Thursday, May 24, 2012

Barker's Newsbites: Thursday, May 24, 2012


Just in case my ol' buddy Tim drops by, today's newsbites theme song honors... high school.

The actual newsbites are within the Comments space, Tim; browse and enjoy!

Oh...! Almost forgot...! Today's Kim's birthday...! My kid is a quarter century old today...!!!

15 comments:

William R. Barker said...

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304840904577422452374106994.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_MIDDLETopOpinion

"Obama Spending Binge Never Happened," announces the headline of a column by MarketWatch.com's Rex Nutting, which the president's supporters have received gratefully and eagerly.

Nutting's contention that the Obama years have not seen "a massive increase in federal spending" is literally accurate, at least if one construes "massive" in relative terms. He produces a bar graph that shows during fiscal 2006-09, which roughly corresponds to George W. Bush's second term, spending grew at an average annual rate of 8.7%. During 2010-13, the rate of increase is projected at just 1.4%.

* THE THING IS... DEMS RECAPTURED BOTH HOUSES OF CONGRESS - THE BRANCH OF GOVERNMENT WHICH CONTROLS THE PURSE STRINGS - IN THE 2006 ELECTION AND IN 2007, 2008, 2009, AND 2010 AND THUS THEY (LED BY NANCY PELOSI AND HARRY REID) CONTROLLED THE PURSE STRINGS DURING THOSE YEARS.

(*SHRUG*)

"The major spending decisions in the 2009 fiscal year were made by George W. Bush and the previous Congress," notes Nutting.

* THE PREVIOUS CONGRESS BEING... (*SHRUG*)... THE PELOSI/REID CONGRESS.

* OH... AND BTW, FOLKS, THE DEMS STILL CONTROLL THE SENATE!

The most obvious objection is addressed in his chart, which "reassigns" to Obama "about $140 billion in extra spending in the 2009 fiscal year from the stimulus bill, from the expansion of the children's health-care program and from other appropriations bills passed in the spring of 2009."

(*TSK-TSK-TSK*)

The less obvious but more pertinent objection is hinted at in this paraphrase of Obama's "I-inherited-this-mess" mantra: "Like a relief pitcher who comes into the game with the bases loaded, Obama came in with a budget in place that called for spending to increase by hundreds of billions of dollars in response to the worst economic and financial calamity in generations."

That would be the Troubled Asset Relief Program, enacted in October 2008.

* BY A DEMOCRATIC CONGRESS. (YES... WITH BUSH AND THE RINOs GOING ALONG, BUT WITH MANY CONSERVATIVES REFUSING TO GIVE THEIR SUPPORT. IN ANY CASE, I OPPOSED TARP.)

It accounted for much of the enormous spending increase (to $3.52 trillion from $2.98 trillion, or 17.9%) in fiscal 2009.

Thereafter the rate of change was much smaller: Spending fell 1.8% in 2010, rose 4.3% in 2011, and is expected to rise 0.7% in 2012 and fall 1.3% in 2013.

But TARP was a one-off, a temporary response to an emergency. By itself, it would have caused a bump in spending - that is, a sharp increase in 2009, followed by a sharp decrease in 2010.

As James Pethokoukis notes, "Obama chose not to reverse that elevated level of spending; thus he, along with congressional Democrats, [is] responsible for it."

Obama spends as if the 2008 emergency were permanent.

Or, to put it another way, he's like a relief pitcher who comes into the game with the bases loaded and proceeds to give up run after run.

William R. Barker said...

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304840904577422393164106270.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_AboveLEFTTop

J.P. Morgan's recent trading loss and the resulting Washington blather about tighter regulation have grabbed headlines.

Little noticed is that on Tuesday Team Obama took its first formal steps toward putting taxpayers behind Wall Street derivatives trading...

* THOSE FUCKING BASTARDS...

[N]ot behind banks that might make mistakes in derivatives markets, but behind the trading itself.

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

Yes, the same crew that rails against the dangers of derivatives is quietly positioning these financial instruments directly above the taxpayer safety net.

As we noted in May 2010, the authority for this regulatory achievement was inserted into Congress's pending financial reform bill by then-Senator Chris Dodd.

