BONZER WOLF

A full-blown trade row erupted on Sunday night between the US and China after Beijing accused Washington of “rampant protectionism” for imposing heavy duties on imported Chinese tires and threatened action against imports of US poultry and vehicles.

Trade relations between two of the world’s biggest economies deteriorated after Barack Obama signed an order late on Friday to impose a new duty of 35 per cent on Chinese tyre imports on top of an existing 4 per cent tariff.

In his first big test on world trade since taking office in January, Mr Obama sided with America’s trade unions, which have complained that a “surge” in imports of Chinese-made tyres had caused 7,000 job losses among US factory workers.

Obama’s decision is a clear affirmation of the power of unions in shaping trade policy. It appears that Obama is desperate to shore-up support from unions and the left of the Democratic Party for health-care reform—his most pressing domestic concern—and is prepared to risk repercussions on trade.

Beijing issued a statement Saturday sharply condemning the U.S. move.

"China strongly opposes this serious act of trade protectionism by the U.S.," the statement on the Ministry of Commerce Web site said. "This act not only violates the rules of the World Trade Organization but also violates the relevant commitments made by the U.S. government at the G-20 financial summit."

By taking "this unprecedented action, the Obama administration is now at odds with its own public statements about refraining from increasing tariffs above current levels," said Vic DeIorio, executive vice president, GITI Tire (U.S.), the largest manufacturer of tires in China.

There are 46 million people without health insurance, according to media reports. But aren't a lot of them already eligible for free or subsidized health care? And doesn't the 46 million figure include people who simply don't buy insurance because they feel they don't need it, or are illegal immigrants who aren't supposed to qualify for taxpayer benefits anyway?

The answer is yes. Twenty-five percent of the uninsured are already eligible but have failed to enroll in existing state-federal health coverage under Medicaid, for very low-income parents, pregnant women and people with disabilities, or the State Children's Health Insurance Program, or SCHIP, for children, according to studies, including one in 2007 by the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation.

Different studies use different figures that fluctuate year by year. But based on the 46 million U.S. Census Bureau estimate, removing those people already eligible for free care would knock the figure down to around 34.5 million.

But that figure includes illegal immigrants. Although they have health-care needs, they would not be eligible for federal subsidies under overhaul proposals by President Barack Obama and members of Congress.

Widely varying figures have been reported for the number of illegal immigrants. The census says "noncitizens" account for 9.7 million people. But not all of them are illegal, since that number includes people awaiting a green card or citizenship test and who comply with immigration laws. The Pew Hispanic Center has estimated that 6.8 million people without health insurance were in the United States illegally in 2007. Other figures have put it at 8 million. Using the Pew figure while also subtracting citizens who are already eligible for federal and state programs, the 46 million total now would come down to around 27.7 million.

Can those 27.7 million people afford insurance?

This is where opinions diverge further, because of differing assumptions about the lives of people who don't get employer-provided health insurance and don't buy it themselves. Kaiser figures, which precede the recent economic downturn, show that about 56 percent of this group makes too much money for free health care but earns too little to afford an insurance policy. Kaiser put insurance affordability at 300 percent of the poverty level. The poverty level currently is $10,830 for a single person, or $22,050 for a family of four.

The Employment Policies Institute, a conservative-leaning nonprofit organization, says that about 43 percent of adults under age 65 earn 2.5 times the federal poverty level, "indicating they likely have the means to obtain health-care coverage and thus may be classified as 'voluntarily' uninsured.'¤" But Len Nichols, a health-care economist at the New America Foundation, a centrist think tank, says that a mother with two children, earning three times the federal poverty rate, would have to spend 24 percent of her income for an average health-care policy unless her employer picked up some of the cost.

But we're not done with the math yet. Nearly 30 percent of the 46 million figure that is often cited represents young adults between 18 and 24, according to the census. Reasons for their uninsured status are not tracked with precision. While some are too old to be eligible for their parents' policies but still are underemployed or unemployed, policy makers and politicians also assume that some are simply cocky about their chances of needing care and prefer to save or spend money on other things. But hard data on that point, too, are divergent, and debate on just what is affordable shows wide disagreement.

Within all these numbers is the broader debate: What would happen if the majority of these 46 million people -- or 34 million or 27.7 million -- became insured? Would it be smart of the government to reorder the health insurance system so that almost everyone had coverage?

The Obama administration and many health-care advocates say yes, noting that premiums from younger, healthier people would cross-pollinate with the premiums of others, reducing costs for everyone. And by providing routine health care for the poor, rather than waiting for them to show up in emergency rooms where they sign up for Medicaid or SCHIP, the country could improve its health as well as its economy.

How to do this is where the real policy disagreements lie.

