Declare Victory
In declaring Keynesian economics vindicated I am, of course, at odds with conventional wisdom. In Washington, in particular, the failure of the Obama stimulus package to produce an employment boom is generally seen as having proved that government spending can’t create jobs. But those of us who did the math realized, right from the beginning, that the Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (more than a third of which, by the way, took the relatively ineffective form of tax cuts) was much too small given the depth of the slump. And we also predicted the resulting political backlash. (Paul Krugman, NYT, 12/29/2011)
Like those pesky New Year's resolutions that you just can't seem to keep, RedStateVT promises to stop writing about Paul Krugman and...well, you know the rest. In a column audaciously entitled: "Keynes Was Right" Krugman declares himself to be correct all along. The proof? The Obama stimulus did not work because it was not big enough. Come again? This argument strikes us akin to one of those "prove that you stopped beating your wife" riddles that you can't really prove. Maybe the stimulus didn't work because it was a pork-ladened pay-off to Democrat constituencies. Maybe it didn't work because those shovel-ready jobs weren't really shovel-ready as Obama himself chuckled about. Or maybe just, investors and businesses are sitting on the sidelines waiting for Obama to be gone.
And that austerity that Krugman decries? Well here's another view of it:
Amid this month's payroll tax fracas, few noticed that Congress passed a 1,200-page, $1 trillion omnibus spending bill for fiscal 2012. Maybe no one in Washington boasted because it's a victory for spending as usual. (WSJ, 12/31/2011)
Let's end the year on a positive note:
Although they have become prone to apocalyptic forebodings about the fragility of the nation’s institutions and traditions under the current president, conservatives should stride confidently into 2012. This is not because they are certain, or even likely, to defeat President Obama this year. Rather, it is because, if they emancipate themselves from their unconservative fixation on the presidency, they will see events unfolding in their favor. And when Congress is controlled by one party, as it might be a year from now, it can stymie an overreaching executive. (George Will, Washington Post, 12/30/2011)
How any Liberal could read a George Will column and not have a "Road to Damascus" conversion is unfathomable to RedStateVT!
Saturday, December 31, 2011
Friday, December 30, 2011
RedStateVT Presents the Worst of 2011
Occupy – No leaders, no agenda and no soap. But give us free stuff. Special mention to the mayors who coddled them.
Green – Bankrupt companies which took hundreds of millions from the taxpayers, subsidized electric cars which can drive a full 40 miles before the battery dies…or explodes, and dishonest science all fueled by self-righteous politicians. Despite all evidence to the contrary, still viewed as the future by the Left.
The Gay Agenda – Two people should be free to love each other no matter what their sex. There – we said it. But simply agreeing with this statement is not enough and anyone who disagreed with the larger gay agenda was immediately branded as a bigot. Disagree with gay marriage – bigot! Disagree that soldiers should not disclose their sexual preferences – bigot! Disagree that sexuality should not be taught in elementary school – bigot! At least we finally found out the size of the population driving the argument: <1%.
Jon Corzine – If he were a Republican, the media would be clamoring for him to repay the missing billions from his personal account. How about it Mr. Corzine?
The Mainstream Media….again - With an unpopular president for whom they shilled tirelessly and an election coming looming, old media finds only rare opportunities to reflect on Obama. Meanwhile, after admitting that they did not vet Obama, they determine not to make the same mistake with the Republican slate.
Eric Holder….again – The nation’s top lawman decides not to enforce laws with which he disagrees. Embroiled in a gun-running scandal he gets amnesia. Alberto Gonzales was run out of town for partisan reasons amounting to nothing. By that standard, Holder should be indicted.
Barney Frank – The scandal-ridden (sub) prime mover behind the mortgage crisis finally calls it quits, but only after his gerrymandered ride is revoked. He could have used his exit to mend fences and admit that mistakes may have been made. He didn’t, remaining belligerent and showing in the end what everyone suspected all along – he was a very small man.
Jimmy Carter – A late entry when he thoughtfully reminded us with his paean to North Korea’s Dr. Evil why he is officially: The Worst Ex-President of the Modern Era.
The Kardashians - In 2010, RedStateVT singled out Reality TV. This year, there is no way to avoid honing on the Kardashians. They truly represent everything that is wrong with America encapsulated in one family.
