“In the years leading up to 2008—09's financial meltdown, government control over mortgages, interest rates and America's banking system was at an all-time high.
And yet when crisis struck, free enterprise took the blame.
The cure, therefore, was to give government even wider powers. Washington can now bail out any company, fire CEOs, override contracts and print billions of dollars to "stimulate" the economy — all in the name of the public interest. The result? Our deficits and debt continue to mount, and there's a real possibility of a future like Greece's.
This is the state of our world today. It's remarkably similar to the state of the world in Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged," a mystery story about a future America whose economy is disintegrating and whose government is accumulating power faster than anyone thought possible. This parallel is a big reason a record 500,000 people bought "Atlas Shrugged" last year.
So what can we learn from a book that foresaw in 1957 what few believed possible in 2007? We can learn a lesson the heroes of the novel learn: the cause of the government's greater, destructive control of business. And we can learn how to oppose it.”
So notes Yaron Brook, executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute, who states what many who have read Atlas Shrugged already know: that Ayn Rand in 1957 presciently foresaw what our government could do to destroy our rights, freedoms, motivations and economy.
We hear about unemployment rates being close to 10% which is very high for America. In many states, accounting for the underemployment and those who have given up looking for a job, this rate is in excess of 20%. What is also not accounted for in these numbers is the tragedies on the human side of the effects from our government facilitated and protracted recession. There are millions of people who are suffering and businesses which have gone bankrupt, are failing or are severely impacted as a direct result of government malfeasance particularly as regards the mortgage crisis issues.
The following essay sheds important light on the out of control progressiveness of our tax code and how it threatens our democracy, productivity and attitudes. This is all elucidated in a very cogent fashion and understandable fashion.
Clearly, we must reverse the perversities of the tax code and make sure virtually everyone has some financial responsibility. Our future is depending on it.
Guess Who Didn't Pay Taxes On Tax Day
By Elizabeth Factor and Mallory Factor April 16, 2010 FOXNews.com
Progressive Democrats are using “tax reform” to create a group of Americans who pay no federal income tax at all.
Did you file your federal income taxes on or before April 15? Almost 50% of American households won’t be paying any federal income tax this year, and the reasons why have profound implications for our democracy as well as our economy now.
A series of tax reforms, generous exemptions and tax credits, including last year’s economic stimulus bill, have dropped millions of Americans from the federal tax rolls. Huge numbers of Americans are simply no longer affected by the federal income tax. The Tax Policy Center projects that 47 percent of all U.S. households will pay no federal income tax for 2009. And, the bottom 40 percent of income earners actually receive a cash payment from the government at tax time. This cash payment is styled as a “refund” but it is actually a net cash transfer from the government--not a refund of taxes actually withheld on income. And for many Americans, this cash transfer from Uncle Sam actually exceeds all federal, state and local taxes that they pay in any form during the year including sales taxes and social security taxes.
Of course, we are accustomed to the idea that high income earners pay more in taxes both in absolute terms and as a percentage of their incomes. But taxing only the top half of a society is not normal progressive taxation. Instead, the recent changes to our tax system are an example of politicians using the tax code for their own political ends. In this case, the so-called progressive Democratic politicians are using “tax reform” to grow their political base by creating a group of Americans that pay no federal income tax.
The people who don’t pay federal income taxes are, as the phrase goes, “rational economic actors” just as much as anyone. Like all people, non-taxpayers respond to economic incentives. Their demand for entitlements and government programs is naturally insatiable because they don’t care at all about the cost. Non-taxpayers don’t have any “skin in the game” and are completely indifferent to the government raising income taxes. So they will always support increasing government programs as a long as they get even a small benefit from them because it does not cost them a cent. It’s also perfectly rational for non-taxpayers to support politicians who favor more spending. Non-taxpayers get something for nothing, at least until the country becomes insolvent.
The so-called progressive Democratic politicians are rational actors too. By taking more and more Americans off the federal tax rolls, they are creating a permanent base of supporters for themselves. These politicians may claim to support increased government spending because of their concern for the less-fortunate but--hey, it also happens to be in their own political self-interest. And these politicians will continue to spend on these programs until our nation goes bust because they want to keep their jobs and grow expensive programs for their political base.
And what about the people paying all the federal taxes? Well, taxpayers respond to incentives too. When faced with increasing tax rates, taxpayers will reduce their income, which is why it is impossible to raise a lot of revenue by increasing taxes above a certain point. As taxes on income rise, taxpayers spend less time on work and more on leisure.
They avoid sales of investments and assets which could trigger income until they can pair them with offsetting losses from other transactions. They spend billions of dollars on tax advice and structuring to reduce their tax burden, which makes economic sense for them but which is a waste of resources for our society. In the aggregate, a tax system that is hostile to investment and growth has a distortive effect which harms U.S. productivity and reduces the standard of living of our whole nation.
Under the Obama administration, many Americans accustomed to paying their share of federal taxes are being taken off the tax rolls. Recent tax law changes mean that for the first time, in 2009, a family of four making $50,000 can pay no federal income tax at all. This family may not change its behavior and outlook immediately from its taxpaying days. But the family’s economic incentives are now to keep America taxing and spending. And a family at this income level has surely suffered in this recession, but should they really pay no federal income tax at all?
Ronald Reagan once said that a taxpayer is “someone who works for the Federal government but doesn’t have to take the civil service examination.” Every American should have to work for the federal government at least a little bit. We need to move back to a broad-based tax system so that more Americans understand that there is no such thing as free money—government spending actually has a huge cost for our nation.
The so-called "progressive" politicians have turned John Kennedy’s “Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country” on its head. And telling so many Americans that they don’t need to make sacrifices for our government, as we are now saying, is dangerous new territory for our nation and for the health of our democracy and economy.
