We Must Defeat the Entrenchocrats of Incumbistan...Anything Else Is Just Gridlock

November of 2010 is shaping up to be the most massive restoration project that liberty-loving citizens of this country have undertaken in our history. We have let our liberty leak away for decades at the hands of mediocrities and run-of-the-mill politicians of both parties, and from 2006 through 2008 we handed the full reins of our government to outright socialists (of course they don't call themselves that, but that is what they are) and the result has been galloping government spending that will bankrupt the nation, the full usurpation of whole sectors of the economy, the trampling of private property rights and the rule of law, and the weakening of our defenses. All of this will ensure America's decline and a lower standard of living for our children, if it is not reversed. Decline is not inevitable, it is a choice, and we have chosen it. We must now choose to go back, to repudiate our recent choices.

Sir Lawrence himself highlighted an encouraging development in this regard. By all accounts, Republicans stand a good chance of making gains and even taking one or both houses of Congress in November. That is, well, OK news as far as it goes. What is decidedly better news is the type of Republicans that could very well lead this retaking of the government. Sir Lawrence pointed out last night in a great segment that many of the Republican candidates that are competing in November are not career politicians - they are drawn from outside of government, from the military, from the business world. This is precisely what the Republican Party needs, more regular people, more people coming out of private life to supplant the careerist bozos that have destroyed the Reaganite base. (N.B. It is actually happening on both sides, but only ever so faintly on the Dem side) We've needed this type of insurgency for years, but rather than over-turning the establishment, this insurgency will link up with insurgents on the inside and augment positive changes already taking place within the establishment. The right guys (and gals) are becoming the new faces of the party - Pence, Coburn, Ryan, Bachmann, DeMint. I have long lamented on this blog that the Republican Party leadership consists of the wrong type of Republicans. Just a few short years ago Tom Coburn and Paul Ryan were considered troublemakers within the party establishment and kept on the back benches. Today, those two fellows are the leading faces of the Republicans in their respective chambers. These guys need principled allies. So, fielding the right team is critical.

Even more critical though, is taking down hard targets on difficult turf. Jettisoning a Walt Minnick in deep red Idaho is nice (for more on that check here), and we need to grab that low-hanging fruit to be successful, but the real test of whether average people can take back our government and restore our liberties and prosperity is whether we can win races like the one in my distrcit, NY-18. Speedreading Nita Lowey has held a seat (first from NY-20 and then from the 18th after a redistricting) in Congress since 1988. But this Entrenchocrat from Incumbistan is vulnerable. Westchester County toppled a local Entrenchocrat back in November and put in place a guy whose message was "Stop the Tax Madness." Taking on Entrenchocrat Lowey is Mark Rosen, the same type of candidate - a regular, private citizen, heretofore uninterested in politics. Rosen has the same team that pulled off Astorino's win, and is gunning for the Speedreading Nita. However, it will be an uphill fight. NY-18 has a distinct registration advantage for Democrats and Nita has banked a campaign war chest over the years, never having to spend much to defeat a series of worthless candiates. (And we've got union goons coming out the ying-yang in these here parts.) Nonetheless, this is a bellweather fight. If regular citizens can rise up and topple the Entrenchocrats from Incumbistan, like speedreading Pelosibot Nita Lowey, then there is great hope for renewed liberty, restored prosperity, and a country where we are not taxed to death for wasteful, inefficient centrally planned utopian schemes that usurp our freedom to choose and forge our own solutions to problems. Short of that, all we can hope for is run-of-the-mill political gridlock, where we've hamstrung government expansion for a spell. True restoration lies in the fights like NY-18 and candidates like Mark Rosen.

UPDATE: Not quite the same in terms of magnitude of terrain, but similar in theme is the candidacy of Nan Hayworth just to the north in NY-19.

Having Crippled NY, Unions Go In for the Kill

New York State is effectively bankrupt (but not yet insolvent), and hurtling ever-faster to the fiscal abyss. Our problems are well-known and out in the open, and yet...and yet...you can still read stories like this. There is no getting around this reality, the public sector is at war with private sector citizens and they will stop at nothing to take and take and take what is yours. While there are some sparks of reality within the cesspool that is Albany, Abbate's proposal is more true to the Albany we've come to know, and why, eventually, many more families - quite possibly the Baseball family - will leave New York State.

