This from New York:

New York state faces a $1 billion cash shortage in June, budget director Robert Megna told reporters today.

The state is considering all options to deal with the shortage, including borrowing, Megna said.

“We are significantly underfunded in the first week of June,” Megna said.

If retail sales are up – and the experts say they are – then where are the sales tax revenues? If employment is picking up, then where are the income tax revenues? If the economy is improving, then where is the decline in government expenditures as people start looking after themselves?

The only way to think this economy is ok is not just to think that employment is a lagging indicator, but that everything other than the stock market is a lagging indicator. Other than this absurd, sucker rally – which is already past it’s prime and Lord only knows what is keeping it afloat – there isn’t a single indicator out there telling us that we’ve turned the economic corner.

Over at Gay Patriot. I made a prediction last year that we’d win 25-30 seats and I’ll stick with that – don’t want anyone out there getting cocky, ya dig?

But it is a good year to be a Republican.

Interesting:

Right now, the race is close: according to a Democratic source, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has conducted an internal poll showing Case at 32%, Djou at 32%, Hanabusa at 27%, and 9% undecided.

The race is winner-take-all – so, with the Donks split, Republican Djou could win with 40% or so of the vote. Here is his website. If you live in Hawaii – get out there and help. If not, then donate.

It is not absolutely crucial that we win, but this would be quite a feather in our cap as we head forward in 2010. Democrats would tout a victory as proof that they aren’t toast – in spite of the fact that a victory would amount to holding one of their own in a very blue area of the country. A GOP win helps us to keep our fervor and momentum at a high pitch.

Victor Davis Hanson lists some possibilities:

So as the U.S. completes its metamorphosis into a much larger version of the EU, we should expect to see something of the following:

Karzai or Allawi will look more to Iran, which will soon become the regional and nuclear hegemon of the Middle East.

Eastern Europe and the former Soviet republics had better mend fences with Russia.

The EU should finally start on that much-ballyhooed all-European response force.

Taiwan, the Philippines, and South Korea should strengthen ties with China.

Buffer states in South America had better make amends with a dictatorial, armed, and aggressive Chavez.

Israel should accept that the U.S. no longer will provide support for it at the UN, chide the Arab states to cool their anti-Israeli proclamations, remind the Europeans not to overdo their popular anti-Israeli rhetoric, or warn radical Palestinians not to start another intifada. (In other words, it’s open season to say or do anything one wishes with Israel.)

As for bankrupt, wannabe national defaulters, don’t worry — we are rapidly catching up, and have neither the credibility nor the desire to lecture you about artificial constructs like “debt,” “bonds,” “trust,” and other archaic financial euphemisms manipulated to protect the international capital of an overseer class.

Sowing a new crop takes a while, but the sprouting has begun and the bitter, 1979-like harvests will soon be upon us.

Which sounds about right – welcome back, Carter, indeed.

The one error we conservatives must not fall in to is to think of this as some sort of deliberate attempt by Obama to wreck the United States or run the world up on the rocks. It does risk both these things, but that doesn’t mean it is what Obama intends.

Always keep in mind just what sort of person Obama is – the product of elite, liberal education. Because of this, Obama believes that the source of conflict is not in evil men doing wicked things, but in misunderstandings – mostly on our part. If we would just reach out to our enemies – who are not really enemies, just misunderstood people – then we can usher in a new era of peace and cooperation.

Don’t get hung up on how monumentally stupid such a world view is – liberals have a way of completely insulating themselves from reality. It doesn’t matter what actually happens – to this day, Jimmy Carter doesn’t believe he was an utter failure as President. If anything was wrong, it was with us – people too stupid to see what a wonderful job he was doing. Iran could nuke Tel Aviv and Obama simply will not admit that his policies have failed – he’d blame Bush and pledge to press for Iran to not nuke Tel Aviv a second time, all the while asserting that the key to peace is nuclear disarmament and adherence to the non-proliferation treaty.

