It's as simple as A, B, C, congresswoman; we want you back!
***UPDATE***
Frankly, folks, it appears the lies, deceptions, manipulations, and general dishonesty of the Boehner Republicans is worse than even I'd feared.
Please... read today's newsbites.
Please... click on the comments tab below.
8 comments:
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20110412/D9MI4KNG1.html
The historic $38 billion in budget cuts resulting from at-times hostile bargaining between Congress and the Obama White House were accomplished in large part by pruning money left over from previous years, using accounting sleight of hand and going after programs President Barack Obama had targeted anyway.
(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)
The details of the agreement reached late Friday night just ahead of a deadline for a partial government shutdown reveal a lot of one-time savings and cuts that officially "score" as cuts to pay for spending elsewhere, but often have little to no actual impact on the deficit.
* THOSE FILTHY, ROTTEN, LYING REPUBLICAN PRICKS...!
As a result of the legerdemain, Obama was able to reverse many of the cuts passed by House Republicans in February when the chamber approved a bill slashing this year's budget by more than $60 billion.
* FUNNY HOW MY CONGRESSWOMAN - DR. NAN HAYWORTH - FAILED TO MENTION THIS IN ANY OF HER EMAILS TO ME.
[T]he cuts that actually will make it into law are...cuts to earmarks, unspent census money, leftover federal construction funding, and $2.5 billion from the most recent renewal of highway programs that can't be spent because of restrictions set by other legislation.
Another $3.5 billion comes from unused spending authority from a program providing health care to children of lower-income families.
* "UNUSED SPENDING AUTHORITY..."
The National Institutes of Health, which funds critical medical research, would absorb a $260 million cut, less than 1% of its budget, instead of the $1.6 billion cut sought by House Republicans. Family planning programs would bear a 5% cut rather than being completely eliminated.
* OH, YEAH... BOEHNER'S NEGOTIATING SKILLS ARE OBVIOUSLY TOP NOTCH... (*SNORT*)... HE MUST BE ONE HELL OF A POKER PLAYER! (*SNICKER*)
* JEEZ... IMAGINE THAT... THE DOWN THE MIDDLE COMPROMISE BETWEEN NO CUT AND PROGRAM ELIMINATION IS... er... 5% (NOT 50% AS I WAS TAUGHT IN... oh... ELEMENTARY SCHOOL).
Congress approved Obama's $1 billion request for high-speed rail grants - crediting itself with $1.5 billion in savings relative to last year.
* SO REPUBLICANS ARE INDEED FAMILIAR WITH THE CONCEPT OF A CUT BEING SPENDING LESS THIS YEAR THAN LAST YEAR; GOOD TO KNOW!
* FOLKS... THAT THERE IS PROOF POSITIVE THAT BOEHNER REPUBLICANS ARE FULL OF SHIT. THIS IS PROOF POSITIVE THEY'RE DELIBERATELY LYING TO US AS OPPOSED TO SIMPLY DIFFERING ON THE "DEFINITION" OF A CUT!
About $10 billion of the cuts comes from targeting appropriations accounts previously used by lawmakers for so-called earmarks, those pet projects like highways, water projects, community development grants and new equipment for police and fire departments.
* THE ONLY "PROBLEM" WITH CALLING THIS A CUT... (*DRUM ROLL*) (WAIT FOR IT... WAIT FOR IT...)
Republicans had already engineered a ban on earmarks when taking back the House this year.
(*SMIRK*)
Republicans also claimed $5 billion in savings by capping payments from a fund awarding compensation to crime victims. Under an arcane bookkeeping rule - used for years by appropriators - placing a cap on spending from the Justice Department crime victims fund allows lawmakers to claim the entire contents of the fund as budget savings. The savings are awarded year after year.
* FUCKING SCUMBAGS...!!!
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5il-7COiRQUJ9kbLkZ3gg4nrlac5Q?docId=CNG.dcd81b51497966fd4c6461748e63e3ee.921
The US budget deficit shot up 15.7% in the first six months of fiscal 2011...
(*SIGH*)
The Treasury reported a deficit of $829 billion for the October-March period, compared with $717 billion a year earlier, as revenue rose a sluggish 6.9%...
