The perfect answer to rich liberals who say we should raise taxes.

Don’t raise all our taxes – raise yours. Come on, liberals – you think that we should all pay more? Ok, you, first. Money where mouth is, please.

Remember, boys and girls that line from Shakespeare: Treat each man as he deserves and who would ‘scape whipping?

To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you. – C. S. Lewis

Its just something I think important – forgive, forgive and then forgive some more. There’s nothing anyone ever did to you which will matter 100 years from now, so forgive it.

Please note: there are no moderate Islamsits.

Is Mitch Daniels sticking a toe in to the 2012 waters?

Poll: 60% of Japanese firms see negative impact from earthquake/tsunami. The effects of that disaster will be large and long-lasting…don’t believe anyone who says in six months or so Japan will be up and running. It just won’t happen – it can’t happen; the damage and the loss of capital (monetary and human) has just been too large.

Sexism! New study indicates women make 8% more than men. Of course, the whole “pay gap” thing was nonsense from the get-go…when you account for different types of education achievement and length of time in the work force, there never was a pay gap. People get paid the same for the same work, period – it’d be asinine to do it any other way.

Just how good could Republicans do in the Senate in 2012 and 2014? Pretty good, actually.

Obama’s budget speech was really, really lousy.

Well, here ya go – from PJStar.com:

…(Illinois) State government is an employer, too, with approaching 70,000 full- and part-time workers. And from that pool there are currently 25,000 open workers’ comp claims. That’s a breathtaking number. It is impossible to believe all of those are legitimate…

That works out to about 35% of Illinois State workers having a workers’ comp claim. Not only is is impossible to believe that they are all legitimate, it is impossible to believe that most of them aren’t bogus. Military units engaged in battle don’t have that high a casualty rate. But this is what unionized employee pools bring – especially when they are on the taxpayer’s dime. You just build up a huge number of people who will game the system as much as possible – and, of course, unions setting up contracts to they can be gamed in the most brazen manner.

And its not just Illinois, of course. Out here in Las Vegas there is a brewing scandal over the way our firefighters have been milking the system. All sorts of arcane rules were put in to place regarding sick leave, overtime and such – and because of this, at lot of people figured out they could do things like call out sick, have themselves called in while they were “sick” and then get paid over time for working their regular shifts. One firefighter called in sick 42 times, but never four days in a row because that would have required a doctor’s note – in the end, he managed to pile up 232 grand in 2009.

Cities and States are going broke largely because of things like this – bloated payrolls and pensions brought about by unions working out slick deals with bought politicians. In the end, the only way to ensure rational fiscal policies at the State and local level is to either do what Walker did in Wisconsin, or just outsource all the city services, as Sandy Springs, Georgia did – to massive savings and vastly improved services.

It is time to stop this – it is time to stop allowing tiny, corrupt minorities to look the public treasury for personal gain. Outsource, privatize and get rid of the unions.

HAT TIP: Mish’s

From Gallup:

Though majorities of blacks (85%) and Hispanics (54%) continue to approve of the job Barack Obama is doing as president, his ratings among these groups slipped in March and have set or tied new lows. His approval rating among whites, at 39%, remains above where it was in the latter part of 2010…

A year ago Obama was backed by 92% of blacks and 65% of hispanics. To be sure, when election day rolls around we can rely upon it that Obama will win 90%, at least, of the black vote. We can also expect that he will win a good majority of hispanic votes. Unless, by some chance, we put together a Rubio/West ticket. But the key is not what percentage he gets, but how many of each group actually show up on election day. It is looking less and less as if Obama will have the gigantic turnout of 2008 – a lot of people are getting dispirited about Obama.

Fundamentally this is because he lied about himself – he lied about who he is and what he would do. He promised everyone the world and has delivered, at best, only tiny, broken bits of the 2008 program. It is to be hoped that the experience of the Obama years will finally start to open African-American eyes – liberalism is a god that failed. It only speaks about concern for the poor and disadvantaged, it doesn’t actually do anything about them. Look where our liberal leaders mostly live – in gated, guarded communities which are overwhelmingly white; and which are priced out of any chance of most minorities living within 10 miles. Obama was supposed to be different – but he’s not. He’s just another rich, white liberal…he just has a tan.

The opportunity for us is to start an aggressive campaign among America’s minority voters – and come up with a genuine plan to address things such as the persistent, black underclass as well as a comprehensive immigration reform bill which will be both just and merciful (I’m working on such a thing, myself, and will have it out in the next few days). While the Obama magic fades, while liberalism continues to fail, this is our opportunity to permanently change the electoral dynamic in the United States among minority voters.

We daren’t let this opportunity slip – we might not get another chance for a generation.

UPDATE: It could be that Obama just sucks really bad at politics, you know?

“Overseas contingency operations”. “Man-caused disasters”. We should have seen this coming a mile away:

…The president also called for undoing the Bush tax cuts for upper-income taxpayers, and for canceling other tax cuts many of them receive such as the mortgage interest deduction — which he called “spending reductions in the tax code.”…

What that means is “tax increase”. The bizarre world of the left in which not taking your money counts as “government spending” and taking more of your money is a “spending cut”.

