What Was That About Jobs, Madam Speaker?
Nancy Pelosi said in her final pitch on the cap-and-trade bill that it was all about four words: “jobs, jobs, jobs, and jobs.”
Unfortunately for her and the president, not a week after the massive energy tax was pushed through, the unemployment numbers went through the roof. In June, 465,000 Americans lost jobs — 140,000 more than the number lost in May and than the number most economists had predicted. The unemployment rate hit 9.5 percent, a 26-year high.
The Washington Post explained:
The nation now has 14.7 million people who are looking for a job but can’t find one, up 7.2 million since the beginning of the recession in December 2007. A broader measure of unemployment, which also includes people who are working part-time but want a full-time job and who have given up looking for a job out of frustration, also rose, to 16.5 percent from 16.4 percent.
Republicans, not unexpectedly, pounced. After all, the president had promised that passage of his $787 billion stimulus bill would keep unemployment at eight percent. Eight percent now seems like a distant, fond memory.
Rep. Tom Price released a statement declaring:
After five months of the so-called stimulus, Americans are left with just one question: where are the jobs? The administration assured us its bloated spending package would halt unemployment at eight percent, yet it has now hit 9.5 percent and continues a rapid ascent. This is not the economic security that Americans were promised — far from it! It seems the grim outlook of the job market is only matched by the impending fiscal disaster to which this failed stimulus is contributing.
Minority Leader John Boehner took his trusty bloodhound in search of the non-existent jobs which the stimulus had “saved or created.”
And Minority Whip Eric Cantor was quick to weigh in as well, chastising the president’s failure to focus on the public’s number one concern:
Inexplicably, instead of focusing on jobs and restoring the financial security that has been lost by millions of struggling families, the president continues to push an agenda that the majority of Americans are uneasy with. The American people do not support a government health care plan that will increase costs, reduce patient choice and flexibility, and lower the quality of care available in our country. The American people do not support the radical cap & tax plan which will impose a hard-hitting tax upon families and small businesses costing our struggling economy thousands of jobs.
Pundits debated why the president’s stimulus had not delivered. Maybe he should have tried those tax cuts which Republicans had suggested. Perhaps once again we have learned that Keynesian schemes don’t work. But in any event the party in power at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue will have a hard time shirking responsibility for the atrocious jobs outlook.
Moreover, it remains unlikely that a consumer-driven economy will rebound so long as so many consumers are out of work. As the Wall Street Journal reported:
“Jobs are usually a lagging indicator, but this time they’re almost a leading indicator in this scenario,” said Doug Roberts, chief investment strategist for Channel Capital Research. “Right now, if the consumer at these levels feels there’s a prospect of him being unemployed, he’s going to pull back. This is a consumer-led recession, and despite the government’s best efforts, they can’t get them to spend.”
The jobs problem creates a number of political problems for the White House.
First, it bolsters the “no” party which inveighed against the stimulus and predicted, quite correctly, it would do nothing to put people to work. Republicans who voted against the stimulus and opposed it as a giant waste of taxpayers’ money look rather smart.
Second, the skyrocketing unemployment figure creates further doubts about the viability of the cap-and-trade plan. Those 44 Democrats and all but eight Republicans who voted against the bill, in large part because imposing a huge energy tax and new regulatory regime on American businesses is a “job killer,” may now find many in the Senate who agree. Moreover, with the addition of a convoluted scheme of “offsets” that allows a company, for example, to buy a rain forest in Brazil to make up for its own emissions, it will be increasingly difficult to argue that any of those “green jobs” are being created here in the U.S. What is being created is a giant tax, anti-trade, and government intervention regime. And the “jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs”? They are actually predicted to go down.
Third, once again the public and the president’s critics will begin to ask why the president is engaged in a non-stop effort to pass a government takeover of the health care industry rather than focusing on creating jobs and fostering an economic recovery.
The White House is nothing if not dogged in its determination to use the “opportunity” which an economic crisis presents to remake the American economy. But for now, the opportunity is proving to be the undoing of the president’s credibility on the economy and reason for Democrats on the ballot in the next year or so to panic.
What are they going to say when Republicans ask: “Where are the jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs?”
The whole point of Obama’s agenda is to wreck the economy. There is no way he can be that stupid or naive to think that all the spending and all the regulation and all the czars and all the terrorist hugging is going to actually improve the economy. (I’m sure lots of his supporters are that stupid). I think the end game here is a world begging for a strong leader to bring salvation. If Obama/Soros/Lewis/Sanders et al can destroy the US economy, so goes the rest of the world just like a long line of dominoes. Kudos to the Honduran military for upholding their constitution. How much more will it take before our military acts?
Well, I suppose that Col. obama will just have to schedule a speech for the beginning of the week, in which he will explain that they guessed wrong about Stimulus 1. He will then propose Stimulus 2, which will increase projected deficits by 4.3 trillion dollars.