* I CAN HARDLY WAIT TO HEAR THE "EXPLANATION" FOR THIS... (*SNORT*)
The Treasury argued that the pace of increase in the deficit was deceptive because of large one-off reductions in expenditures made during the first half of fiscal 2010, compared with previous and subsequent periods.
* FOLKS. WHAT YOU JUST READ - THE SENTENCE ABOVE - PURE GOBBLY-GOOK.
Those included a $115 billion reduction in funds spent on the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) - the financial institution bailout program - in March 2010.
* A REDUCTION OF SPENDING OF MONEY ALREADY BUDGETED? IF SO, WAS THE MONEY SPENT ON... er... OTHER SPENDING? (SURE SOUNDS LIKE IT, HUH!)
But 2011 so far has also seen significant increases in spending on defense...
* OH, YEAH... WE'RE... uh... "DEFENDING" OURSELVES AGAINST LIBYA AS I TYPE!
"The jump in outlays mostly owed to a smaller estimated reduction in TARP outlays this year versus 2010," said Theresa Chen at Barclays Capital Research.
* AGAIN... GOBBLY-GOOK.
(*SMIRK*)
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/dc1aadea-652e-11e0-b150-00144feab49a.html#axzz1JLTylfaI
The US lacks a “credible strategy” to stabilise its mounting public debt...says the International Monetary Fund.
In an unusually stern rebuke to its largest shareholder, the IMF said the U.S. was the only advanced economy to be increasing its underlying budget deficit in 2011 at a time when its economy was growing fast enough to reduce borrowing.
* DIRTY, FILTHY, ROTTEN BASTARDS...
To meet the 2010 pledge by the Group of 20 countries for all advanced economies – except Japan – to halve their deficits by 2013, the U.S. would need to implement tougher austerity measures than in any two-year period since records began in 1960, the IMF said.
In its twice-yearly Fiscal Monitor, the IMF added that on its current plans the U.S. would join Japan as the only country with rising public debt in 2016...
(*GNASHING MY TEETH*)
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0411/53001.html
House Republicans won a symbolic victory by dethroning four White House "czars" under the contentious federal spending agreement rolled out early Tuesday morning...
(*CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*)
...but symbolism may be all they got.
* HUH...?
The language in the short-term budget agreement seeks to put four of President Barack Obama's policy czars out of jobs - those appointed to assist the president on health care, climate change, autos and manufacturing, and urban affairs.
* O.K., SO WHAT'S THE CATCH?
The catch: At least three of those four czars have already moved out of the czar jobs.
* YOU... BASTARDS...!
* YOU DUPLICITOUS SONS (AND DAUGHTERS) OF...
(*BITING MY TONGUE*)
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/big-banks-government-backed-feds-hoenig-20110412-112137-434.html
The 2008 bank bailouts at the height of the financial crisis and other implicit guarantees effectively make the largest U.S. banks government-guaranteed enterprises, like mortgage finance companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, said Kansas City Fed President Thomas Hoenig.
"That's what they are," Hoenig said at the National Association of Attorneys General 2011 conference.
He said these lenders should be restricted to commercial banking activities, advocating a policy that existed for decades barring banks from engaging in investment banking activities.
"You're a public utility, for crying out loud," he said.
(*CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*) (*STANDING OVATION*)
The Kansas City Fed president has been a vocal critic of rescuing the biggest banks rather than allowing them to fail. He has criticized the Fed's easy money policies in the wake of the crisis.
(*THUNDEROUS APPLAUSE*) (*TWO-FINGER WHISTLES AND FOOT STAMPING*)
http://www.pressherald.com/news/Maine-House-passes-sovereignty-resolution-.html
The Maine House of Representatives is asking Congress to respect state sovereignty.
(*CLAP...CLAP...CLAP*)
By a 79-67 vote today, the Republican-controlled House passed the nonbinding resolution that says some congressional mandates exceed federal power. It now awaits a Senate vote.
* "NON-BINDING." PUSSIES!
The resolution highlights the 10th Amendment to the Constitution, which lays out federal and state powers, and asserts that a number of federal mandates exceed congressional authority.