Maybe there is a trade in this - like the Stupak Short (which was, btw, sa-weeeet). Is there some qunituple-inverse NY state bond ETF, maybe symbol ABTE (for Abbate)??

Eye Off the Ball...Anyone?

Ah yes, by all means, go ahead and round up those dangerous, slaughtering Christians. Clearly those Jesus-freaks are plotting something like this. Resources well spent. Well spent indeed.

Depressing Report from the Front Lines of the Economy

Big conference today. So I'm sitting down on the sidelines with a big-time CEO and there is another investor/analyst type guy there and he asks the CEO guy the most boring, annoyingly jejune question that people in my profession can ask (but that always gets asked)..."What keeps you up at night?" (I am always hoping that the guy answers, as I would, "my three year old" but I guess most CEOs don't have three year olds). And in typical fashion for a know-it-all finance dork, it is not just "What keeps you up at night?" full stop, it is "What keeps you up at night? Is it China's potential unsustainability, is it a resurgence of counter-party risk, is it the effects of major central bank's exit strategies, is it fragility in the global economy, is it freakin' Santa Claus entering your business with lower cost elf labor...yadayadayada....eyes glaze over...

But then the CEO guy laid it out straight for all of us and it was bracing..."You know what keeps me up at night?" (Pause here to know that this guy runs a US-based, global company that does business all over the world, has thousands of employees and can spend hundreds of millions of dollars whenever and wherever he wants) "The United States Senate. They don't have a clue."

There you have it folks, what I would consider a man at the helm of the bread and butter of the US economy, a man who single-handedly can create jobs here or abroad...thinks the US Senate is the biggest impediment to his business. Not the after effects of the financial crisis, not tin pot dictators around the world, not lackluster demand, not rising energy costs, not labor strife, not competition. None of these things.

THE UNITED STATES SENATE!!!!!!!!!!

ARGHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!

Message to DeCarlo Flythe

Just like I had a message for Peggy Joseph, I have a message for DeCarlo Flythe. The message is: I wish you no ill, trust me, but you will not just "pay your co-pay and be alright". Maybe for a time, but not in the long run. You see, the best doctors will refuse to provide their services for the low rates that the government pays, so you will have to make up the difference or you will have to find another doctor who will. Invariably doctors that take the government mandated reimbursements will be inferior doctors. (That is, if you can get in to see a doctor, because many will retire.) Ultimately, DeCarlo you will get inferior care for the inferior level of resources that you personally pony up. Neither will you get the satisfaction of knowing that all Americans are getting the same care as you. You see this fate won't be befall a guy like me. The best doctors will operate completely outside of the government apparatus, they will only accept patients who pay their asking prices in cash, and that'll be me. I'll save for my family's healthcare, seek out these doctors, and whip out my American Express card. I wish it were otherwise, but everyday ain't Christmas. That's life.

It'll be just like the schools. You send your kids to that crappy public school on the cheap and I'll either send mine to private school or move to a town where higher taxes support a fine school. Healthcare will be no different. Again, I wish you no ill, but knuckleheads like you who expect something for nothing are this country's biggest problem. I just wish you wouldn't vote.

"Control the People"

No, Freudian slip here folks. This is what they want, what they intend, and what we are getting. ObamaCare is not about healthcare, it is about control - over resources and over your lives. Elections have consequences: you elect socialists, you get socialism. Have fun.

As always, Burke is apropos..."The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion."

Pick your delusion: Hope and Change, Healthcare for All, Saving the Planet from Climate Change...I could go on...

Nailed the Prediction, Sad to Say

I'm claiming a score on one of my 2010 predictions: Obamacare passes, spurring constitutional crisis. No crisis yet, but multiple states suing the feds is a crisis, so we're all but there. I've scored two and we are not even out of March, which isn't good because my list of prognostications isn't very sunny.

Send Nita Packing

Last November, we witnessed the beginning of things to come with the election of two new Governors, Chris Chritie and Bob McDonnell. But I also noted that the revoultion was happening on a smaller scale as well, such as in Westchester County, NY. At the time, I said that all we needed to do now was to take that momentum and topple speed-reading, Pelosi lap-dog Nita Lowey. Speed-reading Nita is a poster child for what is wrong down there in Incumbistan on the Potomac and she's ripe for a challenge in my opinion. But as of just a few weeks ago there was no one on the horizon to challenge the Speedreading Nita. Well, now there is, and by early accounts he looks to be a solid challenger - business exec, army officer, no previous political experience, and he works for a company that finds people jobs. I've already got my checkbook out...