"There is something to the argument" of wanting to bring younger, healthier people "into the insurance pool," said Michael Tanner, a senior fellow at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank. "The question is, what is the best way to get them in there." He doesn't believe the Democrats' plan, which could cost $1 trillion or more, is the way. Tanner prefers to bring down costs and premiums through market-based solutions, less regulation and fewer mandates.

He, too, studies the numbers. And although he comes at it from a different perspective from Kaiser, he too notes that a quarter of the uninsured already qualify for government coverage.

"If you show up at the emergency room and you are not enrolled already, they'll get you signed up," Tanner said of the roughly 12 million people who already qualify. "Hospitals, after all, want to get paid."

Public doubt about health care reform has grown as the debate's raged this summer, with a rise in views it would do more harm than good, increasing opposition to a public option, and President Obama's rating on the issue at a new low in ABC News/Washington Post polls.

Fewer than half of Americans, 45 percent, support reform as it's been explained to date, while 50 percent are opposed – with many more "strongly" opposed than strongly in favor, 40 percent vs. 27 percent. Support's at just 36 percent among independents, the crucial political center.

Obama's approval rating for handling health care has fallen steadily from 57 percent in April to 46 percent today, led by a steep 17-point slide among independents. And expectations he can successfully accomplish reform have dropped further – from 68 percent shortly before he took office to 49 percent now.

Americans are waking up to the ObamaNation!  Keep the pressure on on your Senators and Representatives in Congress.  WE the people are responsible for our future. We have been complacent and lazy , allowing both Democrats and Republicans to hijack our Constitution and our Republic. 

It's never to late to do the right thing.  We can and will save America!

Bloomberg News reports that Americans fell behind on their mortgage payments at a record pace in the second quarter as job losses and falling real estate prices thwarted government efforts to stabilize the housing market.

The share of loans with one or more payments overdue rose to a seasonally adjusted 9.24 percent of all mortgages, an all- time high, from 9.12 percent in the first quarter, the Mortgage Bankers Association said in a report today. The inventory of homes in foreclosure increased to 4.3 percent, the most in three decades of data, and loans overdue by at least 90 days, the point at which foreclosure proceedings typically begin, rose to 7.97 percent, the highest on record.

“We’ve seen a significant drop in the problem with subprime loans and we’ve moved now to a problem with prime fixed-rate loans,” Jay Brinkmann, the Washington-based trade group’s chief economist, said in an interview. “Job losses are driving it, and we expect that to continue into next year.”

Homeowners fall behind on their mortgage payments when they lose their jobs, and falling prices mean they can’t sell and pay off their loans, Brinkmann said. Companies have shed 5.7 million jobs since January 2008, the biggest employment loss since the Great Depression. The median U.S. home price fell 16 percent in the second quarter from a year earlier, the steepest drop on record, according to the National Association of Realtors.

The percentage of loans on which foreclosure actions were started was 1.36 percent, down from 1.37 percent in the first quarter, driven by the decline in subprime loans. New foreclosures on prime loans increased to 1.01 percent from 0.94 percent, while subprime loans dropped to 4.13 percent from 4.65 percent, Brinkmann said.

Read the entire report here www.bloomberg.com/apps/news

From the Wall Street Journal   online.wsj.com
By JOHN MACKEY

"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out
of other people's money." -Margaret Thatcher

With a projected $1.8 trillion deficit for 2009, several trillions more in deficits projected over the next decade, and with both Medicare and Social Security entitlement spending about to ratchet up several notches over the next 15 years as Baby Boomers become eligible for both, we are rapidly running out of other people's money. These deficits are simply not sustainable. They are either going to result in unprecedented new taxes and inflation, or they will bankrupt us.

While we clearly need health-care reform, the last thing our country needs is a massive new health-care entitlement that will create hundreds of billions of dollars of new unfunded deficits and move us much closer to a government takeover of our health-care system. Instead, we should be trying to achieve reforms by moving in the opposite direction—toward less government control and more individual empowerment. Here are eight reforms that would greatly lower the cost of health care for everyone:

• Remove the legal obstacles that slow the creation of high-deductible health insurance plans and health savings accounts (HSAs). The combination of high-deductible health insurance and HSAs is one solution that could solve many of our health-care problems. For example, Whole Foods Market pays 100% of the premiums for all our team members who work 30 hours or more per week (about 89% of all team members) for our high-deductible health-insurance plan. We also provide up to $1,800 per year in additional health-care dollars through deposits into employees' Personal Wellness Accounts to spend as they choose on their own health and wellness.

Money not spent in one year rolls over to the next and grows over time. Our team members therefore spend their own health-care dollars until the annual deductible is covered (about $2,500) and the insurance plan kicks in. This creates incentives to spend the first $2,500 more carefully. Our plan's costs are much lower than typical health insurance, while providing a very high degree of worker satisfaction.