Elizabeth Factor is an international tax lawyer and former investment banker.Mallory Factor is the co-chairman and co-founder of the Monday Meeting, an influential meeting of economic conservatives, journalists and corporate leaders in New York City. Mr. Factor is a well-known merchant banker and speaks and writes frequently on economic and fiscal topics for news stations, leading newspapers and other print and online publications. Mr. Factor writes frequently for the Fox Forum. Mr. Factor can be reached at mallory.factor@malloryfactor.com
Obama and Congress are seriously considering imposing a value added tax or VAT on us and that should be a severe cause for alarm. The last thing we need is to be burdened with another tax. Or, more to the point, the government has taken enough of our money and it is time to say:
NO MORE!
VAT is an oppressive and to some extent hidden tax which makes it easier for the government to levy it and then relentlessly raise it. And when the government has more of our money they find that it’s never enough – so they spend even more than they collect. Ad infinitum.
This VAT has helped create the stagnation and miasma of indolence in Europe and we must make sure that it is never implemented here.
VAT Will Spell Anything But Relief
Investors Business Daily 04/08/2010
Taxes: Asked why he robbed banks, thief Willie Sutton famously replied: "That's where the money is." The same logic is now being used by the White House as it floats the idea of a broad new tax on all consumption.
White House adviser and former Fed chief Paul Volcker, one of the most respected men on Wall Street, broached the delicate topic of taxes Tuesday.
In his remarks, he said a value-added tax "was not as toxic an idea" as it had been in the past, and suggested it might be a way for the U.S. to escape its growing budget crisis.
"If at the end of the day we need to raise taxes, we should raise taxes," he said.
No doubt this is a trial balloon. Based on the $10 trillion in budget deficits expected over the next 10 years, this is one crisis the White House won't want to waste, as Rahm Emanuel would say.
Already, it's waged open war on the rich — vowing to take as much from those having $200,000 in income as it can. The 10-year budget plan submitted by President Obama in fact hits that group with $636 billion in new taxes.
But that's not even close to being enough to pay for the Democrats' reckless expansion of government.
As we've noted here before, Obama's new budget spends $45 trillion from 2011 to 2020. That's a 70% rise in spending from the previous decade. The only problem is, we're expected to collect only $35 trillion in taxes — and even that might be an overestimate, based on recent dismal economic growth.
So just going after the rich can't close that gap. The wealthy literally don't have the money. And even if we raised income taxes on everyone, which is highly unlikely, we would have to double current income tax rates to balance the budget, according to a recent Tax Foundation study.
So with deficits averaging $1 trillion a year through 2020 and spending soaring, where will the money come from?
Answer: A VAT. Only a VAT will give the government enough money to let it continue its out-of-control spending — which now seems to be the Democrats' main political goal.
Right now, the poor and the middle class pay virtually no taxes at all. In 2008, 49% of all households paid no taxes, new data show.
Those who had no tax liability at all receive about $70 billion in benefits and cash a year. In effect, for many, tax day has become an opportunity to collect a giant welfare check.
Yet, despite Obama's pledge that those with incomes below $200,000 wouldn't see their taxes raised "one dime," the fact is, they're the ultimate target of a VAT.
Yes, Obama is giving them lots of goodies. But he and the Democrats in charge of Congress know they'll have to tax the poor and the middle class to create the cradle-to-grave welfare state they so desperately want. It's the dream of all so-called progressives.
And it's already happening. In the health care takeover just signed into law, there are 13 new taxes — many of which will hit the poor and the middle class.
Still, that's penny-ante stuff. A VAT, as used in 150 countries around the world, would be a real money gusher — a Trojan horse for tax hikes on all Americans, especially the poor and middle class.
A VAT, remember, is really a tax on consumption. And since the poor and middle class spend a much greater ratio of their incomes on consumption than the wealthy, they'll bear the brunt.
A recent report from the liberal Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center said: "A major concern with a VAT is that it could be regressive, raising tax burdens proportionately more on lower income than on higher income taxpayers."
Even so, many Democrats point favorably to the European Union's welfare states, where VATs as high as 20% have long been a staple of public finance. The U.S., these critics suggest, would do well to imitate our EU friends.
Or not.
As the Cato Institute's Daniel Mitchell recently noted, "real-world evidence shows that VATs are strongly linked with both higher overall tax burdens and more government spending."
Indeed, in 1965, just before the EU adopted the VAT broadly, the average EU tax burden was about 28%, vs. 25% in the U.S.
By 2006, the EU tax burden was 40% — compared with 28% in the U.S.
The VAT tax grew and grew and grew. But Europe's economies didn't. Now, thanks to too much government and excessive taxation, the EU is almost hopelessly behind the U.S. in terms of both innovation and productivity. Is that the future we want?
No. The VAT's a terrible idea. It would bring higher taxes, slower growth, fewer jobs and lower standards of living. But it would do one thing well: give bureaucrats a lot more of your money to spend.
Few in Hollywood are Conservatives and even rarer are those who are outspoken on these beliefs. One of those individuals is Jon Voight. Given that most people associated with Hollywood are supporters of the far-left and with many zealots among them, opening admitting that one is a Conservative often is a career killer.
Jon Voight was a guest on the Mike Huckabee show on April 10th, 2010. On the show he read an open letter to America and to Barack Obama where he discussed the future of America and the need for us all to get involved in our individual states Tea-Party movement in order to save our nation.
The following is the text of the letter:
“In one year, the American people are witnessing the greatest lie that is cleverly orchestrated by President Obama and his whole administration. The lie is a potent aggression that feeds the needs of people who either have not educated themselves enough to understand the assault upon us all or the very poor and needy who live to be taken care of.
President Obama feeds these people poison, giving them the idea that they are entitled to take from the wealthier who have lived and worked in a democracy that understands that capitalism is the only truth that keeps a nation healthy and fed. Now the lie goes very deep and President Obama has been cleverly trained in the Alinsky method and it would be very important that every American knows what that method is.
It is a socialistic, Marxist teaching and with it, little by little, he rapes this nation, taking down our defenses, making new language for the Islamic extremists. The world looked up to us as a symbol of hope and prosperity now wonders what will become of the entire world if America is losing its power.
