Will Unemployment Increase?

Mark Noonan17 Comments

Lance Roberts over at Zero Hedge thinks so:

Unemployment is potentially set to rise sharply in the coming months.  That is a pretty bold claim on the surface and one that flies in the face of both mainstream economists, and the White House which is about to unveil a new “jobs plan”.

Let’s take a quick look at some numbers:  8, 160, 400, 350, 12 and 5.  There have only been 8 weeks out of last 160 weeks that unemployment claims have been below 400 thousand claims.   In normal circumstances we are worried about recessions when claims are rising above 350 thousand claims.   Furthermore, jobless claims tend to plunge below 350 thousand a week within 12 months after the end of a recession.  Currently we are still holding above 400 thousand claims after more than two full years since the recession statistically ended…

But what about “5”?  He gets to that – the STA Composite Employment Index.  When it gets to “5” or less, it is a solid indicator of a recession.  Right now, it is at “5”.

But even without that, anyone with eyes to see knows that the economy is in bad shape – the mere fact that we’re sitting on 400,000+ plus claims for unemployment week after week after week shows that we are, at best, treading water…and more likely we’re slowly losing ground, in spite of all the new jobs the Bureau of Labor Statistics claims we’re creating (of course, it must be noted that then the BLS says “X” jobs were created in month “Y” it is really no more than a guess…and it will be about a year before we know how many really were created in month “Y”…and if BLS guesses wrong…).  Along with the jobs picture, every metric of economic activity has been pathetic for a “recovery” period…and they are all trending towards worse.  Even when some statistic comes in higher than expected, it is not high enough to indicate a robust economy.

It remains to be seen whether or not Bernanke will print up a bag of money to keep us out of official recession through the 2012 election – I think it would be disastrous, and may not even give us fake “growth”.  But he may try it – the Ruling Class is worried about a political revolution in the United States next year and will pull out all the stops to ensure that Obama is re-elected.  Or, failing that, that the eventual GOPer is wedded to the current system.  These people don’t care if America is going to heck in a handbasket…all they care is that they remain rich and in charge.

Brace yourselves – we’re going to have to deal from now through election day with a bad economy and an exceptionally nasty, political fight.  We will win – and win rather big, I think – but it will take every last ounce of effort we can muster.  As for me, I’m excited about the prospect and looking forward to the battle…it will be honorable, it will be fun and it will change America.

 

Battle for NY-9 Neck and Neck

Mark Noonan2 Comments

Not the sort of news the Democrats want to hear:

A new Republican-commissioned poll showed the race to replace ex-Rep. Anthony Weiner (D) in New York’s 9th district to be a dead heat.

A McLaughlin & Associates poll of 300 likely voters found 42 percent would vote for state Assemblyman David Weprin (D) while 42 percent said they would vote for retired businessman Bob Turner (R).

Sixteen percent of those polled said they were undecided with less than two weeks to go before the Sept. 13 special election. The poll was conducted for Turner’s campaign…

There is a gigantic Democrat registration advantage in the 9th…so that it is even close is astounding.  It probably isn’t helping matters for the Democrats that Weprin hadn’t the foggiest notion of the national debt when asked the other day…proof that Democrats have just put up a loyal hack who will do what he’s told and is expected to easily win a heavily Democrat district.  There is a monumental contempt for the people in this – and it must be kept in mind that this contempt is being shown by Democrat leaders for Democrat voters.  They really do expect that the “D” after Weprin’s name will do the trick.

It’d be nice if Turner wins, but if he even comes within 5 it will amount to a crushing loss for the Democrats…the sort of small indicator which shows that things are going in a very different way.

Best of luck to Turner – let’s give Obama and his Democrats a big scare as they crawl in to 2012.

His Majesty is Not Amused

Mark Noonan4 Comments

Seems like His Majesty, Barry I, isn’t all that happy his speech on jobs was postponed – from Politico:

It seemed like a trivial matter: On Wednesday, House Republicans forced the president to delay his speech to a joint session of Congress by one day.