• Equalize the tax laws so that employer-provided health insurance and individually owned health insurance have the same tax benefits. Now employer health insurance benefits are fully tax deductible, but individual health insurance is not. This is unfair.

• Repeal all state laws which prevent insurance companies from competing across state lines. We should all have the legal right to purchase health insurance from any insurance company in any state and we should be able use that insurance wherever we live. Health insurance should be portable.

• Repeal government mandates regarding what insurance companies must cover. These mandates have increased the cost of health insurance by billions of dollars. What is insured and what is not insured should be determined by individual customer preferences and not through special-interest lobbying.

• Enact tort reform to end the ruinous lawsuits that force doctors to pay insurance costs of hundreds of thousands of dollars per year. These costs are passed back to us through much higher prices for health care.

• Make costs transparent so that consumers understand what health-care treatments cost. How many people know the total cost of their last doctor's visit and how that total breaks down? What other goods or services do we buy without knowing how much they will cost us?

• Enact Medicare reform. We need to face up to the actuarial fact that Medicare is heading towards bankruptcy and enact reforms that create greater patient empowerment, choice and responsibility.

• Finally, revise tax forms to make it easier for individuals to make a voluntary, tax-deductible donation to help the millions of people who have no insurance and aren't covered by Medicare, Medicaid or the State Children's Health Insurance Program.

Many promoters of health-care reform believe that people have an intrinsic ethical right to health care—to equal access to doctors, medicines and hospitals. While all of us empathize with those who are sick, how can we say that all people have more of an intrinsic right to health care than they have to food or shelter?

Health care is a service that we all need, but just like food and shelter it is best provided through voluntary and mutually beneficial market exchanges. A careful reading of both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution will not reveal any intrinsic right to health care, food or shelter. That's because there isn't any. This "right" has never existed in America

Even in countries like Canada and the U.K., there is no intrinsic right to health care. Rather, citizens in these countries are told by government bureaucrats what health-care treatments they are eligible to receive and when they can receive them. All countries with socialized medicine ration health care by forcing their citizens to wait in lines to receive scarce treatments.

Although Canada has a population smaller than California, 830,000 Canadians are currently waiting to be admitted to a hospital or to get treatment, according to a report last month in Investor's Business Daily. In England, the waiting list is 1.8 million.

At Whole Foods we allow our team members to vote on what benefits they most want the company to fund. Our Canadian and British employees express their benefit preferences very clearly—they want supplemental health-care dollars that they can control and spend themselves without permission from their governments. Why would they want such additional health-care benefit dollars if they already have an "intrinsic right to health care"? The answer is clear—no such right truly exists in either Canada or the U.K.—or in any other country.

Rather than increase government spending and control, we need to address the root causes of poor health. This begins with the realization that every American adult is responsible for his or her own health.

Unfortunately many of our health-care problems are self-inflicted: two-thirds of Americans are now overweight and one-third are obese. Most of the diseases that kill us and account for about 70% of all health-care spending—heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes and obesity—are mostly preventable through proper diet, exercise, not smoking, minimal alcohol consumption and other healthy lifestyle choices.

Recent scientific and medical evidence shows that a diet consisting of foods that are plant-based, nutrient dense and low-fat will help prevent and often reverse most degenerative diseases that kill us and are expensive to treat. We should be able to live largely disease-free lives until we are well into our 90s and even past 100 years of age.

Health-care reform is very important. Whatever reforms are enacted it is essential that they be financially responsible, and that we have the freedom to choose doctors and the health-care services that best suit our own unique set of lifestyle choices. We are all responsible for our own lives and our own health. We should take that responsibility very seriously and use our freedom to make wise lifestyle choices that will protect our health. Doing so will enrich our lives and will help create a vibrant and sustainable American society.

Mr. Mackey is co-founder and CEO of Whole Foods Market Inc.

Lake Las Vegas’ third and final golf course, the private Southshore Golf Course, is heading for foreclosure.

The resort, which has been in bankruptcy reorganization since July 2008, has already abandoned its two public courses, The Falls and Reflection Bay, allowing them to enter foreclosure. Though the courses are being maintained, they remain closed.

"We're still hearing from the casino operators that weekends are doing well, but filling rooms during the middle of the week is an issue," Frank Streshley, chief of the Gaming Control Board's tax and license division, said Tuesday after the agency released gaming revenues for June. "People are coming, but they are just not spending."

Nevada casinos collected $818.2 million from customers during June, a 13.8 percent decline from $949.3 million collected the same month a year ago.