The good news is that Obama is just going along with what he’s done for two years: a combination of dishonesty and empty rhetoric. The American people have already tuned this out, so his speech today won’t move the political needle, at all. The ball now comes firmly back in to our court and it is up to us to craft a plan and the tactics necessary to illustrate the bankruptcy of Obama and liberalism. I like my plan best, of course – but the main thing is to think about things and come up with something new. Sure, oppose the tax hike proposal – but don’t just oppose it; figure out a way to throw it right back in their faces.

All in all, there is growing inside me a confidence about 2012 I didn’t feel even a month ago. If there was a time for Obama to really put it back together and prepare a genuine response to us, this was it. He blew it. We’ll still get all the nastiness from the Obama campaign as the campaign season developes, but we won’t be fighting on his terms…he’ll be fighting on our territory and without a map or a battle plan.

The title of this post may sound like so much hyperbole, but what other conclusion can one come to?

The American Principles Project (APP) Wednesday criticized the Obama administration for allowing the elimination of $600 million for Community Health Centers while protecting funding for Planned Parenthood as part of last week’s budget deal agreed to by Congress and the White House.

Touting Planned Parenthood as a key women’s health-care provider, Democrats held firm to their promise not to allow cuts to the nation’s largest abortion provider. Community Health Centers, which do not perform abortions, provide health services to the needy — including mammograms and pre- and post-natal care.

According to the American Principles Project last year Community Health Centers performed 320,000 mammograms while Planned Parenthood did none.

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2011/04/13/white-house-protects-abortion-provider-allows-cuts-to-community-health-centers/#ixzz1JRYVzxjY

Unlike the blatant lie that Planned Parenthood president Cecele Richards told, Planned Parenthood performs no mammograms. Aside from a few ancillary condoms given out, abortion is, by and large, Planned Parenthood’s Business.

Remember, as an Illinois legislator, Obama voted three times AGAINST the Born Alive Protection Act. In other words, Barack Hussein Obama was quite OK letting a live-aborted baby perish on a gurney or in a trash can, rather than offer it life support.

Obama, beyond a shadow of a doubt, is the most pro-abortion, pro-dead-baby President we have ever had. Period.

His latest act of fealty toward the nation’s most prodigious killer of developing human beings, ostensibly in the name of ‘women’s health,’ to the detriment of organizations that actually provide services geared toward women’s health, is added testament to Obama’s ghoulish psyche.

From AFP:

The US budget deficit shot up 15.7 percent in the first six months of fiscal 2011, the Treasury Department said Wednesday as political knives were being sharpened for a new budget battle.

The Treasury reported a deficit of $829 billion for the October-March period, compared with $717 billion a year earlier, as revenue rose a sluggish 6.9 percent as the economic recovery slowly gained pace…

The government argues that this is a reflection of this, that or the other special circumstance which weren’t foreseen when budget projections were made. Yeah, no kidding. Which is why one has to be very careful when reading projections – the only thing which is consistent about government is that, on the whole, more will be spent than projected and revenues won’t grow as fast as expected. The reason for this is that the government likes to lie to us about this. It is much easier, you see, to get the people to swallow another Big Government pill if you say it will only cost so much – when the real bill comes in, its too late…the money is already spent. As for revenues, government always presumes that the economy is a Magic Money Tree and will provide whatever is necessary – and revenue projections never take in to consideration the negative aspect of increased taxes on economic activity (and they also never take in to consideration the positive aspects of reduced taxes).

Ultimately, only a Balanced Budget Amendment will get this permanently under control. But not just any, old amendment – it will have to be carefully crafted it to “idiot-proof” it from Congressional action. In my view, an amendment should have the following provisions:

1. Set total federal spending as a percentage of GDP in the previous fiscal year. So, if we set it at 20% of GDP and last year’s GDP was $14 trillion, then Uncle Sam cannot spend more than $2.8 trillion dollars. The only way federal spending can go up is if GDP goes up.

2. Remove government spending from calculations of GDP – no fair raising government spending to raise the GDP numbers so you can raise government spending some more.

3. Require a 2/3 vote in Congress for raising the debt ceiling.

4. Forbid the sale of US debt to foreign persons, groups or governments; if you can’t borrow it from Americans, it can’t be borrowed.

5. Set statutory limits on the total dollar value of US currency in circulation at any given time. Someone will have to crunch the numbers, but figure it out and then don’t let the Federal Reserve go on a money-printing spree (and, really, this would just be a first step towards returning to the gold standard for currency).

Do that, and Congress will forever lose the power to bankrupt us. There is still gigantic flexibility in there on what to spend money on – there just won’t be the ability to pretend there is an endless supply of money. Congress will have to set priorities. There is still bags of money to spend ($2.8 trillion isn’t chump change, after all) but not enough for what every dimwit in Congress would like to spend it on.

