Law makers are counting on people following their onerous rules to the letter. Part of ObamaCare demands that business, charities and government entities issue a 1099 tax form for all business transactions over $600. This will help them raise money to cover other people’s medical expenses.
What is more likely to happen is that people will start to do more cash transactions with a little wink.
Congress believes that the 1099 reporting requirement will compel businesses to report more income to the IRS because they will all of a sudden either recognize income they were not reporting before or feel it necessary to report income they were sheltering from taxation. More reporting will not bring in more revenue because Congress overestimates how much income businesses overlook or shelter from tax.In reality, the 1099 reporting requirement will raise little, if any, revenue. It is phantom revenue that will likely never materialize, so attempting to offset it is unnecessary…read more
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Taxes on January 26th, 2011
Government spending does not translate into jobs.
John Hinderaker of Powerline.com asks:
It is blindingly obvious that spending does not equal stimulus, and increasing federal spending will not create jobs. There are two possibilities here. One is that Obama is one of the last people in America who have not figured this out. The other is that Obama knows his proposals are dumb, from an economic standpoint, but doesn’t care.
Personally, I think he doesn’t care. He thinks our free market is unfair, he is determined to fix it and he is arrogant enough to think he can do better…better than the free market capitalist system that made us strong and better than all the wealth redistribution plans that have failed in the past.
Those who are now demanding civility in our politics are the same people who voted for Al Franken. Before becoming a senator and after his unfunny antics on Saturday Night Live, Al Franken was a bomb thrower on Air America and the author of totally forgettable books.
At one time, communists and socialist hid. They largely kept their views to themselves. With the election of Barack Obama and a dominating Democratic majority, the extreme left was emboldened. They shouted their convictions from the roof tops. Newsweek Magazine declared on their cover, we are all socialist now. Lawrence O’Donnell admitted he was a socialist on MSNBC (no surprise to me).
American voters wanted change…but not that change. They have overwhelmingly rejected left-wing politics and the November elections are the proof. President Obama’s poll number have rebounded because he has done a good job of using moderate rhetoric and playing nice with Republicans. I personally think it is a political show, but it shows the benefits rejecting left wing politics.
Ask Glenn Beck about his politics and he will proudly tell you he is a religious libertarian with great respect for the founders and their vision. He hides nothing.
Now go ask his favorite target, Frances Fox Piven. Stanley Kurtz has a run-down on her socialist history and a link to her claim that she is not a socialist.
The overwhelming stance from people who are passionate about politics is that conservatives are proud while socialist deny and hide their true agenda. That should tell you something.
What makes this chart so scary is that a large number of adviser to President Obama and President Obama himself are from Illinois. What is amazing is that with a record of failure, they still remain arrogant.
Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/the-planet-illinois-2011-1?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+businessinsider+%28Business+Insider%29
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Debt on January 24th, 2011
What if there was an assassination attempt against a high powered official and nobody hear about it? That couldn’t happen in today’s 24 hour news cycle with total Internet coverage. WRONG.
Last September, a left wing kook charged the governor of Missouri with a knife and wearing a bullet proof vest. His intentions were clear. REDSTATE.COM report:
In light of the media’s race to talk about the right’s climate of hateful rhetoric, you have probably guessed by now that Casey Brezik was an anti-Christian, anti-capitalist leftist who participated in a number of left wing protests. He was also a diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic…read more
Where were the calls for civility and toning down the left-wing rhetoric? Where were the calls to ban Che t-shirts, knives, bullet proof vest and schizophrenia?
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Liberal Bias on January 24th, 2011
I think there is no question that the Obama Administration has overstepped its Constitutional bounds…now the courts will decide
When the Federal Communications Commission voted in December to enact its first binding net neutrality rules, a legal challenge was widely expected. But most observers didn’t think it would come so soon…read more
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Constitution on January 24th, 2011
Michelle Malking says: Let the era of real transparency begin.
I like that. Americans like a split government. They were unhappy when Republicans ruled Washington. They were unhappy when Democrats ruled Washington. They like the branches of government are advisories, not partners. Gee…It’s like the Founding Fathers were on to something with that “Checks and Balances” thing.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Constitution on January 24th, 2011
The cliche is, “You can’t yell fire in a crowded movie theater.” It means you have the right to speak your mind unless your rights threatens the rights of others.
Applying this standard can be tricky. For instance, if someone advocates for violent riots as Frances Fox Piven does when she says:
An effective movement of the unemployed [that] will have to look something like the strikes and riots that have spread across Greece in response to the austerity measures forced on the Greek government by the European Union (emphasis mine)
The riots in Greece have been violent and have caused death. Is Ms. Piven advocating violence and if so, would this not be a case of yelling “fire”? It’s not according to the Center for Constitutional Rights. What worries them is not what Ms. Piven has written. In an Orwellian twist, they believe quoting Ms. Piven accurately and repeatedly is where you step over the line.