The total was the lowest monthly figure since July 2004, when casinos won $813 million from gamblers. June was the 18th straight monthly decline as the gaming industry continued to be hampered by the sagging economy.

On the Strip, gaming revenues fell 14.8 percent in June to $414.5 million, compared with $486.4 million last year.

For the first six months of the year, gaming revenues are down statewide almost 13.5 percent, while the money won from gamblers on the Strip is off 14.7 percent.

June marked the end of fiscal year 2008-09 and gaming revenues for the 12 months were almost $10.8 billion statewide, a 13.7 percent decline from $12.5 billion in 2007-08. On the Strip for the fiscal year, gaming revenues declined 15.3 percent to $5.65 billion, compared with $6.67 billion in the previous fiscal year.

Visitor volume in Las Vegas continued to fall in June, according to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.

In June, 2,980,122 visitors stayed in Las Vegas, a drop of 6.3 percent from the same month in 2008, with 3,179,472 visitors.

Las Vegas visitors seemed to respond to marketing programs and room rates discounted by 25.5 percent on average, the convention authority said. Yet the occupancy rate came in at 82.2 percent, down 7.2 percentage points from June last year.

Convention attendance dropped from 438,044 in June 2008 to 355,436 this June, an 18.9 percent drop.

Visitor numbers dropped 5.5 percent in Laughlin and by 26.2 percent in Mesquite in the month of June, the convention authority said.

Housing market conditions in Las Vegas remain softer than a week-old banana. 

Bank-owned properties continue to drive the local housing market, accounting for 73 percent of all sales. Prices are still depressed, but they're not falling by $10,000 a month like they were in late 2008 and earlier this year.

Tim Kelly Kiernan, foreclosure specialist at ReMax Pros in Las Vegas, said he thinks a tremendous amount of foreclosures are yet to come. Various reports show a few hundred notices of default being filed daily in Clark County.

He had five clients recently with great credit scores who tried to sell their homes in a short sale, or for less than the mortgage balance, which requires lender approval.

"If they aren't successful, they will just stay in the home for as long as they can, not make the mortgage payments, save that money to move forward in their lives," he said. "Not a good sign for home values, but they feel they will never recoup the lost equity in their homes."

The median price is $139,000, down $1,000 from the previous month and down $81,000 from a year ago.

Of the 35,758 home sales recorded since July 2008, 26,653 are real estate-owned, or bank-owned, and 3,231 are short sales, according to the title company.

 

General Motors Co said on Monday its U.S. auto sales fell 19.4 percent in July from a year earlier, but retail sales rose from the month before for a fifth consecutive month, supported by the U.S. government's "Cash for Clunkers" incentives.

GM, which emerged from bankruptcy last month after the sale of its best assets to a group led by the U.S. Treasury, said U.S. sales fell to 189,443 vehicles in July from 235,184 a year earlier. Retail sales were down only 9 percent from July 2008, but fleet sales were down 47 percent.

The result stands in contrast to a small 2.3 percent sales increase for rival Ford Motor Co, the only Detroit car maker not to pass through bankruptcy in 2009, and a 9 percent decline at Chrysler Group LLC, which emerged from bankruptcy in June.

Corporatism is the organization of our Republic into industrial and professional corporations serving as organs of the federal government with control over persons and activities executed by the political representation in Washington D.C.

GM's failure is more evidence that fascist corporatism does not work.  Your tax dollars were wasted to bail out both GM & Chrysler. FORD did not take any government money.  When will the people wake up and demand that Congress turn their backs on Obama's corporatist socialist agenda and return our economy to free market capitalism?  WE the people elect our representatives and WE must DEMAND that they follow the Constitution and represent US.

Phred Barnet of "Americanly Yours" does a great job of explaining the Obama Lemon aka Cash For Clunkers program.

"My personal opinion was that one of the reasons that this bill was passed was to protect the United States’ “investments” in [read:  theft of] General Motors and Chrysler.  It is clear to all that Congress and the Administration intended for this program to stimulate the economy and help the environment.  But I also believe that the government wanted to use this program to inflate the revenues at GM and Chrysler to make the American people less uneasy about the bailouts of those firms.  Think about it.  If you had just made a hugely unpopular move like taking over two iconic American automakers, you would do anything possible to convince the public that it was a good decision.  This includes funneling money to those companies to make their revenues look good.

My guess is that this program will actually hurt GM and Chrysler as compared to their competitors, namely Ford.  Why?  Well for one, a new Rasmussen poll found that 66% of Americans have at least “a somewhat favorable opinion of Ford.“  The same poll found that “General Motors is viewed favorably by 38%… and unfavorably by 56%”  It also found that 34% have at least somewhat favorable opinion of Chrysler “while 55% see the company unfavorably.”  The American people are angry at the other two companies for taking taxpayer funds, and Ford is now perceived as the only American automaker that isnt owned by the government.

