas interviewed to discredit Mike Huckabee, but all the quotes, interviews, etc. depend entirely on Murray Waas’s reporting.
Perhaps the most definitive thing every written on why no one on our side should trust Murray Waas is is this article. Waas routinely does things that other reporters have picked up on.
Competing reporters have learned to recognize the fingerprints on the Bush-Tenet revelation. One of the things that Murray does is take factsthat are known and puts them into a different setting, says Washington Post reporter Walter Pincus.
Keep reading . . .
Then, of course, there is the shoddy work of actually quoting people. There is also his reporting “techniques” summarized here by Michael Lenehan about a series of emails exchanged with Mr. Waas.
This maneuver includes several features that I have learned to recognize as characteristically Waasian. First, theres his masterful manipulation of the rules of reportingon the record, off the record, on background, etc. This makes Waas a lot harder to deal with than your typical source or subject. He knows what buttons to push; he can drop a phrase like reckless disregard of the truth in a way that will make your libel lawyer squirm.
Second, Waas e-mail contains a threat thinly veiled as a courtesy: He requests permission to reveal something that could get you into a lot of trouble. In this case Waas was threatening to sic the Department of Justice on Cherkis and/or his source, a DOJ employee.
Finally, theres the upshot: none. We never heard from the Justice Department on this matter. This, too, is typical of our dealings with Waas.
Waas should not be treated credibly by *any* person on our side. That the Washington City Paper, not exactly a right of center paper, has spilled so much ink to lay out the kind of reporter Waas is, should be an indication.
And no, don’t go there. Your temptation is to say we should look at the people Waas quoted and leave Waas out of it. Well, go back through the links above and if you still think that, then your hatred of Mike Huckabee has overcome your objectivity and I can no longer take anything you say about Huckabee to be serious.
Put it another way, better to cite from the New York Times than cite Murray Waas in this matter.
![]()
![]()
Originaly from Source
Permalink
Posted in Economic at 8:25 pm by
Michael Goodwin of the New York Daily News is on CNN and just said that Huckabee is exploiting anti-Mormon bias in Iowa. The guy was already down on Huckabee for being religious. This strikes me as a damned if you do damned if you don’t moment. Huckabee, by talking about his faith, exposes himself as a Christian, which is a selling point. If he doesn’t talk about it, he doesn’t drive home a major selling point among evangelicals. But by talking about it, idiots like this can accuse him of exploiting anti-mormon bigotry.
Look, there are certainly people pushing the anti-Mormon angle. It’s by and large the press in Iowa. Huckabee may be benefiting from evangelicals wanting one of their own, but don’t accuse the man of pushing bigotry. If anything, the media has been turning up its nose at him because he dares to wear his faith on his sleeve. It’s the drive by press engaging in bigotry.
The media, like the left, hates religion. They hate Romney for daring to talk about it yesterday. They hate Huckabee for talking about it articulately. So now they have no problem accusing either of bigotry. Look at the Washington Post attacking Romney for ignoring atheists in his speech. They don’t like it. And people like Michael Goodwin are happy to lie about Huckabee because they view any talk of religion as a threat.
![]()
Read the rest of this entry »
Permalink
03.23.08
Posted in Economic at 9:55 pm by
People familiar with the state of affairs in Latin America know that Bolivia’s Evo Morales is as objectionable in his policy preferences and manner of governance as is Hugo Chavez. Which makes this news very interesting indeed:
Bolivian President Evo Morales called on Wednesday for a nationwide referendum to decide whether he should stay in the job as a way to resolve a deepening political crisis in the country.
The leftist leader’s plans to overhaul Bolivia’s constitution have reignited long-running conflicts between more indigenous Andean regions, where Mr Morales has his support base, and wealthier lowland areas.
In an apparent bid to draw a line under the conflict, Mr Morales proposed a referendum to decide whether he and nine regional governors should remain in their posts. Six of the country’s nine regions are controlled by his opponents.
“If the people say ‘Evo’s going’, I’ve got no problem. I’m democratic,” the former coca farmer said in a televised speech. “The people will say who’s going and who’s staying to guarantee this process of change.”
He said he would send a bill to congress on Thursday to call the referendum vote.