Double Dip Here We Come

I've already called it, but I might as well reiterate my stance for the record on the very date of the vote...we're doubling dipping. Unemployment will be back over 10% by Q4 2011.

I Shorted Bart Stupak !!!!!

I knew that ObamaCare was going to pass so I bought a solid chunk of TBT - to add to my position - on Friday to juice my juice from the disaster that this horror-show will be. Bloomberg and Drudge are already on the game, we're headed to the junk heap. TBT should rock on the open! I don't think Michael Lewis will write a book about me, but I am thoroughly capable of enjoying my trading profits in obscurity...

UPDATE: Looking like a good trade...betting on a Congressman to have no spine...like taking candy from a baby!

UPPDATE: Speaking of sovereign credit, Iraq as money good as California? Small evidence that history will likely vindicate George W. Bush's administration, at least the foreign policy part...

Memo to CEOs: Hand Out "ObamaCare Pink Slips"

Caterpillar lays out the bottom line. If I were Jim Owens, or ran a company of any size, I'd be sending out "ObamaCare Pink Slips" the minute this thing passes. Actually I would have been doing it for the last year - with the addendum, "you can have your job back if this bill goes down in flames." Too bad Corporate America is run by a bunch of chickens (I used the nice animal reference for coward...this is a family friendly blog!!!)

Kudlow & Cramer: ObamaCare Will Sink Stocks

Watch this 11 minute video. This is a reunion for the ages, it's better than Simon & Garfunkel in Central Park in 1981.

I wanted these guys to split up, and I think the world is better for it, but this reunion is awesome. Watch it.

Getting Boring...Another Shitload of Oil Found

Shell finds a shitload of oil right here at home. No bbls reported yet but 530 and 380 feet of "pay" is huge. Which of my many, now annoying, catch-phrases should I include here:
a) Nothing to see here, move along
b) There is NO MORE OIL LEFT TO FIND
c) We can't drill our way out of our energy problem

All I can say is I am thankful that the Era of Obama has given us the Year(s) of the Hydrocarbon and DrillDrillDrill!

Civil Disobedience

This guy gets it and lays out a little personal civil disobedience roadmap. It jibes with this. Good. More needed.

Funny, a wave of civil disobedience, if it comes (and I hope it does), is likely to descend upon the nation from, not a empowered youth foaming with revoultionary zeal, but the middle-aged, middle class and the geezers. Sit down kids, it's our turn to shake things up!!!

Ugh, and I Mean U-G-H !!

I love the Gettysburg Address, as do most Americans. I think, though, that as one studies and learns more about the American Civil War, you love of those 256 (*) words more and more. As a history buff kinda guy, my love is indeed great for that greatest-of-all speeches.

That is why this gives me deep, sharp stomach pains. It'll likely be more like Edward Everett's address - the actual headline event that was the rambling, scholarly journeys that were so cool back then and that nobody knows or cares about today -than like Lincoln's.

UPDATE: Am I right or am I right?

The Hangover Is Just Beginning Folks

I have said it before and I will say it again...the story here is not that this is happening, it is that anybody thought for a moment that it wouldn't happen...

Not Too Big to Fail

I agree with Dan Riehl. Healthcare has now become about saving Obama. Barack Obama is not too big to fail.

They Told Him If He Voted for McCain...

This is priceless. Sounds like a book idea!

UPDATE: The Good Professor is so en fuego this AM, he even brings Adam & the Ants (technically Adam Ant, but purists never drop the "& the Ants") into the mix!

I Love a Good Told Ya' So

You heard it here first folks, ObamaCare will drive doctors out of the profession.

The Land of the Mostly Free, and the Home of the Occasionally Brave

Truth.

Meet the New Pelosi Lapdogs

Sources are telling the Tea Party movement that the following representatives that voted "No" on ObamaCare previously intend to switch their votes to "YES". Nuff said. Melt the phones...