The American people who understand exactly what is taking place have come together in the thousands, vowing to try to stay together as a unit of love and freedom for all men and women, from all walks of life, shivering to think that this once great nation will be a third world country.
This will be the first president to ever weaken the United States of America. President Obama uses his aggression and arrogance for his own agenda, against the will of the American people when he should be using his will and aggression against our enemies.
Every loving American for peace and truth and the security of our nation must come out and join the Tea Parties in their states. The opposition will continue their tactics; they will lie and plant their own bullies amongst us. Everyone must pay close attention to who stands next to them. We can weed out the liars and agitators.
Let us all stay in Gods light. Let no man put asunder. We can and we will prevail. God bless us all!”
As many people are beginning to realize and what we have been warning about for a long time, Obamacare is not truly about healthcare or healthcare reform. That is the liberal pretense used for its passage. This legislation is all about the transfer of wealth, expropriation of 17% of our economy by the Federal government, and unfettered control and intrusion by the government into our private lives including access to our medical records.
There are no cost savings nor will there be a reduction in our national debt. We don’t think that adding in excess of 170 new federal agencies enumerated within this bill will accomplish this trick. Nor will the planned hiring of 16,500 new IRS agents (we don’t think that they have your interest at heart) to monitor compliance save us money. These actions tell you all you need to know about Obama’s and the Congressional Democrats’ true agenda under the guise of healthcare reform.
We all must vigorously thwart implementation of Obamacare by also providing verbal and financial support to our Senators, Representatives, Tea Party Groups, organizations and States who will be fighting this despicable legislation.
Enacting A Lie
Investors Business Daily 03/22/2010
Health Overhaul: Sunday's vote exposed the ugly truth that ObamaCare is not really about health care at all. It's all about who pays for it and who controls it — in effect a massive wealth-redistribution scheme.
Those who believe this will lead to some medical nirvana will likely be disappointed. Fact is, this poorly designed monstrosity will lead to lower-quality care, higher costs, fewer practicing physicians, higher taxes and fewer jobs.
We've done more than 150 editorials in the past year or so documenting these problems. Democrats surely understand them.
Yet, despite a recent CNN poll showing that 59% of Americans oppose ObamaCare, Congress approved it anyway.
Why? Because it's not really about health care. It's the largest wealth grab in American history, masquerading as health care "reform," another step in the socialization of Americans' income in the name of "fairness" and "spread(ing) the wealth around," as Obama himself has put it.
That's why we call the program a lie.
The idea behind all this, simply put, is control. This is a vast expansion of government that will require as much as $3 trillion in added spending over a decade. All claims of deficit neutrality are a joke.
This is socialization through the tax code. That $3 trillion has to be paid for. As we showed last week, the health care bill levies $569.2 billion in new taxes over the next 10 years alone.
At the same time, as noted by Douglas Holtz-Eakin, former head of the Congressional Budget Office, it will increase U.S. budget deficits by $562 billion.
Who'll pay all these taxes? Those deemed "rich" by Democrats, and businesses. Specifically, the bulk of the money comes from a special 3.8% Medicare tax on 5 million people earning more than $200,000 a year. That tax is imposed on capital gains, dividends, rents, royalties and interest — that is, investment income.
Obama already has proposed boosting these taxes in his budget. So the top tax take on dividends and cap gains will rise to 23.8% from 15%, an increase of nearly 59%, while top rates on interest and rents will soar from 15% to nearly 44%, a 193% jump.
About 50% of this higher-taxed group reports small business or partnership income. So don't be fooled: These aren't taxes on the "rich," but on small businesses and jobs.
In ObamaCare, the taxes will be ruinous. Unlike real insurance, where individuals pay to cover their risks, this program covers everyone — including 32 million uninsured — and pays for it by a "mandate" ( read: "tax" ) and by taking money from other people to subsidize those who can't pay. And this just scratches the surface of the new taxes — we literally don't have room to list them here.
Hmm. Taking money from one group, and giving it to another. That's called welfare — or, perhaps, health-fare. It's not insurance.
Once the new program is finished wrecking what remains of the private health insurance industry — as it ultimately will — we'll be stuck with the government declaring that "the market doesn't work" and forcing all of us into a single-payer government plan.
That's what those Democrats who back "Medicare for all" want — to kill what's left of the private market for health care, which has created the best medical system on earth, and use "reform" to expand an already-bankrupt Medicare system.
The math behind this is ugly. Medicare's long-term liabilities now total $89 trillion, according to the Government Accountability Office. Based on projected deficits, the just-passed health reform will take that to $136 trillion.
It will take a lot more than the "rich," as defined today, to make up such unfathomable tax shortfalls. That's when they'll come for the rest of us — poor, middle-class and rich alike — and we all will be paying vastly higher taxes for vastly inferior medical care.
Unfortunately, the degree of adherence to baseless ideology by Obama is only exceeded in magnitude by his ignoble narcissism that passage of healthcare reform will cement a deified legacy. As a consequence and facilitated by other far-left, corrupt, like minded elitist individuals like Pelosi and Reid, America’s economy in addition to its healthcare will suffer irreparably. We will all pay the immense price in freedom, rights, choices and ability to advance from our individual efforts.
We need to fight to overturn or annul this legislation.
Let the second revolution by the American people begin …
Health Overhaul's Assault On Business
Investors Business Daily 03/19/2010
Taxes: If ObamaCare becomes permanent, no one will suffer more than U.S. businesses. They'll face higher taxes, more regulations and a higher cost of capital. But don't take our word for it. Go ask Caterpillar.
The heavy-equipment giant reckons its insurance costs will go up 20%, or $100 million, the first year after the health care system is overhauled, and may go even higher. Multiply that by literally tens of thousands of companies nationwide, large and small, and you can see how costs will soar.
"We can ill-afford cost increases that place us at a disadvantage versus our global competitors," said Greg Folley, a Caterpillar vice president. "We are disappointed that efforts at reform have not addressed the cost concerns we've raised throughout the year."