Green – Bankrupt companies which took hundreds of millions from the taxpayers, subsidized electric cars which can drive a full 40 miles before the battery dies…or explodes, and dishonest science all fueled by self-righteous politicians. Despite all evidence to the contrary, still viewed as the future by the Left.
The Gay Agenda – Two people should be free to love each other no matter what their sex. There – we said it. But simply agreeing with this statement is not enough and anyone who disagreed with the larger gay agenda was immediately branded as a bigot. Disagree with gay marriage – bigot! Disagree that soldiers should not disclose their sexual preferences – bigot! Disagree that sexuality should not be taught in elementary school – bigot! At least we finally found out the size of the population driving the argument: <1%.
Jon Corzine – If he were a Republican, the media would be clamoring for him to repay the missing billions from his personal account. How about it Mr. Corzine?
The Mainstream Media….again - With an unpopular president for whom they shilled tirelessly and an election coming looming, old media finds only rare opportunities to reflect on Obama. Meanwhile, after admitting that they did not vet Obama, they determine not to make the same mistake with the Republican slate.
Eric Holder….again – The nation’s top lawman decides not to enforce laws with which he disagrees. Embroiled in a gun-running scandal he gets amnesia. Alberto Gonzales was run out of town for partisan reasons amounting to nothing. By that standard, Holder should be indicted.
Barney Frank – The scandal-ridden (sub) prime mover behind the mortgage crisis finally calls it quits, but only after his gerrymandered ride is revoked. He could have used his exit to mend fences and admit that mistakes may have been made. He didn’t, remaining belligerent and showing in the end what everyone suspected all along – he was a very small man.
Jimmy Carter – A late entry when he thoughtfully reminded us with his paean to North Korea’s Dr. Evil why he is officially: The Worst Ex-President of the Modern Era.
The Kardashians - In 2010, RedStateVT singled out Reality TV. This year, there is no way to avoid honing on the Kardashians. They truly represent everything that is wrong with America encapsulated in one family.
Tuesday, December 27, 2011
The Fundamentals
Obama will thus be the conservative in 2012, in the truest sense of that word. He is the candidate defending the modestly redistributive and regulatory government the country has relied on since the New Deal... (E.J. Dionne Jr., Washington Post, 12/25/2011)
In the upside down world of the Liberal, Obama is a "conservative" defending the modest redistribution of wealth. How modest? Let's check with Dionne's colleague Robert J. Samuelson:
From 1960 to 2010, the share of federal spending going for “payments to individuals” (Social Security, food stamps, Medicare and the like) climbed from 26 percent to 66 percent....
Oh, 66 percent!
Samuelson continues:
No one wants to take away; it’s more fun to give. All of 2011’s budget feuds — over the debt ceiling, the supercommittee, the payroll tax cut — skirted the central issues. There’s a legitimate debate about how fast deficits should be reduced to avoid jeopardizing the economic recovery, notes Charles Blahous, a White House official in George W. Bush’s administration. But the long-term budget problem, as he says, stems from Social Security, Medicare and other health programs. (Robert J. Samuelson, Washington Post, 12/25/2011)
In the upside down world of the Liberal, Obama is a "conservative" defending the modest redistribution of wealth. How modest? Let's check with Dionne's colleague Robert J. Samuelson:
From 1960 to 2010, the share of federal spending going for “payments to individuals” (Social Security, food stamps, Medicare and the like) climbed from 26 percent to 66 percent....
Oh, 66 percent!
Samuelson continues:
No one wants to take away; it’s more fun to give. All of 2011’s budget feuds — over the debt ceiling, the supercommittee, the payroll tax cut — skirted the central issues. There’s a legitimate debate about how fast deficits should be reduced to avoid jeopardizing the economic recovery, notes Charles Blahous, a White House official in George W. Bush’s administration. But the long-term budget problem, as he says, stems from Social Security, Medicare and other health programs. (Robert J. Samuelson, Washington Post, 12/25/2011)
Sunday, December 25, 2011
Saturday, December 24, 2011
Around Every Corner
Suspicious Minds
A federal judge dealt a new setback Friday to the immigration enforcement efforts of America's self-proclaimed "toughest sheriff," barring his deputies from detaining people based solely on the suspicion that they're in the country illegally. (Foxnews.com, 12/23/2011)
RedStateVT has developed a foolproof formula to help law enforcement (including border patrol agents and airport security) catch the bad guys without offending Liberals who favor political correctness over protecting America. Notwithstanding that young males from Muslim countries are more likely to blow things up and Hispanics are more likely to cross the border illegally, agents cannot show bias. Therefore, for every Muslim/Hispanic detained, security personnel must also detain one Swede, one Pole, one Samoan and one Japanese. It is a foolproof system for sure.
