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April
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- Weekend Newsbites: Sat. & Sun., April 30 & May 1, ...
- Barker's Newsbites: Friday, April 29, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Thursday, April 28, 2011
- The NYT Never Ceases To Amaze
- Barker's Newsbites: Wednesday, April 27, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Tuesday, April 26, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Monday, April 25, 2011
- Weekend Newsbites: Sat. & Sun., April 23 & 24, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Friday, April 22, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Thursday, April 21, 2011
- Gang, I'm Not A Happy Camper
- Barker's Newsbites: Wednesday, April 20, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Tuesday, April 19, 2011
- Sarah Palin Sure Sounds Smart To Me!
- Barker's Newsbites: Monday, April 18, 2011
- Weekend Newsbites: Sat, & Sun., April 16 & 17, 2011
- Does Anyone Still Watch C.S.I. - The Original... L...
- Senate Vote Tally re: HR 1426 - The Budget "Compro...
- Barker's Newsbites: Friday, April 15, 2011
- HR 1473 - The Budget "Compromise"
- Barker's Newsbites: Thursday, April 14, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Wednesday, April 13, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Tuesday, April 12, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Monday, April 11, 2011
- Calling Rush Limbaugh - Rush Hudson Limbaugh III
- I Feel Betrayed By John Boehner and Nan Hayworth
- Weekend Newsbites: Sat. & Sun., April 9 & 10, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Friday, April 8, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Thursday, April 7, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Wednesday, April 6, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Tuesday, April 5, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Monday, April 4, 2011
- Weekend Newsbites: Sat. & Sun., April 2 & 3, 2011
- Barker's Newsbites: Friday, April 1, 2011
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April
(34)
About Me
- William R. Barker
- Pearl River, NY High School Class of '81; Northeastern University, Boston, MA Class of '87.
11 comments:
http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/doug-heye/2011/04/29/tax-payer-funded-npr-brings-rock-stars-to-swanky-washington-party
[A]s Washington prepares to celebrate, well, itself at the annual White House Correspondents’ Dinner, where media organizations try to out-do each other by planting celebrities at their $2,500 tables, taxpayer-subsidized and donor-supported NPR is no exception.
Joining NPR staff will be Ambassador Susan Rice as well as three [rock stars]. Which raises the question: In a time when, NPR’s budget is under scrutiny, is hosting rock stars at a swank dinner the sign NPR officials want to send?
* APPARENTLY IT IS!
And, is promoting new recordings of musical artists - be they starving or sated - something the government should even subsidize in the first place?
* IN THE AGE OF OBAMA... APPARENTLY, YES!
* THREE-PARTER... (Part 1 of 3)
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704330404576291772245610028.html#articleTabs%3Darticle
Larry Pope is the chief executive officer of Smithfield Foods Inc., the world's largest pork processor and hog producer by volume.
Bobbie Jean Pope, the 81-year-old mother of C. Larry Pope of Newport News, Va., can't afford [to buy] her [son's] bacon.
"I can't afford y'all's meat anymore! Why is y'all's meat so expensive?" [Pope's mom asks him].
[Pope replies,] "Mom, you ought to understand why it's expensive - it's 'cause our costs are so expensive."
[P]olitics...plays a large role, as Congress subsidizes favorite industries and the Federal Reserve pursues an expansive monetary policy.
Some 60% to 70% of the cost of raising a hog is tied up in the grains, Mr. Pope explains. "The major ingredient is corn, and the secondary ingredient is soybean meal." Over the last several years, the cost of corn has gone from a base of $2.40 a bushel to today at $7.40 a bushel, nearly triple what it was just a few years ago.
(Which means every product that uses corn has risen, too - including everything from cereal to soft drinks and more.)
What triggered the upswing? In part: ethanol.
President George W. Bush came forward with the edict that we were going to mandate 36 billion gallons of alternative fuels by 2022, of which corn-based ethanol is a substantial part.
* F--KING IDIOT BUSH!
Companies that blend ethanol into fuel get a $5 billion annual tax credit, and there's a tariff to keep foreign producers out of the U.S. market. Now 40% of the corn crop is directed to ethanol, which equals the amount that's going into livestock food, Mr. Pope calculates.
* F--KING BUSH... F--KING RINO CONGRESS... F--KING DEMOCRAT CONGRESS... F--KING OBAMA...
* SEE MY POINT, FOLKS...?!?! IT'S BOTH PARTIES AGAINST THE INTERESTS OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE...!!!
