Obamaville January 25 - The State of the Union

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 No Debt or Deficit?

President Obama finally took the spotlight from the Republican debates with his third State of the Union address to the nation last night.  Once again he proved that he is a master of the teleprompter and his Harvard delivery is intact.

Our often time ethereal president softened his political attacks for the moment and changed his rhetoric about the decline and fall of our empire.  Seems his aides have finally figured out Jimmy Carter negativism does not help one get re-elected.

On the other hand, the vision he outlined for America was not real clear.  One thing about politics and politicians, there is a fine line between working up a head of steam and being lost in a fog.  On the surface they look almost the same but in truth they are opposites.  It is often hard to determine which role Obama plays.

As I predicted, his economic plan was based on the Buffett principle, not proven economic strategies or techniques.  I was a little disappointed Obama had Warren Buffett's secretary in the President's box and not Warren Buffett himself but rumor has it he was busy playing his ukulele in China.

After three years in office and with little to say in terms of accomplishments on the issues of most concern to Americans, like protecting Social Security and Medicare, slashing the $15 trillion national debt, cutting the trillion dollar annual deficit, or reducing the high unemployment rate, one must embrace the ethereal to avoid the real.

There were no new or even old proposals to address any of these issues but he did offer an unusual assessment of how he had turned around all our economic problems in what must be some Harvard Business School secret code because I did not understand it.  Obama said:

"In the six months before I took office, we lost nearly four million jobs. And we lost another four million before our policies were in full effect.

Those are the facts. But so are these. In the last 22 months, businesses have created more than three million jobs."

Now I realize my handicap in being from the Midwest yet I still have not figured out how losing 8 million jobs as he said, then gaining 3 million jobs as he said, which leaves us 5 million short of where we started, is a sign we have recovered from our economic problems.

He also offered some curious proposal on how he would help the millions of people who are in housing foreclose because they could not afford what they bought because of fraud in the first place, or they lost their jobs.  Some unfortunate folks have lived in homes up to two years or more without making payments.

Rather than help them move to homes they can afford, he wants Uncle Sugar to pay billions of dollars to keep them in the homes they can't afford.  Well, that means those that have made their payments and met their obligations will have to fork over even more money to subsidize those living beyond their means.

I thought the people subsidizing those who lived beyond their means was a discussion of the difference between taxpayers and politicians like the president and congress.  So I guess since we have done such a good job of subsidizing the runaway national debt of our politicians we now must pay off the mortgages for those who can't afford the homes to begin with.  I think these are the types of proposals that cause polarization.

One thing did change in his speech.  He used to define the rich at first as those making $200,000 a year, then $250,000 a year, then $1 million a year, and now it is not clear if he says the enemy are millionaires or billionaires.  We only know it is not Warren Buffett's secretary.

The fuzzy math of the White House policy was apparent also in terms of defense spending and cuts.  In his speech he said:

"That's why, working with our military leaders, I have proposed a new defense strategy that ensures we maintain the finest military in the world, while saving nearly half a trillion dollars in our budget."

And he said:

"Take the money we're no longer spending at war, use half of it to pay down our debt, and use the rest to do some nation-building right here at home."

Now that sounds great but does it really mean what he said?  The failure of Congress to pass any kind of deficit reduction plan last November automatically triggered a forced budget reduction calling for cutting $1.2 trillion over the next ten years, 2013 through 2022.  Of that, about $492 billion must come from the defense department.

Wait, Obama said he and his generals worked out a half a trillion dollars in defense savings.  What he forgot to say was he had no choice.  The failure of congress and the president to pass a budget or address the deficit and debt automatically triggered the cuts, no matter what Obama and the generals had to say about it.

That is not all.  The Obama deficit is now running over $1.3 trillion a year.  Our total defense budget is about $1 trillion a year.  Does that mean we are cutting 50% of our defense budget to lower the deficit, as he seems to suggest in the speech, without sacrificing our defense capability?  That would be great but is not true.