Who cares? The White House cares. Very much.

“It is a big deal that the House said ‘no’ to the president from our end,” a White House source with intimate knowledge of what took place between the House and the president told me Thursday. “This confirms what we all know: They will do anything in the House to muck us up.”

On Wednesday, the White House staff did not know exactly what President Barack Obama was going to say in his major jobs speech, but it knew exactly where and when he was going to say it…

This is a sign of a floundering White House…they are not only mad about something as trivial as this, but they are letting people know they are mad.  The White House cooked up a plan and, darn it, Congress didn’t meekly go along with it!  The nerve!

Leaving aside the fact that the Congress is not at the beck and call of the President, it speaks volumes about the Obama Administration that they didn’t clear the date in advance with Speaker Boehner.  This shows that they just presume that obedience is automatic…that at the end of the day everyone will defer to The One.  While Obama has lost his luster with the public, it seems that for himself and his closest advisers, the rules of 2008 still apply…and when it is time for the Prophet to speak, everyone else is supposed to tremble and obey.

I’ve got one piece of advice to Obama and his crew – get used to this.  Its not that we disrespect the office of the President, but that we’re not about to follow the Obama script.  Obama is one player among many – certainly an important piece of the puzzle, but in no way does he rule the roost.  And, as an aside, if Obama and his cronies hadn’t so continually insulted us and lied about us, things would be different.

 

 

Applied Liberalism

Mark Noonan28 Comments

Liberal, Democrat governor; liberal, Democrat legislature; tax hikes…and what do you get?  From the Illinois Policy Institute:

In a trend that continues to worsen, more Illinoisans found themselves unemployed in the month of July.

Illinois lost more jobs during the month of July than any other state in the nation, according to the most recent Bureau of Labor Statistics report. After losing 7,200 jobs in June, Illinois lost an additional 24,900 non-farm payroll jobs in July. The report also said Illinois’s unemployment rate climbed to 9.5 percent. This marks the third consecutive month of increases in the unemployment rate.

Illinois started to create jobs as the national economy began to recover. But just when Illinois’s economy seemed to be turning around, lawmakers passed record tax increases in January of this year. Since then, Illinois’s employment numbers have done nothing but decline…

This is entirely unsurprising – in fact, it was predicted in many quarters.  Why on earth should business expand or even remain in Illinois if they are to be taxed higher than elsewhere?  Do you liberals out there really think that higher taxes are just so much water off the business duck’s back?  I mean, seriously – tell us:  did you really expect that things would get better after a tax hike?

Over in Wisconsin the conservative, Republican governor and legislature took the opposite course – and it is paying off in jobs growth.  Anyone want to bet that some of those new, Wisconsin jobs are old, Illinois jobs?  Not like its all that far to move.  This isn’t rocket science – make something more expensive and there will be less of it being used…Illinois made having employees more expensive, so less employees are being used.

As I’ve said before, the dichotomy between the States being governed by liberalism and those by conservatism will be immensely instructive for a generation of Americans.  In practical application, the people are seeing the results.  Those States with the most liberalism are doing worse than those States with the most conservatism…and as time goes on, this will merely become more pronounced…and when the next election rolls around, I think we’ll see some startling results in the liberal States.

HAT TIP:  Mish’s

Paved With Good Intentions

Mark Noonan6 Comments

You know the destination – from Strategy Page:

Complaints from the Congo are growing about the U.S. legislation intended to stop illegal mineral sales. The Dodd-Frank bill (also called the Obama Law) has a clause that prohibits the sale of so-called conflict minerals may have been well-intentioned but it was not well-thought out. Rather than run the risk of buying any minerals that might have been smuggled from the Congo, many major mining companies are simply refusing to buy minerals from central Africa. The result is a de facto embargo. There are few buyers for Congo’s valuable minerals, especially tantalum and tungsten which have many hi-tech uses. This has damaged the Congo’s economy, because the nation relies on mineral exports. According to some sources, China, which does not have to meet Dodd-Frank standards, is snapping up many minerals at very cheap prices.