* To be continued...
* CONTINUING... (Part 2 of 3)
The rapidly depreciating dollar is also sparking inflation...
* DUH...!
Rising prices are already squeezing food producers' 2% to 3% earnings margins.
"Many of us had our costs hedged in the commodity markets and we all took on strident measures to control our cost structures," Mr. Pope says. "In the case of Smithfield, we closed six processing plants and one slaughter plant. We also closed 15% of all our live production business. But once those measures are done, we have no choice but to pass those prices down" to consumers."
* SO TO PARAPHRASE, IDIOTIC GOVERNMENTAL POLICIES ARE LEADING TO STAGFLATION - PLANTS ARE CLOSING... PEOPLE ARE LOSING THEIR JOBS... AND ON TOP OF ALL THIS CONSUMERS ARE PAYING MORE FOR LESS...!!!
A pound of sliced bacon costs $4.54 today versus $3.59 two years ago...
Ground beef is $2.72, up from $2.27 in 2009 and $1.74 in 2001.
* AND THAT'S THE CHEAP CRAP... (*SIGH*)
"You eat eggs, you drink milk, you get a loaf of bread, and you get a pound of meat," [Pope] drawls. "Those are the four staples of what Americans eat in their diet. All of those are based on grains."
* MY GOD, PEOPLE... OBAMA AND BERNANKE ARE IMPOVERISHING OUR PEOPLE...!!! THEY'RE DESTROYING OUR STANDARD OF LIVING...!!!
"Maybe to someone in the upper incomes it doesn't matter what the price of a pound of bacon is, or what the price of a ham, or the price of a pound of pork chops is," [Pope] says, "but for many of the customers we sell to, it really does matter."
* DAMN RIGHT IT MATTERS...!!!
Mr. Pope also worries about the impact on farmers, who are leveraging up operations to afford the ever-rising price of land and fertilizer that has resulted from the increased corn demand. "There are record prices for livestock but farmers are exiting the business!" he exclaims. "Why? Farmers know they won't make money."
(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD IN DESPAIR*)
* To be continued...
* CONCLUDING... (Part 3 of 3)
Weather is a factor, too. [Pope notes,] "We've had the luxury for the last three years of extremely good corn crops, with high yields and good growing conditions. We are just one bad weather event away from potentially $10 corn, which once again is another 50% increase in the input cost to our live production."
We have an unsustainable meat protein production industry," [Pope notes,] "We're built on a platform of costs, on a policy that doesn't make any sense!"
Nor does the science [make any sense]. The ethanol industry would supply only 4% of the nation's annual energy needs even if it used 100% of the corn crop. The EPA has found ethanol production has a neutral to negative impact on the environment.
"The subsidy has been out there since the 1970s," Mr. Pope says. "If they can't make themselves into a viable economic model in 40 years, haven't we demonstrated that this is an industry that shouldn't exist?"
* YES...! YES WE HAVE...!!!
Smithfield's economists estimate corn prices would fall by a dollar a bushel if ethanol blending wasn't subsidized.
"Even the announcement that it is going away would see the price of corn go down, which would translate very quickly into reduced meat prices in the meat case," [Pope] says. (Imagine what would happen if the mandate and tariff were eliminated, too!)
[Pope] also advocates lifting regulatory and tax burdens on business. "I fundamentally don't understand the logic of corporate income taxes; if I have a 35% tax, all I do is take that 35% tax and I transfer it into the price of bacon and the price of pork chops."
(*NOD*)
* BUT, NO... THE SCHOOLS WON'T TEACH THIS... THE MEDIA WON'T REPORT THIS REALITY... GENERATION AFTER GENERATION IS DELIBERATELY RAISED IN IGNORANCE. WHY...? WHY...???
Then there's the challenge of opening up export markets, which Mr. Pope sees as a long-term opportunity for U.S. agriculture. "This is a land-rich country, with rich soils, with the right kind of temperatures and the right kind of cultivation practices," he says. "We can raise livestock and compete with anybody in the world. That's how we can help the balance of payments."
(*TWO THUMBS UP*) (*STANDING UP TO APPLAUD*)
* BOTTOM LINE:
Mr. Pope says the losers here are the consumer, who's going to have to pay more for the product, and the livestock farmer who's going to have to buy high-priced grain that he can't afford because he's stretching his own lines of credit.
"The hog farmer . . . is in jeopardy of simply going out of business 'cause he doesn't have the cash liquidity to even pay for the corn to pay for the input to raise the hog. It's a dynamic that we can't sustain."