In the speech, he will also lecture Caterpillar for their irresponsible practices in which they have continued to lay off employees who are no longer needed because of plummeting customer orders.
He will pay for Stimulus 2 by immediately discontinuing all Social Security and Medicare payments and closing those programs down completely by August 15. This, of course, will actually create new jobs as 5,000 more government workers will be put in place to assist in closing those programs down.
The cancellation of Medicare will have the secondary benefit of escalating the death rate among seniors, further offsetting the costs of Stimulus 2. It should also ease the energy crisis, because the seniors who do live will not be able to afford either gas for their cars or fuel for their furnaces.
Col. obama will make a follow up speech in August in which he gleefully informs the public, “See? You DO need me!” which, of course, will be true in the strictest sense of the word since the government cheese will be the only food in town.
This is such a painful, painful, predictable catastrophe. Democrats should be ashamed of themselves for aiding and abetting the destruction of our nation by their silence.
They’re going to create jobs by placing more restrictions on American businesses.
Yeah, that should work.
The part I cannot figure out for the life of me is: are these people morons, or do they just think WE are?
What will dems say when the R’s ask, “Where are the jobs,jobs, jobs”?
They’ll blame it on Bush. As usual.
For full coverage on the employment situation, see this site:
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm
Then make your own conclusions.
I find it difficult to put much faith and stock in what amounts to a political one-night stand.
On one hand we have those who swallowed Obama’s line of BS hook, line and sinker.
And on the other hand we have those who swallowed George Bush’s line of BS hook, line and sinker.
But, now that Obama is in charge, with enough horsepower to ram whatever he wants down America’s throat, we are supposedly to rally behind the same GOP forces that literally sat on their fat rear ends doing nothing for over 8 years as far as doing anything to substantially help our country.
So now, America has fallen on hard times when it comes to job losses, but the GOP’s track record promises them little more than some sort of a thin veneer short term fix, if that. Ms Rubin really had to dig deep in order to justify the main points of her article and even with that it has to rely more on the Democrats are bad guys than it does proven math coming from the right.
In other words, from Clinton, to and through Bush, and now with Obama people from all walks of life and political persuasions hear the same noise and see the same circus coming from both political parties.
Snickers and glee on the left, tea parties and I told you so promises on the right with the resultant middle ground sounding more like a cheap circus act than it does like the greatest nation that’s ever existed on Earth.
Will the real “Hope and Change” please stand up?
This is how you create jobs: leave people alone! Ego tripping elites who graduated from our “best” universities do not know more than you about your own challenges. Barack Obama and his allies should have simply lowered taxes, undo senseless regulations, severely curtailed their own spending habits—and get the hell out of the way. They have instead made a bad problem far worse. Obama is an economic illiterate and fails to comprehend that every dollar spent by the government is one less dollar available to the private sector. Keynesian economics is merely an excuse for elites to grab power and tell the rest of us what to do. They wish to become our benevolent dictators. Many of them are also motivated by greed. Elites like Al Gore and the Goldman Sachs crowd are heavily invested in the spending proposals advocated by the Barack Obama administration. Cynically, one might describe them as Harvard University graduate enrichment opportunities. Am I exaggerating? Well, take a look. It seems that just about every major program advocated by Obama enriches his Harvard buddies.
How many Americans know that Larry Summers is greatly responsible for Harvard University losing eight to sixteen billion dollars in its investment programs. Do we really want the same people who screwed up that academic institution’s finances to also severely damage the overall American economy? By the way, Harvard has recently laid off hundreds of employees. Take a look at this story:
http://harvardmagazine.com/breaking-news/harvard-layoffs-update-more-reshaping-come
Good article, Ms. Rubin. Try as I might, I cannot see the circular reasoning that C and T will create jobs. Will one of PJ’s many excellent posters please explain this? This is the second time this morning I’ve read such drivel.
Reasons why jobs are not growing:
Retail sales falling.
Motor vehicle sales falling.
Massive debt load has caused globally for $50 trillion in wealth to be destroyed in the matter of one year.
Personal savings rate going UP.
Hours worked are down, less $ to spend.
2009 will have the highest number of foreclosures in history.
Short-term treasuries (ie, savings) are returning a near zero percent rate.
The stock markets are still off and have still seen $32 trillion in global wealth disappear.
We send our money abroad and we consume locally. That makes our trading partners wealthier while we get instant gratification.
Commodity prices have been in a near free fall.
We will likely see unemployment hit 19% by the end of 2009. Fortunately we have more safety nets than during the Great Depression but to expect this to be a walk in the park is naive.
We are in a serious situation and things will only get tougher in the short run.
Where are the jobs? Where is the economy? Where is GM? Where is Barack Obama taking us?
I wonder if any of those masses of newly unemployed regret voting for Obama?
President Don Quixote and his horse Nancy will continue to tilt at their windmills until our nation looks like a third world country. If republicans don’t take over Congress in 2010 then ACORN will insure that there is never a democrat minority again.