It really wouldn’t be too much to hope that Morales suffers the same fate with his referendum vote that Chavez did just recently. Would it? After all, it would serve Morales right.
![]()
![]()
Originaly from Source
Permalink
Posted in Economic at 9:05 pm by
No one really is sure. And I have harped on this exact point for quite a long time. I don’t care how famous a particular candidate is. I don’t care how amazing it would be for history if that particular candidate got elected to the Presidency and I certainly don’t care how personally pathbreaking such an election might be. Candidates have to have a reason to seek the office they seek, a reason that is entirely independent of their personalities and/or their personal identities. That reason has to do more with the realm of ideas and less with the issue of personalities altogether. And when there is no underlying reason or rationale to a candidacy, that candidacy falls apart pretty quickly.
So it should come as no surprise that Hillary Clinton is running into some strong headwinds these days. I imagine that she still will win the Democratic Presidential nomination; she is well-funded and she has a very good staff working for her. But apart from her fame and identity, she has given no one any reason to vote for her. When he thought about running for the Presidency again in 1988, George McGovern asked–of all people–his old foe, Richard Nixon (the two had become friends) what Nixon thought of a possible McGovern candidacy. Nixon told McGovern that he should only run if he had something to say and if no one else was saying it. “I thought that was damn good advice,” recollected McGovern later. And he decided not to make the race.
I wonder if at the end of the race for the Presidency, Hillary Clinton might realize the wisdom of that advice.
![]()
![]()
Originaly from Source
Permalink
Posted in Economic at 8:15 pm by
Via Slashdot Science I found this article summarizing analyses of the latest Russian election. If this is even news, then clearly someone came up with some signs of fraud, and it shouldn’t be any surprise which political party got the benefits of this alleged fraud…
Read On…
The most striking image plots the percentage of the vote each party got in various districts against the turnout in that district.
Most parties have a slightly negative correlation, but one party has a correlation of 0.9: United Russia, Vladimir Putin’s party.
Combined with this, one finds out precisely how this fraud took place, too, when one looks at this next chart, plotting turnout rate against the rate of invalid ballots, a plot which interestingly slopes downward, when we have no reason to believe that fewer people will make voting errors in districts with higher turnout:
(Chart by Joseph Petviashvili)
If all this is true, it’s hard to believe that something odd didn’t happen. When the United Russia operatives were generating ballots and injecting them into the system, they forgot to find out what the standard invalid ballot rate was and duplicate that!
Russia’s election was likely illegitimate. I now join the calls for US policy with respect to Russia to be adjusted accordingly.
Update: Isn’t it interesting that in this region found by a commenter on Petviashvili’s site (don’t ask me its name; I don’t read Russian), 17,779 people voted, and every single one of them was for United Russia?
| Attachment |
Size |
| russianattendance.png |
241.66 KB |
| russianinvalidballots.png |
13.69 KB |
![]()
Originaly from Source
Permalink
03.22.08
Posted in Economic at 9:45 pm by
For Sunday, December 2, 2007
FOX News Sunday (FNS): Host Chris Wallace will speak once again to 2008 GOP Presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee. He was also speak to 2008 GOP Presidential hopeful John McCain.
Meet the Press (NBC): Tim Russert talks to 2008 GOP Presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani.
This Week (ABC): Host George Stephanopoulos interviews 2008 GOP Presidential hopeful Joe Biden and Newt Gingrich,
Face the Nation (CBS): Host Bob Schieffer talks about the destroyed CIA interrogation tapes and the Iran NIE with Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller and Chuck Hagel.
Late Edition (CNN): Host Wolf Blitzer chats it up with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, U.S. Democratic Senator Diane Feinstein, and House GOP Leader John Boehner.
==========
We see Schieffer (FTN) plans to wallow in negativity and defeatism, but Hagel’s become irrelevant and Rockefeller cannot form proper sentences. Other than that, we’d expect to see Huckabee (FNS), the sudden subject of talk. Rudy (MTP) probably wants to stop the hemorrhaging, but this meeting with Russert was probably planned months in advance. It’s part of that “Meet the Candidates” thing he does.
McCain’s also on FNS, and perhaps he’s trying to find the radar to be certain the old Navy pilot is still flying under it. Joe Biden’s got TW, so we’ve both of the historically favorite Sunday AM guests showing up this week.