* GOD HELP US IF WE DON'T DEMAND REAL CHANGE, PEOPLE; OBAMA, THE DEMS, AND THE RINOs MUST ALL GO. WE NEED COMMON-SENSE CONSTITUTIONIST PATRIOTS IN OFFICE - NOT THE SCUM WHO HAVE RAPED OUR NATIONAL PROSPERITY.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704132204576285471510530398.html
Roughly 2,000 students have to decide by Sunday whether to accept a spot at Harvard. Here's some advice: Forget Harvard. If you want to earn big bucks and retire young, you're better off becoming a California prison guard.
The job might not sound glamorous, but a brochure from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitations boasts that it "has been called 'the greatest entry-level job in California' - and for good reason. Our officers earn a great salary, and a retirement package you just can't find in private industry. We even pay you to attend our academy." That's right - instead of paying more than $200,000 to attend Harvard, you could earn $3,050 a month at cadet academy.
It gets better.
Training only takes four months, and upon graduating you can look forward to a job with great health, dental and vision benefits and a starting base salary between $45,288 and $65,364. By comparison, Harvard grads can expect to earn $49,897 fresh out of college and $124,759 after 20 years.
As a California prison guard, you can make six figures in overtime and bonuses alone. While Harvard-educated lawyers and consultants often have to work long hours with little recompense besides Chinese take-out, prison guards receive time-and-a-half whenever they work more than 40 hours a week. One sergeant with a base salary of $81,683 collected $114,334 in overtime and $8,648 in bonuses last year, and he's not even the highest paid.
Sure, Harvard grads working in the private sector get bonuses, too, but only if they're good at what they do. Prison guards receive a $1,560 "fitness" bonus just for getting an annual check-up.
* WHERE'S MY WHISKEY... I NEED WHISKEY... WHISKEY, WHISKEY, WHISKEY... (*SIGH*)
Most Harvard grads only get three weeks of vacation each year, even after working for 20 years - and they're often too busy to take a long trip. Prison guards, on the other hand, get seven weeks of vacation, five of them paid. If they're too busy racking up overtime to use their vacation days, they can cash the days in when they retire. There's no cap on how many vacation days they can cash in! Eighty officers last year cashed in over $100,000 at retirement.
The cherry on top is the defined-benefit pension.
Unlike most Harvard grads working in the private sector, prison guards don't have to delay retirement if their 401(k)s take a hit. Prison guards can retire at the age of 55 and earn 85% of their final year's salary for the rest of their lives.
* OH... AND...
They also continue to receive medical benefits.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704013604576247021025083428.html
The 'Anti-Christie' ... That's how Connecticut's Democratic Governor Dannel Malloy describes himself...
(*HEADACHE*) (*JUST SHAKING MY ACHING HEAD*)
Whereas Mr. Christie has vetoed tax increases, cut spending and is trying to reform public pensions, Mr. Malloy wants to close the Connecticut budget deficit with a huge tax hike and the legislature in Hartford may approve it as early as next week.
[Malloy] wants to kick every Connecticut worker with earnings above $50,000 into a higher tax bracket.
* AND ON TOP OF THAT... (WAIT FOR IT... WAIT FOR IT...)
The Yankee Institute, a free market think tank, counts some two dozen new taxes in Mr. Malloy's budget. He would raise taxes on cigarettes, gasoline, Internet sales, drugs, booze and wealthy estates.
* BUT WAIT! THERE'S MORE!
Property tax bills would climb by $500 for the average homeowner.
* I DON'T EVEN LIVE IN CONNECTICUT AND I'M SICK TO MY STOMACH READING THIS!
Those who make more than $500,000 would see their tax rate rise to 6.7% from 6.5%. (Even that's not enough for Democrats in the legislature who want to raise it to 7%.)
* NOW... FOLKS... PAY CLOSE ATTENTION TO THE FOLLOWING...
For anyone who thinks income tax hikes are the financial salvation of states, Connecticut's history is instructive. [RINO] Governor Lowell Weicker sold an income tax in 1991 as a one-time reform that would keep sales and property taxes low. Instead, a state that paid its bills for 200 years without an income tax and had become one of the richest states in per capita income is now raising income taxes for the fourth time in 20 years.
* FOLKS... UNDERSTAND...
This is what always happens when a state introduces an income tax: A gusher of new revenue leads to higher spending, which leads the politicians to demand higher rates; rinse the taxpayers and repeat.