I guess it is time to ask once again, is Obama ignorant or evil? (others will remember the exact wording, I believe this has been the topic of an article or two at PJM)
Total unemployment, including those looking for full-time work, at 16.5%? If Gibbs thought Helen Thomas was cranky this week, he and his boss should talk to some of those looking for work. I have heard several people describe their revised career goal as “just getting a job to survive the Obama administration”.
You own this mess, BHO, because you are not listening to anyone else.
President Bush is still punishing the American people, Obama just inherited every mess he is standing in up to his ankle, or mid-shins, or just below the knees, or at the knees, or, oops, now almost up to the neck…
Sure is a good thing Obama can still take credit for no attacks on the country since that last ‘man made’ disaster.
I’ll end the anticipation for them….Where are the jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs?
I’d also like a full accounting of all of that stimulus money that did NOTHING. Any news on where that wandered off to? I can only imagine what health care will look like after they get their greedy claws into it after what they’ve done to the private sector already.
Now that Helen Thomas and Chip Reid have finally be roused from their Kool-Aid naps, maybe other journalists will follow suit and finally start asking what the hell is going on in the White House (other than cocktail Wednesdays and date nights).
“But in any event the party in power at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue will have a hard time shirking responsibility for the atrocious jobs outlook”. Yeah right. We all know it’s George Bush’s fault. It’s the evil Republican’s that don’t like the unions fault. It’s everyone’s fault but the Dems, because they’re swell.
There’s not going to be a recovery. At best we get a dead cat bounce when they pump all those worthless Obama dollars into the economy. My best guess is late next summer for the ’10 elections. Then we go down permanently.
After that they will have completed their destruction of the election process through thuggery, fraud and Third World immigration. They will also will have comleted their destruction of the First, Second, Fourteenth and God forbid the Twenty Second Amendments.
No flags flying at our home tomorrow.
Rubin is on point, particularly about the failure of Keynesian economic policy. I am still waiting for examples of success for that doctrine, the only one that comes to mind is WWII which presented unique circumstance for turning an economy around. Remember, even in that case much of the money went into the private sector which restored economic performance and eventually jobs.
The so called experts like Larry Summers and Austin Goolsby are ivory tower types who have a poor track record of prediction and performance. Laffer’s theory has repeatedly been implemented with success that undeniably turns economies around. Why people continue to treat Keynes as some guru is beyond me.
The Obama administration had it’s chance and, predictablly, blew it. If their stimulus had focused on the private sector and getting it moving by creating friendly conditions for it, given the depth and length of the recession thus far it is likely things would be starting to turn. We aren’t close thanks to the Keynesian foolishness foisted upon us by Pelosi and company.
I personally have curtailed discretionary spending by 60% since August of last year and have no plans on changing that in the next 6 months. The government is intent upon treating the private sector as the problem, not the solution, something to be taxed, milked and burdened. I will continue to save for the coming inflation and continuing economic downturn. This rainy day hasn’t hit noon yet.
I hope all you Obama supporters can live with the consequences of your choice and your economic naivete. You fail to understand that it is the healthy private sector that creates the tax revenue for all your socialist largess. Lots of luck, it’s completely under your control now.
The job loss numbers play right into the statist liberal Obama’s hands. How else could he get people to do the “green jobs” unless he scraped off a few million capitalist pig jobs first. He needs to first create a hungry, poor and needy segment of the population–then, get them to do his bidding. They’ll be building national Obama monuments like the ones Obama saw in China–massive infrastructure projects upon which the One’s likeness can be emblazoned for all of his eternal reign. There shall be massive thoroughfares through which Obamabots shall march upon his glorious reelection and penultimate rule for the ages. This is tyranny folks, it is coming and will hit you like a brick in your face. Fight it, oppose it, subvert it, ridicule it and expose it.
I guess I find it interesting that so many still want to call what is happening “mistakes”, “miscalculations”, etc. I realize most people just can’t comprehend there are people out there who want to destroy the US, and that a majority of idiots voted one into the most powerful postion in the world.
However, this *IS* his plan.
Oh, I should add, it is far, far, easier to destroy than to build.
11. JohnR223:
I wonder if any of those masses of newly unemployed regret voting for Obama?
~~~~
I confess little sympathy for the unemployed zerO voter masses. they wanted to live on “hope-n-change”. they got lots of change.
Why no flags flying?
President Obama will try in vain to blame the current job numbers on President George W. Bush as he said yesterday by “inheriting”; however, the creeping job losses are in fact due to Senator Obama’s win of the Office of the President in November 2008. The Democrats are creating an environment hostile to private enterprise with massive tax increases & more hurtful legislation by growing the Federal Government in other areas. Unemployment is going to keep going higher & eventually President Obama is going to get the blame.