If you don't care how this affects businesses, you should. Some 15 million people in this country don't have jobs — and another 12 million work part-time but want full-time positions.
If America's major employers are hit with huge, government-mandated cost increases during an economic downturn, do you really think they'll hire more when the economy starts growing on its own again? Of course not.
Despite this, the White House predicts its plan will "cut costs" for businesses. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi even makes the bizarre prediction that passage of health reform will lead to 400,000 new jobs "immediately," and millions more down the road.
Such claims don't hold water because health reform includes $569.2 billion in new taxes, at last count 160 new bureaucracies and regulations, and 16,500 new IRS agents to collect all those taxes. Tax hits on businesses and industries include:
• $52 billion on companies that do not provide what the government deems "acceptable" or "affordable" insurance for workers.
• $60.1 billion on health insurers.
• $27 billion on drugmakers and importers.
• $20 billion on makers and importers of medical devices.
• $2.7 billion on the tanning industry.
And of course the companies themselves don't pay. You do — both as a consumer, through higher prices, and as an employee, through lower wages.
As the Tax Policy Center, a center-liberal think tank, noted recently, "Economists generally believe that the burden of payroll taxes is borne by workers in the form of lower wages, regardless of whether the tax is levied on the employer or employee."
But that's not the end of it.
A new Medicare tax on capital gains, dividends and other investment income has been raised from 2.9% to 3.8%. Supposedly, this is a tax on the "wealthy," those with $200,000 or more in income. It's really a tax on small business, entrepreneurs and investors.
This provision will push the top cap-gains rate from 15% to almost 24%, while the dividend rate will rise from 35% to 43.4%.
This amounts a big new tax on the very people who are most likely to own or start a new business and hire workers. Health reform will tax large numbers of job creators out of business — and no one in the White House seems to know, or even care.
But it will have an enormous impact. As a result of the Obama-Care taxes on successful individuals and companies, investment in new companies will slow, and old companies will face a higher cost of capital. New jobs will be created offshore in places such India and China.
Economist Steve Entin of the Institute for Research on the Economics of Taxation estimated the Medicare tax would reduce GDP by 1.3%, capital formation by 3.4% and after-tax incomes of those who don't pay the tax directly by 1.2%.
And those estimates came when the tax was "only" 2.9% — not the 3.8% it is in the current bill. So the economic losses would in fact be even larger than Entin estimated.
Because of these taxes and other faults in the plan, a group of 130 economists last Thursday sent President Obama a letter imploring him not to sign the bill, saying that it would be a job-killer.
"In our view," the economists wrote, "the health care bill contains a number of provisions that will eliminate jobs, reduce hours and wages, and limit future job creation."
Health reform's taxes and huge new costs will lead to semi-permanent stagnation in the U.S. economy, marked by higher unemployment and lower standards of living.
Is this how Americans see their future? Based on the Tea Party movement and growing anger at the government for seizing control of the economy's high ground, we doubt it.
The only real question is, are the White House and Congress listening?
The big, centralized government rhetoric of the Democratic Party is eerily reminiscent of that of the old Soviet Union which doesn’t bode well for the country or economy. Adding to the problem is the sinister brainwashing of our children to believe in the virtues of a large, powerful centralized government and denigrate capitalism and free choice.
Inexplicably, those who have the most to lose such as American Jews, are actually the most ardent supporters of these far left ideologies.
Perspectives Of A Soviet Immigrant (No. 6)
By Svetlana Kunin
There was an old Soviet saying: If you need to find food to fill your refrigerator, plug it into the microphone of a party leader giving a speech.
Today in America, if we plug a refrigerator into our leader's teleprompter, I suspect the refrigerator will stop working.
Democratic party leaders speak incessantly of limiting profits and regulating salaries.
It brings back to memory another Soviet line: You pretend you are paying us salaries, and we pretend we are working. If bureaucrats predetermine the value of your work, there is no incentive to be productive. This is the quickest way to kill a dynamic economy.
I never expected to hear this kind of rhetoric in the USA. Today, the American educational machine teaches exactly the same points the Soviets taught.
It idealizes Socialist societies and denigrates America, especially its economic system.
American students are brainwashed to despise economic freedom and to yearn for a big government state.
Freed from their parents' control, but intimidated by the relentlessly negative portrayal of America, young Americans look for politicians to show them the way.
As someone who experienced real government-approved anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union, I am amazed by the obliviousness of American Jews, the most fervent supporters of left-wing politics.
They support a party that is obsessed with pitting one group against another, and that incessantly plays on envy and hatred for bankers, rich people, big business and doctors.
They fail to notice that the success of Jews, as well as other minorities, in the sciences, business and arts is directly correlated to their freedom from oppressive, centralized control. American Jews who support big government do not understand what their ancestors escaped from.
Persecutions of Jews throughout history all have one thing in common: a centralized power that manipulates and directs people's anger away from themselves onto an easy target.
No matter how much Jews align themselves with the power structure and work for noble causes, they will remain an easy target.
As they said in the Soviet Union pertaining to Soviet Jews: They don't beat your record; they beat your face — meaning that no matter how much you try to assimilate, no matter how many good deeds you do, the centralized power can direct populist anger toward you and crush you when it suits them.
When the Bolsheviks took power after the 1917 proletarian revolution, their first steps were to take control of the banks and the media.
Of course, it is not fair to compare our current American democratic leaders with the Bolsheviks.
Yes, they both use the same slogans in their speeches.
Yes, they both stir up envy and class warfare to distract from their failures.
Yes, both political movements sought control of the banks as the foundation for their new egalitarian vision.
And yes, they are both opposed to free speech, as was made clear by the reaction of American leftists to the recent
Supreme Court decision.
But you would never find a Czar anywhere in the Soviet government.
• Kunin lived in the Soviet Union until 1980, working as a civil engineer. She is now a retired software developer living in Connecticut.
The recession keeps dragging on despite close to a trillion dollars in stimulus money and other focal incentives wasted by the federal government. What is happening?