(*SIGH*)
What started in Connecticut as a 4.5% top marginal rate is now 6.5%, and yet the state is...running a $3.5 billion deficit.
[S]tate spending growth has far exceeded gains in median income since the income tax was introduced. Spending growth also roughly doubled the increase in population plus inflation (about 72%) over the period.
(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)
Mr. Malloy also wants to raise the sales tax to 6.25% from 6% and add another 0.1% surtax for Connecticut cities. Mr. Malloy would apply the sales tax for the first time to dozens of services, including parking, cosmetic surgery, yoga classes, manicures and pet grooming. We [here at the WSJ] support a broader sales tax base for states, but only in return for lower rates. Mr. Malloy wants to broaden the tax base and raise rates.
(*MASSIVE MIGRAINE HEADACHE*)
There's more. ... Spending rises by 2.5% under [Malloy's] plan.
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/libya-disabled-children-school-hit-nato-strike-201036691.html
Shattered glass litters the carpet at the Libyan Down's Syndrome Society, and dust covers pictures of grinning children that adorn the hallway, thrown into darkness by a NATO strike early on Saturday.
* FOLKS... AGAIN... THERE'S NO SUCH THING AS A "NATO" STRIKE. THE UNITED STATES IS FOR ALL INTENTS AND PURPOSES "NATO." I MEAN... IMAGINE... IMAGINE BEFORE THE FALL OF THE SOVIET UNION READING ABOUT "WARSAW PACT" STRIKES AGAINST, SAY, AFGHANISTAN. FOLKS... THIS IS A SICK JOKE.
* HEY... FOLKS... WHERE ARE THE "PEACE" PROTESTERS? YOU KNOW... THE ONES WHO FOLLOWED BUSH ALL AROUND THE COUNTRY? WHERE'S THE "ANTI-WAR MOVEMENT" NOW THAT A DEMOCRAT IS IN THE WHITE HOUSE?
* HEY... I'LL GIVE THE OLD HIPPIES CREDIT; AT LEAST THEY HATED LBJ AS MUCH AS THEY DID NIXON. TODAY'S "LEFT" - ABSOLUTE HYPOCRITES.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/libyan-leader-offers-negotiations-with-nato-powers-as-air-strikes-hit-government-complex/2011/04/30/AFEnb1JF_story.html
Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi escaped a NATO missile strike in Tripoli on Saturday, but his youngest son and three grandchildren under the age of 12 were killed, a government spokesman said.
* SO MUCH FOR BANS ON ASSASINATION. SO MUCH FOR THE RULE OF INTERNATIONAL LAW, WHICH I'M PRETTY SURE FROWNS UPON TARGETING THE LEADERS OF COUNTRIES THAT TECHNICALLY NO ONE HAS EVEN DECLARED WAR AGAINST.
The attack struck the house of Gadhafi’s youngest son, Seif al-Arab, when the Libyan leader and his wife were inside.
The commander of the NATO operation, Canadian Lt. Gen. Charles Bouchard, said he was aware of unconfirmed reports that some Gadhafi family members may have been killed and he regretted “all loss of life, specially the innocent civilians being harmed as a result of the ongoing conflict.”
* FOLKS... I'M NOT TAKING GADHAFI'S WORD FOR ANYTHING, I'LL WAIT FOR INDEPENDENT VERIFICATION, BUT I DON'T SEE THE WASHINGTON POST RUNNING WITH THIS STORY UNLESS THEY WERE PRETTY DAMN SURE IT WAS TRUE. (WE'LL SEE...)
Moammar Gadhafi and his wife were in the Tripoli house of his 29-year-old son when it was hit by at least one bomb dropped from a NATO warplane, according to Libyan spokesman Moussa Ibrahim.
On Tuesday, British Defense Minister Liam Fox and U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates told reporters at the Pentagon that NATO planes were not targeting Gadhafi specifically but would continue to attack his command centers.
* DOES ANYONE BELIEVE THESE GUYS? SERIOUSLY... REGARDLESS OF WHETHER YOU SUPPORT THE "LIBYAN WAR" OR NOT, DO ANY OF YOU ACTUALLY BELIEVE FOX AND GATES...?
* ONE WONDERS HOW MANY OTHER "COMMAND CENTERS" ARE LOCATED IN PRIVATE HOMES WHERE CHILDREN PLAY... (*SIGH*)
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.279588144c0fd58d312ca2e921687d3b.681&show_article=1
The killing on Friday of an American soldier made April the deadliest month for U.S. forces in Iraq since 2009, according to figures compiled by AFP.