They also make much better cars now than they used to.  I love my 2007 Ford Fusion.

In another poll that was published on the same day, Rasmussen also found that 46%of Americans are more likely to buy a Ford because they did not take a government bailout (13% said they were less likely and 37% said it didnt make a difference).  41% OF Americans also believe that quality of GM’s cars will get worse now that the government owns the company, while only 19% think it will get better."

Read more here: americanlyyours.com/

 

THE CASH FOR CLUNKERS PROGRAM IS IN CHAOS- BEING SUSPENDED.

THE "DETROIT FREE PRESS" REPORTS THAT AFTER LESS THAN FOUR DAYS IN BUSINESS, THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT WILL SUSPEND THE PLAN SAYING THAT ITS ALREADY BURNED THROUGH ITS 950 (M) MILLION-DOLLAR BUDGET. THE PLAN PROVIDED DISCOUNTS UP TO FOUR-THOUSAND-500-DOLLARS ON NEW CAR PURCHASES IF THE CAR BEING TURNED IN WAS A CERTIFIABLE GAS GUZZLER. NEARLY 23-THOUSAND TRADES HAVE BEEN CERTIFIED BY FEDERAL AUTHORITIES SINCE MONDAY, WHEN THE PROGRAM BEGAN. THE DECISION TO SUSPEND THE PROGRAM FOLLOWS WARNINGS FROM AUTO DEALERS THE GOVERNMENT WAS IN DANGER OF LOSING TRACK OF HOW MANY TRADES HAD ACTUALLY BEEN MADE. THE U-S DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION DID NOT IMMEDIATELY COMMENT ON ITS PLANS FOR THE PROGRAM, OR WHAT WOULD HAPPEN TO DEALS IN PROGRESS.

www.jrdeputyaccountant.com/

accounting enthusiast, hipster artist, mother, authorized snark distributor, disbeliever in government, believer in regulation, potty mouth.

                                                          MUST READ DAILY

"When you look around at what America has become, I implore you, dear reader, to not feel so defeated. I know. The Fed balance sheet just reached over $2 trillion (on record), unemployment is still on the rise, they are marching out the asshats one after another to announce everything is under control, and this Obamacare shit really is going to happen.

Worse for the libertarians and market enthusiasts, we get to watch the markets get perverted and skeezed on and artificially jerked off every single day. It's like fingernails on a chalkboard. No, please, no more...

Still, some of us jump in anyway and hope for the best. The traders are my heroes - especially the @StockTwits boys - and girls! - who are pretty LOL-worthy, clever, brilliant, AND entertaining. I should especially take this opportunity to thank Howard Lindzon personally, for he has advanced our efforts more than any other website, even Google. The man is a genius. (you'd think I'm winning a fucking Webby, wtf is this gay bullshit?) Anyway, if you aren't using it, you're missing out on what could be the single most useful market tool available on the Internet. I have seen many applications, mailing lists, paid lists, services, sites and tricks here in these tubes and between StockTwits and Wikinvest, you've got the picture. If you choose not to look at it yourself, I can't be held responsible for the pound of flesh that gets taken out of your ass later. I tried.

Anyway.

Don't despair, America. We're getting somewhere."

Barack Obama, self-described sports aficionado, friend of our foes, and narcissist of the year, found another golden opportunity to project himself on the world stage. He also probably noticed that his face has not yet graced the cover of Sports Illustrated. In order to correct that dreadful oversight, Obama has decided to inject himself into America's national pastime tonight.

The only modern era President NOT to have  thrown out a ceremonial first pitch at regular season MLB game has saved himself for the BIG stage at the All Star Game. Obama's Treasury Department announced yesterday that the government's annual deficit has passed $1.1 Trillion. The fiscal year will end with the deficit  north of $1.84 Trillion on September 30 according to Treasury projections.

The FOX network will employ 21 HD cameras and 80 field and crowd microphones, as well as approximately 20 microphones for players, coaches and umpires to wear. And during the FOX broadcast, the on-air team will interact with viewers via Twitter. FOX's personalities will tweet at www.twitter.com/MLBonFOX, and Rosenthal will respond to viewer tweets as well.

During the afternoon, MLB.com and FOXSports.com will even bring batting practice to fans. Starting at 4:30 p.m., fans can watch the MLB All-Star Batting Practice Show at those two Web sites, allowing fans who aren't at the ballpark to get a view of some things they don't normally see even during a game broadcast.

Last year's number was the all-time leader at the time, at $454.8 billion -- an "INHERITED" figure that now seems rather puny in comparison.

