clean coal

The Olympic Schedule

NBC just released their Olympic schedule and it goes like this.

Saturday - Figure skating
Sunday - Figure skating
Monday - No figure skating, ice dancing instead.
Tuesday - Figure skating
Wednesday - what ever sport Shaun White does.
Thursday - hockey highlights, figure skating
Friday - More Shaun White and Apolo Ohno's wipe outs.(because he's got a cool name)
Saturday - Ice dancing finals
Sunday - Ice dancing exhibition


Of course, there will be intermittent highlights of the luge accident and an occasional speed skating highlight.

I've made the point before that if you have to judge it, it's not a sport and the winter olympics are chalk full of them. That added to the Oprah Winfreying of sports by NBC means that I probably won't be watching.

Of course, if The Lovely Mrs. Gekko wants to watch over, say The Closer, re runs, I probably won't have a choice.

who did he vote for? #819

Meet Franklin Bell. Why is Franklin in the news?

A Colerain Township man, sentenced to a rehab program at River City Correctional, begged a judge Thursday to alter his punishment so he could keep his long hair.

39-year-old Franklin Bell admitted to being intoxicated June 28 when he was arrested in the 110 block of Hopple. His blood-alcohol content measured 0.112 percent. Police also found a small bag of cocaine in his vehicle.

River City Correctional requires patients to shave their heads, but Bell claims his hair helped form his identity. He asked Judge Robert Ruehlman if he could instead be sentenced to the Talbert House, which does not have strict grooming requirements. The judge refused, noting Bell has two prior drunk driving convictions.

It probably has never occurred to Bell that the identity his hair helped to create was that of a drunken loser.

Never the less, in Nopvermber 2008 did Bell vote for the hope and change of Obama or another four years of Bush.

Article here

Ryan to Geithner - Why propose a budget you admit is not credible, not sustainable?

Real Man of Genius: Joe Biden

Thiessen2 12 10

Prof Watson on Climate Science

Too bad we don't have a media asking these questions

President Obama's Pledge Never to Raise Taxes on Anyone Making Less Than $250,000 a Year

Now he's "agnostic" about the idea.


After tripling the national budget deficit his first year in office Barack Obama told reporters yesterday that he’s “agnostic” to raising taxes on those making less than $250,000 a year to bring down the deficit.
Bloomberg reported:

President Barack Obama said he is “agnostic” about raising taxes on households making less than $250,000 as part of a broad effort to rein in the budget deficit.

Obama, in a Feb. 9 Oval Office interview, said that a presidential commission on the budget needs to consider all options for reducing the deficit, including tax increases and cuts in spending on entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare.

“The whole point of it is to make sure that all ideas are on the table,” the president said in the interview with Bloomberg BusinessWeek, which will appear on newsstands Friday. “So what I want to do is to be completely agnostic, in terms of solutions.”

Obama repeatedly vowed during the 2008 presidential election campaign that he would not raise taxes on individuals making less than $200,000 and households earning less than $250,000 a year.

President Clueless IV

If there was ever a video displaying the incompetence of the Obamunists, it's this video..........

Life in "Progress" City

From the coffee city of Seattle, who hasn't had a conservative in city government since dirt was created......

Three Seattle security guards were caught on video as they stood and watched while a fifteen-year-old girl was punched, knocked down and kicked in the head. These were apparently stop-or-I'll-yell-stop-again types who only have the authority to call the real police should something illegal take place.

Still, one must seriously question why not one of them did anything to prevent the vicious beating.

The attack took place at Westlake Station on January 28.

What's so "progressive" about doing nothing?

More.....

MSNBC Reporter Insists Record Snow Out East Is Due to Global Warming

Frozen Wasteland

Who did he vote for? #556

Meet Lee Dietrick. Why is Lee in the news?

Watch the video.....

 

Now in November, 2008 did lee here pull the lever for The One or the Maverick?

How much is fair?

I just wrapped up my first tax return for a "rich" client. In this case, a single guy who made over $300,000 this past year.

If you are one of those types of people who believe the rich don't pay enough, how much should this guy pay to make it "fair" for everyone?

Seriously, if you somehow know that the rich don't pay enough, then surely you know how much is enough.

So tell me oh swami of fairness. Tell me how much would be fair for this guy to pay. Oh, and make sure you include Federal taxes, FICA, Medicare, State and Local in your calculation(s).