Battle Lines
President Barack Obama's reelection campaign returned political donations made by Jon Corzine, the embattled former Democratic governor and senator from New Jersey, on Friday. (CNN.com, 12/24/2011)
Shouldn't they first verify that the money does not belong to MF Global customers?
A federal judge dealt a new setback Friday to the immigration enforcement efforts of America's self-proclaimed "toughest sheriff," barring his deputies from detaining people based solely on the suspicion that they're in the country illegally. (Foxnews.com, 12/23/2011)
RedStateVT has developed a foolproof formula to help law enforcement (including border patrol agents and airport security) catch the bad guys without offending Liberals who favor political correctness over protecting America. Notwithstanding that young males from Muslim countries are more likely to blow things up and Hispanics are more likely to cross the border illegally, agents cannot show bias. Therefore, for every Muslim/Hispanic detained, security personnel must also detain one Swede, one Pole, one Samoan and one Japanese. It is a foolproof system for sure.
Battle Lines
President Barack Obama's reelection campaign returned political donations made by Jon Corzine, the embattled former Democratic governor and senator from New Jersey, on Friday. (CNN.com, 12/24/2011)
Shouldn't they first verify that the money does not belong to MF Global customers?
Friday, December 23, 2011
The Dark Sea Of Awareness
Eating Cake
2012 will be no cakewalk for Republicans, and they’re fully capable of bungling the opportunity history has given them. But if Obama is defeated, then it will be one of the most stunning turnarounds in the history of modern politics. Consider: George W. Bush entered his first term with a roughly 55% approval rating (averaging the various polls) and left it with about a 47.5% approval rating — a drop of 7.5% over the course of four years full of dissension, accusation and mockery. Obama began his first term with 65% approval ratings and has stood below 45% for the majority of the past four months — a drop of 20%, nearly three times the Bush figure. (Timothy Dalrymple, Patheos.com, 12/22/2011)
A simple, yet stunning indictment of modern Liberalism. Read the entire column. RedStateVT is going to start following Dalrymple.
Adversity
Plaintiffs put up by liberal lawsuit shops routinely claim that ID laws endanger the rights of hundreds of thousands, but lawsuits in Indiana and Georgia were dismissed because they couldn't produce a single eligible voter who'd been turned away due to the ID requirement. Turnout has risen in states that have passed the voter ID laws, with no adverse impact on minorities. (WSJ, 12/23/2011)
About the only voters turned away were those scared off by the New Black Panthers....
Not Saying
President Obama, when asked who is to blame for the schism between him and the Republican, said he doesn't want to say "it's all them," but claims Republicans are against everything he is for. (RealClearPolitics, 12/22/2011)
Once again, RedStateVT will explain why Republicans are "against" Obama. You may remember something called Obamacare. With control of all three branches, Obama, Pelosi and Reid jammed through a massively unpopular new entitlement program using bribes to fellow Dems and questionable legislative tactics. Anything the Repubs have done or will do through the end of Obama's term is payback.
2012 will be no cakewalk for Republicans, and they’re fully capable of bungling the opportunity history has given them. But if Obama is defeated, then it will be one of the most stunning turnarounds in the history of modern politics. Consider: George W. Bush entered his first term with a roughly 55% approval rating (averaging the various polls) and left it with about a 47.5% approval rating — a drop of 7.5% over the course of four years full of dissension, accusation and mockery. Obama began his first term with 65% approval ratings and has stood below 45% for the majority of the past four months — a drop of 20%, nearly three times the Bush figure. (Timothy Dalrymple, Patheos.com, 12/22/2011)
A simple, yet stunning indictment of modern Liberalism. Read the entire column. RedStateVT is going to start following Dalrymple.
Adversity
Plaintiffs put up by liberal lawsuit shops routinely claim that ID laws endanger the rights of hundreds of thousands, but lawsuits in Indiana and Georgia were dismissed because they couldn't produce a single eligible voter who'd been turned away due to the ID requirement. Turnout has risen in states that have passed the voter ID laws, with no adverse impact on minorities. (WSJ, 12/23/2011)
About the only voters turned away were those scared off by the New Black Panthers....