The soaring deficit is making Chinese and other foreign buyers of U.S. debt nervous, which could make them reluctant lenders down the road. It could also force the Treasury Department to pay higher interest rates to make U.S. debt attractive longer-term.

"These are mind-boggling numbers," said Sung Won Sohn, an economist at the Smith School of Business at California State University.

Barack Obama, is already the biggest spender we've ever had in the White House. The previous champ was FDR who put the United States on the path to socialism.

Deflation is defined as a decrease in the general price level.

• It is a negative inflation rate.
  Deflation means the value of money will increase.
• Deflation is often associated with periods of negative or stagnant economic growth (Great Depression, Japanese economy in 1990s, early 2000s). In fact deflation is often used to express a declining economy

Deflation is considered harmful to economy because

1. People delay spending, hoping prices will be cheaper next year
2. Workers resist nominal wage cuts, therefore, real wages rise causing real wage unemployment.
3. Real interest rates become too high. Even interest rates of 0% cannot induce people to spend creating a liquidity trap.
4. Deflation increases the burden of debt

Look for Deflation to happen in the second half of this year and into 2010, which is going to be the financial disaster that finally wakes the public up to the ObamaNation. It's going to get worse before it gets better, but the light at the end of the tunnel will be the 2010 midterm elections. It will be the Republican's to lose. The economy, especially unemployment is going to be THAT bad thanks to Obama.

When deflation ends, hyper inflation will take over. We are going to have our own lost decade just like Japan. The U.S. lost any chance of keeping this recession under control with the election of Obama, a confirmed American Progressive with a fascist economic agenda.

I hereby petition Congress to reject any and all legislation (or regulatory action by the EPA) that would enact new energy taxes and/or establish a national cap and trade system for carbon dioxide that would, as President Obama has said, cause electricity and other energy prices to "necessarily skyrocket."

www.americansolutions.com/energytax/2009/06/the-energy-tax-how-they-voted.php

The National Energy Tax was muscled through the U.S. House by a vote of 219-212. There were 44 Democrats who decided to stand with their constituents and oppose Speaker Pelosi. There were also 8 Republicans, who voted to kill jobs & enact the largest tax increases and most far-reaching centralized (dictatorship) control over every aspect of American life.

Republicans voting yes: 

Congressman Mary Bono, California 202-225-5330
Congressman Mike Castle,Delaware 202-225-4165
Congressman Mark Kirk Illinois 202-225-4835
Congressman Frank Lobiondo New Jersey 202-225-6572
Congressman Leonard Lance New Jersey 202-225-5361
Congressman John McHugh New York 202-225-4611
Congressman Dave Reichert Washington State 202-225-7761
Congressman Chris Smith Trenton New Jersey 202-225-3765

Do not be discouraged. The good news is that people are now paying attention. Our mission must be to prepare for the next stage of this fight in the U.S. Senate.  Pamela Geller at AtlasShrugs reports that both James Inhofe and Harry Reid predict the legislation is dead in the Senate. 

Starting today, it's time to recruit as many people as we possibly can to join our side. This is about our jobs. This is about our economy. This is about our future. And this is about our willingness and courage to stand up to over-reaching politicians and the machine that they are trying to run in Washington, DC.

The lines have been drawn in the sand, and we have a lot of work to do. We must begin today.

If you want to know where your representatives stand, please look below.

clerk.house.gov/evs/2009/roll477.xml

“One of the great follies in legislative history.” That’s how John Hinderaker at Powerline describes the bait-and-switch — I mean the cap and trade — bill that is due to be voted on in the House of, er, Representatives imminently.

As with the 1000-page non-stimulating stimulus bill that Obama shoved down your throat mere days after he assumed office, this bill will go largely unread by the people you elected to (among other things) oversee the country’s finances responsibly. Let me mention that bill’s sponsors, Henry A. Waxman and Edward J. Markey, are up for re-election in 2010, something the readers in California and Massachusetts will want to think about when they wake up to what the bill would mean to them.  As Hinderaker points out, if enacted, the Waxman-Markey climate confusion bill would “create a convoluted federal bureaucracy that would control key sectors of the economy and of our lives.”

The whole point of cap and trade is to hike the price of electricity and gas so that Americans will use less. These higher prices will show up not just in electricity bills or at the gas station but in every manufactured good, from food to cars. Consumers will cut back on spending, which in turn will cut back on production, which results in fewer jobs created or higher unemployment. Some companies will instead move their operations overseas, with the same result.

Really, this bill should be called the decapitate and strangle bill, because what it would do is systematically hobble the U.S. economy by starving it of affordable energy. Why? Because of a misplaced faith in the virtue of using less energy. It’s a version of spiritual smugness like that emitted by eastern yogi, health nuts, and others who believe that the extent of their asceticism is a reliable index of their enlightenment.

