President Obama hit the stump today to tell the American people that 539,000 lost their jobs in April. He explained that was better than the previous month. So does this means the economy is turning around?
Don’t bet on it.
The jobs report is a first estimate. In a growing economy, the number of jobs created is usually corrected upwards months after the first report. In a sluggish economy, the jobs numbers are usually corrected down. Like the first months of this year, the initial numbers reported are probably better than reality.
Does this chart look like it has hit the bottom?
Another statistic that President Obama is going to leave unsaid…and the media isn’t going to point it out either…is the number of jobs that have shifted from the private sector to the public sector. It is estimated that 60,000 jobs have moved from the private to public sector.
The salaries for people who work for the government are funded by the private sector. The private sector is shrinking. The public sector is increasing. How long can this spend, borrow and spend some more continue? I feel like we are perched on top of a house of cards.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Common Sense on May 8th, 2009
President Obama has never run anything until now…and now he wants to run everything.
He is not happy with the hard choices being made out in California
The Obama administration is threatening to rescind billions of dollars in federal stimulus money if Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and state lawmakers do not restore wage cuts to unionized home healthcare workers approved in February as part of the budget. (LINK)
The President fired the CEO of GE (LINK). He has threatened the bond holder of Chrysler (LINK) and negated contracts. He is well along on a plan to nationalize the banks (LINK). He is currently working on taking over the health care industry and he wants to redirect economic activity in the energy sector from things that work to things that don’t. He wants to stick his nose into the credit card business and help pay the mortgages of irresponsible people.
It makes me think that only someone who has never been in charge would meddle in so many things. He has not had the experience of good plans gone bad. Unfortunately, when he learns the hard way…it is we the people who will pay the price.
A team of eco-warriors ran into trouble at sea and had to be rescued by an oil tanker. How ironic!
An expedition team which set sail from Plymouth on a 5,000-mile carbon emission-free trip to Greenland have been rescued by an oil tanker…The team, which left Mount Batten Marina in Plymouth on 19 April in a boat named the Fleur, aimed to rely on sail, solar and man power on a 580-mile (933km/h) journey to and from the highest point of the Greenland ice cap…In one incident Mr Stoddart hit his head and the wind generator and solar panels were ripped from the yacht. (LINK)
And these people would have you believe that they have superior intelligence and know what is best for the rest of us.
According to Rasmussen Reports
For the second straight week, Republicans edge out Democrats in the latest edition of the Generic Congressional Ballot.
You would think this was impossible if you believed the main stream media, Senator Specter or Collin Powell. Fortunately, these three sources lost credibility a long time ago.
(more…)
I teach my children to defend themselves when threatened and deal with the consequences later.
There is a story out of Georgia that highlights the importance of the 2nd amendment, self defense and the limits of “police protection”.
A group of college students said they are lucky to be alive and they’re thanking the quick-thinking of one of their own. Police said a fellow student shot and killed one of two masked men who burst into an apartment. Read more…
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
guns on May 6th, 2009
General Colin Powell is giving his political advice,
Americans do want to pay taxes for services,” he said. “Americans are looking for more government in their life, not less. (LINK)
Huh? Ronald Reagan and the prosperity he ushered must have been a dream.
Are Senator Specter and General Powell correct? Has the country moved away from what Ronald Reagan once stated, that “Government is the problem.”
In April, Rasmussen Reports ran a poll that showed 60% of Americans thought the government had too much power and too much money. Really, they don’t have any money…just a credit card with no limit. Only 9% said the government had too little power and money.What’s even more astonishing is…
Not surprisingly, the Political Class sees things a lot differently. While 85% of Mainstream Americans say the government has too much power and money, just two percent (2%) of the Political Class agree.
and…
On many issues, the gap between the Political Class and Mainstream Americans is bigger than the gap between Mainstream Republicans and Democrats. When it comes to the question of whether the federal government has too much power and money, 94% of Mainstream Republicans say yes along with 72% of Mainstream Democrats.
It looks like General Powell couldn’t be more wrong. Americans are not looking for more government. Government workers are looking for more government.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Common Sense on May 6th, 2009
Michael Savage was denied entry in the UK. Home Secretary Jacqui Smith had this to say:
Coming to this country is a privilege. If you can’t live by the rules that we live by, the standards and the values that we live by, we should exclude you from this country (LINK)
We should apply this same logic to those who ignore our immigration laws.
In Britain, there are Sharia Courts opperating (LINK). Sharia Law is not the standards and values of the British people. A British official making such a claim is as ridiculous as Tim Geitner saying he is going to get tough with people who avoid their taxes. He’s only going to get tough with certain (productive) people.
Apparently, the United States is the last best hope for free speech, and with campaing finance laws and Democrat majorities threatening talk radio, we have but a tenuous hold on the 1st amendment.
You can find yourself in hot legal water in Canada under the guise of “hate speech” if you point out some inconvienant facts about Islam (LINK). Mark Steyn fought a protracted legal battle against Canada’s Human Rights Commission when excerpts from his book were published in Maclean’s magazine (LINK). He was accused of Islamaphobia. The troubling aspect of this case (which was dismissed) was the chilling effect on speech that such lawsuits can bring. As Mark Steyn said, the punishment is the process.