Not Saying
President Obama, when asked who is to blame for the schism between him and the Republican, said he doesn't want to say "it's all them," but claims Republicans are against everything he is for. (RealClearPolitics, 12/22/2011)
Once again, RedStateVT will explain why Republicans are "against" Obama. You may remember something called Obamacare. With control of all three branches, Obama, Pelosi and Reid jammed through a massively unpopular new entitlement program using bribes to fellow Dems and questionable legislative tactics. Anything the Repubs have done or will do through the end of Obama's term is payback.
Thursday, December 22, 2011
Bringing The Yearlings Home
Matching Purse
How and when Congress acts will also have an important, if impossible to quantify, impact on consumer and business confidence, economists say. Households and companies uncertain about their income, unclear about their tax rates and lacking confidence in their government might hold off on major financial purchases and tighten their purse strings. (NYT, 12/22/2011)
So is The New York Times now on board with the Republican position that regulatory uncertainty caused by, for example, Obamacare, hinders economic growth?
Imperatives
Despite Saudi Arabia's promises to clean up textbooks in the kingdom, recent editions continue to raise alarms in the West over jihadist language...In a textbook for 10th-graders, printed for the 2010-2011 academic year, al-Ahmed said teenagers are taught barbaric practices. “They show students how to cut (the) hand and the feet of a thief,” he said. In another textbook, for ninth-graders, the students are taught the annihilation of the Jewish people is imperative. One text reads in part: “The hour (of judgment) will not come until the Muslims fight the Jews and kill them. ... There is a Jew behind me come and kill him.” (Foxnews.com, 12/22/2011)
Long before he announced his presidential run this year, Newt Gingrich had become the most prominent American politician to embrace an alarming premise: that Shariah, or Islamic law, poses a threat to the United States as grave as or graver than terrorism....The idea that Shariah poses a danger in the United States, where the census pegs Muslims as less than 1 percent of the population, strikes many scholars as quixotic.
Even within that 1 percent, most American Muslims have no enthusiasm for replacing federal and state law with Shariah, as some conservatives fear, let alone adopting such ancient prescriptions as stoning for adulterers, said Akbar Ahmed, chairman of Islamic studies at American University in Washington, who spent a year traveling the United States and interviewing Muslims for his 2010 book “Journey into America: The Challenge of Islam.” (NYT, 12/22/2011)
So the Saudis are still teaching their kids to hate, but Gingrich is ginning up the Sharia threat?
Here is the problem, Americans cannot trust the Arabs. Yasir Arafat was well known - and eventually exposed - as someone who would talk about peace in English to the Western press and then about annihilation of the infidels in Arabic to the Palestinians. The Saudis promise to clean up the hatred and then get caught red-handed.
The Sharia threat? Take it seriously until there is 100% certainty that the threat is gone.
Lacking
Matt Damon is expressing his disdain for Barack Obama’s presidency again, this time saying that the President doesn’t have any “balls.” (Foxnews.com, 12/22/2011)
If the president has lost Mat Damon then we don't know what to say. Plenty of room on the Right, Matt.
Citation
The attorney general cited race in explaining why a "more extreme segment" of his critics were going after him. "This is a way to get at the president because of the way I can be identified with him, both due to the nature of our relationship and, you know, the fact that we're both African-American," Holder said in an interview with The New York Times. (Foxnews.com, 12/22/2011)
Even our friends on the Left have got to be embarrassed by Holder.
Message In A Bottle
Former President Jimmy Carter has sent North Korea a message of condolence over the death of Kim Jong-il and wished "every success" to the man expected to take over as dictator, according to the communist country's state-run news agency. (Washington Times, 12/21/2011)
Even our friends on the Left have got to be embarrassed by Carter.
Estimations
BT and the city, however, underestimated the cost of building the system, and they overestimated the revenues the service would generate. By late 2007 or early 2008, the new money from Citibank was spent, and Mayor Bob Kiss and Chief Administrative Officer Jonathan Leopold decided to use money from the city’s checking account, the cash pool, to pay Telecom expenses. BT’s license permitted use of cash pool money, but with the stipulation the money be repaid within two months. It wasn’t.
Kiss and Leopold spent $16.9 million from the cash pool on Burlington Telecom without informing the Board of Finance, the City Council, state regulators or the public. BT’s inability to repay the money on time was a violation of the terms of its state license.