Representative Waxman cites a misleading number from a preliminary analysis conducted by the Congressional Budget Office estimating that the bill would cost the average household a mere $175 a year. Cheap to save the planet and give yourself a daily pat on the back, what? But as the Journal points out the real cost is likely to be $1,870 a year for a family of 4 in 2010, a figure that rises to $6,800 by 2035 as various restrictions take effect.

Bottom line: “Americans should know that those Members who vote for this climate bill are voting for what is likely to be the biggest tax in American history.” I’m not sure anyone has been able to dramatize this effectively.



 

Congress is trying to skyrocket your cost of living while putting another 1 million-plus Americans out of work.  And they want to do it before the week is out.

You see, the “Cap-and-Trade” bill currently in the House is really nothing more than a thinly disguised energy tax that will hit every single American.

And now Nancy Pelosi and Congressional Democrats are pushing this tax hike toward a vote that could come as soon as Friday.

By invasively manipulating an already over-regulated energy industry, this legislation seeks to fix an alleged problem that has recently been discredited by over 31,478 scientists -- including over 3,803 with specific expertise in atmospheric, earth, and environmental sciences.

All 31,478 of these scientists are trained to understand and evaluate the scientific data relevant to the human-caused global warming hypothesis -- and are speaking out against government “remedies.”

With this bill, Congress is once again just doing what it does best -- fleecing taxpayers to further an alarmist agenda.

You see, energy companies just pass the costs of these draconian regulations through to the consumer in the form of huge price increases.

As a result, you will pay higher gas prices, higher electric prices, and higher costs for goods.

Barack Obama has estimated the costs of this legislation to American taxpayers to be over 650 BILLION dollars over the next eight years, and that figure is no doubt just a fraction of the real cost.

But even that modest estimate amounts to hundreds of dollars a year in increased living expenses for every family -- and will more likely cost thousands a year.

And according to the Heritage Foundation, between 1.2 and 2.3 million jobs could be lost over the next ten-years due to the bill’s stifling regulations.

This current economic crisis is no time for Congress to consider both raising prices on hard-working Americans AND costing them jobs.

That’s why we must act now to send a message to Congress to reject this disastrous Cap-and-Tax Scheme.

Call your U.S. Representative now and ask for the staff member that deals with Energy policy.  Politely but firmly tell them that you are opposed to this costly government power grab.

Supporters of the legislation are of course trying to downplay the cost of this scheme to the American people.

But if the bill does not directly and massively increase energy costs to consumers, how would it possibly achieve its stated aims?

It is only through these massive cost increases -- mandated and enforced by the federal government -- that the dubious goal of reducing carbon emissions could possibly be reached.  The only alternative to huge energy price increases would be massive, government-ordered power outages, leaving Americans literally in-the-dark like some war-torn Third World Country.

Contact your Representative and voice your opposition to Cap and Trade BEFORE it is too late.   (202) 224-3121

www.house.gov/house/MemberWWW.shtml

Mr. Wolf is enjoying his time in Las Vegas while he can. The ObamaNation is going to be much, much worse than I ever imagined last year. My friend TG told me this was going to happen, and I said "no way". Well, WAY.  I am very sorry to say, that at this point there is no light at the end of this tunnel of economic and political disaster. At the least we are facing a lost decade.

Everyday, BO puts another nail in the coffin. Monday it was socialized medicine based on made up statistics and Obama Facts, which, in reality are all lies and distoritions. Today, it's the over haul of the financial regulation's system, which takes us from bad to worse, as does everything that BO touches.

 Enjoy life in America while you can. We are not even close to hitting bottom. Open your eyes. Stop being Obama Sheep. Unemployment, taxes, government spending, trillion dollar deficits, and radical Islamists are all on the rise.  Unfortunately, it appears, we as a nation will have to hit rock bottom before we decide to try and stop this bullet train to fascism and class war far.

I worked for the federal government from 1976-2008.  FEAR this continued and rapid federal expansion and control. Get  your money OUT of the stock market NOW.  Convince the Republican Party that our only hope is returning to the values and constitutionally sound policies advocated by the Libertarian Party.  Seriously, we are a nation in trouble. This is the calm before the storm.

Mr. Wolf is in Las Vegas until June 25. Follow my adventures on Twitter    twitter.com/BonzerWolf

The New York Times does not get it right most of the time and they published this article only to show support for socialism. But there is a lesson here that even in a socialist democracy fiscal responsibility is required to succeed and survive long term.

In the midst of the worst global downturn since the Depression, Norway’s economy grew last year by 3%. The government enjoys a budget surplus of 11 percent.  By comparison, the U.S. is expected to chalk up a fiscal deficit this year equal to 12.9 percent of its GDP and push its total debt to $11 trillion, or 65 percent of the size of its economy.