Which, then, will eventually find their way in to products used by Americans because we import so much from China…and there is no way to separate out that bit of mineral inside your electronic gadget which was obtained in the Congo.  We have very much shot ourselves in the foot…as well as shot the poor people of the Congo, while at the same time given even more power and wealth to our enemies in China.  Good job, well-intentioned sob-sisters.

God gave us reason and He expect us to use it.  In a rather confusing world where there is always conflict, we are supposed to thread our way carefully.  Before we take a step we should be thinking about what may come after – will it have the effect we want?  If it does, will it also have some bad effects?  Will the good effects equal or outweigh the bad?  It is hard to get people to look even an inch in to the future…but it must be done.  If we go off half-cocked an allow emotion to rule our decisions, then we are bound to get it wrong…emotions have their place, but only as a spur to action…the action, itself, must always be in accord with the best reason we can muster.

We want to ensure that evil people do not profit off the sweat of poor, working people.  That is an admirable goal…a completely Christian goal.  But before we take an action designed to thwart evil we’d better be sure that it (a) thwarts evil and (b) doesn’t cause even more problems for the poor people we’re trying to help.  Some poor man in the Congo who breaks his back mining the goods of the earth deserves first priority on the benefit of those goods…how are we to get the benefit to him?  By cutting him off?  By making his primary customer the People’s Republic of China?  Come on, think clearly!

Perhaps instead of cutting off the Congolese mineral exports to the United States we should, instead, have put a tariff on it and plowed the proceeds back into to efforts to improve the lot of the miners?  Give them some schools and hospitals?  Just an idea…something to think about; and thinking is what we most need in the world…and it is what we have so little of these days.

I realize that thinking can be hard work – I further realize that the more we think, the less liberalism we’ll have.  This is why liberals are so opposed to thought and so insistent upon adherence to a party line.  Start thinking about what we want and what steps might get us there and all of a sudden there’s not much room for appeals to raw emotions which lead to stupid, counter-productive policies.  And just where would liberalism be then?  But I do believe it is a risk worth taking – we can become a rational world again.  We can recover the traditions of the Judeo-Christian West and start to think, and apply human reason to the problems of human life.  It has been done in the past, and it can be done again…just takes a little bit of courage.

Another Obama Business Dies

Mark Noonan9 Comments

If Obama lauds it, it will die – from NBC Bay Area:

Solyndra, a major manufacturer of solar technology in Fremont, has shut its doors, according to employees at the campus…

…Solyndra was touted by the Obama administration as a prime example of how green technology could deliver jobs. The President visited the facility in May of last year and said  “it is just a testament to American ingenuity and dynamism and the fact that we continue to have the best universities in the world, the best technology in the world, and most importantly the best workers in the world. And you guys all represent that. ”

The federal government offered $535 million in low cost loan guarantees from the Department of Energy. NBC Bay Area has contacted the White House asking for a statement…

Government can’t deliver jobs – it can’t even pick which company will be solvent a year later.  The only proper role of government in the economy is as a facilitator of a honest and free market…after that, it is up to the people to decide what works and what doesn’t.  Maybe Solyndra’s technology will eventually catch on or maybe it will remain a white elephant…but there is no way for government to know, and any attempt by government to make it work only ensures it will fail…because if you subsidize something, you’re just going to ensure that it never developes enough strength to make it on its own.

Please learn the lesson, liberals…you can’t control the market.  Sure, you can make certain that everyone is being honest; sure you can make the paths of the inventor, manufacturer, investor and consumer smooth…but you can’t choose the path and you can’t force people on to it.  Leave it alone – it will all be ok; it happens all of its own accord, if you just leave it alone.