When inflation combines with more unemployment, stagflation will be in full bloom. It will truly be a return of the awful President Jimmy Carter years! The 20-somethings who never lived under stagflation will get their taste of the misery index & Obama’s bumbling, rambling excuses of being an idiot follower in leader’s clothing.
It seems that nothing but bad news comes out daily from the handling of the country, especially the economy. The recent slim passage of the so called energy bill will hurt everyone if the senate passes it. Your electrical bill will most likely double at the least you gasoline costs will go up and even if you could find a buyer for your home it must be inspected for energy efficiency and if it dos not meet the requirements they will have to be corrected before you can sell you home.
I did not vote for this administration and hope that those that did can now see that it was a poor decision that the entire nation is going to have to suffer through, unless we can get the liberal out of congress in the 2010 elections to put a brake on the reckless spending and useless costly programs we will all be in trouble.
and bambi is feeding his acolytes “hope”. let his supporters endure the winter on that for their food and see how long they last.
Maybe they will learn to get *definitions* when he feeds them his *very* nebulous terms.
it is all about jobs, jobs, jobs….just loosing jobs…
Oh ye of little faith. We’re going to have a green economy where we all sell arugula to each other. Or something like that.
Oh, and WINGNUT!!!
This is the part you didn’t get. We are evolving into a post-consumer economy. What that means is that we won’t have any stuff that we don’t need anymore. Kinda like the good old days in Romania.
If you don’t like it, you’re a racist.
Doesn’t matter. Nothing the Dems do matters from here on out. Acorn has it covered.
Samizdat (#18), Leftists are without logic unless you would want to describe it as Through The Looking Glass Logic where all rules does not exist & madness is sanity; therefore, the liberals keep listening to the fatally flawed heroes such as Saul Alinsky & Noam Chomsky. Noam Chomsky should stick to pure grammarian enterprises & leave out his political rants, but he has not; as a result, Chomsky is not as good a man as I was taught when I took advanced grammar is college.
29. Teleprompter….”Kinda like the good old days in Romania”….that just reminded me…\
a few months back I was reading 2-3 current books reporting on conditions in Albania between the fall of Communism and collapse into anarchy. This is the quote I was reminded of:
The author’s first person narrative: “I had realized within a few days of arriving in Albania that nothing would ever be done to clean up and rebuild the country, because that was always and would always be ‘someone else’s’ job. No one took any responsibility for anything. Everyone liked to talk politics, but no one would ever actually do anything to change things: to speak of reform, repair, replacement was to have achieved it. The Albanian intelligentsia lived in a cloud of glorious rhetoric in which problems were the fault of others. I disconcerted them most by being concrete.
“‘They are ashamed’, Gabriel had told me about the politicos I had interviewed, ‘because you ask them’ ‘How much will this cost?” and “Where will you get the money?” No one has ever asked them this before and they do not know the answers. This is the Western way and they are not used to it.’” Title: “The Accursed Mountain”
So the liberal aversion to specificity and results is not inherently an American characteristic—it occurs wherever communist/socialist/Marxist ideals are accepted.
I see I needed to close the loop on the reasoning in my final statement. (post 30)
Even though the Albanian said (at the time of the interview) “This is the Western way” (questioning costs and planning work)—it looks we’re getting over that idea and becoming more like the Albania portrayed in the book.
BillJ:
Good article, Ms. Rubin. Try as I might, I cannot see the circular reasoning that C and T will create jobs. Will one of PJ’s many excellent posters please explain this? This is the second time this morning I’ve read such drivel.
A new sector. all the wind related factories have even had layoffs.
The hot sector is the chicago climate Exchange and the Goldman Sachs Carbon trading groups. Swapping carbon and selling indulgences is getting ready to ramp up. Madoff Ponzi schemes will be explosive in the intangible carbon tradin mess. Where do we actually see a rail car load of CO2 on the way to underground storage? This will be impossible to monitor. At least the mortgage fraud bubble had some back up paperwork and houses. Carbon trading will be imaginary.
No one will know if an opium field in Columbia has had its carbon offsets sold 20 times.
I “hope” all you fools who voted for Obama are enjoying the bread line. The “change” will come when the government starts taxing the bread. Enjoy!
So the liberal aversion to specificity and results is not inherently an American characteristic—it occurs wherever communist/socialist/Marxist ideals are accepted.
Ah yes, the aversion to specificity and results is exactly why so many people become more conservative as they get older…and grow up. Non-specific people make lousy leaders.
In case I have not said it before, Meryl, I look forward to your comments.
Sebastian at 31,
My point exactly. They cling to Keynes because he provides “theory” for their world view. The fact that he, Marx, Kruggman, Chomsky, Galbraith and the other left economists are demonstrably wrong is of no moment because the MSM doesn’t understand economics and is conditioned by their liberal arts education to demonize the economic system.
They don’t understand that if the economy was set up favorably to growth, they could reap the tax revenues for their socialist policies. Instead they attempt to regulate and kill the goose that lays the golden eggs. It makes no sense, and shows incredible lack of foresight. The American people remember prosperity and will not put up with the crowd that created this for long. They already got rid of the spend thrift Republicans; the liberals will be next.