* PRIOR TO DODD's RETIREMENT. (*SMIRK*)

Two months later, the legislation was re-named Dodd-Frank and signed into law by President Obama.

(*PURSED LIPS*)

One part of the law forces much of the derivatives market into clearinghouses that stand behind every trade.

Mr. Dodd's pet provision creates a mechanism for bailing out these clearinghouses when they run into trouble.

Specifically, the law authorizes the Federal Reserve to provide "discount and borrowing privileges" to clearinghouses in "emergencies."

(*SIGH*)

Traditionally the ability to borrow from the Fed's discount window was reserved for banks, but the new law made clear that a clearinghouse receiving assistance was not required to "be or become a bank or bank holding company." To get help, they only needed to be deemed "systemically important" by the new Financial Stability Oversight Council chaired by the Treasury Secretary.

* THAT WOULD BE TIM "THE TAX CHEAT" GEITHNER.

Last year regulators finalized rules for how they would use this new power. On Tuesday, they began using it. The Financial Stability Oversight Council secretly voted to proceed toward inducting several derivatives clearinghouses into the too-big-to-fail club.

* ...SECRETLY...

After further "review," regulators will make final designations, probably later this year, and will announce publicly the names of institutions deemed systemically important.

(*SARCASTIC CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*)

We're told that the clearinghouses of Chicago's CME Group and Atlanta-based IntercontinentalExchange were voted systemic this week, and rumor has it that the council may even designate London-based LCH.Clearnet as critical to the U.S. financial system.

* YOU'RE READING THIS, RIGHT, FOLKS...?!?!

U.S. taxpayers thinking that they couldn't possibly be forced to stand behind overseas derivatives trading will not be comforted by remarks from Commodity Futures Trading Commission Chairman Gary Gensler. On Monday he emphasized his determination to extend Dodd-Frank derivatives regulation to overseas markets when subsidiaries of U.S. firms are involved.

* OH... GET THIS, FOLKS...

Readers know Mr. Gensler as the chief regulator of MF Global, which was run into bankruptcy by his old Beltway and Goldman Sachs pal Jon Corzine. An estimated $1.6 billion is still missing from MF Global customer accounts. What an amazing feat Mr. Gensler will have performed if, through his agency's oversight, he can manage to have U.S. customers eat the cost of Mr. Corzine's bets on foreign debt and have U.S. taxpayers underwrite bets in foreign derivatives trading.

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

If there's one truth we've learned about government financial backstops, it's that sooner or later they will be used.

[E]ventually taxpayers will have to bail out one derivatives clearinghouse or another.

William R. Barker said...

http://spectator.org/archives/2012/05/23/the-wisconsin-turning-point

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker's Reforms Are Working - spectacularly!

Walker came into office facing another state budget deficit of $3.6 billion. Historically, Wisconsin like many other states would raise state taxes to counter these recurring deficits, on top of annual stiff property tax increases to fund skyrocketing school and other local government costs. But those continual tax increases were imposing greater and greater costs on state economies in terms of lost economic growth, jobs and wages.

Walker... focused on cutting the growth in state and local government spending instead.

That spending restraint included requiring state and local government workers to contribute to their own benefits more like private sector workers.

(After all the yelling and screaming in Wisconsin, in the end these government workers were only required to contribute 5.8% of their salaries towards their pensions, which is matched by their government employers - the taxpayers - and 12.6% of the costs of their health insurance, with the other 87% paid by taxpayers. This compares to private sector workers paying on average 21% of the cost of their company health insurance, with most private sector workers having no pension at all.)

The state budget reforms also made payment of union dues voluntary for government workers, empowering these workers to each decide for themselves if they want to be full dues paying members of the public employee unions. That is a potential savings for families of $1,000 a year for each government worker in the family. This forces the public unions to focus on serving their members and convincing each one that their services are worth the dues, just like every other private sector institution in American society.

The budget reforms also limited collective bargaining to negotiations over salary but not over benefits or working conditions and rules. This gave counties, cities, and school boards the flexibility to make management changes to increase efficiency in serving the public and to reduce costs, without laying off workers and reducing services to the public.