Global Warming Hoax Update

Mark Noonan8 Comments

From Investors Business Daily:

Experiments performed by a European nuclear research group indicate that the sun, not man, determines Earth’s temperature. Somewhere, Al Gore just shuddered as an unseasonably cool breeze blows by.

The results from an experiment to mimic Earth’s atmosphere by CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, tell researchers that the sun has a significant effect on our planet’s temperature. Its magnetic field acts as a gateway for cosmic rays, which play a large role in cloud formation.

Consequently, when the sun’s magnetic field allows cosmic rays to seed cloud cover, temperatures are cooler. When it restricts cloud formation by deflecting cosmic rays away from Earth, temperatures go up…

Who woulda thunk it?  That big, bright, hot yellow thing in the sky is responsible for the temperature?  I’m telling you, this is the shock of all shocks…to think that for years we’ve been thinking it was driving cars which determined temperature!  How did our brave men of science like Al Gore miss this?  How are we going to save the polar bears, now?  For crying out loud, the Goron is quite a potentate, but I don’t know if even he can turn off the sun…

Democrats Go Even Lower in the Gutter

Mark Noonan10 Comments

From Politico:

A top lawmaker in the Congressional Black Caucus says tea partiers on Capitol Hill would like to see African-Americans hanging from trees and accuses the movement of wishing for a return to the Jim Crow era.

Rep. Andre Carson, a Democrat from Indiana who serves as the CBC’s chief vote counter, said at a CBC event in Miami that some in Congress would “love to see us as second-class citizens” and “some of them in Congress right now of this tea party movement would love to see you and me … hanging on a tree.”…

Any liberal, any Democrat, who has a shred of decency would repudiate these disgusting statements and call on Carson to resign – he has proven himself unfit to serve in the United States Congress.  Enough is enough – I am thoroughly sick and tired of this slander of the TEA Party.  It is an outright, bald-faced lie to state that there are any racists or racism in the TEA Party.  I’ve been to the TEA Party rallies, I’ve met the people attending and never once did I ever detect even a hint of racial animosity.  The people who make up the TEA Party come from all walks of American life – including minorities – and their sole desire is to restore American greatness so that all Americans can have a nation to be proud of and a future of liberty and prosperity.

Standing firm for basic decency, Allen West has advised the head of the Congressional Black Caucus that he’d better condemn these and other slanderous remarks or West will resign from the CBC.  I say that there has to be more – there has to be a demand that Carson resign, and if he won’t resign the CBC must work for his defeat next year.  It is what we Republicans would do if we found a Republican making such statements and it is the least the Congressional Black Caucus can do.  And it is a matter of doing this or being forever known as a collection of corrupt, hate-filled hacks who use fear and slander to gain personal power and wealth.  The choice lies before the CBC – decency or depravity.  Let the tree be known by its fruit.

 

Is Tolerance an End, or a Means?

Mark Noonan27 Comments

Lots of continuing commentary going on in the blogosphere, especially the Catholic part of it, regarding the Accepting Abundance “public morality” post we discussed here yesterday.  Over at Little Catholic Bubble, Leila posted an interesting quote:

We need to remember that tolerance is not a Christian virtue. Charity, justice, mercy, prudence, honesty — these are Christian virtues. And obviously, in a diverse community, tolerance is an important working principle. But it’s never an end itself. In fact, tolerating grave evil within a society is itself a form of serious evil. – Archbishop Chaput

The left long ago learned the trick of using a nice-sounding word to cover a wicked agenda.  The key is to find a word that is hard to argue against, claim that the word covers some desired, liberal goal and then say anyone who opposes this goal is opposed to the nice-sounding word.  “Tolerance” is one of those words being misused – like using “choice” for abortion; if you are opposed to abortion you are not opposed to murdering babies, you are opposed to people choosing, you see?  These days, the left uses the word “tolerance” as the nice-sounding word to cover the concept of homosexuality being morally the same as heterosexuality.