President Clueless III

Don't listen to me listen to liberal econ wonk, Paul Krugman ........

I’m with Simon Johnson here: how is it possible, at this late date, for Obama to be this clueless?

The lead story on Bloomberg right now contains excerpts from an interview with Business Week which tells us:

President Barack Obama said he doesn’t “begrudge” the $17 million bonus awarded to JPMorgan Chase & Co. Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon or the $9 million issued to Goldman Sachs Group Inc. CEO Lloyd Blankfein, noting that some athletes take home more pay.

The president, speaking in an interview, said in response to a question that while $17 million is “an extraordinary amount of money” for Main Street, “there are some baseball players who are making more than that and don’t get to the World Series either, so I’m shocked by that as well.”

“I know both those guys; they are very savvy businessmen,” Obama said in the interview yesterday in the Oval Office with Bloomberg BusinessWeek, which will appear on newsstands Friday. “I, like most of the American people, don’t begrudge people success or wealth. That is part of the free- market system.”

Obama sought to combat perceptions that his administration is anti-business and trumpeted the influence corporate leaders have had on his economic policies. He plans to reiterate that message when he speaks to the Business Roundtable, which represents the heads of many of the biggest U.S. companies, on Feb. 24 in Washington.

Oh. My. God.

Read the rest.......

Relationship advice for Rachel

Rachel Uchitel has got a new gig.....

She will report for the show “nightlife hotspots” but if you’re looking forward to her nightlife with Tiger…..then, you are up for disappointment as she’s not going to speak on her Tiger-related life.

She won’t talk about Tiger, but she talks about how she wants to find a husband and have kids. She only has a few real friends left whom she trusts. She is alone a lot and spends time with her two dogs. She seems very vulnerable,” quips a source.

Rachel, takes some good advice from a stable type accountant.

You want to find a husband? Quit spending your down time whoring already married men.

It works.

Because he's President Clueless #2

The relationship between the US and the European Union is cooling. By declining to come to Spain for a trans-Atlantic summit, President Barack Obama made it clear that Brussels is far down on his priority list. The reasons for that can be found in Europe.

The US president is traveling a lot these days -- and a clear pattern has emerged. The deeper into the United States it takes him, the better -- be it Nashua, New Hampshire or Tampa, Florida. The issue is always the same: How can Barack Obama create more jobs?

Little time remains to travel abroad -- particularly not to Europe. The White House recently cancelled Obama's visit to the EU-US summit in Madrid, scheduled for May. The president's schedule, White House European policy coordinator Phil Gordon said, was "full."

The message, though, couldn't have been any clearer. The president has plenty of time in his schedule to visit Australia and Indonesia in March. The Wall Street Journal recently sneered that the Europeans, so enamored of Obama, must be missing the Bush years. Bush, at least, diligently attended each EU-US summit. As the Washington Post wrote, though: "Unlike most of his predecessors, Obama has not forged close ties with any European leader."

Geez, you'd think these guys would be a little more grateful for that box of DVD's the obamunists gave Gordon Brown.

More.....

Why I'm a conservative #11

Because I get that with entitlement programs you get this side effect.........

A US mother has been convicted of murdering her four-year-old daughter and accused of concocting symptoms of ADHD and bipolar disorder in the girl.

Carolyn Riley, 35, and her husband Michael were accused of convincing a psychiatrist to diagnose their daughter Rebecca with mental illness in order to claim disability benefits.

Prosecutors said Rebecca was overmedicated "for months" in order to keep her quiet.

She was found dead in her parent's bedroom, with a state medical examiner telling the court she had died of an overdose of ADHD blood pressure medication Clonidine, antiseizure medication Depakote, a cough suppressant and and antihistamine.

Her mother was immediately sentenced to life in prison. Her father will face a seperate trial.

The court heard Rebecca's uncle pleaded with her mother to take her to a doctor just days before she died, but Riley instead gave her a lethal dose of Clonidine.

More.....

A tea bagging snowman

How long before Rachel Maddow attacks this guy.....

Check out The Tea Party site here

What's 350 jobs amongst friends

The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Co will close its five-diamond property in Las Vegas this May, after the hotel struggled with a slide in demand and revenue.

"It's nothing the hotel did. It's a simple lack of business and a decline in the tourism industry," said Ritz-Carlton spokeswoman Vivian Deuschl.