Rep. John Boccieri, Ohio, 16th
http://boccieri.house.gov/
DC Office Number: (202) 225-3876, DC Fax Number: (202) 225-3059
Local Office Number: (330) 489-4414, Local Fax Number: (330) 489-4448
Voted Yes on Stupak
Voted No on Health Care


Rep. Jason Altmire, Pennsylvania 4th
http://www.altmire.house.gov/
DC Office Number: (202) 225-2565, DC Fax Number: (202) 226-2274
Local Office Number: (724) 378-0928, Local Fax Number: (724) 378-6171
Voted Yes on Stupak
Voted No on Health Care

Rep. Bart Gordon, Tennessee 6th
http://gordon.house.gov/
DC Office Number: (202) 225-4231, DC Fax Number: (202) 225-6887
Local Office Number: (615) 896-1986, Local Fax Number:
Chief of Staff: Donna Pignatelli email: donna.pignatelli@mail.house.gov
Voted No on Health Care

Rep. Brian Baird, Washington 3rd
http://www.baird.house.gov/
DC Office Number: (202) 225-3536, DC Fax Number: (202) 225-2478
Local Office Number: (360) 695-6292, Local Fax Number: (360) 695-6197
Voted Yes on Stupak

"California Dreamin' " Becomes "Livin' on Tulsa Time"

Funny, just last week I was thinking about doing a post about the girlhood home of the ever-ravishing Mrs. Baseball. I mean, how could you not ballyhoo a place with citizens of such good sense that they send Tom Coburn and Jim Inhofe to the US Senate? So, a story I picked up from Instapundit writes itself - Oklahoma is growing in a reverse Grapes of Wrath scenario. I hope you followed my investment advice from way back...

UPDATE: Just a little taste of the Good Doctor Senator, here...(scroll down)

RIP Capt. Clarence Oveur

Since this blog draws its title from the the movie "Airplane!" we are duty bound to note the passing of actor Peter Graves. Ready for final takeoff, you have clearance Clarence!

Can This Be True?

Oh my God, I must be drunk (it is Friday night, but it's only 8:30...) or dreaming but the Republicans actually did something really smart for a change. President Obama's fig leaf VAT Tax Commission, oops sorry, Deficit Commission gives Republicans a bunch appointee slots. Of course we all expected them to appoint lame-ass, go-along-get-along, eminence grise type losers. I mean, that's what Republicans do, right? Never would they channel Donny Baseball and say, "Fine Lightworker, you wanna talk deficits? We'll talk deficits! How's does Tom Coburn sound, how does Paul Ryan sound, how does Hensarling sound, tough guy?!?!" Sure enough, we got Coburn, and Ryan, and Hensarling, and Gregg and Crapo to boot. No wooly, wishy-washy faux deficit hawks here. These guys are fiscal bad-asses...spending scourges. If fighting the out-of-control growth of government spending is a war, the Republicans finally sent in some Navy Seals rather than some protocol officers. I don't know what to say...enjoy it while it lasts???

While We're Taking Entire Industries Over...

Um, I guess because the Democrats haven't overreached enough...

Civilization Paralyzed In Face of Piracy

"Somalia: NATO Commodore Predicts Increase In Pirate Attacks
March 12, 2010
NATO Commodore Hans Christian Helseth said the pirate attacks around Horn of Africa will increase in upcoming months and extend to east to India and south to Madagascar because of calmer weather, Reuters reported March 12. He said there was also pirate activity in the Bay of Bengal near Bangladesh as well as in the Gulf of Guinea off Nigeria. Helseth explained that the three months between winter and summer monsoons provide pirates with significant range in the Indian Ocean, and they are departing more frequently with fuel and supplies. "

Why the hell haven't we seen all out war against the pirates? Why haven't we put a couple of commando/special op/badass units in civilian garb on board a couple of these, troll the Gulf of Aden to draw the pirates in and then kill them all dead?? Do this three or four times and I guarantee piracy will go down.

A Tale of Two Cities

Paris gets fed.

Caracas not so much.

Thank You Alistair Darling

New York has regained lost ground to London and is now tied with the British capital as the world's leading financial center. On current course we are poised to pull ahead into sole leadership. This ongoing rivalry for the title is an odd contest where, alternatively, one cedes the the advantage to the other rather than one overtaking the other through raw force of will. We gave up the crown with Sarbanes-Oxley and London has had a good run for nearly ten years, but now the Labour government's class warfare assault on London's financial industry and its workers is handing the mantle back to the Big Apple. And Lord knows we need it, so much thanks to you, Chancellor Darling!

