POTUS Salutes TOTUS (Teleprompter of the US)
"Yes, Sir! As you say General Teleprompter!"
via Don Surber.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
BEST PHOTO CAPTION EVER
POTUS Salutes TOTUS (Teleprompter of the US)
"Yes, Sir! As you say General Teleprompter!"
via Don Surber.
EARMARK MADNESS?
No, earmark entertainment. Daniel Henninger at the Wall Street Journal has an entertaining suggestion.
Quoting Henninger, “Hey, it used to be your money. Why not enjoy it?”
Indeed. Grab your popcorn.
Joy in public life is hard to find these days, so I exhort conservatives to get over their anti-earmark mania and view the pork spectacle as (relatively) cheap entertainment.
Some Washington experts say that to come out from the shadows and join respectable society, this distasteful Congressional habit just needs to be reformed. I agree. Reform's watchword is "transparency."
Let's not be shy about this. Given its past sins, the earmark pork barrel must migrate to America's most transparent medium -- television.
On the "American Earmark" show, Senators and Representatives would have to do a song and dance about each of their projects. Sen. Jon Tester could sing out for $682,000 for Sustainable Beef Supply in Montana. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins could do a lovely duet for the $3.45 million Machias River project. Frank Luntz, the pollster, would assemble focus groups of local citizens who'd use those little post-debate machines to vote thumbs up or down on the competing pork.
These sectionals could be escalated to a televised national finals of earmark madness. Taxpayers for the first time would see some of earmarking's legendary professionals compete in public: John Murtha, Bobby Byrd, Dan Inouye ($238,000 this year for the Polynesian Voyaging Society), Virginia's Jim Moran.
Quoting Henninger, “Hey, it used to be your money. Why not enjoy it?”
Indeed. Grab your popcorn.
TIME FOR A CHANGE
A reader on Instapundit writes:
Exactly! I only wish we had a parlimentary system where we could call for a vote of no confidence and send these clowns to Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey where they belong. Though I doubt the “Greatest Show on Earth” would hire them.
After watching the Liddy debacle on C-SPAN, it has become painfully clear to me that our federal government is a joke. Those jerks were personally attacking a man working very hard to pull our collective butts out of the fire, all at great risk to his reputation, and for only $1 per year. I was angered and saddened.
Congress has zero accountability. The only solutions that I can come up with to address this are term limits and flat taxes. If the American people don’t put the reigns [sic] on these people by limiting the power of longevity and limiting their ability to tax us to death, we are doomed.
I vote the the Tea Party movement adopt term limits and flat taxes as major components of governmental reform.
Exactly! I only wish we had a parlimentary system where we could call for a vote of no confidence and send these clowns to Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey where they belong. Though I doubt the “Greatest Show on Earth” would hire them.
GOING AFTER JOHN GALT?
Via Instapundit.
Is the IRS going after John Galt?
Since many small business owners are near that $250,000 cusp of the Obama tax plan, one must wonder.
Is the IRS going after John Galt?
[I]f you're a small business person, either as a partnership or a Schedule C filer reporting self-employment income on your personal tax return, make sure you take extra care with your returns.
There's a good reason for the IRS' increased interest in small business filers. Because self-employment income typically has no verification mechanism (i.e., the IRS can't double check much of it in the way it can verify wage income via an employer-issued W-2), tax officials believe that many small business people underreport their income.
Since many small business owners are near that $250,000 cusp of the Obama tax plan, one must wonder.
‘TOO BIG TO FAIL’ A FAILURE
In today’s news:
Umm ... isn’t that what we taxpayers have been screaming for months now? Let ‘em go bankrupt; then start over by assembling the pieces into smaller, more diversified, more nimble entities.
With that experience, we can then tackle the real problem: state and federal government. They’re also “too big to fail.”
The head of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. says the government's strategy in the financial crisis of bailing out huge institutions deemed "too big to fail" must be replaced by a new model.
Umm ... isn’t that what we taxpayers have been screaming for months now? Let ‘em go bankrupt; then start over by assembling the pieces into smaller, more diversified, more nimble entities.
With that experience, we can then tackle the real problem: state and federal government. They’re also “too big to fail.”
GM CEO ENDORSES $4 GASOLINE
From the Washington Times:
Another reason to let GM go bankrupt ...
In a surprising turnabout, General Motors Corp. Chief Executive Officer Rick Wagoner said Tuesday that increasing the federal gasoline tax to guarantee a minimum price of $4 a gallon is an idea "worthy of consideration."
Another reason to let GM go bankrupt ...
NEW MARKET ANALYSIS
The Obama Factor. Richard Miller writes:
In an earlier post, I had come to much the same conclusion. Here is a chart of the Dow Jones Industrial Average for the last two months (Jan 18 through March 18).
Here is a chart of President Obama's Presidential Approval Index from the Rasmussen daily tracking polls from January 21st through March 18th. The Approval Index is the difference between the percentage polled strongly approving President Obama's performance and the percentage of those disapproving.
I think, as I did earlier, that Wall Street finally concluded that the Obama administration is incompetent and decided to go it alone.
I have come to the conclusion that the recent stock market rally is not so much a bear market rally as it is a reaction in support of the growing bipartisan disenchantment with Obama’s spending, tax, and so-called stimulus plans — or, as some contend, the lack of any clear plan. His competence is now being openly questioned, even within his own party; the market has already reached solid and unpleasant conclusions about his management skills.
In an earlier post, I had come to much the same conclusion. Here is a chart of the Dow Jones Industrial Average for the last two months (Jan 18 through March 18).
Here is a chart of President Obama's Presidential Approval Index from the Rasmussen daily tracking polls from January 21st through March 18th. The Approval Index is the difference between the percentage polled strongly approving President Obama's performance and the percentage of those disapproving.
I think, as I did earlier, that Wall Street finally concluded that the Obama administration is incompetent and decided to go it alone.
THE STATE OF THE ECONOMY
From John Paul Jones via Don Surber's place:
A French doctor says "Medicine in my country is so advanced that we can take a kidney out of one man, put it in another, and have him looking for work in six weeks."
A German doctor says "That is nothing; we can take a lung out of one person, put it in another, and have him looking for work in four weeks."
The Russian doctor says "In my country, medicine is so advanced that we can take half a heart out of one person, put it in another, and have them both looking for work in two weeks."
An American doctor, not to be outdone, says "You guys are way behind. We recently took a man with no brains out of Illinois; put him in the White House, and now half the country is looking for work."
A French doctor says "Medicine in my country is so advanced that we can take a kidney out of one man, put it in another, and have him looking for work in six weeks."
A German doctor says "That is nothing; we can take a lung out of one person, put it in another, and have him looking for work in four weeks."
The Russian doctor says "In my country, medicine is so advanced that we can take half a heart out of one person, put it in another, and have them both looking for work in two weeks."
An American doctor, not to be outdone, says "You guys are way behind. We recently took a man with no brains out of Illinois; put him in the White House, and now half the country is looking for work."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