The owners of the 348-room property, Village Hospitality LLC, an arm of Deutsche Bank, will stop funding the Ritz-Carlton Lake Las Vegas day-to-day operations on May 2.

"That was the owner's decision and we reluctantly agreed to go along with it," Deuschl said.

Luxury properties have been hit hard in the past year and a half. Corporate travel and business from associations accounts for the bulk revenue of these hotels, but companies and groups have cut back on travel spending in the past year.

But check this out......

Luxury hotels have also suffered from the backlash from the so-called "AIG effect," referring to the uproar caused by American International Group's decision to fly top brokers and executives to a resort shortly after receiving a bailout check from the U.S. government.

"The whole demonization of luxury meetings and companies' pulling back on having their high-end meetings in luxury hotels -- this has had a tremendous impact on Las Vegas," Deuschl said. "I can't think of another destination that has had to defend itself more against comments from politicians."

Read the whole, thing

President Clueless

If you ever needed more proof that our current president is a full fledged idiot read this........

Some baffling comments by President Obama in today's press conference.

Asked how how and why small business loans would help small business, President Obama replied:

"If [small businesses] can get the bank loans to boost their payroll... they will do so." He further claimed that in his "travels" he has spoken with small business owners nationwide, and they see optimism and new customers.

This guy has no clue about how banking and the business world actually operates.

First, businesses don't just increase payrolls for shits and giggles. They increase payrolls because there's an increased demand for their goods and services. Banks don't create that increased demand.

Second, when businesses go to a bank, banks looked to be repaid. If you walk into a bank to borrow money to cover payroll that's indication number one that you do not have a going concern (a long term viable business). For sure, there are times when companies need short term working capital for orders in the pipe line. Again, see #1.

Third, at least 75 - 85 percent of bank financing is for the purchase of equipment and/or fleet vehicles. You know what happens when businesses buy equipment and/or vehicles? It creates jobs for people in those businesses. Do you know why businesses buy equipment. Again see#1.

Prudent banks are not welfare depots. They loan money with the intent to be repaid. Just loaning money on the fly is exactly how our mortgage industry became such a mess; loans to people with no real ability to repay just a speculation that property values would increase.

But the obamunists have no clue because not one of them have ever run a business with a true profit motivation. So that's how we end up with dumb ass comments from a dumb ass.

read the whole thing

More from the Masculists

How do you know when NOW has lost it's relevance?

When they come up with this lame attack on the Tim Tebow ad where he tackles his mom.......

Who among the estimated 106.5 million television viewers – and the untold millions more who have seen it on YouTube and other outlets – could possibly be upset with the image of a happy, active family?

The National Organization for Women, that's who.

The Los Angeles Times reported that NOW President Terry O'Neill said the Tebow ad – I couldn't make this up – glorifies violence against women.

"I am blown away at the celebration of the violence against women in it," she said. "That's what comes across to me even more strongly than the anti-abortion message. I myself am a survivor of domestic violence, and I don't find it charming. I think CBS should be ashamed of itself."

Are you serious?

For the record, did you notice that Terry and Friends made no comment on how Snickers is promulgating violence against senior women like poor Betty White.

All I know is that I saw the ads and my first instinct was to drill Mama Gekko with a chop block and Grandma Gekko with a crackback.

If NOW ever wonders why they have all the relevance of one hand clapping, they can read this comment.

More....

It should be named Masculist movement

I've often said that the feminist movement has always been misnamed. It should be the "masculist" movement because the movement seems most inclined to teach girls to act like men; especially sexually.

Look, I like being a guy but I don't think we need more than 50% of the population being men. And regardless of what a feminist would tell you, sex for a young woman has a lot more consequences than sex for a young male.

You won't find this study in a Planned Parenthood brochure but it's one more consequence of sexual promiscuity for a young woman......

Earlier this week I wrote about a sort of disturbing story of HPV gone bad. Sorry to be a downer (again!), but researchers have just released some fascinating new findings that seem to link the age in which you first starting having sex to your risk for a certain, deadly, form of cancer ...

I just heard about a woman I know who was diagnosed with cervical cancer--this week--so when I came across some news, reported by the BBC, about a new study of cervical cancer in women, I paid attention.