It's Drill Drill Drill in the Age of Obama

Two pieces of good news today for those of us who are thankful for the glories of hydrocarbon-based energy supplies and wish to see ever more supplies of affordable energy that enables our modern world to hum and our living standards to rise. First, the province of Alberta is lowering its grab in an effort to encourage more investment in energy development. Second, new Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell has signed a law that positions Virginia as the first state poised to allow and encourage drilling offshore in the Atlantic. It's not an ultimate victory but it is an important step. Who woulda thunk it, after only a year into the Obama administration, "Drill Drill Drill" seems to be breaking out all over!!

Bonus: it seems like literally every day they are finding more oil offshore Brazil. Funny what happens when you actually look for oil...

Ten Four, Over and Out Good Buddy

Thanks to the SayAnything guys for pointing out just how damn right I might turn out to be - I said we'd see 10% unemployment and $4 gas by the time The Lightworker has to campaign for a second term. Well, we are at 10% unemployment (more like 17% if you use the measure that Paul Krugman used while Bush was in office) and are fast approaching $3 gas (in fact we have $3 gas in California and parts West), and looking to go higher. With no other obstacles in his way, The Lightworker would have a tough fight on his hands just with the 1o/4 tandem. Alas he's got many other obstacles - the arrogance, the radicalism, and the ineptitude. Add in 10%/$4 and it's over and out barring a miracle.

Supply Siders: Right and, Hopefully, Much Richer

The market bottomed one year ago yesterday on March 9, 2009. It's been up 68% since in one of the greatest recoveries in history. This man called it. And this man has been calling it, and, of course, Sir Mustard Seed Himself made the call. If you've followed them, you know that they were right all along, but more importantly, they were early. They called it when no one could see it. Unbelievably great job by them and I hope they are very rich because of it (better revenge than being right). Further, I think the difference between making the right call and the wrong call - the wrong call was "Great Depression II, other shoe to drop, armageddon, etc - was how you saw the financial crisis and the economy. If you saw it as a panic or a "velocity of money" problem, you were probably more inclined to make a "V-shaped recovery call". If you saw it through the lens of classic business cycle theory, you were probably looking for a "U-shaped" recovery. Then there were the armageddonists, the "L-shaped" recovery people, the people who didn't like the "Porkulus" because it wasn't big enough - the Roubinis, Krugmans, Roaches and Stiglitzes of the world. Granted the situation was complicated by a change in political power in Washington that represented a massive change in idealogical trajectory (as we have been finding out; some of our fellow countrymen were duped as to how much of an philosophical leap we were taking in the other direction - these people are commonly referred to as "rubes" around here.) and still is, but in retrospect we can identify real winners and losers. The supply-siders came out big winners, and the Keynesians and the "imbalances" crowd - Rubinomics folks - came out losers. If you were of the former camp, you had a better chance of calling it right and making some nice money. If you were of the latter camp, you likely spent the year predicting more doom and gloom and you missed the recovery. That is not to say that idealogy, or your philosophical approach to the economy, was solely determinative of outcome, it helped to know your financial history - 2008 was more akin to 1907 than to 1929, and if you were perceptive enough to make that key comparison, you had the analytical foundation to call a recovery and put down some markers, which hopefully were big financial bets on that recovery.

Meet Chris Christie's Mini-Me

Chris Christie has created alot of buzz by virtue of his early moves as governor of the profligate, bankrupt, governance disaster otherwise known as the state of New Jersey (boyhood home, btw, of Donny Baseball). He is emerging as a model of what Republican politicians ought to do once they are actually in office, as opposed as what they have been doing over the years. We need Chris Christies at every level of government, and I am heartened to see one emerging on a smaller scale but in a place every bit as profligate, bankrupt and dysfunctional as New Jersey, Westchester County, NY. I've talked about it before (and here), but Rob Astorino is making the same moves as Christie out of the gates and is establishing himself as a mini Chris Christie. If Astorino and Christie can fix these two fiscal disasters, it'll prove that out of control government can be reined in at the levels that it matters, and eventually the good sense will trickle up. Christie and Astorino represent the vanguard of a new, better, and actually vote-deserving Republicanism.