The half a trillion in defense cuts he proudly exclaimed are over ten years, not one.  That means a cut of $50 billion a year in defense, not half a trillion.  But even that is based on a foundation of quicksand.  What it really means is the government will reduce future increases in defense spending by $50 billion a year so our actual defense budget will go up while we are cutting half a trillion dollars.

Remember, he also said half of the cuts will go to reduce the deficit.  That means $25 billion a year will go to deficit or budget reductions.  Our annual deficit is now $1.3 trillion.  It does not even make a small dent in the annual deficit.  More than that, we still have the national debt of $15 trillion.  Did he forget what got us into this mess in the first place?

If that is modern math Pythagoras would be turning over in his grave and declaring it is time for an end to the American Empire because we are so caught up in our falsehoods, misrepresentations and distortions we can no longer tell the difference between having a head of steam or being lost in the fog.

Rome burned while Nero fiddled.  Let's hope Obama doesn't take up the ukulele like Buffett and pluck away while America goes up in flames.

Will someone out there please help the people strengthen Social Security and Medicare, reduce the national debt, cut the annual budget deficit, get people back to work, and then get out of our lives thank you very much.

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Obamaville January 24 - The Millionaire's Club

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With the President about to come on television and give his State of the Union address tonight I need to get a few thoughts on paper regarding the presidential c ampaign.

Last night we had the 18th out of what seems like 40-50 potential debates between the GOP candidates and if nothing else, it was quiet by comparison to the others.  What a change when the normally rowdy audience has to be quiet.  It was like March Madness without cheerleaders.  Eerie...

In the last 24 hours Gingrich released his contract with Fannie Mae and Romney released his taxes for two years.  Considering the massive hype by the media in demanding the information, most analysts had no clue how to analyze the information.  How could they, they didn't know anyone but Buffett could make that many millions a year.

It seems it took about 400 pages for the Romney taxes to get done under the existing tax laws and the jealously among liberal pundits was obvious.  After reviewing the material all day they are still distorting the information, twisting the facts and mangling the analysis.

Of course that is minor compared to the outright lies by Democratic spokespeople but lies have become institutionalized under the current Administration.  So let me just ask this because I think Obama is a nice guy but ill-prepared to be president, and that is after three years on the job.

Why is it nearly every single Obama economic policy staff member he brought into his Administration is gone, disappeared, silenced?  Why is it the only economic mouth piece for the president are political hacks from the campaign, and not an economist from the White House Council of Economic Advisors?  And why is a multi-zillionaire from Omaha the only economist the president mentions?

Now I like Buffett and I lived in Omaha but he doesn't work for the president, he seldom talks to the president, and even he must be wondering after three years what in the heck is the kid doing in the White House?

About the Romney return, he may not be Buffett but he is definitely the richest candidate for president since John F. Kennedy and I am delighted we finally have a candidate for president who can't be bought because he has all the money he needs.

Obama, the Democrats and even the Republicans have been talking about the need for tax reform.  So why has nothing been done for the last three years?  As I recall, Obama and the Democrats had veto proof majorities the first two years, and controlled the White House and Senate all three years.  So what is the problem?  Probably the same problem as the fact the Democratic controlled Senate has not passed a federal budget for over 1000 days, sheer lunacy in these trying times.

Romney paid about $3 million in taxes and gave $3 million in charitable contributions in 2010, and did about the same in 2011.  Like I said in an earlier article, he gave more to charity than all the other candidates and Obama combined.  Virtually all his income came from investments, was not earned income under tax laws, so it was taxed at 15%.  There is nothing in his return to raise any questions, only jealously from political and media pundits.

I would think the American dream would be for anyone to have been so successful in business that they make $21 million a year from investments, investments in many other companies in our country.  Still, the Democrats will condemn it.  For some reason "making it" in America is a bad thing.

As for Gingrich he may have more to explain than his super rich opponent.  Newt made well over $1 million with a consulting contract with Freddie Mac, the agency behind the collapse of the housing market.  While Freddie was driving more people into foreclosure than any time in our history to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars in tax losses, Gingrich was walking away with over $1 million.