* OH, YES, FOLKS... MUSTN'T FORGET IRAQ...
The soldier "was killed April 29 while conducting operations in southern Iraq," a US military statement released on Saturday said, without giving further details.
* "OPERATIONS," HUH? BUT... DIDN'T OBAMA AND CLINTON TELL US ALL U.S. COMBAT TROOPS ARE OUT OF IRAQ...???
The death brought to 11 the number of US troops to have died in Iraq in April, according to an AFP tally based on data compiled by independent website www.icasualties.org.
(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)
That is the highest monthly toll since November 2009, when 11 soldiers also died, starkly highlighting the risks American soldiers still face even after combat operations were officially declared over last summer.
* LAST... SUMMER... (*SNORT*)
* COMBAT OPERATIONS WERE "OFFICIALLY DECLARED OVER" LAST... SUMMER...
* NOT A PEEP FROM THE LEFT, FOLKS. NO "OBAMA LIED, AMERICANS DIED." NO "CLINTON LIED, AMERICANS DIED."
Friday's death also brings to 4,452 the number of American troops to have died in Iraq...
(*PURSED LIPS*)
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703346704576295873060349068.html?mod=WSJ_hp_LEFTWhatsNewsCollection
What is 20 times taller than the Statue of Liberty, 15 times longer than "Moby Dick" and would take the average reader more than a month to read, even if you hunkered down with it for 40 hours a week?
* ANSWER...
The growing paper trail formed by the Dodd-Frank law, passed by [a Democrat-controlled] Congress last year...
(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)
Getting the legislation through that political thicket was easy compared with the slog now under way to turn Dodd-Frank into regulations. The process has produced more than three million words in the Federal Register - or more than 3,500 11-inch-high pages that would stretch end-to-end more than a third of the way from the Capitol to the White House.
And about 62% of the 387 sets of rules required by the law haven't even been proposed,
* YEP. YOU'RE READING THIS CORRECTLY. AMAZING... (*SIGH*)
In April, not a single U.S. agency met any of the 26 Dodd-Frank-related deadlines set for April under the law.
* BUT... BUT... IF THERE WERE DEADLINES... AND THIS IS A LAW... (*SCRATCHING MY HEAD*)
* FOLKS... UNDERSTAND LAWS APPLY TO SCHMUCK LIKE US; THEY DON'T APPLY TO THE POLITICIANS OR THEIR GOVERNMENT AGENTS.
"The reality is, we're not going to complete all the work in the timetable Congress set," Scott O'Malia, a commissioner at the CFTC, said in an interview. But the need to "get the rules right" is more important than rigidly meeting Congress's "unrealistic" deadlines, he said.
* UNFRIGG'NBELIEVEABLE, HUH?! CONGRESS HAS CREATED A FRIGG'N MONSTER!
The Dodd-Frank "law" [itself] has 849 pages...
* BUT THE BILL AS WRITTEN AND PASSED DOESN'T REPRESENT THE "LAW" BUT RATHER "AUTHORIZES" THE REGULATIONS - REGULATIONS CONGRESS NEVER VOTES FOR OR AGAINST. (*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)
* FOLKS... THE RULE OF LAW... THE CONSTITUTIONAL RULE OF LAW... IT'S IN SHAMBLES. PERIOD.
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2011/05/01/gop-senators-defend-nato-air-strikes-in-libya/
[Three prominent] GOP senators on Sunday defended the air strikes that hit a house where Col. Moammar Gadhafi was staying, with one senior lawmaker calling for greater U.S. involvement to force the Libyan leader’s ouster.
* THE AUTHOR IS REFERRING TO JOHN MCCAIN, LINDSEY GRAHAM, AND MARC RUBIO.
* FOLKS... CHECK YOU OWN HOUSE REPRESENTATIVE'S WEBSITE AND YOUR OWN SENATOR'S WEBSITE. CHANCE ARE YOU'LL FIND LITTLE OR NOTHING THERE DESCRIBING THEIR VIEWS ON LIBYA. IT'S SICKENING. THESE SCUM WHO REFUSE TO TAKE THEIR CONSTITUTIONAL RESPONSIBILITIES SERIOUSLY SHOULD BE TARRED, FEATHERED, AND RUN OUT OF TOWN ON A RAIL.
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