(A chief example of how this flexibility has been used is for these local governments to open their employee health insurance to competitive bidding. Previously, the unions demanded that public employers use the unions' own sponsored insurance entity as their insurer, without market bidding. But since Walker's reforms removed benefits from collective bargaining, government employers were freed to turn to competitive bidding on the open market, where many have found their coverage at substantially reduced costs. For school districts so far, the savings from this competitive bidding alone have amounted to $211.47 per student. Statewide that would add up to nearly $200 million in savings.)

The state has also used this flexibility to halt fraudulent sick leave abuses that unions used to inflate overtime expenses. (Workers had called in sick for their own shifts, and then worked the next shift on overtime pay.)

School districts have also been freed to pay teachers based on performance and not just seniority, and to keep better performing teachers rather than longer term time servers who have long given up caring about their job performance.

Walker's collective bargaining reforms have added up to over $1 billion in documented savings for state and local governments in Wisconsin in the first year alone. That enabled the entire state deficit to be eliminated without yet another tax increase, and without layoffs of teachers and other government workers, except in three school districts that have continued to resist implementing the reforms.

* PRETTY DAMNED IMPRESSIVE IF YOU ASK ME. I STRONGLY URGE YOU TO CLICK ON THE ABOVE PROVIDED LINK AND READ THE ARTICLE IN ITS ENTIRETY.

William R. Barker said...

http://blog.american.com/2012/05/actually-the-obama-spending-binge-really-did-happen/

Until Barack Obama took office in 2009, the United States had never spent more than 23.5% of GDP, with the exception of the World War II years of 1942-1946. Here’s the Obama spending record:

– 25.2% of GDP in 2009

– 24.1% of GDP in 2010

– 24.1% of GDP in 2011

– 24.3% (estimates by the White House ) in 2012

What’s more, if Obama wins another term, spending — according to his own budget — would never drop below 22.3% of GDP.

(If that forecast is right, spending during Obama’s eight years in office would average 23.6% of GDP. That’s higher than any single previous non-war year.)

William R. Barker said...

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/300656/democrats-budget-blame-game-james-c-capretta

[T]he incumbent president has amassed the worst fiscal record of any president in American history.

The numbers speak for themselves. At the end of 2008, the federal government’s cumulative debt stood at $5.8 trillion.

In 2009, the federal government ran its first-ever trillion-dollar deficit.

And then did it again in 2010 and 2011.

Over those three years, the government borrowed an additional $4.2 trillion.

This year will be no better. The Congressional Budget Office expects another trillion-dollar deficit.

During Obama’s four-year term, the federal government will have added nearly $5.5 trillion to the government’s cumulative debt total — nearly as much as was accumulated from 1789 to 2008!

Some defenders of the administration argue that it’s unfair to blame the president for debt accumulated in 2009 since he assumed office one-third of the way into the fiscal year.

* AND FRANKLY THERE'S TRUTH TO THAT ARGUMENT - AT LEAST THE LOGIC BEHIND THE ARGUMENT. WHERE THE TRUTH BREAKS DOWN HOWEVER IS WHERE LIBERALS REFUSE TO ACKNOWLEDGE THAT PRIOR TO BECOMING PRESIDENT, BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA WAS A UNITED STATES SENATOR... A SENATOR WHO VOTED FOR TARP... A SENATOR WHO VOTED FOR MOST OF THE SPENDING WHICH TOOK PLACE IN 2007 AND 2008!

[Upon becoming] president [Mr. Obama] proposed an $800 billion spending bill within a month of taking the oath of office, with the explicit purpose of increasing the 2009 deficit in the name of Keynesian stimulus.

He also took numerous executive actions to push up the deficit in his first year, particularly through the use of bailout funds[!]

Based on his record, it is apparent to everyone at this point that the president isn’t interested in fiscal restraint, deficit reduction, or fiscal conservatism. Even as the budget outlook deteriorated, his priority was to expand governmental commitments.

The truth is that we are facing pronounced fiscal pressures for one reason: the unrelenting growth in entitlement spending. In 1972, the federal government spent 4.4%t of GDP on the big three entitlements — Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. Today, spending on those programs totals 10.2% of GDP. That jump in spending alone — six percentage points of GDP — far exceeds the size of the defense budget.