Newt (TW) probably wants to further discuss that project of his, and Steph ought to ask him if he might want to be a “savior” at the GOP convention in the Twin Cities next September. The question would be a polite ego thing with Newt, of course, but the possibility of a “savior” is one to keep in mind. (I’m thinking more Jeb Bush or Fred Thompson, but I’m getting ahead of myself.)
I know I’m not considering the gravity of Wolf’s Musharraf interview (LE) with the gravity it deserves, but now that Pervez has stepped wholly into civvies, I wonder if he still wears his medals on his button-down. Di Fi’s a throwaway, and I hope Boehner sticks to the positive strides his caucus had made against the House Dems and stays away from endorsing any more folks in the wrong caucus.
![]()
![]()
Originaly from Source
Permalink
Posted in Economic at 8:55 pm by
This year’s Arlington Cemetery Christmas Wreath ceremony will take place on December 15th beginning at 12pm.
If you are interested in helping, go here.
If you aren’t in DC, these ceremonies will be going on across the country. You can learn where here.
To get into the spirit and get an idea of what this is all about, watch this:
![]()
Read the rest of this entry »
Permalink
Posted in Economic at 8:05 pm by
Predictably, but no less unbelievably, Congressional Democrats are considering a new approach in dealing with the burgeoning success in Iraq. Michael OHanlon, of the Brookings Institution and author of a now famous New York Times op-ed that was one of the first to claim that the surge was working, has another opinion piece in todays USA Today. OHanlon argues that Democrats are due a large share of the credit for the surges apparent success.
Rarely in U.S. history has a political party diagnosed a major failure in the country’s approach to a crucial issue of the day, led a national referendum on the failing policy, forced a change in that policy that led to major substantive benefits for the nation and then categorically refused to take any credit whatsoever for doing so.
The Washington Post characterizes OHanlons thesis as a first airing of a possible shift in strategy by House Democrats over funding for the Iraq war. Democrats are considering dropping timeframes for troop withdrawal altogether in favor of timelines on political progress. This strategy says OHanlon, will allow Democrats to acknowledge the success of our troops while maintaining opposition to the war.
Read on
OHanlons plan would actually be pretty solid political advice, if this was the beginning of the surge. But coming now, after nearly every Democrat leader has derided the surge, prematurely called it a failure, denigrated its commander, and voted time and time again to withdraw from Iraq before success could be achieved, it doesnt pass the laugh test. Even OHanlon says as much in his USA Today piece. Democrats were not the authors of the surge and in fact generally opposed it. Still he seems to think that they can now turn on a dime and take credit for that which they did not propose or support.
The tone of the piece also gives away OHanlons and Democrats desperation to salvage something positive from the unmitigated mess they have made for themselves with their obstinate stance against the surge. Still, OHanlon cant bring himself to utter the one word that may give Democrats a chance at turning public perception of their Iraq position around.
We now have a realistic chance, not of victory, but of what my fellow Brookings scholar Ken Pollack and I call sustainable stability. Violence rates have dropped by half to two-thirds in the course of 2007, the lowest level in years. Iraq is still very unstable, but it has a chance. (my emphasis)
Not of victory. Until the Democrats can believably state that they want and desire victory in Iraq, they will not be credibly able to take any credit for it when it comes.
Wanting military victory is a commitment. It requires that obstacles to that desired result be overcome at some cost. Rather than military victory, Democrats want political victory. In order to achieve that, they believe that they must find the lowest cost route to their desired outcome, an end to the mission in Iraq. If Democrats wanted military victory, which in this context includes political stability in Iraq, the supplemental funding for the troops would have been passed last February when it was submitted. Instead, Congress has spent ten months searching for ways to undermine the very results that they are seeking now to claim as their own.
No amount of posturing can save Democrats from their pessimism, cynicism, and defeatism on Iraq. The American people are far smarter than that, and so are many Democrats. The Post reports that OHanlon realizes that none of the Democratic presidential candidates will be willing to sign on to his strategy, and with good reason. They know that for the Democrats there are only two options: sincerely admit their mistakes and apologize to the American people; or continue to try and prevent the growing victory in Iraq from making life any worse for the Democratic Party.
![]()
![]()
Originaly from Source
Permalink