Our Moderate, Centrist President Is Gunning for an Uprising

Forget fiscal profligacy taking us to national bankruptcy...you want to see a real revolution, a "pitch-forks in the street revolution"? Then ban fishing.

Amateur Hour in Four Acts

Act I.

Act II.

Act III.

Act IV.

ObamaCare is Today's Smoot-Hawley

Actually, more like the National Recovery Act of 1933. This act probably did more to reverse a nascent recovery and deepen a routine recession into the Great Depression in the 1930s, but Smoot-Hawley has more brand recognition as a true policy disaster. Remember, our scorecard is currently 1 for 4. ObamaCare represents higher taxes and massive regulation of the economy, and I am afraid that our one success in avoiding the mistakes of the 1930s - monetary expansion - will be swamped by this failure to learn from the past. If ObamaCare passes, not only are we double-dipping, the Great Recession deepens, perhaps into Great Depression Dos.

A few more eerie parallels: 1) Roosevelt's cadre of academics went on a trip to Moscow and came back with a glowing admiration of Stalin's putatively efficient economic model. Today, our intelligentsia is again enamored with authoritarian models of efficiency (again, putative efficiency). 2) Given the dubious constitutionality of some major provisions in the emerging Obamacare bill, we may have to wait upon a defining Supreme Court case to set us free from the economic shackles that this legislation will put on us - just like Schechter Poultry v United States, aka the Kosher Chicken case. 3) In anticipation that many of his New Deal initiatives would run into judicial scrutiny, FDR aimed to pack the Supreme Court. On cue, similar calls can be heard today.

History never repeats? Horsepucky.

UPDATE: Jim "Mad Money" Cramer thinks we double dip too.

Never Blame the Drunk

You are at a bar. You see a man who has drunk way too much. You make a bet with your companion that the man will fall off his barstool and hit his head hard on the floor. Your wager did not cause the man to drink too much and it will not make any difference as to the severity of the head injury that will result if the man does indeed fall off his barstool. Of course in the world of politics and government, it is your fault for making the wager - not the drunk's. In fact, it may be the fault of the bartender, the bar and even the existence of alcohol itself.

Obama is a Black Swan

Gosh I know that will draw howls of racism but I am talking about a Talebian Black Swan. (If you don't get the reference, then get off my website.) This is a serious but, I am sure, little contemplated issue. Thanks to the Neo-Neocon for raising this thought. It is not the deficits. It is not the foreign policy fecklessness. It is not the socialism. It is not the despoliation of creditors' rights (Chrysler!). It is not the invitation to non-taxpaying Maoists into the halls of power. It is...alas...that the US is now...flakey. We are an international airhead. A ditz on the global stage. This is however not "Obama's fault" as in the fault of Barack H. Obama the man. It is however the fault of Obama, the phenomenon. The loss of America's reliability and steadiness on the world stage is culminated in Obama. He's doing it but he is merely our vessel and the fact that he is there, doing this to our nation and our nation's standing is more a reflection on us than on him.

So yes, the damage is done. As stated, it is not the tangible, dollars and sense, touch with your fingers damage - the Tea Party movement has blessedly helped us avoid that to date. It is the sad, ineffable, slumping reality...the United States of America has become...officially...flakely. And no one would have ever thought that. That is the Black Swan.

Sound the Alarm

Calling Bat One. $1.2 trillion more in deficits...sound the alarm...to the Bat Cave!

Bombshell: CBO Says Obama Budget Underestimates Deficits By...

only $1.2 trillion!!!!! That's a big miss. We are out of irresponsible territory; we are in full-on, pedal-to-the-metal headed for the brick wall mode now baby.

Check it out here. Doug Elmendorf & Co. have just dropped a MOAB on Obama's head. The CBO paints a picture of Japan's lost decade (and still counting really) and Euro-style entitlement state meltdown all rolled into one.

My FDR-votin' grandma just became a Tea Partier...

Venezuela In a Death Spiral??

Back in January I speculated that Venezuela's crises might be too deep for the Chavez regime to survive much longer. Things for ole' Hugo are spiralling down quickly. Imports are barely keeping the country in the necessities as Chavez has wrecked the agriculture sector and smashed manufacturing, so this ain't good.