* WHICH IS OBVIOUSLY, OBSERVABLY TRUE!
* TWO-PARTER... (Part 1 of 2)
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704415104576250672504707048.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop
The unemployment rate is consistently higher among men than among women.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that 9.3% of men over the age of 16 are currently out of work. The figure for women is 8.3%.
Unemployment fell for both sexes over the past year, but labor force participation (the percentage of working age people employed) also dropped.
* IN OTHER WORDS, FOLKS, "RISING EMPLOYMENT" AIN'T ALL IT'S CRACKED UP TO BE. (IN OTHER WORDS, GOVERNMENT STATISTICAL MODELS ARE OFTEN DEVELOPED TO MISLEAD INSTEAD OF TO INFORM.)
The participation rate fell more among men (to 70.4% today from 71.4% in March 2010) than women (to 58.3% from 58.8%).
* I KNOW... I KNOW... ALL THESE STATS...
* BOTTOM LINE:
That means much of the improvement in unemployment numbers comes from discouraged workers - particularly male ones - giving up their job searches entirely.
(*SIGH*)
* To be continued...
* CONTINUING... (Part 2 of 2)
Men have been hit harder by this recession because they tend to work in fields like construction, manufacturing and trucking, which are disproportionately affected by bad economic conditions. Women cluster in more insulated occupations, such as teaching, health care and service industries.
* NOT THAT SERVICE INDUSTRIES HAVEN'T EXPERIENCED A DOWNTURN... NOT THAT TEACHERS HAVEN'T BEEN LAID OFF... BUT IN TERMS OF RELATIVE IMPACT - LIKE IT OR NOT - THERE'S A DEFINITE HIERARCHY OF HURT. (*SHRUG*)
[I]f you can accept that the job choices of men and women lead to different unemployment rates, then you shouldn't be surprised by other differences - like differences in average pay.
Feminist hand-wringing about the wage gap relies on the assumption that the differences in average earnings stem from discrimination. Thus the mantra that women make only 77% of what men earn for equal work.
(*ROLLING MY EYES*)
[E]ven a cursory review of the data proves this assumption false.
(*NOD*)
The Department of Labor's Time Use survey shows that full-time working women spend an average of 8.01 hours per day on the job, compared to 8.75 hours for full-time working men.
One would expect that someone who works 9% more would also earn more.
This one fact alone accounts for more than a third of the wage gap.
(*SMILE*)
Choice of occupation also plays an important role in earnings. While feminists suggest that women are coerced into lower-paying job sectors, most women know that something else is often at work. Women gravitate toward jobs with fewer risks, more comfortable conditions, regular hours, more personal fulfillment and greater flexibility. Simply put, many women - not all, but enough to have a big impact on the statistics - are willing to trade higher pay for other desirable job characteristics.
[Men suffer the overwhelming majority of injuries and deaths at the workplace. [Yet one doesn't hear charges that men are being "discriminated against" with regard to health and safety regulations.]
(*SNICKER*)
Men...often take on jobs that involve physical labor, outdoor work, overnight shifts and dangerous conditions...
* MORE SO THAN WOMEN! NO ONE IS SAYING THAT SOME WOMEN DON'T DO THESE SAME JOBS! WHAT THE ARTICLE IS POINTING OUT, THOUGH, IS THAT MEN DO FAR MORE OF THESE JOBS! LIKE IT OR NOT, THAT'S THE TRUTH. (*SHRUG*)
Recent studies have shown that the wage gap shrinks - or even reverses - when relevant factors are taken into account and comparisons are made between men and women in similar circumstances.
In a 2010 study of single, childless urban workers between the ages of 22 and 30, the research firm Reach Advisors found that women earned an average of 8% more than their male counterparts. (Given that women are outpacing men in educational attainment, and that our economy is increasingly geared toward knowledge-based jobs, it makes sense that women's earnings are going up compared to men's.)
* ANYWAY... JUST MORE STUFF YOU WON'T LEARN IN SCHOOL OR WHILE LISTENING TO OPRAH, JON STEWART, OR WATCHING NETWORK NEWS OR CNN. (*SHRUG*)
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