According to a major study of 20,000 women by the International Agency for Research on Cancer, which was published in the British Journal of Cancer, having sex at an early age can double the risk of developing cervical cancer later in life.

Now if you are a Gloria Steinum type, your response to this is simply load up our young women with some HPV and little girls can resume being the skanks little boys are.

But it only takes a little common sense to realize that early sexual activity has emotional and physical consequences. I realize this is anecdotal but every woman I've met with fertility problems was sexually promiscuous at a young age. Coincidence? I doubt it but you'll probably never see a study from the Masculists published because the results can only hurt their cause.

I'd be willing to bet that most women who were sexually active at a young age have more regrets regarding their sex lives than those women who waited.

I'll wait on Cosmopolitan Magazine to publish that one.

Read the rest.....

A real halftime show

To think this was popular at one time

The great global warming swindle continues

BUT I WANT TO BELIEVE!!!!!!!!

It’s not just the threat of Himalayan glaciers disappearing by 2035.

Now another headline grabbing IPCC scare story is melting away. A report in Sunday’s London Times highlights new humiliations for the IPCC.

“The most important is a claim that global warming could cut rain-fed north African crop production by up to 50% by 2020, a remarkably short time for such a dramatic change. The claim has been quoted in speeches by Rajendra Pachauri, the IPCC chairman, and by Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general.”

There is however one teensy-weensy little problem. As Professor Chris Field, the lead author of the IPCC’s climate impact team has now told reporters that he can find “no evidence” to support the claim in the IPCC’s 2007 report.

There’s more. When the glacier story broke, IPCC apologists returned over and over again to a saving grace. The bogus glacier report appeared in the body of the IPCC document, but not in the much more carefully vetted Synthesis Report, in which the IPCC’s senior leadership made its specific recommendations to world leaders. So it didn’t matter that much, the apologists told us, and we can still trust the rigorously checked and reviewed Synthesis Report.

But that’s where the African rain crisis prediction is found — in the supposedly sacrosanct Synthesis Report.

More....

Kicking companies while they're down

Unemployment rates are going up on employers. If you are liberal you may know these employer types as the scourge of the earth......

The median increase will be 27.5%. And employers in places such as Hawaii and Florida could see levies skyrocket more than ten-fold.

Many of these hikes happened automatically as prolonged joblessness triggered state laws governing their unemployment insurance systems. But at least seven states voted to raise their taxable wage bases, the level of income subject to unemployment tax. And another 10 are looking at upping the wage bases or tax rates.

The states are scrambling to restore their unemployment insurance trust funds, which cover claims.

State trust funds have been decimated by the Great Recession, forcing a record 26 states to borrow a total of more than $30 billion from the federal government. The numbers are expected to grow to 40 states borrowing $90 billion by 2012, said George Wentworth, policy analyst at the National Employment Law Project.

But this is the kicker......

In Hawaii, taxes automatically increased from an average of $90 per worker in 2009 to $1,070 this year. Part of the problem stems from the fact that the state was generous to businesses during prosperous times. In fact, lawmakers lowered the tax rate in 2007, when unemployment did not exceed 3.1%. The state's jobless rate now stands at 6.9%.

More....

Thanks reader jeremy

What Obama isn't saying

Thanks reader Tim for this link.........

"I am not the first president to take up this cause, but I am determined to be the last.”

The words are those of President Barack Obama speaking to Congress on health care reform on September 9, 2009. They contain the secret of his appeal—and the cause of his first-year failure.

His appeal from the first has been to be beyond ordinary politics. Ordinary politics is partisan politics, and to be beyond it is to be nonpartisan or, as sophisticates say, postpartisan. Obama has the cool of a nonpartisan, quite unlike the late Edward Kennedy, who was a paragon of partisan heat and sweat. But beyond politics is not just a mood, it’s a place and a situation. Obama’s aspiration, the goal of his politics, is to put the country in a situation that no longer requires parties, when at last partisan rhetoric has accomplished its task, advocacy is inapt, sympathy and zeal are no longer needed, and postpartisan cool is correct.

Postpartisan cool is not, however, the mere sign of an intellectual fad such as postmodern relativism. One can see Obama’s aspiration in the first Democratic president, Thomas Jefferson, who founded not only the Democratic party but also the idea of party government in America. After forming the first publicly avowed party against the Federalists, he proceeded to announce in his first Inaugural Address that “we are all Republicans, we are all Federalists.” “Republicans” meant Democratic-Republicans, later Democrats. Yet the best word to describe Obama is progressive, for -nonpartisanship in politics is inherent in the idea of progress.