For decades, the Democratic party has defined itself as the party of entitlements and has fought at nearly every stage to expand spending rather than control it.

President Obama can’t be blamed for all this history. But he most definitely can be blamed for doing nothing to address the problem, and for making it much worse when he had the opportunity to make it better.

William R. Barker said...

http://www.heritage.org/research/projects/medicare-at-risk-visualizing-the-need-for-reform#.T76EYlI1PHu

* I URGE YOU TO TAKE A MINUTE AND GO THROUGH THE (ABOVE LINK PROVIDED) POWERPOINT PRESENTATION.

* NONE OF THE INFO SURPRISES ME - OR SHOULD SURPRISE FREQUENT READERS - BUT ANY NEWBEES...

(*SHRUG*)

William R. Barker said...

* TWO-PARTER... (Part 1 of 2)

http://www.aei.org/article/education/higher-education/costs/the-truth-about-college-aid-its-corporate-welfare/

President Obama is holding thinly-veiled campaign events at college campuses around the country touting his plan to retain low interest rates on federal student loans. Amidst the debate over whether a temporary 3.4% interest rate passed in 2007 should be retained and, if so, how to pay for it, a far more important question has been ignored:

Who really benefits from the $65 billion-plus that Washington spends each year on student aid?

Recent economic research suggests that colleges siphon off a significant portion of federal education aid rather than lowering costs to students. Simply put, much of federal student aid is corporate welfare for colleges.

College Board reports from 2001 through 2011 tuition for public colleges increased by an average of 5.6% points higher than inflation, while private college tuitions rose 2.6% above inflation.

Tuition, housing and other expenses at public institutions today tops $21,000 per year. (Double that if you want to attend a private college.)

In response to rising tuition costs, federal aid such as Pell Grants, work-study programs and tuition tax credits have more than tripled over the last decade, reaching $65 billion in 2011. (Washington also made over $100 billion in subsidized student loans last year.)

But is all this college aid actually making college more affordable?

The most obvious way that colleges might capture federal student aid is by raising tuition. Research to date has been inconclusive, but Stephanie Riegg Cellini of George Washington University and Claudia Goldin of Harvard have provided compelling new analysis.

Cellini and Goldin looked at for-profit colleges, utilizing the key distinction that only some for-profit schools are eligible for federal aid. [They] find that that aid-eligible institutions "charge much higher tuition ... across all states, samples, and specifications" even when controlling for the content and quality of courses.

The 75% difference in tuition between aid-eligible and ineligible for-profit colleges - an amount comparable to average per-student federal assistance - suggests that "institutions may indeed raise tuition to capture the maximum grant aid available."

* FOLKS, READ THOSE LAST THREE PARAGRAPHS AGAIN IF NECESSARY. (I DID!) TO REITERATE THE FINDINGS, WHAT THE STUDY SEEMS TO SHOW IS THAT AID-ELIGIBLE INSTITUTIONS SIMPLY UP THEIR TUITIONS TO SOAK UP "EXTRA" RESOURCES STUDENTS HAVE ACCESS TO SHOULD THEY ATTEND THE AID-ELIGIBLE INSTITUTIONS!

* TO BE CONTINUED...

William R. Barker said...

* CONCLUDING... (Part 2 of 2)

An alternative way that colleges can capture federal aid is by reducing their own student assistance. This is a particularly effective approach, since students receive widely differing amounts and are unaware of what they might receive in the absence of federal assistance.

(*NOD*)

Writing in the Economics of Education Review, Nicholas Turner, a Treasury Department economist on leave from the University of California, analyzed colleges' responses to student eligibility for tuition tax credits. Programs such as the American Opportunity Tax Credit allow up to $2,500 tax credits for tuition costs, a benefit that flows mostly to the middle class. Turner found that roughly four-fifths of the benefit students receive from tuition tax credits is lost through reduced student aid provided by colleges.

(*SNORT*)

* FOLKS... IT'S BAIT AND SWITCH WITH THE TAXPAYER (AND THE STUDENT) PLAYING THE PART OF THE DUPE!