Small businesses, the real engines of our economy, are extremely worried about present conditions and future prospects including massive government regulations and more than 2 trillion dollars of proposed tax hikes that would destroy thousands of businesses. Consequently, they are being advisably circumspect, prudent and conservative, trying to protect the viability of their businesses rather than take aggressive actions that could jeopardize their survival.
For starters, we would all benefit from a massive across the board decrease in taxes, major reduction in government spending, and abolishing useless and costly regulations...
A Real Cure For What Ails Small Biz
Investors Business Daily 02/09/2010
Jobless Recession: Small business has been a key part of plans to stimulate the economy from the very start of the Obama presidency. So why is this crucial job-creating sector of our economy doing so poorly?
The latest soundings from small business are not reassuring. In its annual poll of 2,114 members, for example, the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) found that "small-business owners entered 2010 the same way they left 2009 — depressed." Meanwhile, the ADP Small Business Report for January shows companies with fewer than 50 workers shed an additional 22,000 jobs.
These are the businesses that account for 48 million jobs, or 44% of all private nonfarm employment — and two-thirds or more of all employment growth in recent years. But despite efforts by government to "fix" their problems, they've only grown worse. The programs were ineffective or never got off the ground.
Last year, amid much hoopla, the White House announced plans to give tax credits to "green" energy companies. As a result, according to reporter Renee Schoof of McClatchy Newspapers, the U.S. installed a record 9,900 megawatts of wind-power generating capacity last year — enough to power 2.4 million homes.
A boon for conservation jobs? Hardly. Indeed, the American Wind Energy Association reports the industry cut 2,000 jobs last year, in part because some of the wind energy equipment is made overseas.
Then there was the program unveiled in March to spend $15 billion to "unlock" lending to small businesses. That grew to a $30 billion program later in the year after TARP funds were added to the mix. But as noted by ABC News reporter and blogger Jake Tapper, this is a "phantom" jobs program.
Even Neil Barofsky, head of the Troubled Asset Relief Program, admitted as much. As of Dec. 31, he wrote recently, "the details of the initiative under this program had not been announced and no funds had been disbursed."
In short, the White House talked about $30 billion in aid to small businesses, but never did anything about it.
Meanwhile, President Obama announced a sweeping small-business aid program in his State of the Union. He knows this is key to the economy's recovery, if only because he hears it all the time from Democrats and Republicans.
Among the president's new proposals for small business are a $5,000 tax credit to hire new workers, elimination of capital gains taxes and new incentives to invest in plants and equipment. Will anything come of it? Based on recent history, we doubt it.
Congress, correctly interpreting its sinking poll numbers, has also jumped on the jobs bandwagon and is eagerly crafting another big-time jobs stimulus — this one rumored to be $80 billion in size.
Some of Obama's ideas aren't bad. But even if passed, they likely wouldn't help much. The problems that small businesses have aren't about small businesses per se; they're about the economy.
Small businesses have the same doubts as the rest of us. Besides all these "jobs programs," they see a failed $862 billion stimulus, a $700 billion TARP program that has turned into a politicized auto and bank bailout fund, Cash for
Clunkers, attempts in Copenhagen to impose massive taxes on America to stave off global warming, a $1 trillion health care overhaul, new "responsibility fees" on banks, and worry for our economy's future.
Worse, the new budget contains $2 trillion in tax hikes over a decade, mostly on multinationals and successful entrepreneurs. These taxes undo all the good the White House and Congress would do with their "incentives" and "credits" and whatnot.
Washington thus has it wrong. Businesses aren't awaiting more "stimulus." As the NFIB suggested, they're clinically depressed, seeing the government's dead weight lying across the economy for years to come in all its spending, taxing and ad hoc rule-making.
What sensible entrepreneur would commit his wealth to a money-making project in such a high-tax, high-regulation environment — one in which those who make profits are routinely demonized?
This is a problem with a solution, and the solution is the same one that's worked in the past: Cut taxes across the board — for business big and small — and look for ways to cut regulations, not add more. At the same time, pull back on the insane surge in government spending.
By unlocking our nation's entrepreneurial spirit and reviving growth across the economy, we can put an end to this nightmare and help all Americans regain prosperity. Then small businesses can get back to doing what they do best: create lots of jobs.
America was once the quintessential free economy that served as a paragon for the rest of the world to emulate. Unfortunately, with an ever increasingly intrusive and regulatory government, we have fallen from this enviable position and are now looking up at those ahead of us. Embarrassingly, that includes socialized healthcare Canada as well. The consequences are quite significant and will restrain the growth of our economy - short and long term.
America's 'Free' Falling Economy
Investors Business Daily 02/01/2010
Competitiveness: The latest index of economic freedom shows America falling fast, being ranked for the first time as "mostly free." We've fallen behind Canada, and it's look out below.
Our accelerating descent into a command-and-control economy with government pulling the strings is taking its toll.
The Heritage Foundation's 2010 index of leading economic indicators shows that the land of the free is only mostly free, falling to eighth in the world from sixth last year, now sandwiched between Canada and Denmark.
That Canada, long considered a bastion of socialized medicine, is ranked as economically freer may surprise some. But our neighbor to the north has at least been trying to develop its domestic energy reserves, from hydroelectric to natural gas to oil extracted from its tar sands. Energy is the lifeblood of a free economy.
We have shackled our domestic energy producers with environmental regulations, leaving vast pools of energy lying offshore and in the ground. We regulate what you can build, where you can build it, even how. Endangered critters rank above equally endangered entrepreneurs. Climate change is more important than the business climate.
We have allowed our government to be the engine of stimulus when the only thing that's being stimulated is government itself. The public sector booms while the private sector languishes as the federal government sucks the financial oxygen out of the room. Businesses are afraid to move because they are unable to plan in an environment where government is trying to tax or regulate everything that moves and most things that don't.
Our government has taken upon itself the task of picking winners and losers, instead of letting the free market decide, and as a result we all lose. From car companies to financial institutions, the long arm of government has grabbed freedom by the neck, seeking to decide who gets paid what and how big companies and banks can grow.