If we don’t do something along these lines, then we’ll just risk being driven in to bankruptcy at some later date, even if we dodge the bullet this time. The genius of America is to put all sorts of limits on what government may do. Our Constitution had many wise provisions to prevent recklessness on the part of government but over 200 years, ways were found around those provisions. This sort of a Balanced Budget Amendment would take what we’ve learned and apply it to government – it will allow we, the people, to once again be one step ahead of the government.

From Judicial Watch via PJ Tatler:

Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, announced today that it has obtained documents from the Obama Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) detailing the agency’s massive taxpayer-funded multimedia campaign designed to promote the Affordable Health Care Act (also known as Obamacare) and other HHS policy initiatives. According to the records obtained by Judicial Watch pursuant to a March 23, 2011, Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (No. 11-608)), the total cost of the campaign, which targets Obama’s electoral coalition, could reach as much as $200 million.

You can be certain that this is going to be defended an expenditure for “public education” or some such nonsense – but the fact of the matter is that government has no business using taxpayer dollars to try to convince any taxpayer of the merits of a program. If Obama wants this done, he should raise campaign funds for it and clearly identify the effort as a partisan attempt to increase support for his signature issue. Doing it this way turns HHS in to an Orwellian “Ministry of Truth” trying to hammer in to the public mind the party line.

And this is precisely the sort of thing we should demand stop, even at the cost of a government shut-down. We have to teach these liberals that government doesn’t belong to them – that they don’t have the right to try and change people’s mind using public money. And this is also the sort of thing we have to remember – and when we get a new President on January 20th, 2013, investigations should be launched in to the Obama Administration to find out just what money was spent on and whether any of it violated federal law.

Glenn Reynolds says we should:

‘If you get shot at, you can have a shot.” That’s the rationale behind Alaska State Representative—and Vietnam veteran—Bob Lynn’s effort to establish a drinking age of 18 for active-duty service members.

It’s an idea that has gotten consideration in other states, and it makes sense. Unfortunately, Mr. Lynn’s proposal would violate the 1984 Federal Uniform Drinking Age Act, costing Alaska federal highway money. This is a battle that Republicans—and fair-minded Democrats—in Congress should join…

That “Uniform Drinking Act” came about because of the efforts of MADD – Mothers Against Drunk Driving (side note, my mother considered herself a charter member of DAMM – Drunks Against Mad Mothers). This was (and is) a national busy-body group which is dedicated to the principal that if even one person is irresponsible, all other people must pay the price. It was all part and parcel with that on-going demand on the part of some that life be made risk-free – and that means freedom-free; we daren’t risk allowing you, 19 year old, to have a drink because if you do you might drink to much and then you might get behind the wheel and then you might hurt yourself or others. The method of enforcement of this law – which could not constitutionally be forced upon the States – was to say that if a State didn’t knuckle under, they’d lose their federal highway funds. Faced with a choice of standing on principal or getting federal swag, State politicians swiftly fell in line.

But it is absurd that an 18 year old can vote in our elections and fight in our wars, but can’t have a drink. Once you are a legal adult you should be able to do all things a legal adult may do – if you can’t, then you are being treated unjustly. Our choices are to either lower the drinking age to 18, or raise the age of adulthood to 21. Either way would be logical and just; pick one or the other, but don’t go for halves.

My view is that to take away the vote from someone who already has it is not really tenable, so might as well make 18 the all-around legal age for everything. Aside from being a simple act of justice, it would also be a blow against all of those who propose to use the heavy club of government to control our behavior. The same logic behind a national 21 law is behind laws trying to limit how much fat we can have in our foods, or whether or not the kids can have a coke at school. If there is one thing I despise it is the sort of person who feels he has to stick his nose in – who proposes to save me from myself. I have a Savior, thanks very much, and don’t need another.

Time for a revival of liberty – including, as necessary, the freedom to be a fool:

The free man owns himself. He can damage himself with either eating or drinking; he can ruin himself with gambling. If he does he is certainly a damn fool, and he might possibly be a damned soul; but if he may not, he is not a free man any more than a dog. – GK Chesterton

From Gallup:

Americans’ optimism about the future direction of the U.S. economy plunged in March for the second month in a row, as the percentage of Americans saying the economy is “getting better” fell to 33% — down from 41% in January. It is also down three points from the 36% of March 2010…

Didn’t everyone get the memo? Obama says we’ve turned the corner and are moving in the right direction. Bernanke says he’s got it all under control and there is still no inflation. CNN says that no matter what happens, hiring will continue to increase. For crying out loud, the economy is just going great…so why are you people so negative?

I guess it could be the fact that our home values continue to drop, wages are still flat, food and fuel prices continue to rise and there are a record number of us on food stamps…that could be playing a role in this silly and unreasonable bout of Depression. Snap out of it, folks; Obama is on the job (‘cept when he’s golfing or on vacation…but don’t mention that, you racist!) and all is well.

HAT TIP: Mish’s