Pell Grants focus more on lower-income households. Lesley J. Turner, a doctoral candidate in economics at Columbia University, analyzed how institutional aid changed as students became eligible for Pell Grants. She found that, on average, "institutions capture 16% of all Pell Grant aid." However, important differences exist. Public colleges and universities garnered very little Pell money. But selective private colleges - the ones parents really want their kids to attend - claw back 79% of the value of Pell Grants.

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

* BASTARDS... GREEDY BASTARDS...

Together, these studies imply that tens of billions of dollars in federal educational assistance may be siphoned off by educational institutions rather than making college more affordable for students.

Where does this money go?

* I KNOW! I KNOW! (ADMINISTRATION SALARIES AND "CLASSING UP" EVERYTHING FROM INFRASTRUCTURE TO COLLEGE POPULATION "LIFESTYLES.")

One possibility is higher salaries. But while superstar professors' salaries have increased rapidly, overall full-time faculty salaries have risen only slightly above inflation over the past decade, according to the American Association of University Professors. A more likely suspect is administrative staffing...

* I KNEW IT...!!!

...where the number of employees per 100 students has risen by 13% over the past decade.

The largest increases in both salaries and staffing have been for private universities, bolstering the view that private schools have greater abilities to capture federal dollars.

William R. Barker said...

* TWO-PARTER... (Part 1 of 2)

http://www.taxpayer.net/search_by_category.php?action=view&proj_id=5284&category=Wastebasket&type=Project

As farmers finish the last of their spring plantings, lawmakers on the Agriculture Committees are scrambling to sow the seeds for costly new entitlements.

Most of the programs under their jurisdiction — from payments to farmers and conservation programs, to research funding and food stamps — will soon expire - unless they are re-authorized in a new Farm Bill.

But instead of leading efforts to separate the budgetary wheat from the chaff, the committees are digging in their heels and braying against real reforms like a pack of stubborn mules.

Recently the Senate Agriculture Committee passed its bloated version.

* THE SENATE... CONTROLLED BY THE DEMOCRATS... LED BY HARRY REID...

Despite the President’s call for $33 billion in cuts, and the House $30 billion...

* IF PRESIDENT OBAMA TRULY WANTS TO CUT EVEN MORE MONEY THAN REPUBLICANS IN THE HOUSE DO, THEN CALL ME A BARACK OBAMA SUPPORTER ON THIS ONE!

...the Senate Agriculture Committee included only $23 billion. Senators found it so hard to prune these programs — projected to cost $995 billion over the next decade — that when the bill’s preliminary score came in at $24.7 billion in savings, they promptly “spent” this unexpected $1.7 billion "windfall" on subsidies for ethanol blender pumps and special entitlements for cotton.

* AGAIN, FOLKS, MORE EVIDENCE SUPPORTING MY CONTENTION THAT IN THE END... (*SIGH*)... VIOLENCE IS THE ONLY ANSWER.

Bowing to the reality that agricultural businesses experienced record revenue for the last few years, the bill eliminates some wasteful entitlements: direct payments, counter-cyclical payments, and the Average Crop Revenue Election program (a failed subsidy from the last farm bill). But it makes no improvements to the costliest support for agricultural businesses - taxpayer subsidized crop insurance.

In fact, Senators plowed more subsidies into the program and made it worse.

* AGAIN WITH "SENATORS..." (AND AGAIN... DEMS CONTROL THE SENATE; HARRY REID IS SENATE MAJORITY LEADER.)

With “leftover” cash from eliminating direct payments, the Committee created new entitlements to essentially make much of agriculture a no-loss business.

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

* TO BE CONTINUED...

William R. Barker said...

* CONCLUDING... (Part 2 of 2)

With fancy names like Agriculture Risk Coverage (ARC) and Crop Insurance Supplemental Coverage Option (SCO) these new programs will force taxpayers to send checks to agricultural businesses that seem to suffer losses — but not enough losses to trigger crop insurance payments — in a given year.