The violations were disclosed after Kiss was re-elected in 2009 to a second term as mayor. (Burlington Free Press, 12/22/2011)
In the world of the Progressive, you do not have to pay back your student loans, you do not have to pay your mortgage and you do not have to pay back your lenders. Good intentions trump the rule of law.
How and when Congress acts will also have an important, if impossible to quantify, impact on consumer and business confidence, economists say. Households and companies uncertain about their income, unclear about their tax rates and lacking confidence in their government might hold off on major financial purchases and tighten their purse strings. (NYT, 12/22/2011)
So is The New York Times now on board with the Republican position that regulatory uncertainty caused by, for example, Obamacare, hinders economic growth?
Imperatives
Despite Saudi Arabia's promises to clean up textbooks in the kingdom, recent editions continue to raise alarms in the West over jihadist language...In a textbook for 10th-graders, printed for the 2010-2011 academic year, al-Ahmed said teenagers are taught barbaric practices. “They show students how to cut (the) hand and the feet of a thief,” he said. In another textbook, for ninth-graders, the students are taught the annihilation of the Jewish people is imperative. One text reads in part: “The hour (of judgment) will not come until the Muslims fight the Jews and kill them. ... There is a Jew behind me come and kill him.” (Foxnews.com, 12/22/2011)
Long before he announced his presidential run this year, Newt Gingrich had become the most prominent American politician to embrace an alarming premise: that Shariah, or Islamic law, poses a threat to the United States as grave as or graver than terrorism....The idea that Shariah poses a danger in the United States, where the census pegs Muslims as less than 1 percent of the population, strikes many scholars as quixotic.
Even within that 1 percent, most American Muslims have no enthusiasm for replacing federal and state law with Shariah, as some conservatives fear, let alone adopting such ancient prescriptions as stoning for adulterers, said Akbar Ahmed, chairman of Islamic studies at American University in Washington, who spent a year traveling the United States and interviewing Muslims for his 2010 book “Journey into America: The Challenge of Islam.” (NYT, 12/22/2011)
So the Saudis are still teaching their kids to hate, but Gingrich is ginning up the Sharia threat?
Here is the problem, Americans cannot trust the Arabs. Yasir Arafat was well known - and eventually exposed - as someone who would talk about peace in English to the Western press and then about annihilation of the infidels in Arabic to the Palestinians. The Saudis promise to clean up the hatred and then get caught red-handed.
The Sharia threat? Take it seriously until there is 100% certainty that the threat is gone.
Lacking
Matt Damon is expressing his disdain for Barack Obama’s presidency again, this time saying that the President doesn’t have any “balls.” (Foxnews.com, 12/22/2011)
If the president has lost Mat Damon then we don't know what to say. Plenty of room on the Right, Matt.
Citation
The attorney general cited race in explaining why a "more extreme segment" of his critics were going after him. "This is a way to get at the president because of the way I can be identified with him, both due to the nature of our relationship and, you know, the fact that we're both African-American," Holder said in an interview with The New York Times. (Foxnews.com, 12/22/2011)
Even our friends on the Left have got to be embarrassed by Holder.
Message In A Bottle
Former President Jimmy Carter has sent North Korea a message of condolence over the death of Kim Jong-il and wished "every success" to the man expected to take over as dictator, according to the communist country's state-run news agency. (Washington Times, 12/21/2011)
Even our friends on the Left have got to be embarrassed by Carter.
Estimations
BT and the city, however, underestimated the cost of building the system, and they overestimated the revenues the service would generate. By late 2007 or early 2008, the new money from Citibank was spent, and Mayor Bob Kiss and Chief Administrative Officer Jonathan Leopold decided to use money from the city’s checking account, the cash pool, to pay Telecom expenses. BT’s license permitted use of cash pool money, but with the stipulation the money be repaid within two months. It wasn’t.
Kiss and Leopold spent $16.9 million from the cash pool on Burlington Telecom without informing the Board of Finance, the City Council, state regulators or the public. BT’s inability to repay the money on time was a violation of the terms of its state license.
The violations were disclosed after Kiss was re-elected in 2009 to a second term as mayor. (Burlington Free Press, 12/22/2011)
In the world of the Progressive, you do not have to pay back your student loans, you do not have to pay your mortgage and you do not have to pay back your lenders. Good intentions trump the rule of law.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)