Waiting for the inevitable lefty ad hominem attack.
PS: I had a good laugh at Chip Reed and Helen Thomas at the presser with Gibbs attacking the administration for pre setting the town halls on health care with preselected questions and planted people. What fools they are. They got the guy elected, never publicly questioned his past associations or world view, and act surprised at marketing fraud and duplicity when it is thrown in front of them. They are to be mocked and have no credibility.
You’re looking at it the wrong way. The question you need to be asking is do they have any idea what causes jobs?
When you don’t know diddly from squat, its all magic. And if it’s magic, you can posit any causal relationship you want. So cap’n tax will cause jobs. Yes, we can. QED.
Something like that,,,,,,,
It appears you are overlooking a key part of the Obama Magic program, the concept of “saved” jobs. Gibbs and Pelosi have the exact number, a number calculated by the same staff that stuffs ballot boxes in Chicago, of jobs “saved,” but I’m betting the number is about 3.5 million jobs. So, while a million folks have actually become unemployed, i.e., lost a job, 3.5 million folks who would have become unemployed under the evil Bush had their job saved through the divine intervention of the Kenyan. Subtract the two numbers and 2.5 million folks are employed by the blessings of Obama.
These are hard numbers, people, so let’s give credit where credit is due.
Obama’s ill-advised $700B+ “stimulus” program is a train-wreck: these jobs figures are far worse than the ones the White House warned us about if we DIDN’T pass the bill- so it was passed, and then unemployment soars anyway?
Instead of creating jobs, interest rates were bumped up, the dollar slid… and it didn’t help anybody get work. Much of this is due to the fact that Obama’s radical agenda has mortified almost every machine of job-and-growth creation in the country.
The One couldn’t deliver the type of “temporary, targeted, and timely” bill that he promised repeatedly- Regardless of his image in the MSM as omnipotent, Obama simply lacks the the political stature to control Pelosi and Reid… who hit the trough hard, while bickering like children.
And the lack of GOP co-conspirators exposed Obama politically… this legislation now looks to be a HUGE gamble. When all this pork-n-welfare fails to generate any real economic gains, the Democrats will face a bloodbath in 2010.
It is laughable to think of Dems as job creators other than Govt. jobs. The entire funding mechanism of their party is anti-business. I would say labor unions, trial lawyers and environmental groups are what make up 80% of the campaign funds that go to Dem candidates.
And then you have Chuck U. Shumer complaining about the Chamber of Commerce not giving to Democrat candidates. The C of C giving to Dems would be like devout christians giving to the ACLU.
All I know is that when 2010 comes, everybody needs to be shouting from the rooftops, Bush and the Repubs had 6 good years of economic growth UNTIL the dems took over in his last 2 years. If the Repubs don’t pound this over and over any venue they can, the MSM will bury it all. Mostly all people care about is their money and they didn’t seem to realize that all these vague world problems “supposed fixes” were going to be paid for by them. Amazingly most people don’t realize government money is actually their own money one way or the other.
Yeah,TexEd,and if President Os keeps saving jobs,every person in American will be unemployed who doesn’t work for the government.
The economy will not “recover” because thanks to the Alleged Hawaiian’s policies, (not to mention the DemoCongress’), there is no way for the economy to return to what it was.
With Federal control of corporations, rewriting bond laws, cap and trade eco-hogwash, and raising income taxes, an economy like we enjoyed from 2002-2006 will simply not be possible anymore.
The whole thrust of the fellow who claims to have been born in Hawaii is to FORCE this economy into a more socialist model. He’s “pushing on a rope”, though, and rather than become the “new Sweden”, all he’s really going to accomplish is a tangled mess for someone else to undo…with a chainsaw.
And Meryl,a guess econony and a guesswhat government. It’s only trillions of dollars. It’s only liberty and tyranny.
Oh ye of little faith. I can multiply fishes and loaves; of course I can multiply jobs and dollars. In fact, I’m going to be the only game in town.
And John Galt, I’m going to find your ass, and make you work.
42.Conservative Mom
“Amazingly most people don’t realize government money is actually their own money one way or the other.”
Absolutely.
The government doesn’t have any money. That’s why they keep taking ours.
Why do you belive in a “bloodbath” in 2010?
With Acorn getting twenty billion stimulus
dollars,they will provide enough dem-votes to
break the republicrates for good.
What’s the point in creating jobs if they get filled with foreigners? And why limit the discussion to jobs? Doesn’t anyone realize that millions of American businesses were destroyed thanks to the deliberate mass importation of foreigners?
Hey, good news, I hear they’re waterboarding protesters in Iran. Given that we’re the experts in that, I’m sure there are jobs to be had.