Our task – as patriots – is to back our President up in whatever firm policies he does undertake (thus our strong support for the campaign in Afghanistan) and for the rest of it, just pray that nothing really bad happens while Obama is in office. This is part of the price of defeat, fellow conservatives – we lost in 2008, and part of what we’re going to have to endure is a foreign policy completely divorced from reality.

UPDATE – Breaking News: President of Poland, senior Polish leaders killed in plane crash.

UPDATE II: Pajamas Media has a round up.

Seems that Ohio Democrats would rather become Republicans.

43% strongly disapprove of President Obama’s performance. This is becoming rather consistent in the Rasmussen survey. Its going to be hard for Obama to climb out, and as long as he’s down there, he’s a drag on all Democrats.

Liberal love and tolerance: NJ teacher wishes Gov. Christie’s death.

In more “booming economy news”, Wal-Mart is aggressively cutting prices to reverse a sales slump. But, but, but…they said that retail sales are increasing. How can the experts be wrong, again?

Mish reports:

Florida remains ground zero of the housing bust with an amazing 19.39% delinquency rate. The Tampa Bay area has a delinquency rate of 17%.

The St. Petersburg Times has the details in Nearly 17 percent of Tampa homeowners three months behind on mortgage.

Nearly 17 percent of Tampa Bay homeowners haven’t paid their mortgages for at least three months.

The February report by First American CoreLogic shows mortgage delinquencies rising steadily for more than a year. From February 2009 to February 2010, delinquencies increased from 10.84 percent to 16.96 percent of all residential mortgages, making mincemeat of such government anti-foreclosure measures as Making Home Affordable.

Florida’s 90-day delinquency rate was even worse at 19.39 percent. The U.S. rate was 8.78 percent.

This might not be strictly related to the economy – it could be a sign that Floridians are just bailing out on their “underwater” home loans. It would make sense: walking away is probably something which starts small, and then builds. As people see their neighbors giving up on underwater mortgages, it becomes more likely that they’ll do it, too, as whatever stigma is attached fades away.

I’m going to be watching things with care out here in Nevada – a lot of ARMs come due in the second half of 2010. These will be on houses which cannot be refinanced and which cannot be sold to cover the principal. The pressure to just walk away will, I believe, become irresistible. It might already be happening – housing prices continue to drop, which indicates more houses are coming on the market and I’ll bet dollars to donuts it is because of “short sale” actions (where a person puts the house on the market and the bank agrees to accept whatever the house brings).

There is really no easy way out of this – even if the economy really is in recovery, housing prices will not recover fast enough to bring home values back in line with mortgage balances. And if the economy really isn’t improving – and I think its all smoke and mirrors – then we just have a bad situation about to get very much worse.

Wow–I received this neat email today from none other than Joltin’ Joe Biden!

Leo —

Two weeks after it was signed into law, health insurance reform is still the talk of the town.

It’s for a good reason: This was a historic accomplishment. But it wasn’t easy. I remember what it’s like to be a senator and take a tough stand on an issue — confident that it’s the best thing for your constituents, but equally sure that special interests will pour buckets of money into attacking you for it.

Your senators, Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken, took that tough stand when they supported health reform. Now, we need to provide a line of defense money can’t buy: the voices of real constituents speaking out and showing their support.

That’s where you come in. Do you have three minutes to jot down a quick letter to your local newspaper? If you need ideas on what to say, you can watch a quick video Organizing for America put together about how reform will benefit Minnesota.

Click here to get started.

Believe me, senators and their staff read the letters page — because they know just how influential it can be. Your letter could make a tremendous difference.

In my conversations with my old colleagues, I made it clear that this White House was prepared to back them up — that no barrage of partisan attack ads would go unanswered. But to follow through, I’m going to need some help from folks like you.

This legislation will put Americans in control of their own health care, rein in insurance-company abuses, and give millions of Americans access to affordable health care for the first time.