Then there are the taxes, which are to business what vampires are to blood banks. A nation's corporate tax rate is important. Its effect on a country's competitiveness and its ability to draw or repel investment has a direct impact on economic health.
Companies are being driven offshore by a combined 39.1% federal and state tax rate that is second only to Japan's. In some states, the combination leads the world. California, which would have the world's eighth largest economy as an independent country, teeters on bankruptcy. If you were a CEO, would you headquarter there or in Switzerland or Ireland, which also rank above us?
The 2010 index shows the U.S. dropping from 80.7 points out of 100 in 2008 to 78 in 2009 and slipping from the "free" category to "mostly free." America's 2.7-point decline is among the fastest ever, ranking right up there with those of such socialist paradises as Bolivia, Libya and Hugo Chavez's Venezuela, whose policies our administration czars are seeking to emulate.
The authors of the Heritage report — Kim Holmes, Anthony Kim and Terry Miller — cite the gargantuan growth of government in both size and power, noting that government spending last year equaled 37.4% of GDP. Spending increases totaled well over $1 trillion in 2009 alone, up more than 20% from 2008.
"Uncertainties caused by ongoing regulatory changes and politically influenced stimulus spending have discouraged entrepreneurship and job creation, slowing recovery," the report states.
"Tax rates are increasingly uncompetitive, and massive stimulus spending is creating unprecedented deficits. Bailouts of financial and automotive firms have generated concerns about property rights."
On these pages last November, former Microsoft COO Robert Herbold and Hoover Institution fellow Scott Powell noted that "ambiguity and the threat of new taxes from Washington, such as cap-and-trade, have already prompted 11 major U.S. companies to move offshore in the past year."
They can be accused of being greedy, but not of being stupid.
We must stop bailing out failure and punishing success through regulation and taxation. Only then can the land of the free be economically free to thrive and prosper.
The ever increasing magnitude of anger that is being generated by American citizens in response to what we see as an imperious, arrogant, dictatorial government is nothing short of remarkable. We are being treated contemptuously by a Government that disregards the will of the people, seeks to tax us to oblivion and “legally” redistribute the fruits of our labors, and aims to insinuate itself in every activity of our daily lives, restricting our freedoms and rights. Our present political and socioeconomic milieu is far more dire and repressive than what the Colonists contended with under King George just before the American Revolution.
Unfortunately, we are in the midst of a political perfect storm which threatens the whole underpinnings of our culture, rights, freedoms, and economic system. Our government has been hijacked by the extreme far left which has malevolent intentions for America. It has a super-majority that is essentially unstoppable legislatively but is also willing to employ corrupt, heavy handed tactics if warranted. Complicit in this and facilitating the situation is the vast majority of the press whose role in the past had always been to serve as a watchdog to protect the average American and keep the government more honest and in check.
Millions of Americans are not only concerned by our present situation but also by the perceived malignant intentions of our government starting with Obama on down. The rhetoric of these politicians is indisputably incongruous with their legislative actions whether it pertains to healthcare reform, the national debt or even our rights. These Democrats and radicals are actively and aggressively seeking to destroy the free America we knew and instead, transform it into a pseudo-dictatorship with the likes of Obama, Reid, Pelosi, Frank and Schumer at the helm.
It is imperative that we all understand the gravity of our present circumstances and then aggressively and pertinaciously act in whatever manner necessary to oppose and reverse this course. Unfortunately, with the Government’s relentless consolidation of power by means of unfettered legislative actions, a political solution may be difficult if not impossible to obtain.
We must do whatever it takes to reclaim our country!
The following article brilliantly, insightful and thoroughly explains why what we see as illogical actions by Obama and other “representatives of the people” are instead intentional, calculated, rational but malignant moves that can and may destroy America. This is a must read!
Cloward-Piven Government
By James Simpson
It is time to cast aside all remaining doubt. President Obama is not trying to lead America forward to recovery, prosperity and strength. Quite the opposite, in fact.
In September of last year, American Thinker published my article, Barack Obama and the Strategy of Manufactured Crisis. Part of a series, it connected then-presidential candidate Barack Obama to individuals and organizations practicing a malevolent strategy for destroying our economy and our system of government. Since then, the story of that strategy has found its way across the blogosphere, onto the airwaves of radio stations across the country, the Glenn Beck television show, Bill O'Reilly, and now Mark Levin.
The methodology is known as the Cloward-Piven Strategy, and we can all be grateful to David Horowitz and his Discover the Networks for originally exposing and explaining it to us. He describes it as:
The strategy of forcing political change through orchestrated crisis. The "Cloward-Piven Strategy" seeks to hasten the fall of capitalism by overloading the government bureaucracy with a flood of impossible demands, thus pushing society into crisis and economic collapse.
Richard Cloward and Frances Fox Piven were two lifelong members of Democratic Socialists of America who taught sociology at Columbia University (Piven later went on to City University of New York). In a May 1966 Nation magazine article titled "The Weight of the Poor," they outlined their strategy, proposing to use grassroots radical organizations to push ever more strident demands for public services at all levels of government.
The result, they predicted, would be "a profound financial and political crisis" that would unleash "powerful forces ... for major economic reform at the national level."
They implemented the strategy by creating a succession of radical organizations, most notable among them the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), with the help of veteran organizer Wade Rathke. Their crowning achievement was the "Motor Voter" act, signed into law by Bill Clinton in 1993 with Cloward and Piven standing behind him.
As we now know, ACORN was one of the chief drivers of high-risk mortgage lending that eventually led to the financial crisis. But the Motor Voter law was another component of the strategy. It created vast vulnerabilities in our electoral system, which ACORN then exploited.
ACORN's vote registration scandals throughout the U.S. are predictable fallout.
The Motor Voter law has also been used to open another vulnerability in the system: the registration of vast numbers of illegal aliens, who then reliably vote Democrat. Herein lies the real reason Democrats are so anxious for open borders, security be damned.