A good read.....

Ooops. There went John Galt

"What experience and history teach is this -- that people and governments never have learned anything from history, or acted on principles deduced from it." (Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, "The Philosophy of History," 1837)

Last week, the Newark Star-Ledger reported that New Jersey lost $70 billion in wealth over the past five years. The reason? Affluent people have moved to states with a lower tax rate or no income tax at all.

The findings are from a study conducted by the Center on Wealth and Philanthropy at Boston College, the first study on interstate wealth migration in the country. The report found that wealthy New Jersey residents apparently grew tired of the state treating their success as an ATM for politicians and so they moved to Florida, Pennsylvania and even New York, a state not known for low taxes, but its levies are not as high as New Jersey's.

The study found that wealth migration is a relatively new phenomenon. In the five years preceding 2004, researchers discovered an influx of $98 billion into the state. That would have been during a period when New Jersey was enjoying tax cuts after a run of four successive Republican governors. The Democrats who followed raised taxes, some substantially.

Dennis Bone, chairman of the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce, told the Newark Star-Ledger, "This study makes it crystal clear that New Jersey's tax policies are resulting in a significant decline in the state's wealth."

Who would have thunk it?

Read the whole thing

He just sounds like a liberal to me

Dennis Prager on Frank Rich.......

If one had to read one columnist to appreciate the state of contemporary left-wing commentary, my nomination would be Frank Rich of the Sunday New York Times.

No well-known leftist columnist better exemplifies the worst aspects of today's left. Virtually every piece is filled with anger, filled with ad hominem responses to arguments, filled with insults of opponents and at the same time devoid of intellectual arguments. A Frank Rich column is essentially a weekly tantrum meant to make his readers nod in agreement and reinforce their contempt for those who differ with them.

I offer this past Sunday's column as an example.

The subject was the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy regarding gays in the military.

Not a single serious argument of proponents of DADT was cited, nor did Rich did offer a single argument on behalf of repealing it. Instead, the article was a smear of all supporters of that policy or of retaining the male-female definition of marriage. The article contains 71 sentences. Twelve sentences contained an insult. I suspect that Times readers who love his columns -- this was listed as the second most e-mailed piece in the New York Times -- are generally people who read Frank Rich so as to have their hatreds reinforced, not for cogent arguments.

More....

Unlock the unlocking program

Last March 16, President Obama and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner announced a new $15 billion program to help encourage loans to small businesses -- the Unlocking Credit for Small Businesses, or UCSB program.

Subsequently, wrote Neil Barofsky, Special Inspector General of the Troubled Asset Relief Program, in his latest report, "two additional initiatives were announced to support small-business lending, and Treasury announced an increase of the TARP funding dedicated to support these efforts to $30 billion."

But oddly, Barofsky noted, as of December 31, 2009, "the details of the initiative under this program had not been announced and no funds had been disbursed."

A $15-30 billion program for small businesses and no details have been released?

And no money disbursed??

More....

Sowell on fairness

Thomas Sowell on fairness........

Nature's discrimination completely dwarfs man's discrimination. Geography alone makes equal chances virtually impossible. The geographic advantages of Western Europe over Eastern Europe-- in climate and navigable waterways, among other things-- have led to centuries of differences in income levels that were greater than income differences between blacks and whites in America today.

Just the fact that the lay of the land is different in different parts of Europe meant that it was easier for the Roman legions to invade Western Europe. This meant that Western Europeans had the advantages of the most advanced civilization in Europe at that time. Moreover, because Roman letters were used in Western Europe, the languages of that region had written versions centuries before the Slavic languages of Eastern Europe did.

The difference between literacy and illiteracy is a huge difference, and it remained huge for centuries. Was it the Slavs' fault that the Romans did not want to climb over so many mountains to get to them?

To those living in Western Europe in the days of the Roman Empire, the idea of being conquered, and many slaughtered, by the Romans probably had no great appeal. But their descendants would benefit from their bad luck. And that doesn't seem fair either.

Read the whole thing

The BO curse

The One does it again.......

President Barack Obama says the Indianapolis Colts "have to be favored" in the Super Bowl, even though he has a "soft spot" for the New Orleans Saints.