It’s noble work, right? And besides, it’s not torture. It’s . . . oh, how did Ann Coulter put it . . . “No worse than a fraternity hazing” . . . or Hannity who says, “Big deal, they get their face pushed in some water . . . I’ll do it for charity” . . . not.
Thank god those Iranian protesters aren’t suffering.
David Thompson, I agree with you somewhat. This (and all liberals in the past few decades) is the rule of elites over the benighted, ignorant, racist, selfish masses. They can never, therefore, just “leave us alone” unless we make them. We know how to do that–vote conservatives (Most Republicans and some certain Democrats)into power.
It should be obvious that conservatism wants government to leave us alone since it wants small unintrusive government. Liberalism, by contrast, wants big government that ipso facto is intrusive and dictatorial.
sheesh, would you mind actually saying something relevant to the conversation? Anyway, we should pray the Democrats aren’t stupid enough to blatantly steal an election, like say the Iranian mullahs did. Because if they do, there will be rioting in the streets, except here the rioters have the guns. What are they going to do, sick the Marines on US citizens? You couldn’t get enough US military personnel to follow such an order.
Since we’re the experts on holy waterboarding, let’s do the trolls. I could provide instruction on something else that I’m famous for, but I think the troll could probably give me some tips on how that is done.
Sorry Mythbuster, they won’t riot in the streets. The election was blatantly stolen in the Washington state gubernatorial race. The Republican won, but it was close and they recounted the votes until they found, miraculously, enough votes in a previously unremarked box in a warehouse in a strongly Democratic district in Seattle. And in Minnesota they kept counting until they found enough new votes in Democratic precincts. They tried it for the first time in 2000 but the Supreme Court stopped it. And hell, they’ve had the dead voting in Chicago for generations now.
I suspect that the strategy going forward will be for Democrats to target close contests in traditionally Republican districts and force recounts until they get the right number. I’m sure the billions of stimulus money going to ACORN will enable whole lot of that. And I don’t expect any rebellion over it. The absolute sadness is that the liberals will be able to justify it to themselves as an ends and means thing where they are doing the good work preventing bad people from taking office. People will object, in the blogs, in letters to the editor that won’t be printed, but no one will become a Wolverine. Soft despotism is strangling what’s left of the republic.
“However, this *IS* his plan.”
I agree, but how can we start calling this conspiracy what it is in a way that doesn’t make us sound like “conspiracy theorists?”
People have become so complacent that they honestly don’t believe such a thing could really happen. Then again, neither did the Germans in the 30s…
Prediction: More jobs will appear in the economy about one year before the next election – 2010. Even more jobs will appear in the economy just before the next presidential election – 2012. That is how long it takes to create jobs in the political economy.
However, the political system will not be able to control inflation as well. Therefore, the jobs will be well-paying by today’s standards, but will have the purchasing power of available during the Roman Military Anarchy – constantly approaching zero. People will be confused because they are beginning to work again, but cannot seem to live comfortably. It will be the time of the Next American Revolution – the people will finally control the government, but the government will not be able to control itself. There will be a decline into tyranny and no one will really be able to explain how we got there, except “It was Bush’s fault.”
Well…as things spiral downward the next couple few years, and more and more “porkulus” gets thrown at the windmill by our President Quixote (good one, Morry)…(oh, and would that be like more s**t hitting the fan?) reality may just begin to sink in (don’t quote me on that!) and
maybe, just maybe, after the talk of “malaise” and “stagflation” gets repeated a few times…
Maybe a national awakening to a SUCCESSFUL businessman who has actually KNOWS how to FIX things might begin to take shape…
Who am I referring to?
Mitt Romney, of course.
Interesting to look back and see what we had to go through before we finally elected Reagan in 1980. Reagan lost the nomination in ’76 after a hard fought race…as the “powers that be” in the GOP felt Ford was the man, seeing as he was a sitting President after all, if not ever actually elected. Not much difference with McCain, seeing as how he was a sitting senior (in every sense of the word!) Senator.
Could ANOTHER incumbent Democratic President actually LOSE?
You betcha! (to borrow a phrase.)
History can repeat itself here, folks. I’m just sayin’…keep buckled up, cause it will be a rough ride the next 3 years!!!
You misunderstand. She was talking about her favorite CEO/constituent. As long as Apple is happy, nothing else matters.
I work for the Army at a large western base. Yesterday I was talking to a Captain about the damage Obama is causing to our economy and freedom. I asked him if and when things really break down, who would the Army side with. He said the Army understands these are Constitutional issues, and that the Army will side with the Constitution. (like the Honduran military). If the Supreme Teleprompter thinks he can count on the US military to suppress rebellion, he’d better get a contract with Hezbollah, ’cause the Army/Marines/Navy/Air Force won’t play.
59.Fairbanks 99
Appreciate your comments and truly hope that is the military’s perspective re the Constitution.
Since our Congressmen and women don’t seem to give a rip about the Constitution of the United States, it’s encouraging to hear that our armed forces still do.