It should be clear to anyone with a mind and two eyes that this president and this Congress do not have our interests at heart. They are implementing this strategy on an unprecedented scale by flooding America with a tidal wave of poisonous initiatives, orders, regulations, and laws. As Rahm Emmanuel said, "A crisis is a terrible thing to waste."
The real goal of "health care" legislation, the real goal of "cap-and-trade," and the real goal of the "stimulus" is to rip the guts out of our private economy and transfer wide swaths of it over to the government to control. Do not be deluded by the propaganda. These initiatives are vehicles for change. They are not goals in and of themselves except in their ability to deliver power. They and will make matters much worse, for that is their design.
This time, in addition to overwhelming the government with demands for services, Obama and the Democrats are overwhelming political opposition to their plans with a flood of apocalyptic legislation. Their ultimate goal is to leave us so discouraged, demoralized, and exhausted that we throw our hands up in defeat. As Barney Frank said, "the middle class will be too distracted to fight."
These people are our enemies. They don't use guns, yet, but they are just as dangerous, determined, and duplicitous as the communists we faced in the Cold War, Korea, Vietnam, and bush wars across the globe, and the Nazis we faced in World War II.
It is time we fully internalized and digested this fact, with all its ugly ramifications. These people have violated countless laws and could be prosecuted, had we the political power. Not only are their policies unconstitutional, but deliberately so -- the goal being to make the Constitution irrelevant. Their spending is off the charts and will drive us into hyperinflation, but it could be rescinded, had we the political power. These policies are toxic, but they could be stopped and reversed, had we the political power. Their ideologies are poisonous, but they could be exposed for what they are, with long jail sentences as an object lesson, had we the political power.
Every single citizen who cares about this country should be spending every minute of his or her spare time lobbying, organizing, writing, and planning. Fight every initiative they launch. It is all destructive. If we are to root out this evil, it is critical that in 2010 we elect competent, principled leaders willing to defend our Constitution and our country. Otherwise, the malevolent cabal that occupies the government today will become too entrenched.
After that, all bets are off.
Businessman and Examiner.com columnist Jim Simpson is a former White House staff economist and budget analyst.
The great British statesman and philosopher once said that “Those who don’t know history are destined to repeat it.” A close corollary to it is that “Those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it”. Unfortunately, we have this precise situation at many levels with Obama and the Congressional Democrats. In our Dec. 1st post , we compared the parallels of history regarding the British car industry and the government takeover there to our present situation with GM. Obama’s actions are mirroring the failed policies of the 1930’s that painfully prolonged the depression far beyond what would have otherwise occurred. Of course, there are many other examples.
The following describes a hauntingly similar situation to ours that transpired in Argentina and what happened when the government there did exactly what Obama and the Democrats are pursuing. The results: DISASTER!
Michael Cembalest from J.P. Morgan researched the prior private sector experience of the cabinet officials selected by Presidents since 1900 who would be expected to deal with employment related issues. These are the individuals that the president might seek advice from regarding economic issues as they would have real world experience. This includes the secretaries of State, Commerce, Treasury, Agriculture, Interior, Labor, Transportation, Energy, and Housing & Urban Development and excludes Postmaster General, Navy, War, Health, Education & Welfare, Veterans Affairs, and Homeland Security. There are a total of 432 cabinet members that were assessed.
The chart (below) shockingly though not unexpectedly shows one of the reasons why many Americans have been critical of Obama's cabinet selections and provides a strong explanation for the economic failures of Obama’s policies: he has surrounded himself with virtually no individuals with private sector experience. Obama's percentage at around seven percent is essentially off the chart and is miniscule compared to all the other Presidents.
This visually shows that Obama has, at best, made extremely poor choices for key positions which then leads to questions about his judgment and motivations. Another question that these findings raise is whether these individuals were selected specifically because of general ideology versus specialized experience with a positive track record. (Rhetorical question - just consider Tim "turbo tax cheat" Geithner and Lawrence "I lost $1.8 billion dollars of endowment funds at Harvard" Summers!)
Any way we look at it, Obama has surrounded himself with many corrupt, incompetent and/or ideologically liberal or radical individuals. We, the American people, unfortunately are paying a colossal price.
We surely got CHANGE with Obama! Unfortunately, it is not the change we wanted or needed. For more than two centuries, we have had Presidents of varied backgrounds, intelligence, political persuasions and ideologies but they all had one thing in common: EXPERIENCE that could prepare them well for the Presidency. It might have involved been leading an army, running a business, or managing a city or state but it was some experience that required leadership, a sine qua non of being at least a partially successful and effective President.
Now, thanks to the aggregate effect of millions of voters who were either ignorant, credulous, recklessly partisan, voted solely base on race, or were have-nots jealous of those who have, we have a change: a President with no practical or useful leadership experience. Not even as a manager of a fast food restaurant. And he is going to make decisions of monumental import, know when to delegate, make prudent fiscal decisions, realize the consequences of his actions and words, etc.? So far, we have seen the unfortunate results of his inexperience and incompetence.
In “trying” to address the relentless unemployment crisis (which the Porkulus Bill of around $800 billion was promised to fix), Obama now has proposed a “Jobs Summit” that is scheduled for next month. As IBD put it:
Something's wrong when the government of the most prolific job-creating economy in history has to schedule a "summit" to decide how to create jobs.
This isn't rocket science. Any business owner, entrepreneur or manager can tell you that job creation requires new businesses, new investment in plant and equipment, and economic policies conducive to both.
But so far, those in charge in Washington seem to be doing everything in their power to kill jobs, whether it's hiking the minimum wage, snubbing trade deals, imposing new mandates with health reforms and climate controls, or paving the way for a massive 69% increase in capital-gains tax rates by letting the Bush cuts expire.
We feel a great start for job creation, would first be to actually increase unemployment by one – get rid of Obama!