Now I agree with Obama on one thing, only the super rich can tell us how to fix the tax code.  Obama has Buffett and I have Romney.  The question we must ask is do you want someone outside the government making these monumental decisions like Buffett, or do you want someone in the presidency who has the knowledge and experience and works for the people of the United States?

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Obama Hijacks Palin Agenda for Born Again Populist Pitch

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Obama talks for 70 minutes, people are still not sure what he said. But he did smile a lot, tell a few jokes, lecture the public, scold the Supreme Court, castigate an inept Congress and hijacked a bunch of Sarah Palin's agenda that he condemned so viciously last year.

So now, will the liberal elite who buried Palin in insults and smears claiming she was too inexperienced to be babysitter let alone president when she was really running for vice president, now apologize to her since the Chosen One has now seen the light and co-opted her platform and that of the Tea Party? Why he didn't even credit the source of the ideas.



Off shore oil drilling, business tax credits, eliminate capital gains taxes, hiring credits, more nuclear plants, coal and natural gas production, he used a whole lot of the Palin platform to try and win back the independents and people who expect government to be competent. You don't think it has anything to do with the polls do you?



Just so you know he was not completely out of form, as the original Obama was quite the entertaining speaker, he did point out that recent letters he has received from people tell him of the suffering and pain Americans feel about jobs, housing, healthcare and education. You would think after campaigning for president for two years and being president for one year he would have known how bad people were suffering but at least he reads the mail.



Did he hear anything the people told him? Guess not as he said the anti-Washington feeling sweeping across the nation and sweeping politicians out of office was the same wave he rode on his surfboard. I don't think so Mr. Obama. How in the world could someone with all the experience you had as United States Senator and community organizer make you an outsider? Anyone mistaking Obama for anything but a Washington insider would be the same people who mistake Bambi for a serial killer.

Anyway his long and often used "outsider" pivot is another area where he ripped off Sarah Palin who really was an outsider and did fight the political establishment. Heck, Obama even made reference to the bank bailout being like a root canal. Does that mean he ripped off Palin once again with her "drill baby drill" mantra during the campaign? After all the flip flops and absconding of Palin's agenda and platform he would have been a lot better off to have had Palin as VP and kept Biden in the doghouse.



Okay, then there were the 66 references to the almighty "I", another consistent Obama trait that leaves one wondering if the virtue of humility has any place in our young president's worldview. I'm beginning to think he has no foundation to his worldview but snatches the last argument he heard about what to think, whether it came from Sarah Palin or South Park. Then he throws out all he stood for in the campaign which seems to upset those liberal groups expecting socialism to already be here.



Did Obama pivot on his policies like he did his Palinesque rhetoric? Let's see. He still wants his health care bill, cap and trade legislation, pending jobs bill, maybe another similar stimulus since the first one did not do what he wanted, and he now has better ideas for the Tarp funds repaid by the big, bad banks. One might have thought the bank payments would go to reduce the deficit but not our president.



Overall there is one difference between what Obama proposes and what Palin, the Republicans or the Tea Party people would want. I'm sorry Mr. President but you are not the poster boy for the Tea Party and you are most certainly not the Washington outsider you claim. You made the deals to bailout out the banks, insurance companies, auto companies and save the unions and Goldman Sachs from huge losses for irresponsible investing.



You along with most of the politicians in Washington take the money from the lobbyists, banks, insurance companies and every other group like trial lawyers and pharmaceuticals and stick it in your campaign coffers. Some outsider. If you could just tell us the truth and say you will stop being a politician we might believe you. But you act as if you are disgusted by the very practices you encourage behind the scenes and behind closed doors. Where I come from that is being a hypocrite.



Beyond the rhetoric and entertainment there were a couple of ominous signs that would scare the hell out of any God fearing, patriotic American but our adoring media seemed to not notice, and they all too often seem to not notice when Obama makes no sense. This time he made sense.

First he threatened Congress when he said if they didn't give him a bill he wanted he would just sign an executive order and eliminate the need for Congress to act. So the Executive branch can eliminate the need for the Legislative branch to perform their duty. It has already happened under Obama with the cap and trade fiasco demonstrating a distain for such Constitutional principles like the separation of powers and checks and balances between the Executive and Legislative branches.