From the New York Times
“We are vigorous defenders of the First Amendment,” the center said in its letter to Fox. “However, there comes a point when constant intentional repetition of provocative, incendiary, emotional misinformation and falsehoods about a person can put that person in actual physical danger of a violent response.” Mr. Beck is at that point, they said.
This is considered an intellectual and thoughtful response from the left. Calling for riots is OK, but quoting that call is threatening.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
free speech on January 24th, 2011
We have new leadership in Pennsylvania. We could go a long way if the people in Harrisburg would stop trying to right a new law every problem that pops up (like whack-a-mole) and started enforcing the laws we have and demanding competency for our state agencies.
In all, prosecutors said, state officials failed to inspect the clinic despite repeated complaints from 1993 until January 2010, when a federal drug raid investigating heavy painkiller distribution at the clinic shut it down…read more
The doctor at the center of this storm has been running a shady operation for years. It is likely that he skated because of the politics of abortion. Career bureaucrats get nothing but grieve when they take on politically charged issues, so they just steer clear. Meanwhile, babies and women died.
That has to end.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
PA Politics on January 23rd, 2011
The next financial bubble is out there. It is comprised of people like your son who are carrying enormous debt without any prospect of paying it off. They are going to default. It’s our fault, you say. Well, you say that now. But if we gave your son the grades he deserved you both would have screamed foul and due processed us to death. If your son is a member of some protected class, we would have had to defend against the accusation that we discriminated against him. Anyhow, he got more than he deserved, and the rest of us subsidized his education directly or indirectly with our tax dollars. Of course, you do know that we are going to have to pick up the defaults, just as we picked up the sub-prime mortgages. . . . When the defaults come, we will print more money and maybe foreclose on a few for-profit institutions. There will be congressional hearings, a few scapegoats from the for-profit world, and a few horror stories about exploitative student loans. There will be an academic Enron and an academic Countrywide. When the smoke clears, the academic AIG will have bailed out the academic Goldman Sachs for one hundred cents on the dollar. And it will be business as usual.
Read more
Once given power, most people will not relinquish it. In Venezuela, Hugo Chavez was “granted” special legislative powers by decree. Now (to nobody’s surprise), he says he will not relinquish his new powers.
Keep this in mind as President’s day approaches. The amazing thing about our revolution is that George Washington could have ruled until he died. He didn’t. He was elected twice and then stepped down. For over 100 years, this remained the standard until a hard-left president broke that tradition. FDR was elected 4 times. After FDR died, the Constitution was changed.
Remember, freedom is not the norm. We must struggle to remain free from tyranny.
Posted by: The Elephant Owner in
Constitution on January 21st, 2011
In Arlington, you can have your First Amendment rights or your Second Amendment rights…but you can’t have both.
Arlington Man Loses Gun License Due To Blog About Tucson Shooting…read more
It is obviously a joke. It’s in the same vein as this joke:
Q. What do you call 10 dead lawyers in a life boat
A. A good start
The left stands up for the tasteless and the crass in the name of the 1st Amendment (especially if it insults Christianity), but they will look they other way if they can take the 2nd Amendment down a peg.
An abortion doctor who catered to minorities, immigrants and poor women was charged with eight counts of murder in the deaths of a patient and seven babies who were born alive and then killed with scissors, prosecutors said Wednesday…read more
Gordon Brown recognizes the problem, but has the wrong prescription.
The world faces global youth unemployment of epidemic proportions…read more
Gordon Brown believes the answer is more education. It seems that is always the political answer, but I believe this is what happens when older people are secure in their cushy jobs. We have a higher rate of college graduates then ever, nearly 25% higher then 20 years ago, but our unemployment rate among the young rate is as high as it has ever, and I think I know why.
Governments with a socialist bent (particularly in Europe) have tilted the legal system in favor of the employees for years. In many countries, jobs have become life-time appointments. The young can only find jobs if an older person retires.
In the United States, it isn’t that bad (yet) and our unemployment rate among the young is the proof. The sad truth is that under the current administration, we are moving in that direction. Barack Obama is a huge supporter of labor unions.
The answer to low youth employment is a more dynamic economy where companies are allowed to fail leaving space for new ideas to prosper. We need an economy where the workers of one industry are not given special treatment over the workers of another. We need laws that allow employers to hire who they feel will best meet their needs without the fear of law suits and strikes.
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