Friday, February 3, 2012

Barker's Newsbites: Friday, February 3, 2012


Newsbites...! Newsbites...! Enter the Comment Section to get your newsbites!

(Some really good newsbites today, folks... please give 'em at least a browse!)
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7 comments:

William R. Barker said...

http://spectator.org/archives/2012/02/03/his-abominations-accelerate

The recent litany of Obama's odiousness begins with his growing, unambiguous war against traditional Christianity.

He has now left no room for any pretense otherwise to be believed. Right on the heels of a unanimous Supreme Court, including his own two appointees, smacking down his administration's attempt to kill the "ministerial exemption" for employment practices of faith-based institutions, an unchastened Obama has decided that even faith-based organizations must provide insurance that covers contraception - even including abortifacients.

This is not just a narrow policy disagreement; it is, as Bishop David A. Zubik of Pittsburgh wrote, the president's way of saying "To Hell With You" to people of faith - "To hell with your religious beliefs. To hell with your religious liberty. To hell with your freedom of conscience."

(*NOD*)

* AND DON'T FORGET... "TO HELL WITH THE CONSTITUTION." "TO HELL WITH THE BILL OF RIGHTS."

Zubik continued: "This is government by fiat that attacks the rights of everyone -- not only Catholics; not only people of all religion. At no other time in memory or history has there been such a governmental intrusion on freedom not only with regard to religion, but even across-the-board with all citizens."

* HAT TIP - MIKE D.

February 3, 2012 at 10:47 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/record-12-million-people-fall-out-labor-force-one-month-labor-force-participation-rate-tumbles-

A month ago, we [here at Zero Hedge] joked...that for Obama to get the unemployment rate to negative by election time, all he has to do is to crush the labor force participation rate to about 55%.

Looks like the good folks at the BLS heard us: it appears that the people not in the labor force exploded by an unprecedented record 1.2 million.

No, that's not a typo: 1.2 million people dropped out of the labor force in one month!

So as the labor force increased from 153.9 million to 154.4 million, the non institutional population increased by 242.3 million meaning, those not in the labor force surged from 86.7 million to 87.9 million.

* RE-READ THE ABOVE PARAGRAPHS AS NECESSARY...

(*SIGH*)

Which means that the civilian labor force tumbled to a fresh 30 year low of 63.7% as the BLS is seriously planning on eliminating nearly half of the available labor pool from the unemployment calculation.

* YEAH, FOLKS... YOU MIGHT WANNA RE-READ THAT AGAIN. (INDEED... YOU MIGHT WANNA FORWARD THE LINK TO THIS STORY TO EVERYONE IN YOUR ADDRESS BOOK.)

As for the quality of jobs, as withholding taxes roll over Year over year, it can only mean that the U.S. is replacing high paying...jobs with low paying construction and manufacturing [jobs].

So much for the improvement.

February 3, 2012 at 11:10 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000

* JUST IN CASE ANYONE IS LOOKING FOR THE RAW GOVERNMENT STATS UPON WHICH ZERO HEDGE RELIES UPON...

(*SMIRK*)

February 3, 2012 at 11:13 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.cnbc.com/id/46250775

* HERE'S HOW THE MSM REPORTS (SPINS) THE SAME EXACT STATS THAT ZERO HEDGE RELIES UPON...

The pace of job creation surged in January, with the US economy generating 243,000 new positions while the unemployment rate dropped to 8.3 percent, according to government data released Friday.

* YEP. THAT'S THE FIRST PARAGRAPH. HAPPY NEWS INDEED, HUH?!

(*SNORT*) (*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD WITH A RUEFUL CHUCKLE*)

Both numbers were far better than consensus...

* YEP. THAT'S DIRECT FROM THE FIRST SENTENCE OF THE SECOND PARAGRAPH.

(*SMIRK*)

The stock market rallied on the jobs news...

* YEP. YOU GUESSED IT - THIRD PARAGRAPH.

(*LOPSIDED SMILE*)

* OK... LET'S GO TO PARAGRAPH NUMBER FOUR NEXT:

"What’s not to like about the report?" said Andrew Wilkinson, chief economic strategist at Miller Tabak in New York.

(*DRUM ROLL*)

* WAIT FOR IT... WAIT FOR IT...

* FINALLY... (*SNICKER*)... FROM PARAGRAPH NUMBER SIX:

On the downside, the closely watched labor-force participation number, which can skew the unemployment rate, fell to 63.7 percent, the lowest since May 1983.

(*SARCASTIC CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*)

* OH... AND THERE'S MORE:

The number of those working part-time for economic reasons rose 1.2%.

* OH... AND BY THE TIME THE READER REACHES PARAGRAPH EIGHT OF THIS STORY:

"Looking beyond these statistical quirks, watching the unemployment rate drop five months in a row is rare event, and our expectation is that the unemployment rate rises in the immediate-term," said Neil Dutta, economist at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

(*SMIRK*)

* FOLKS... YOU HAVE THE LINK; READ THE FULL STORY FOR YOURSELVES. THE AUTHOR AND HIS EDITORS HAVE CLEARLY BURIED THE LEAD. WHY WOULD THEY DO THAT...?