Hopefully, he'll come to Ohio soon to campaign for Governor Ted.

More...

Why not?

Apparently, Phil Jones, purveyor of global warming hoaxes, has been so depressed he's considered suicide.

Here's what I don't get. Why doesn't he?

Seriously, many of the believers in global warming also believe that humans are just a primordial mistake of protoplasm without any real soul. So why should Phil Jones continue on his life as a carbon releasing world wrecker?

Even worse, this guy procreated, and his children have procreated, thus adding even more carbon spewing protoplasm to the mix.

So let me throw this out to you branch gorevidians. If you truly believe in this "science" why are you still here consuming and ejecting carbon into our beloved eco system. YOU are part of the problem.

Otherwise it's just all talk no action.

Tell voters the truth?

You may know Evan Thomas as just another liberal white guy on MSNBC (don't they all kind of look alike).

But he's actually got a good piece in Newsweek.President Obama's new federal budget proposal projects, with unusual clarity, that the trillion-dollar-plus federal deficits piling up during the current recession are not just a temporary condition necessitated by hard times, soon to be cured by a return to prosperity. Rather, the red ink threatens to drown us. For many years, federal spending remained about 20 percent of the overall economy. But under Obama it's now a quarter of the economy. The national debt has grown to more than 50 percent of GDP, and according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, it could plausibly approach 100 percent of GDP by 2020—a figure not reached since World War II. Unless something drastic happens—like significant tax increases and cuts in those sacred entitlement programs—the cost of the government will continue to outrun revenue by staggering margins.

Well, so what? Can't the government keep on borrowing? During wartime and deep recessions the federal debt has soared and then settled down once peace and prosperity returned. In America, the political classes have always been saved by growth—the wondrous engine of the American economy that has spared the politicians from having to face up to dire choices in taxing and spending.

But a new era of high economic growth is not inevitable. The Next Big Thing—say, the long-awaited green revolution in high tech, alternative energy sources, and the like—should not be confused with the Next Sure Thing. What if government spending really does outrun growth in a way that chokes the economy before it can take off again? Will the Chinese—our rivals for world economic supremacy and the power that goes with it—indefinitely support our profligate ways by buying our debt?

The federal government can, it's true, always print more money. Not so the states, many of which also have balanced-budget requirements. Dominated by the political power of public-employee unions demanding generous pensions and benefits, big state governments—California, New York, New Jersey—are starting to go over the fiscal cliff. California was driven to pay some of its obligations with IOUs, not cash. There are dark mutterings about "failed states"—state governments that are utterly dysfunctional.

Read the rest....

Steyn on sustainability

Mark Steyn in a snark filled tirade.........

Obama’s spending proposes to take the average Bush deficit for the years 2001–2008, and double it, all the way to 2020. To get out of the Bush hole, we need to dig a hole twice as deep for one-and-a-half times as long. And that’s according to the official projections of his Economics Czar, Ms. Rose Colored-Glasses. By 2015, the actual hole may be so deep that even if you toss every Obama speech down it on double-spaced paper you still won’t be able to fill it up. In the spendthrift Bush days, federal spending as a proportion of GDP average 19.6 percent. Obama proposes to crank it up to 25 percent as a permanent feature of life.

But, if they’re “unsustainable,” what happens when they can no longer be sustained? A failure of bond auctions? A downgraded government debt rating? Reduced GDP growth? Total societal collapse? Mad Max on the New Jersey Turnpike?

Testifying to the House Budget Committee, Director Elmendorf attempted to pull back from the wilder shores of “unsustainable”: “I think most observers expect that the government will act, that the unsustainability will be resolved through action, not through witnessing some collapse down the road,” he said. “If literally nothing is done, then eventually something very, very bad happens. But I think the widespread view is that you and your colleagues will take action.”

Dream on, you kinky fantasist. The one thing that can be guaranteed is that a political class led by Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Barney Frank, a handful of reach-across-the-aisle Republican accommodationists, and an economically illiterate narcissist in the Oval Office is never going to rein in unsustainable spending in any meaningful sense. That leaves Director Elmendorf’s alternative scenario. What was it again? Oh, yeah: “Some collapse down the road.”

Hey, California has had to make tough budget choices and that's worked out great!

Read the rest of this rib splitter.....