The House passed the Al Gore/Goldman Sachs cap and trade carbon emissions retirement bill but the Senate wants to think about it, so it spins in the wind doing nothing while others investigate it. Obama's Environmental Protection Agency then decides it knows how to cut Congress out of the decision by declaring carbon dioxide a toxic gas thus making it subject to federal regulation with no action by Congress. One again the Administration has demonstrated a disregard for the Constitutional separation of powers between the Executive and Legislative branches.

My advice to EPA is to go out and arrest all the trees of the world because they emit carbon dioxide when they are cut down. Forget about the fact they also absorb nearly 40% of all carbon dioxide through their natural photosynthesis process. Arrest all the people burning wood for heat because they are directly polluting our atmosphere. And arrest the oceans while they are at it because the sea both generates carbon dioxide and absorbs it to the tune of 60% of all emissions.



The Obama Administration disregard for our Constitutional protections, ones which our forefathers warned us about, is quite disturbing. Why do they think they can ignore elements of the Constitution that guarantee the separation of powers and assure the checks and balances between each division of our republic? Not content with ignoring the separation of powers with the Legislature, he then took aim at the third division of government, the Judiciary.

He scolded the Supreme Court, condemning their decision on corporate free speech, and seemed to try and embarrass them as they sat in the front row watching his speech. One was visibly upset, not by the criticism but by the fact Obama did not even tell the truth about the decision. Obama said the court action will allow corporations, including foreign corporations, to own the US election process. Well foreign corporations are prohibited from contributing to our campaigns and the Supreme Court decision had nothing to do with that.



Obama also forgot to mention he and the Democrats already have taken millions of dollars from corporate executives while the political parties take money directly. He also forgot to mention that anytime Obama and Congress want to fix the system of campaign financing they can do it if they have the guts. However, corporations are betting millions that Obama and our political leaders in the capitol will do nothing.

The thought that a president thinks he can ignore the Constitution if the Legislature and the Judiciary fail to do his bidding is very scary. Finally, his criticism of both parties for not doing what he wanted is a joke as he was the one who refused to work with both parties choosing to work directly with the lobbyists of the special interests. His approach resulted in a new meaning for pork barrel as he gave away $60 billion to the unions without Congressional approval, tens of millions of dollars to the people of Nebraska and Louisiana to bribe their Senators, and billions in protection to the pharmaceutical companies.



Well, he can say what he wants but it sure seems to me as if politics as usual is alive and well in the back rooms of our nation's capitol from the White House to the Halls of Congress. Don't be fooled by the rhetoric. Don't be fooled by the pivots. Don't be fooled by the new found or born again populism. No one in Washington, including our Ivy League educated president, is a friend of the people over special interests or Wall Street.

The State of the Union - What Can We Expect from Obama, the Born Again Populist?

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It's time once again for that great American drama, the event that proves we are in the depressing depths of winter and we really have nothing to do, the State of the Union speech by our president. Thanks to the complicity of the television networks the president gets to dominate the airways tonight to tell us all the things politicians tells us to reassure us we are in good hands.

Now I don't know about you but it is hard for me to take too seriously anyone in Washington, DC who has the audacity to say we are in good hands. I'm not sure but it seems as if we would be a lot better off if our politicians just shut up for a year or two and stopped telling us all the nonsense.



Fortunately, we have become accustom to these annual invasions of privacy by those who know better so we are not going to get our hopes up and expect a miracle, like someone might tell us the truth. After all the campaigning and the first year of torture under the control of the Democrats, I still really can't tell the difference between the elephants and donkeys, or is it jackasses?

The Washington Post, that revered institution of truth if you happen to think the liberal view is remotely related to the truth, says President Obama made about 360 promises of things he would do once he got elected. After a year they say he did 15 of them and none were much to talk about. Does that mean after four years of Obama in 2012 he will have delivered on 60 promises of the 360, or a total of 16% of all that he promised?