Norway is a relatively small country with a largely homogeneous population of 4.6 million and the advantages of being a major oil exporter. It counted $68 billion in oil revenue last year as prices soared to record levels. Even though prices have sharply declined, the government is not particularly worried. That is because Norway avoided the usual trap that plagues many energy-rich countries.

Instead of spending its riches lavishly, it passed legislation ensuring that oil revenue went straight into its sovereign wealth fund, state money that is used to make investments around the world. Now its sovereign wealth fund is close to being the largest in the world, despite losing 23 percent last year because of investments that declined.

Norway’s relative frugality stands in stark contrast to Britain, which spent most of its North Sea oil revenue — and more — during the boom years. Government spending rose to 47 percent of G.D.P., from 42 percent in 2003. By comparison, public spending in Norway fell to 40 percent from 48 percent of G.D.P.

The ObamaNation paid lip service to "pay go" at BO's daily live TV appearance. Of course his lips were moving, so he is lying. "Tax & Spend" and  the "Great American Entitlement"  are destroying the greatest country in the world. The USA is NOT to big to fail.  BO needs to learn a lot before he can lead this country from the Great Recession.  Perhaps he can start with the socialist Finance Minister of a tiny country which has thrived in a big way by being fiscally responsible and practicing capitalism.

Eirik Wekre, an economist who writes thrillers in his spare time, describes Norwegians’ feelings about debt this way: “We cannot spend this money now; it would be stealing from future generations.”

Norway Thrives by Going Against the Tide - NYTimes.com

Last week, General Motors finally declared bankruptcy.  Many in government thought $20 billion in taxpayer dollars would save the company, but as predicted, it only postponed the inevitable.  The government will dump another $30 billion into GM and take a 60 percent controlling interest for it.  Public officials are now involving themselves in tactical business decisions such as where GM’s headquarters should move and what kind of cars it will build.

The promise that this is temporary and will eventually be profitable is supposed to ease the American people into accepting this arrangement, but it is of little comfort to those who remember similar promises when the American taxpayers bought Amtrak.  After three years, government was supposed to be out of the passenger rail business.  40 years and billions of dollars later, the government is still operating Amtrak at a loss, despite the fact that they have created a monopoly by making it illegal to compete with Amtrak.  Imagine what they can now do to what is left of the great American auto industry!

Read what Ron Paul has to say about Fascist America under the ObamaNation.

GM, Amtrak and an Increasingly Fascist America

A UAW trust is taking over GM’s retiree healthcare costs, removing those obligations from the company’s books. In return, the trust gets 17.5 percent of the new GM and an opportunity to buy another 2.5 percent later at a discounted price.

Among other things, the new UAW deal cuts off coverage for retirees’ erectile dysfunction drugs, except for certain cases involving high blood pressure.

Yes, my friends, only those GM retiree's with high blood pressure will get free viagra now! This is just one of the many, many reasons GM should be called GREEDY MOTORS. I have no empathy for any of the union workers who killed this company. There are hundreds of other benefits, many, which are still on the books, that killed the goose that layed the golden eggs for GM employees and the UAW. There is not a corporation or company in the world where employees worked less and received more benefits than at GM. 

Zip car, which has 300,000 members and shares ownership of cars does not own one GM car. Zip car has 26 vehicle models in their fleet, including FORD. Today on CNBC, the CEO said that in the six year history of the company, not ONE request for a GM model had been made by a single member.  

Yet, the ObamaNation is giving GM $50 billion of our taxpayers dollars. We will not get one penny back from the "new" GM. Government Motors is DEAD ON ARRIVAL. 

I will never spend another penny on any GM product. The last time I bought a GM car was in 1976, when I purchased a Pontiac Firebird!  Millions of other American car buyers have done the same, leaving GM behind. GM has been in denial for the last decade. GM employed the most greedy union workers on the planet who produced shitty products.

GM was competitive in their truck and suv product lines over the past decade.  But now that Chairman Obama is running GM, trucks are out and the VOLT is in. Good luck with all that GM!   Sasha and Malia may drive a Volt. They will eligible for employee pricing!  How many others will shell out $40,000 for this bucket of volts?

The taxpayers are paying off  the union workers for $50 billion dollars so they will vote the straight DEMOCRAT ticket in the next election.  BO is running for election in 2012 and he is using taxpayer money to finance his campaign.

The ObamaNation wants to continue the fiscal and moral destruction of what was the greatest nation on earth.  The free market economy is going to be brutally murdered by Obama if the voters don't come to their senses. The ObamaNation continuation of Collective, Statist & Fascist agenda and policies will destroy this country for sure.