[T]o be clear, we’re not simply talking crops. These programs guarantee a level of expected revenue, meaning a drop in prices could trigger a payment from taxpayers. Sweet deal if you can get it. What American wouldn't have wanted guaranteed revenue during the recession? This is a business cash guarantee unparalleled in any other industry.

(*ORDERING A NIGHT-CAPABLE SNIPER SCOPE*)

The grass doesn’t look any greener in the House.

* THE HOUSE... THE HOUSE CONTROLLED BY RINO JOHN BOEHNER AND THE BOEHNER RINO REPUBLICANS! (BASTARDS...!!!)

Months of hearings have shown Representatives hoeing another subsidy row for special interests.

(*ADDING OVERNIGHT DELIVERY TO MY ORDER*)

With Rep. Lucas (R-OK) and southern agriculture interests behind the reins, brand new wagons are looking to hitch onto the subsidy gravy train.

Even though the Senate tried to quell a southern uprising by adding crop insurance for profit margins (a boon to rice and even catfish farmers), special treatment for peanuts, and a whole new program for cotton (a crop that just can’t get enough special treatment), that’s not enough. Rumblings indicate that the House Agriculture Committee might use its Farm Bill to create an optional parallel universe of target prices, where the government steps in when prices dip below a mandated level.

* SERIOUSLY, FOLKS... ABSENT LITERALLY KILLING THESE BASTARDS... (*SHRUG*)

Talk of farm subsidies sends most Americans, like most lawmakers, into a stupor. That’s what Ag fat cats count on. But not everyone is asleep at the wheel. Fiscal conservatives have awoken and demanded billions in savings. And reformers like Rep. Flake (R-AZ) have emerged, calling for no new entitlements, while Senators Coburn (R-OK) and Durbin (D-IL) are directing Congress toward common sense savings.

* I'LL BELIEVE IT WHEN I SEE IT.

There can be a role for the federal government in agriculture. Protecting against catastrophic losses caused by widespread flooding and drought may be in taxpayers’ interests. But commodity groups aren't interested in a limited safety net. They want to add to the tangled web of overlapping subsidy programs to create a springboard to perpetual profits. While this may be a win-win for agriculture, it is a lose-lose for taxpayers.

William R. Barker said...

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-05-24/half-of-detroit-s-streetlights-may-go-out-as-city-shrinks.html

Detroit, whose 139 square miles contain 60% fewer residents than in 1950, will try to nudge them into a smaller living space by eliminating almost half its streetlights.

As it is, 40% of the 88,000 streetlights are broken and the city, whose finances are to be overseen by an appointed board, can’t afford to fix them.

Mayor Dave Bing’s plan would create an authority to borrow $160 million to upgrade and reduce the number of streetlights to 46,000. Maintenance would be contracted out, saving the city $10 million a year.

* ER... UMM... AHH... QUESTION: AS A FISCAL BASKET CASE, HOW EXACTLY IS DETROIT EXPECTED TO PAY BACK PRINCIPAL - AT INTEREST - REPAYING THIS $160 MILLION THE CURRENT MAYOR PLANS TO BORROW...??? (REASONABLE QUESTION... NO?) BTW, FURTHER DOWN THE PAGE OF THIS STORY IT'S NOTED THAT "Detroit is digging out of a $265 million deficit and saddled with more than $12 billion in long-term debt." AGAIN... DEBTS HAVE TO BE PAID... THEY'RE CURRENTLY RUNNING DEFICITS... NOW THEY WANNA BORROW MORE MONEY... THEY'RE ALREADY SADDLED WITH MORE THAN $12 BILLION IN LONG-TERM DEBT... HOW'S THE MATH SUPPOSED TO WORK?

Detroit’s plan...would leave sparsely populated swaths unlit in a community of 713,000 that covers more area than Boston, Buffalo and San Francisco combined. Vacant property and parks account for 37 square miles (96 square kilometers), according to city planners. Only major streets and intersections remain lit in the city of 12,000, once home to Chrysler Group LLC’s namesake car manufacturer and Henry Ford’s first moving assembly line.

(*SARCASTIC CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*)

* GREAT! THE AGE OF OBAMA! MAD MAX MEETS ESCAPE FROM... er... DETROIT.