At the rate he is delivering it will take him 24 years just to do the things he promised before he got elected. That was before he got God, I mean lost in Virginia, New Jersey and Massachusetts, and suddenly changed his tune back to the born again populist. It was also before his policies were rejected in poll after poll by the public.

CBS news reports that our president gave 411 speeches during his first 365 days as president, including two speeches to joint sessions of Congress. He also gave 158 interviews and held four prime time news conferences. Just like his billion dollar campaign spending, that is far more than any previous president in our history.



Now we are being told by his henchmen that the people, we, did not understand his message so he has to try again but more forcibly so us stupid humans might get it. It must be a real burden for a person to have such an intellect and so much knowledge and be forced to speak to the six pack majority of America. How in the world will these people ever get it?

Well I don't get it. Congress doesn't seem to get it either. After a year of senseless blabber does anyone know what he wants in his health care bill, what the current bill will do, or why we need to throw out the whole health care system in the first place? Don't expect him to dwell too much on that issue except to say raising your health care costs will create more jobs.



In fact everything in his speech will most likely create more jobs even though not a single respectable economist can figure out the value of creating jobs if they cost about $500,000 each like the stimulus package has done. Does he even know millions of people lost their jobs since he became president?

How stupid of me, whatever went wrong this past year was Bush's fault. Maybe he won't need to say too much about Bush in this speech since he already blamed everything that went wrong the last century on Bush. I think that must be an Ivy League debate tactic, blaming everyone else for your failures.

Yet Obama did support the bank bailout and even kept it going. And it was Obama's AIG, auto, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bailouts that cost us way over a trillion dollars. It was his inability to do anything to stop the banks that resulted in billions of dollars in profits for the very guys who ripped off the system and got the taxpayer to pay off their sins. Then they gave out $60 billion in executive bonuses just to remind the public how they could care less that we saved them.



Even today, the day of his State of the Union, Congress is holding hearings to determine how Obama's administration could bailout AIG and let them pay $62 billion in taxpayer money to Goldman Sachs and other big banks. The Obama gang say they didn't know it happened. If they didn't know $62 billion was ripped off in taxpayer money they should all go to jail for intellectual constipation and moral indifference.

But those are truths and when talking about the good old boys in Washington truth has no place. Wasn't it Goldman Sachs who financed Obama's campaign? Didn't Goldman Sachs pour millions of dollars into his and other leaders campaigns and get millions more from their partners for the politicians in the great American Monopoly game? In fact, weren't they behind the housing market collapse, the energy price increases, the economic collapse and over $20 billion in executive bonuses this year?

Well don't expect the president to tell us how the banks, insurance companies, health care groups, auto companies, pharmaceutical companies and unions, who all have gotten and/or made billions of dollars off the president and Congress, are now pouring millions more into the campaigns of our leaders in the nation's capitol.



However, our born again populist president, the man who taught us that the only problems we have are those he tells us we have, will most certainly double cross those other bridges when he gets to them. As for tonight, everything will be okay. He knows. He knows we don't know. All will be well on Wall Street because he is now going to give us tax credits, incentives, and even a federal spending freeze to save the day. Of course the freeze will not apply to 83% of federal spending but that is a trivial detail. And none of the credits and incentives are going to small business where jobs are created.

But the jobs, well, he is going to create more jobs than anyone in history as it will take more to make up for the disastrous first year in office. Of course the jobs may go to the unions who poured millions into his campaign and are pouring millions more into his campaign committee in 2010. Why does he need to raise tens of millions of dollars when he just got elected to a four year term? And why raise it from the very people you say are the bad guys?

Anyway, there will be millions of jobs created, probably most in government service which will not help the economy but will give the unions a great big payoff. Somehow Obama's Chicago gang has turned economic principles upside down. They have determined we should not worry about increasing the deficit by over $1.4 trillion a year. Why worry? Let the next generation blame it on Bush as the nation goes bankrupt.