I am Overly Observably Concerned with this jobs report.
But I promise you 15 percent is my limit.
-Barry H. Obama.
Samizdat#18 Encore une bonne idee!!! My family has also decided not to spend one thin “discretionary” dime. We live in temperate zone and can turn off heating and layer a few more clothes We have space for a kitchen garden. This is NOT the result of financial constraints but a determination not to put cash into an economy that is being deliberately sabotaged by this un-American administration
Thank you Fairbanks99 for one tiny sliver of comfort!
She meant to say was “Government jobs, government jobs, government jobs, and government jobs.” Some temporary ones too, like road & bridge, etc. Create a job here and there, lose a hundreds or hundreds of thousands elsewhere.
If they really cared, which they don’t, they should read “Meltdown: A Free-Market Look at Why the Stock Market Collapsed, the Economy Tanked, and Government Bailouts Will Make Things Worse”
by Thomas E. Woods (written by common sense economist and his group who foresaw this mess).
We are creating jobs. lots of jobs. They also are not green jobs. They are unfortunately created in India. IBM just put on 7,500 there. We are friends in a global way aren’t we?
*Sigh*
Many of us saw this coming. Of course people were like, “We Need to do SOMETHING.” (Back in Bush)
“Give him a chance.” (Obama)
What are they going to say now? Especially as we see the jobs die left right and center?
Probably, “We should have let him do more!”
*Groans*
#59 Fairbanks99 – Of course the Cpt. said that. Anyone who has ever served in the military knows that. No military man wants to see us turn into a banana republic.
59. Fairbanks99:
I work for the Army at a large western base. Yesterday I was talking to a Captain about the damage Obama is causing to our economy and freedom. I asked him if and when things really break down, who would the Army side with. He said the Army understands these are Constitutional issues, and that the Army will side with the Constitution. (like the Honduran military). If the Supreme Teleprompter thinks he can count on the US military to suppress rebellion, he’d better get a contract with Hezbollah, ’cause the Army/Marines/Navy/Air Force won’t play.
~~~~~
his high and mightiness knows that. That’s why he wants to defund the military and has already passed legislation to start the organization of an “equal in power and armament to the military” that is loyal to HIM.
It sounds like you’re responding to three different topics all at once. Huh?
Sheesh,
I notice you’re being much less specific. Sure makes it hard to pin you down…but then, why even bother posting to the site?
Crap-and-Trade is dead. With these job loss numbers just announced, it’ll never pass the Senate. The meme, whether you agree or not, that it will cost jobs and raise utility rates, is just too powerful. To vote for it now is to seal your fate in the next election.
These pols cannot read bills, but they can read polls. Obama’s going quickly into decline. There’s no more political cover there. (Shoot, he’s even lost Helen Thomas! Hilarious! Major Garrett and Helen Thomas made strange bedfellows.)
When have democrats EVER cared about making jobs?? I can’t for the life of me believe that anyone, anywhere, ever thought that stimulus or energy-tax would create jobs. I assumed everyone knew the dems were just winking when they said that, knowing we all know they really just want more power, which is best achieved over poor people.
Our new administration is in such a rush to pass everything and anything witout clear understanding of the destruction of the American economy. Our President does NOT hold open town halls but scripted events that explain nothing. Time to kick the bums out of Congress starting with the leadership. No more!
Two observations from reading here:
1. I wonder if Democrats really see Pelosi as being “successful.” How she continues in her position as Speaker is a mystery to be. However, I am still mystified on how she even became Speaker.
2. I agree with comments about failed dem policies being tried over and over again, over the years. If an individual does the same thing over and over expecting different results, we call them insane. What do we call it when the insanity jumps from person to person and generation to generation? How about “mental illness” distributed in tainted kool-aid by anti-Americans.
It is a devastating disease which has become a real pandemic. There is only one treatment I know of that can effectively defeat this sort of disease … and it isn’t through common suffering.
Pelosi: You ungrateful lot, conveniently ignore the jobs the stimulus has saved. Without me saving the economy, the unemployment rate would at least be 20%. Anyway, I still have another year before the midterm.
Ew!
Who are the Einsteins who voted for 0bama because he was going to be better for the economy???
Did Obama make things worse?
http://hyphenatedamericans.blogspot.com/2009/07/did-obama-make-economy-much-worse.html
#70 Marc Crap-and-Trade is dead. With these job loss numbers just announced, it’ll never pass the Senate. The meme, whether you agree or not, that it will cost jobs and raise utility rates, is just too powerful. To vote for it now is to seal your fate in the next election.
Hope that you are right but I fear the alternative. When a democratic house member was asked why he voted for the bill that he vehemently opposed his response? “I had to, if I didn’t the EPA is going to institute even more draconion measures” Seems Obama doesn’t really need a Congress. He just creates another organization, czar, or shifts the power to the federal reserve (non partisan my ass) EPA. Whatever it takes-he is going to do this.