Mission Creep from Creeps

Sir Lawrence makes a strong case against the healthcare montrosity currently hovering over our nation, which is worth reading but the one nugget that everyone needs to remember is this: healthcare reform began as an attempt to address a relatively small number of uninsured people and yet what we now have before us will impact every single citizen of this country. I call it a takeover, you can call it what you want, but the inescapable fact is that this bill is Washington DC having a hand in the healthcare decisions of every single living, breathing American. It is a worse than ugly development, preceding along via the ugliest of processes, stewarded by a clique of very ugly individuals. Americans know a piece of garbage when they see one, but yet we still might have to swallow it. Unless you fight back...to be continued...

I Don't Get It

A guy who holds no elective office, with no authority, convenes an emergency meeting to "protect issues of concern" related to two men who do hold political office and who have been rebuked for ehthical transgressions in the conduct of their public duties. Huh?

Bring Back the "Robber Barons"!

Dan Henninger says "Bring Back the Robber Barons." I wholeheartedly agree. Of course, "robber baron" is a linguistic crime perpetrated on these men - they were neither robbers or barons. Classic "robber barons" like Carnegie and Rockefeller were, of course, the opposite of barons, they were both born and raised in obvious poverty, and they did not rob anything, but created something from almost nothing. But even if you have a distaste for them, for great wealth, they are vastly better than the alternative, as C.S. Lewis writes:

"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. "

Fightin' Words

O God how I wish I had written this. I've come damn close but no cigar for me. Cigar to Dan Riehl. O hell, I'm just going to paste the whole thing here...

When In The Course Of Human Events
"That this inexperienced travesty of a chief executive, Obama, more a byproduct of timing and media collaboration, than his own worth, or accomplishment, is personally advocating for the so-called nuclear option is the final straw.

It’s official. After months of threatening to push the button on the so-called nuclear option, reconciliation — the parliamentary maneuver that Harry Reid said “nobody” is talking about and that President Obama said Americans didn’t care about last week — is a go.

Reconcile this, you distasteful, malevolent little quisling punk - a timely reminder of some words I never thought would have such import during my lifetime.

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

The cause is well known and it is just. When the alleged leader of a democratic republic places his own wishes so above those of the complete body politic, he is no longer worthy of the title, leader, no matter what office he might occupy.

Only a fool with no clear appreciation of, or for, America past and present, would dare undertake what this pustule in the White House is attempting to do. It is contingent upon the Republican Party to undertake every step, every maneuver it can to bring this government to a halt.

Tell me now how wrong Bunning was to do as he did, yesterday? Whose side are those Republicans who didn't support him really on, ours, or merely their own? If the GOP lacks the courage, or the ability to stop this pathetic power grab by the un-American, decadent Left - an ideology that has already failed over and over throughout much of the world - then it becomes not just a right, but a responsibility for the American people to take their country back from the political elites that have already bankrupted it. And after that, they now seek to do even more harm by capitalizing on a crisis.

They confessed as much via ex-ballerina Rahm Emanuel, hence, they deserve no respect, or just due, as they are self-admittedly, an unjust crew. It is time to stop this government in its tracks, take it back democratically in the fall, or it then becomes time to bring this government down.

This neophyte, this joke we have in the White House has absolutely no idea of the force and the rage he is about to unleash on him and his entire political party. If there are not enough responsible adults left within his party to rein in this accidental, affirmative action jerk, this self-styled, extremely flawed little man, then his party is worthless to America. It deserves to be marginalized electorally and, ultimately, utterly destroyed, before being relegated to the dung heap of history with the rest of the marxist, socialist clowns Americans have dispatched before.

Reconciliation for this disaster of a destructive health care bill I doubt anyone on the Hill can fully define means all out war. The only question remaining is, whose side are you on? "

DB's Early Call Now Conventional Wisdom...?

Funny, the Democrats at CNBC are now seeing (and saying, that's the amazing part) what I was saying this time last year and all throughout 2009.

"B. Hussein...Sucka Where's My Job?"

More delicious.

Well, Al Baby, I'm Coming After You...

Delicious. (sign in req'd)

UPDATE: Full interview here. OK, it's plain for all to see...Monckton 2012!!

More Smart Power

"Sarkozy the American" has been blown off to the point where France is now cozying up with Russia, who is not our friend.