Supporting schools

Last week, Little Miami Schools, a school district in my little slice of Redville, Ohio was in the news as a result of a fourth school levy going down in flames.

The Wall Street Journal did a piece on the district and the difficulties the district has in passing levies.

I won't go on about how we don't need to pass a levy to "support" our schools. That fashionably liberal concept of "I won't pay unless my neighbor does".

But I will offer this tip to Little Miami leadership, who spent all of about one day before announcing that they'd put another levy, with an increase, on May's ballot. Clue...... That one's going down in flames as well.

The School District has failed at passing a levy FOUR times and each time it comes back with an even larger levy.

What alternative universe are these people living in? People reject a levy and you think a larger one will be more likely to pass. You folks need to quit hitting that meth pipe.

The next levy will result in an increase of $1000 on a $200,000. Think about that. How many people in this economy have an extra grand laying around?

I talked to a number of seniors who live in the district and have determined that there is no chance of a levy passing in this district.

The Little Miami leadership has exhausted whatever confidence it has with the residents of the area. That's not going to come back with a cry for more.

Until you folks get that, I hope you enjoy the rejection because that's all you're going to get from this community.

Why I'm a conservative? #448

Because I understand that governments cannot produce or employ anybody without a vibrant private sector to pay taxes.....

Bizzyblog a breakdown of the current employment figures.

There’s a reason why Americans who don’t happen to work for the government or directly benefit from its largesse are not sensing an economic recovery. For them, it’s mostly not happening. ADP’s January employment report showing 22,000 private-sector jobs lost, the latest available jobs-related information available when this column was written, only confirms that feeling.

A look at what has happened to the nation’s inflation-adjusted Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the value of all goods and services produced in the economy, during the last six quarters is sadly instructive. Comparing the fourth quarter of 2009 with the second quarter of 2008, we see that:

• Even after six months of “recovery,” the economy as a whole has shrunk by almost 2%.
• Uncle Sam’s level of annualized consumption and “investment” has grown by 8.5%.
• Despite the incessant pleadings of poverty by most state and local governments, their consumption and “investment” have hardly changed.
• What remains, i.e., the private sector, is 3% smaller.

The private-sector shrink is really about 1 percentage point higher than indicated, because the above data treats General Motors and Chrysler as if the government and a meddling Congress aren’t in control of them. This of course is nonsense.

Consider that there are currently 4.8 private sector workers for every government worker on the payroll; a number that continues to decline.

Assuming that all workers make the same wage (of course private sector employers make less). Then it would take 5 workers paying a fifth of their wages just to support one fat ass government employee; and it's getting worse all the time.

It's a system that just cannot sustain itself.

What's amazing that the people most inclined to believe in suspect global warming "science" can't seem to get their arms around something more provable. It's as though they are either so stupid they can't comprehend this or don't care.

If you are a liberal maybe you can educate me how a government can employ someone without a tax base to pay for it.

Or you'll just continue on being a dumbass.

Tax Fraud R Us

An income tax fraud scheme discovered during a drug raid Thursday night is expected to lead to hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegal tax refunds.

“I wouldn’t be surprised it went into the millions,” Etowah County Sheriff Todd Entrekin said during a news conference Friday.

Agents went to a mobile home on Sligo Road, just off Egypt Road in the Rockledge community, Thursday night to raid a suspected methamphetamine distribution ring and discovered more evidence than expected in the tax scheme.

Lori Lei Bodden, 41, her husband, Carlos Cardona-Herrera, 36, and Juan Hernandez-Telle, 22, were charged with trafficking in methamphetamine. Bodden is expected to be charged with distribution of methamphetamine.

Three-fourths of a pound of methamphetamine in its purest form, ice, was found hidden in a baby wipes container. The drugs have a street value of about $40,000.

Three children under the age of 4 were in the mobile home when agents raided it Thursday night and the Etowah County Department of Human Resources was called.

The drugs, along with guns, swords, cash, vehicles, a boat and several computers, were seized during the raid.

Those computers are expected to provide more information about the tax scheme, Entrekin said.

It is believed Bodden was filing income tax returns from her mobile home, primarily tax returns for illegal immigrants, and claiming the first-time home buyers tax credit of $8,000.

If someone is using a Social Security number and paid taxes through an employer, income tax returns can be filed.

I guess if I really want to grow my tax business, I need to offer a little free meth.

More....