All Gore can win world wide honors by distorting and lying about global warming, but pointing out inconvientant facts about Islam can land you in a heap of trouble. And people wonder why I write my blog anonymously.
We live in interesting times.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
free speech on May 6th, 2009
Dennis Prager asks the left If You love America, Why “Transform” It? (LINK). He compares love of country to a marriage
If you constantly criticize your spouse, for example, it is difficult to imagine that you really do love him or her. And perhaps more important, it is very unlikely that your spouse feels loved. That is why after being routinely described as racist, sexist, imperialist, etc., it is difficult to be able to tell that America is loved by the Left.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Common Sense on May 5th, 2009
It’s one thing to be partisan…that’s politics and there is nothing wrong with it.
It’s another thing to be opportunistic….that’s politics and there is nothing illegal about it.
What is not OK is fraud.
I held my nose and voted for Arlen Specter six years ago. What a mistake. Specter has sunk to a new low. I can accept that he has become a Democrat. What I can not stomach is a fraudulent attempt to raise campaign money.
Michelle Malkin explains it this way:
He pimped a “Specter for the Cure” website under the guise of rallying people to help lobby for increased medical research. One wrinkle: “Specter for the Cure” is actually “Specter for His Campaign Coffers.”(LINK)
She offers her readers a way to FED Complaint (LINK)
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
PA Politics on May 5th, 2009
Our president is a sweet heart to our enemies, but he has no patience for people who lend money.
Cliff Asness, managing partner at AQR Capital Management, distributed the following letter after listening to Obama blast the Chrysler hedge-fund holdouts.(LINK).
When hedge funds, pension funds, mutual funds, and individuals, including very sweet grandmothers, lend their money they expect to get it back. However, they know, or should know, they take the risk of not being paid back. But if such a bad event happens it usually does not result in a complete loss. A firm in bankruptcy still has assets. It’s not always a pretty process. Bankruptcy court is about figuring out how to most fairly divvy up the remaining assets based on who is owed what and whose contracts come first. The process already has built-in partial protections for employees and pensions, and can set lenders’ contracts aside in order to help the company survive, all of which are the rules of the game lenders know before they lend. But, without this recovery process nobody would lend to risky borrowers. Essentially, lenders accept less than shareholders (means bonds return less than stocks) in good times only because they get more than shareholders in bad times.
The above is how it works in America, or how it’s supposed to work. The President and his team sought to avoid having Chrysler go through this process, proposing their own plan for re-organizing the company and partially paying off Chrysler’s creditors. Some bond holders thought this plan unfair. Specifically, they thought it unfairly favored the United Auto Workers, and unfairly paid bondholders less than they would get in bankruptcy court. So, they said no to the plan and decided, as is their right, to take their chances in the bankruptcy process. But, as his quotes above show, the President thought they were being unpatriotic or worse.
Let’s be clear, it is the job and obligation of all investment managers, including hedge fund managers, to get their clients the most return they can. They are allowed to be charitable with their own money, and many are spectacularly so, but if they give away their clients’ money to share in the “sacrifice”, they are stealing. Clients of hedge funds include, among others, pension funds of all kinds of workers, unionized and not. The managers have a fiduciary obligation to look after their clients’ money as best they can, not to support the President, nor to oppose him, nor otherwise advance their personal political views. That’s how the system works. If you hired an investment professional and he could preserve more of your money in a financial disaster, but instead he decided to spend it on the UAW so you could “share in the sacrifice”, you would not be happy.
Justice David Souter has announced that he will retire. President Obama has wide partisan margin in the Senate. This may be his best opportunity to push a radical liberal onto the court.
I say let him try. Now is the time for this debate. Anyone President Obama selects will be campaign fodder for the fall. A more radical pick will serve as a contrast between conservative and liberal philosophies.
Republicans may be unwilling to fight. Senate Republicans have no problem sending young men to fight and die in Iraq for freedom and democracy, but many are unwilling to risk their political careers on such an endeavor.
Go ahead President Obama. Pick a liberal. We already know you are standing next to Karl Marx on the political spectrum. Let us find out which Republican will stand up for the Constitution. Let us find the Republicans that will roll over to collectivism and international law. A Republican party that won’t fight for liberty isn’t worth saving.
A Democrat said this weekend that Jack Kemp died because Republicans didn’t fund cancer research (link)…a notion that may be widely held, but is completely wrong.
During Republican control of Congress, federal spending on health research and regulation increased 46% after inflation, from $49 billion a year to $72 billion a year, or about 7% increase each year. That’s almost the same rate of increase as Defense spending got in the same period (48%), when we actually had a real war on our hands, and not a political contrivance for excusing federal spending. (Hotair.com LINK)
This outrageous statement was made by the newest Democrat, Arlen Specter. Good. Now the Democrats have to explain this self-serving loon.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
PA Politics on May 4th, 2009
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