Special interests know that in the coming months, all their lies about reform will be proven false. But that won’t stop them from inventing new ones and spreading attack ads.

It’s just the first step, but one letter from a constituent is worth a hundred paid advertisements. So please make sure your friends and neighbors understand the benefits this law will bring to ordinary Americans — take three minutes and write a paragraph or two now:

http://my.barackobama.com/SenateThank

Thanks,

Vice President Joe Biden

Well, shucks–that was mighty nice of ol’ Joe–I mean–to offer the resources of Organizing for America to write a letter of ‘thanks’ to Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken for their thoughtful consideration in voting for Obamacare! It was so nice, that I thought I would take him up on his offer. So, I wrote the following LTE to the St. Cloud Times, the Star Tribune, and the Duluth Tribune, all on OFA’s dime:

I am writing this letter to voice my disgust over Senators Al Franken and Amy Klobuchar’s blind passage of the behemoth health care bill that is neither about bringing down the cost of health care nor of expanding the coverage of quality health care. Already we are seeing the effects of planned layoffs at corporations who will, by virtue of the mandates of the bill, be required to lay off hundreds of workers, merely to stay in business. This, along with the proposed Value Added Tax (VAT) could not come at a worse time, and will only prolong this, the greatest recession since the 1930s. This bill was ill conceived from the onset, and it is clear that Senators Klobuchar and Franken lacked the integrity to do the right thing and to block the passage to the greatest affront to America’s personal and financial liberties since before the American Revolution.

Rest assured, the voters will long remember this transgression, and Senators Klobuchar and Franken will go down in History in the Hall of One-Term Wonders.

The rumors are out there:

If Barney Frank Is Retiring, We’ll Know Soon

A candidate ending his campaign a little early isn’t always big news, but I find it interesting that Dave Sukoff says he was encouraged by Massachusetts Republicans to run in the state’s 4th District, against Barney Frank, in light of the rumors that Frank is thinking about retiring. Sukoff had been running against Rep. John Tierney in the 6th District.

I would note that if Frank is indeed retiring, we should hear a lot more buzz between now and the May 4 filing deadline. The only other Democrat currently on the ballot is a LaRouchie. Frank is way too loyal a Democrat to leave his party without a strong candidate as his successor, so my guess is we’ll hear about some state legislator getting his campaign set up in the coming weeks.

While beating Frank would be a very hard task, the fact of the matter is that its not impossible in 2010 – certainly, Frank could be given a run for his money. Now, if Frank sticks then he’s got a very hard fight and then might wind up as a mere minority-party back-bencher in 2011. Not a very appealing set of circumstances – and not at all appealing to have the power in GOP hands, which will mean that the machinery of the House will no longer be at his disposal to help cover up his corruption.

Might be better, in Frank’s view, to take a powder and angle for some easy appointment in the Obama Administration. We’ll have to see.

But, never fear, the “experts” are convinced that we are in a sustained recovery period and all will be well:

With unemployment still at a severe high, a majority of states have drained their jobless benefit funds, forcing them to borrow billions from the federal government to help out-of-work Americans.

A total of 33 states and the Virgin Islands have depleted their funds and borrowed more than $38.7 billion to provide a safety net, according to a report released Thursday by the National Employment Law Project. Four others are at the brink of insolvency.

One thing, though: weren’t the experts now telling us all is well once telling us that all was well, just before the crash?

The man sells out his own values, and apparently has no ability to defend his action and is now taking the easy way out.

Michigan Rep. Bart Stupak, the congressman who led anti-abortion rights Democrats in the House during health care negotiations, will retire this year, CBS News has learned. He is expected to announce his plans later this morning.

Had Stupak sought re-election, he would have faced challengers from both the left and the right backed by interest groups angered by Stupak’s health care vote.

Stupak negotiated with Democratic leaders down to the eleventh hour for stricter abortion language in the health care bill, but he ultimately voted for it after President Obama agreed to sign an executive order assuring the new laws will keep taxpayer dollars from funding abortions.