So expect promises for a better economy, millions of jobs for the unions, billions to be spent on alternative energy which is not even cost effective but will make Al Gore and Goldman Sachs billions, billions more to prop up housing through Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae because the Democrats cannot let those liberal bastions fail, billions more for education which will take care of those unions but insure that the inferior education system in America will continue to prosper, lots of billions for wars since two new ones are likely in Yemen and the Middle East while Iraq, another promise to get out, will continue and Afghanistan will expand, and a whole bunch of other things we didn't know we needed.

The State of the Union, about the 415th speech in the 370 days he has been president. Haven't we had enough? I mean he is a nice guy and all but doesn't he ever lose his voice or anything? Maybe he could go on another extended world tour and do to the world what he has been doing to us. We have 535 politicians in Congress, a president with a bionic tongue, a vice president who keeps stepping on his tongue, a bevy of presidential advisors, his personal army of drones spewing innocuous facts and engaging in flights of fantasy, and we pay for all that. As far as I can see the only jobs saved this past year were all the blowhards in DC.

When will it be time to really help the rest of us?

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Obama - America's Perpetual Presidential Candidate - Turns Governing over to Campaign

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President's Job Stimulus Saves Campaign Workers & Contributors Jobs

As if his 2008 billion dollar campaign was not enough politics for America to stomach Barack Obama has turned his presidency over to his campaign team. throwing aside any pretentions of serving all Americas, and refuses to acknowledge there are any Independents, Republicans or Americans sick of politics as usual.

In preparation for his State of the Union an army of Obama campaign workers took to the airways to pave the way for his first State of the Union message telling long, tall tales of how Obama saved millions of jobs for America, how everything that went wrong since he was elected was caused by George Bush, how the American public is confused and deluded about the facts, and how he is going to help all those Democrats who are the old time politicians in the upcoming campaign.



With all government spending, policy, hiring, stimulus, communication and knowing what is best for an uninformed electorate safely in the hands of his old campaign team and out of the hands of an experts in their field, the Obama campaign fraternity has taken control of America in a way never seen before in politics.



Gone are the voices of cabinet members, except the Treasury Secretary who was also part of the campaign team. The only people authorized to speak for the president and his policies are those who were part of the Chicago gang who got him elected including the campaign manager David Plouffe who doesn't even work for the government, David Axelrod Senior Aide, Robert Gibbs, Press Secretary, Valerie Jarrett, Senior Aide, and the head of his campaign transition team Raul Emanuel, Chief of Staff.



I have been following politics for a lot longer than most of the media people except Larry King who I think came to America with Christopher Columbus, and I have never seen a president rely on his campaign team to run the nation. A year after getting elected Obama only relies on his campaign team for spending, policy, appointments, strategy and every word his speaks.



According to the White House appointment records he also relies on the people who financed his campaign as well including Wall Street executives, insurance executives, union bosses and others who invested millions in getting their guy in the White House.



So now they promise a feisty president who will fight for what he knows we don't know. These are the same speech writers and policy specialists who gave us the bank bailouts, insurance and auto bailouts, the economic non-stimulus program and more national debt than any president in history including Bush.



They also promised an open presidency, total transparency, negotiations with enemies, a new role for the US in world affairs, bipartisan governing, the elimination of terrorism and prisons and all that other stuff his circle of '60's radicals, big mouthed preachers and Wall Street manipulators told him to say.



After a year of failing to deliver on anything for the good of the people the wagons have circled the president and the same advisors who view promises as statements of political expediency with no need to worry about being truth are back, in control, once again telling Obama what to say.



What is good for the frat pack in Chicago has little relevance to all Americans. They have not learned a thing since taking over the presidency. They refuse to accept responsibility for anything he does as president. They are still running a campaign based on half truths and deception, whatever it takes to get elected, and let the public be damned.



The State of the Union should be a real interesting speech as long as the teleprompter keeps running. We might actually discover more promises for a yet to be determined future. But we will never know the real truth, the real agenda, and where they intend to drag America before they are done bankrupting the nation and gutting the government. It will most surely be an interesting display of motivational hyperbole and transparent objectives, more of the same.