Some of my lib acquaintences are starting to see it. (don’t call them friends because our thought processes are so divergent, we don’t recognize the english language
64. seven:
“We are creating jobs. lots of jobs . . . They are unfortunately created in India. IBM just put on 7,500 there.”
And who runs IBM?
69. kevinS: . . . “why even bother posting to the site?”
For all the obvious reasons.
“I confess little sympathy for the unemployed zerO voter masses. they wanted to live on “hope-n-change”. they got lots of change.”
Have you heard of schadenfreude, a German word, that means enjoying the misery of others? Well, about everyday, I am reveling in schadenfreude when I hear about another Obama voter losing their job in Obama’s C”hanged” economy.
J-O-B-S is a four letter word to Democrats… except to Biden, who can only count to three.
Marc Malone, I hope you’re right; Cap & Tax should be killed in the Senate. But President Obama will attempt to use his so-called magic words to persuade otherwise. Obama is slowly falling to Earth, yet he seems oblivious to the real world. He wants to be Dictator Obama–not President Obama. The Congress has to stop Obama from crashing the United States into endless debt for his Alinsky Dreams of Socialism. After Obama, the Democrats will be decimated for several years. The damage he will do & has done will take years to repair. 2010 should be a bloodbath for the Democrats…
Obama (I will NOT call him President, until he acts appropriately) and his VENDETTA excuse me AGENDA for America, is to wreak as much havoc upon this nation. Bringing the American Citizens to their collective knees, so he and the duplicitous Congress can cut our heads off, all to make points with the special interest groups that helped to subversively get him into the position he now holds.
Hey Never For Obama, I didn’t vote for him and lost my job because of the massive influx of Illegal Aliens flooding this country, and our Governor and State Legislature coddling the Illegals. This is reprehensible behavior on the part of the California Legislature. This is the first time in 35 years that I do not have a job.
81. Never For Obama:
“I confess little sympathy for the unemployed zerO voter masses. they wanted to live on “hope-n-change”. they got lots of change.”
Have you heard of schadenfreude, a German word, that means enjoying the misery of others? Well, about everyday, I am reveling in schadenfreude when I hear about another Obama voter losing their job in Obama’s C”hanged” economy.
~~~~~~
It is not schadenfreude I feel. It is the resignation of an adult who has tried to teach an obstinate teen about reality, but the teen knowing better, smacks headfirst into it – The adult may be sorry they hurt their head, but callus enough to let them feel the pain so it will make an impression – and hoping THAT will teach the cocky teen that reality bites.
Reality keeps a hard school, and a fool will learn in no other.
I hope the fools will learn in the school of their own making, but I’m not holding my breath. In reality, I have much more concern for the useful idiots than the elitists on the left – I’d like them to have happy and prosperous lives, but that will only happen if they act like an adult and make responsible, and intelligent choices. Their lives won’t get better if they keep making STUPID choices. The left – with their oh-so-smarmy-”compassion”, does nothing but enable the drunk by giving him alcohol, and struts around telling everyone who will listen how “compassionate” they really are.
It’s appropriate that I read and comment on this piece on Independence Day, because Barack Obama and his party don’t want us to be independent of them and their government programs. They promise us jobs, but they really want to decide for us how we will live and what we will earn, pay and keep.
Jobs are not a right. Neither is an education, a home, an income, medical care or any given standard of living. We need to see ourselves as not dependent on anyone or any government program. We need to know how to get along in a world where nobody owes us a living. We need to see opportunities and go for them, whatever the effort required. Basically, the world is a lot like a wilderness in which we must learn to survive, by being responsible for ourselves and when we are blessed by a society that makes that struggle easier, we should give back by building on what we found, by creating families and teaching them to be independent and to give back as others taught us.
Unless we wake up and rededicate ourselves to our independence, not just freedom, we will lose a great inheritance.
One further thought. What does it matter if the Dems continue to rule or get the boot? The Republicans are unlikely to do anything to change the overall direction we are heading. Libertarians aren’t a factor because they would do away with entitlements, and Americans won’t give those up.
Virginia 1634,
Bravo! Pelosi and the President don’t understand John Galt, but you do. Millions of Americans are following the same path. They have pulled back on spending because they see the uncertain conditions the liberals are putting in place and are voting no confidence. The ivory tower elites who know nothing of economics only socialist theory, are totally in control. They literally don’t understand why their political payoffs aren’t making things better. They are going to find out in the next 18 months or so just what the consequences of adherence to Keynesian policy costs.
I have never felt the need to attend a protest and was not able this 4th of July to attend a TEA party in my neck of the woods. I was attending the joyous event of a nephew’s baptism. I, will, however, attend the event I have heard about in Washington, D.C. in September. It will be a wonderful way to celebrate my birthday to be able to rail against this administration with my fellow true Americans. I was never very interested in politics until 2006 when I started to feel the pinch the new democratic majority was putting on my family.