(*SMIRK*)

February 3, 2012 at 11:26 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20120203_No_hate_charges_in_attack.html?c=0.14090962996337186&posted=y&viewAll=y#comments

Three juveniles accused of assaulting a cabdriver and his passenger in Center City Saturday night while shouting racial slurs will not be charged with a hate crime, the District Attorney's Office said yesterday.

* DAMN THE WHITE RACIST SYSTEM!

The teens, who are black...

* OOPS!

(*SMIRK*)

...were not charged with hate crimes because there was no evidence that the assault had been motivated by the race of the victims, who are white, said Tasha Jamerson, D.A. spokeswoman.

* UH...HUH...

* THE SHOUTING OF RACIAL SLURS DURING THE COMMISSION OF THE CRIME APPARENTLY NOT REGISTERING UPON "TASHA's" SUPERIORS.

(*SMIRK*)

Just shouting racial epithets during the commission of a crime doesn't rise to the level of ethnic intimidation, she said.

(*SHRUG*)

February 3, 2012 at 11:36 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://us2.campaign-archive1.com/?u=75124207697efe9a19ed9a724&id=cc677d3035&e=46483ed98d

* FROM SENATOR JIM DEMINT (R-SC)

Fellow Conservatives:

The U.S. Senate voted on two amendments yesterday that show exactly how tightly politicians cling to power.

The first vote was on a resolution I offered expressing support for a Constitutional Amendment limiting the number of terms someone can serve in Congress.

The term limits amendment was defeated 24-75 with 52 Democrats and 23 Republicans opposing it.

(SEE: http://senateconservatives.com/site/votes/112/2/11?c=5R4F2B4F9B3A137 FOR A TALLY OF THE VOTE IDENTIFYING WHICH SENATORS VOTED AGAINST TERM LIMITS.)

The most common argument I hear against term limits from politicians is that they're unnecessary because "that's what elections are for."

I certainly agree that we should use elections to remove people from office (and there's probably nobody in Congress who works harder to achieve that goal than me), but incumbents have a significant advantage over challengers. We need term limits to ensure there is a regular rotation of the people who represent us.

The longer someone serves, the more power they accumulate, and the more they lose touch with the voters who elected them.

It's no surprise that the senators who opposed my amendment have been in the Senate an average of 13.6 years compared to just 6.4 years for those who supported it.

(*SIGH*)

The second vote was on an amendment offered by Senator Pat Toomey (R-PA) to permanently ban congressional earmarks.

The most common arguments I hear in favor of earmarks is that the Constitution gives Congress the "power of the purse" and Members of Congress know their districts better than government bureaucrats.

The Constitution gives Congress the authority to appropriate funds, but it doesn't say those funds should be allocated in a way that puts seniority and campaign contributions ahead of merit and common sense. And in most cases, the federal government has no business operating these programs. They should either be devolved to the states or eliminated entirely.

(*SINCERE CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*)

I've heard some say we should just get rid of the bad earmarks and keep the good ones, but earmarking is an all-or-nothing enterprise.You see, if you vote against a single earmark (no matter how bad it is), the committee chairmen will take away your projects. (This is why lawmakers will often vote for budget-busting omnibus spending bills just to secure one or two tiny earmarks.)

We could have won majority support for Toomey's earmark ban yesterday if every Republican had supported it, but many in my own party are still reluctant to give up their earmark addiction.

February 3, 2012 at 11:58 AM
William R. Barker said...

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/six_years_of_gloom_FT17uHlq2hX1QxkLKTnHeM

The City of New York will pay more on benefits this year for current and retired workers than it will on salaries for firefighters, police and sanitation.

* REPEAT!

The City of New York will pay more on benefits this year for current and retired workers than it will on salaries for firefighters, police and sanitation.

[P]ension costs [will] gulp down an extra $145 million in taxpayer money — 1.8% more than last year.

(*PURSED LIPS*)

Pensions, health-care and debt costs are the main reasons the city faces a $3 billion budget gap in two years’ time, and another $3.5 billion gap after that.

Debt costs, too, keep going up — rising 14.9% next year, to $5.9 billion, and to $7.1 billion in three years.

* OH... AND BTW... ALL THIS WHILE:

City taxpayers will shell out $51.7 billion for the fiscal year that starts in July — $6,200 for every man, woman and child. That’s a 2.7% rise from this year...

(*HELPLESS SHRUG*)

[P]ensions have already grown to a level that’s a few notches past insane. And they’re not going down. That’s $8 billion a year that we can’t spend on other stuff we need, such as active firefighters and cops and better roads.

Next year, Gotham will spend $6.7 billion on health and “fringe” benefits for workers and retirees — up 8.8%. Add health care to pensions, and these things consume 28% of the taxpayers’ money.

These costs haven’t stopped growing — they’ll jump another 29% over three years, to $8.6 billion.

* FOLKS... IN PLAIN ENGLISH... WE'RE WITNESSING A SLOW-MOTION CAR CRASH... OR SUICIDE.

(*SHRUG*)

February 3, 2012 at 12:16 PM

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