Can Just a Few Examples make Fiscal Sanity Doable Again?

I said that Chris Christie and Angie Merkel were to be watched, we may have some fiscal heroes in them. Gov. Christie isn't playing around and Angie Merkel is either standing firm or twisting Greek arms pretty hard...remains to be seen.

Plus Tax and Tip...and Healthcare

I'm thrilled to see this happening, in fact, I suggested it. Show consumers just how much stupid and/or socialist, nanny-state policies cost them on a regular basis. Shove it in their faces. This is not a "scam" as the article suggests. It's economic reality.

UPDATE: SayAnything hits the nail on the head, this pisses liberals off. Good.

Great Minds...???

Reading Holman Jenkins's column today, you could be forgiven for thinking that it was entirely based on NBfPB posts, including the Warren Buffett reference. Still, Holman deliciously unloads on our POTUS, so read it.

Tax Receipt Disaster Less Than 2 Months Away

I just started putting numbers to paper as a preliminary exercise for completing my taxes, and it confirms my intuition about what the US fiscal situation may look like later in the year. Tax receipts are currently down because so many people are out of work, not earning anything and thus not paying taxes (and lots are likely working off-the-books in order to avoid sharing meager earnings with Uncle Sam). However, our tax code is insanely progressive and thus dangerously leveraged to high income earners. The extra juice in good years mostly comes from the investments and capital returns of the wealthiest Americans. Conversely, when investment income dries up, it wreaks havoc on government budgets. This is not a mystery but it seems never to register with our political class. I think tax year 2009 is going to be a bloody disaster for government finances when the returns start flowing in, and the reason is pretty basic. The worst of the financial crisis started in 2008 but markets didn't bottom until March of 2009, and recall, February 2009 was one of the scariest months in the market. Many who held their assets through 2008 must have concluded after February that it was time to sell and take losses. And those losses were likely large, large enough to offset subsequent gains made in 2009 and max out the $3000 limit on applying losses to ordinary income. Also, traditional dividend paying companies - of 'widows and orphans' fame - slashed dividends to the bone. The same will play out with interest income, rates fell like a stone likely taking taxable interest income down by hundreds of billions. This enormous pot of taxable income simply dried up starting in late 2008 and continued throughout 2009. So while the worst is likely past for the economy and stock market, the disastrous legacy of 2008 and 2009 is suspended in amber and has yet to be felt fully on government coffers. My own numbers bare this out -dividend and interest income is way down and I have capital losses offsetting second half gains and enough left over to offset ordinary income - and I have no doubt that there are tens of thousands of high-earners just like me whose tax returns filed this coming April will revisit the financial crisis on the federal government as well as state governments. Add this to the wild spending that is going on in Washington and all I can say is get ready to be shocked to your core at how bad the US of A's finances are. States, too.

...and if you followed NBfPB's Tax Avoidance Plan for Obama's America, well, then you are going to deliver that much more bad news to Washington DC, Sacramento, Albany, Trenton or wherever.

UPDATE: Albany's budget woes get worse by the day. Here's my favorite: "Other doubtful aspects of Paterson's budget plan include $250 million of still to be negotiated savings in contracts with unionized state workers." Doubtful? Really? Say it ain't so. Cue the latest from Mark Steyn: "...nothing makes an individual more selfish than the socially equitable communitarianism of big government. Once a chap's enjoying the fruits of government health care, government-paid vacation, government-funded early retirement, and all the rest, he couldn't give a hoot about the general societal interest. He's got his, and to hell with everyone else."

UPPDATE: Apropos my main point above, the data is in for 2008...it's bad. Gonna be just as bad, likely worse in 2009.

Buffett Subtly: Strike Three On Obama

Chalk this one up as Warren Buffett's third swipe at the Obama administration's policy efforts. See also strikes one and two. While Warren's political savvy has been rightly questioned, one thing is for sure, you can't trade on Warren's credibility and get away with it for long if Warren doesn't want you to. The Oracle is clearly cutting Obama off from that well.

I stand by my analysis that Obama abusively borrowed the credibility of the (gullible isn't the word, but something quite close) ready to be influenced Buffett and Volcker for the purposes of the election. By all accounts both men are attempting to claw their credibility back gradually over the past year, albeit in their respective gentlmanly ways.