The healthcare reform legislation, AKA Obamanocare or Pelosicare, is disastrous no matter which way it is assessed – cost, quality, delivery, rationing, disorganization, corruption, effects on medical research, etc. The ultimate reality based astronomical price tag will bankrupt our country and obliterate the standard of living for years to come as a consequence. The massive and oppressive tax hikes that Congressional Democrats disingenuously claims will pay for the government takeover of healthcare will not cover the costs but will most assuredly crush and destroy our economy.
“Congress has barely finished blowing the ink dry on its bill, but already its central fiscal premise is being convincingly challenged.
While Democrats have claimed the overhaul will cost $900 billion, the Congressional Budget Office puts the real cost at $1.1 trillion. The Associated Press, citing unnamed Democratic sources, comes up with $1.2 trillion; Republicans say it'll cost $1.3 trillion or more; others say it's more like $1.8 trillion.”
The following insightful editorial written by Sen. Tom Coburn (R. – OK) and Representative Paul Ryan (R. – WI.) exposes the fallacies of the Democrats’ rhetoric and numbers as well as the multitude of dangers that the healthcare reform legislation poses to the average American. They write:
“The current reform product does not meet the test of either real reform or fiscal responsibility. Nor does it represent the best of both parties. It represents the frustrated ideological ambitions of one party that believes the way to pull the welfare state back from bankruptcy is by expanding it.”
Addressing just the financial aspects of the bill and the liabilities that it engenders, they note that:
“What is at stake in this process is not merely a lower standard of living for future generations, but a decline of freedom at home and abroad. We are risking our own national economic stability and security if we continue — through excessive borrowing — to hand potential adversaries leverage over our foreign and domestic policy.”
Yes, Michelle, you now have another good reason to be proud of your country: it’s paying for your servants so that you can continue to comport yourself like arrogant royalty. Let’s revisit that famous statement you made last year and see how much better the situation is for you today. Most Americans could only dream of being given millions of dollars at taxpayer expense without holding an official job and having every one of your whims catered to without protest. But then again this is not unlike your previous “work” experience back in Chicago.
During an almost two year deep recession with high unemployment, with millions of Americans suffering economically, and trillions of dollars of wealth evaporated, you see no reason why you should sympathize and suffer too. Instead, it seems that you are trying almost single-handedly to significantly reduce the unemployment rate by hiring at least 26 servants at taxpayer expense exceeding two millions dollars per year. The number of attendants that you “require” obliterates numerically and cost wise what any previous First Lady needed. Even Hillary Clinton who was spearheading healthcare reform had a maximum of only 13 people under her. Meanwhile, Bess Truman and Mamie Eisenhower had to shell out the salaries for their personal secretaries out of their own pocketbooks. How times have changed for the better! Isn’t that what you stated, Michelle?
Does your Chief of Staff really need to be paid $172,200? That is on par with what our Senators and Congressional Representatives receive and who may work slightly harder for their $174,000. Of course, maybe “combat” pay is included in your Chief of Staff’s base salary to make working under you a little bit more palatable.
Why do five members of your staff deserve to earn over $100,000 per year? Is that really necessary during a financial crisis? Can’t you show just a little fiscal responsibility and restraint? I wouldn’t look to your husband for advice, though, as he also appears to be clueless, sybaritic and financially reckless. Instead of signing the Porkulus bill in the White House Rose Garden like past Presidents have done for other legislation, Obama had to grandstand and fly to Phoenix and Colorado, costing the American taxpayer probably in excess of $30 million dollars. That amount could have paid for a lot of school supplies for children.
Your irresponsible, arrogant, and profligate spending for your little microcosm in addition to Obama’s for both personal (remember your date in New York?) and public adulation are just more reasons that we, the American people can’t and won’t trust your husband, Obama, with the healthcare and other legislation and with our tax dollars. But there is no need to despair as there is a silver lining. You will still have your own taxpayer financed gold plated healthcare plan that the average American would lust for rather than the restrictive, convoluted, and rationed one that Obama wants to impose on us.
You knew this was going to happen. The rabid environmentalists in this country through legal maneuvers and political influences and liberal politicians have thwarted nearly all efforts to explore the vast energy resources situated off our coasts as well as on the mainland and in Alaska. The result has been our ever escalating dependence on foreign oil and with it, a massive but avoidable outflow of US dollars and gargantuan trade deficits. We have also placed ourselves at the mercy of tyrants and authoritarian governments that control much of the world’s available oil such as Iran, Russia, Venezuela, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, etc. which also wreaks havoc when trying to conduct a prudent foreign policy.
Well, the oil is still out there off our shore and the rest of the world needs it. So guess what? Other countries will be sending their crews over here to start drilling off our shores. That’s right! Congress in its infinite wisdom has prevented American firms from exploring for oil but it can’t prevent foreign countries from doing so.
Those who refuse to learn from history are doomed to repeat it. What we have unfolding now with our Government’s intended responses to the Recession, specifically orchestrated by Obama and Congressional Democrats, is eerily and remarkably identical to the actions first initiated by President Hoover in 1932 and then expanded by Franklin Roosevelt. Their policies included onerous tax increases, numerous new taxes on common items, and massive government spending. The upshot of all of this was a severe worsening and prolongation of the Depression by another 12 years!
Assessing the proposals by the Obama Administration and Congressional Democrats, they have passed gargantuan spending bills including the Stimulus (Porkulus) Bill of almost $800 billion dollars, hundreds of billions in TARP funds, are intending to pass the bankrupting Cap and Trade Bill which will cost this country trillions of dollars, and healthcare “reform” that in its present form will realistically cost tens of trillions of dollars. Add to this the proposed income tax increases, taxation on virtually anything that exists and arcane compliance legislation and we will have the mother of all Depressions and the bankrupting of this country.
The ideological fervor with which Obama and the Democrats are pursuing these reckless and irresponsible policies and bills as well as their dismissive attitude of the historical lessons and public discontent demonstrates their unparalleled arrogance and disdain for the American people as well as their intellectual and moral corruptness. This bodes poorly for our future.
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