“You have to identify those neighborhoods where you want to concentrate your population,” said Chris Brown, Detroit’s chief operating officer.

* WOW... JUST WHAT AMERICA NEEDS - THE GOVERNMENT "NUDGING" US ON WHERE THEY WANT US TO LIVE.

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

* DETROIT... POSTER CHILD OF DEMOCRATIC PARTY GOVERNANCE.

William R. Barker said...

http://politicker.com/2012/05/president-obama-wont-be-returning-his-donations-from-bain-capital/

Though the Obama campaign has repeatedly attacked Mitt Romney for his career at Bain Capital...

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

...President Obama still accepted $7,500 in campaign contributions from three Bain executives.

* FOLKS... (*GUFFAW*)

His campaign press secretary, Ben LaBolt told The Politicker the president has no intention of giving the money back.

(*SARCASTIC CLAP-CLAP-CLAP*) (*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD IN AMUSEMENT*)

William R. Barker said...

http://freebeacon.com/senate-dems-betray-lilly/

A group of Democratic female senators on Wednesday "declared war" on the so-called gender pay gap..."

* FOLKS... HOLD ON TIGHT! YOU'VE GONNA LUV THIS ONE...!!! (KEEP READING!)

Of the five [Democratic] senators who participated in Wednesday’s press conference — Barbara Mikulski (MD), Patty Murray (WA), Debbie Stabenow (MI), Dianne Feinstein (CA) and Barbara Boxer (CA) - three pay their female staff members significantly less than male staffers.

(*SNORT*)

Murray, who has repeatedly accused Republicans of waging a “war a women,” is one of the worst offenders. Female members of Murray’s staff made about $21,000 less per year than male staffers in 2011, a difference of 35.2%.

(*GUFFAW*)

A significant “gender gap” exists in Feinstein’s office, where women also made about $21,000 less than men in 2011, but the percentage difference — 41% — was even higher than Murray’s.

(*FALLING OUT OF MY CHAIR LAUGHING*)

Boxer’s female staffers made about $5,000 less, a difference of 7.3%.

(*PURSED LIPS*)

The employee gender pay gap among Senate Democrats was not limited to Murray, Boxer, and Feinstein. Of the 50 members of the Senate Democratic caucus examined in the analysis, 37 senators paid their female staffers less than male staffers.

* FOLKS... (*SIGH*)... YA CAN'T MAKE THIS SHIT UP!

Women working for Senate Democrats in 2011 pulled in an average salary of $60,877. Men made about $6,500 more.

(*STILL CHUCKLING*)

The pay differential is quite striking in some cases, especially among leading Democrats. Sen. Chuck Schumer (NY), who runs the Senate Democratic messaging operation, paid men $19,454 more on average, a 36% difference.

* WHOA!

Majority Whip Dick Durbin (IL) paid men $13,063 more, a difference of 23%.

* FOLKS... SERIOUSLY... THESE PEOPLE ARE SHAMELESS HYPOCRITES.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (VT), who is an avowed socialist who caucuses with the Democrats, has the worst gender gap by far.

* 47.6%...! MEN ARE PAID ALMOST DOUBLE!

Sanders employed more men (14) than women (10), and his chief of staff is male. Like many of his fellow [democrats] he has previously accused Republicans of “trying to roll back the clock on women’s rights.”

(*SNORT*) (*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

* OH... AND LAST... BUT NOT LEAST... (READ ON!)

[The Obama] White House...

(*DRUM ROLL*)

...pays men about $10,000, or 13%, more on average, according to a previous Free Beacon analysis.

William R. Barker said...

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/story/2012-05-18/federal-deficit-accounting/55179748/1

The typical American household would have paid nearly all of its income in taxes last year to balance the budget if the government used standard accounting rules to compute the deficit, a USA TODAY analysis finds.

Under standard accounting practices, the government ran red ink last year equal to $42,054 per household — nearly four times the official number reported under unique rules set by Congress.

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD IN DISGUST*)

The big difference between the official deficit and standard accounting: Congress exempts itself from including the cost of promised retirement benefits.