Just as the left would never get anywhere advocating for baby killing, so they wouldn’t get anywhere trying to convince common-sense people that gay and straight sex are morally the same…so, “choice” instead of “baby killing” and “tolerance” instead of “gay same as straight”.  And if you oppose the concept of homosexuality being morally the same as heterosexuality, then you are being intolerant…even though you’ve never said anything against gay people and, indeed, strongly advocate that every sign of unjust discrimination against them be removed (as all believing Catholics, for instance, hold).

We need to scrape away the lies which have grown up in our society -the various words and phrases the left has twisted to cover the bad and unpopular things they wish to impose on us.  Tolerance is a means, not an end – it is something we do because we wish to live in a peaceful, civil society…but it must not and cannot mean approval.  I am not being intolerant when I say that homosexual sex is inherently disordered…I am merely stating the truth as I understand it.  If the left wants to persist in using that word, then we have to force them to use it properly…and right now, if “tolerance” is the goal, then they’ve won…gay people are broadly tolerated in the American populace and none but a few kooks would dream of putting the slightest legal disability upon homosexuals (good to keep in mind, liberals, that I and plenty of other conservative Christians are, for instance, not opposed to openly gay people serving in the military…and until you went and tried to judicially impose gay marriage, most of us were in favor of some sort of civil union legislation). But that is as far as we can go – to go beyond that, especially for a Christian, is impossible.  We can’t say that what is wrong is right – we are, indeed, supposed to die rather than do any such thing.

Let us start having debates without lies – no more code words, twisted phrases or rhetorical misdirection.  Words mean what they mean, and we should use them as they were intended.  Truth is not subjective – what is right is not dependent upon the ideological viewpoint of the individual.  There is a truth to adhere to – to discover as best we can and then attempt to apply it as best we can in our lives.  To do otherwise is to sink in to a morass of dishonesty where reason cannot exist…and to play the liberals game of undermining us by the clever tricks of the propagandist.

Obamunism! Killing Green Jobs

Mark Noonan5 Comments

From Investor’s Business Daily:

President Obama’s green jobs agenda has become a victim of its own red tape. Several internal reports show that state-level projects have stalled for years due to federal regulations favored by labor and green groups — big boosters of the green jobs push…

This is what you get when you attempt a Big Government solution – parts of the Big Government will work against other parts of it.  Remember, it is only average Americans who want jobs…for the union officials, government bureaucrats and liberal activist groups, the agenda is quite different.  The unions, naturally, want to ensure that all the money only goes to union-approved (and thus over-priced) contractors.  Government bureaucrats want to ensure that the money only goes to contractors who donate the right way.  Liberal pressure groups – in this case, environmentalists – want to ensure that they get a cut of the pie, even if they bring nothing to the table.

The thing we can never get our liberals to understand is that government can never get it right.  Even in the areas where government is supposed to have the authority (law enforcement and national defense) the government gets it wrong.  For all the splendid people in the military and law enforcement, which of us couldn’t in five minutes search find a score of examples of corruption and incompetence in both areas?  And the people in the military and law enforcement are leavened by a those who actually have a selfless dedication to duty…for government agencies without that esprit d’corps, it becomes one gigantic mess.  Think about it – in the Army you’ll find a large number of people who will leap on a grenade to save their friends…how many people at the Department of Energy do you think would do that?  And so how many people at Energy are really willing to sacrifice their own careers in order to advance the the prosperity of those they don’t know and will never meet?

When you put government in charge of trying to make things work you are putting the job in the hands of people who are most likely to fail.  They are not spending their own money, they are not going to put their own future on the line…their prime motivation is to ensure the least amount of work for the highest amount of pay, ending up with a fat pension when they are still relatively young.  That anyone ever thought that the government could lead the way in switching us to a “green” economy demonstrates that we’ll never lack for stupidity.

Scrap it; provide tax incentives to those private enterprises who are investing in green technology and just let the natural development of the economy take it the rest of the way.  There won’t be anything in there to provide fat contracts, cushy jobs and opportunities for graft, but we’ll eventually get a green economy…