* SEE... FOLKS... IN ALL SERIOUSNESS... OTHER THAN KILLING THE BASTARDS... (*SHRUG*)

[C]ompanies, states, and local governments must include retirement commitments in financial statements - as required by federal law and private boards that set accounting rules.

* MAKES SENSE! AFTER ALL... THESE ARE REAL DEBTS!

The deficit was $5 trillion last year under those rules.

The official number was $1.3 trillion.

* ONE MORE TIME, FOLKS...

Congress exempts itself from including the cost of promised retirement benefits.

The deficit was $5 trillion last year under those rules.

* BUT SINCE CONGRESS DOESN'T ABIDE BY THE SAME RULES THEY MAKE EVERYONE ELSE ABIDE BY...

The official number was $1.3 trillion.

* GUNS... AMMO... GUNS... AMMO... GUNS... AMMO...

(*SHAKING MYSELF*)

Liabilities for Social Security, Medicare and other retirement programs rose by $3.7 trillion in 2011, according to government actuaries, but the amount was not registered on the government's books.

* ONE... MORE... TIME:

Liabilities for Social Security, Medicare and other retirement programs rose by $3.7 trillion in 2011, according to government actuaries, but the amount was not registered on the government's books.

(*JUST SHAKING MY HEAD*)

Deficits are a major issue in this year's presidential campaign, but USA TODAY has calculated federal finances under accounting rules since 2004 and found no correlation between fluctuations in the deficit and which party ran Congress or the White House.

* UMM... I'D LIKE TO SEE THE BOOKS FOR MYSELF.

Federal debt and retiree commitments equal $561,254 per household. By contrast, an average household owes a combined $116,057 for mortgages, car loans and other debts.

* FINALLY... HERE'S AN EXAMPLE OF A LIBERAL DEFENDING THE INDEFENSIBLE:

Jim Horney, a former Senate budget staff expert now at the liberal Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, says retirement programs should not count as part of the deficit because, unlike a business, Congress can change what it owes by cutting benefits or lifting taxes.

"It's not easy, but it can be done. Retirement programs are not legal obligations," he says.

* ACTUALLY... THAT LAST PART... HE'S RIGHT! BUT IF YOU ASK ME THAT'S BESIDES THE POINT. THE REAL POINT IS THAT THE POLITICIANS ARE TALKING OUT OF BOTH SIDES OF THEIR MOUTHS AS THEY DESTROY OUR COUNTRY!

* I TRULY FEAR VIOLENCE IS OUR ONLY OPTION.

William R. Barker said...

http://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2012/05/24/flash-mob-steals-from-baltimore-7-eleven-beats-store-manager-who-tries-to-stop-them/

Another mob of juveniles causes problems in downtown Baltimore.

* WHAT... (*PAUSE*)... "FLAVOR"... (*PAUSE*)... OF "JUVENILES?"

(*SMIRK*)

* RHETORICAL WISEASS QUESTION.

[T]he entire incident is caught on video. But city police and managers at the 7-Eleven have refused to let WJZ see that video[!]

(*SMIRK*)

What happened at the store is the latest example of large groups of young people creating havoc in downtown Baltimore.

On St. Patrick’s Day, police broke up several fights and disturbances as crowds of teens gathered in the Inner Harbor.

That same night, another group beat and robbed a tourist. Cameras have spotted large groups of teens roaming streets in November and caught big fights on July 4, all of it upsetting to downtown workers.

* "LARGE GROUPS OF YOUNG PEOPLE."

* "CROWDS OF TEENS."

* "ANOTHER GROUP; LARGE GROUPS OF TEENS."

* BLACKS! BLACKS! BLACKS! BLACKS! BLACKS! LET'S BE FRIGGIN' HONEST...!!!

The juveniles were all wearing yellow shirts and khaki pants. Police are trying to figure out what school they came from.

* SO LET'S GET THIS STRAIGHT... (*LAUGHING*)... THE MEDIA IS WILLING TO DESCRIBE THE SHIRTS AND PANTS... (*SNICKER*)... BY COLOR - BUT NOT THE "KIDS" WEARING THE SHIRTS AND PANTS. GREAT! JUST FUCKING GREAT!

Police declined to be interviewed for this story.

* YEAH. I BET THEY DID.