Obamunism! $4 Trillion in New Debt

Mark Noonan11 Comments

From CBS News:

The latest posting by the Treasury Department shows the national debt has now increased $4 trillion on President Obama’s watch

The debt was $10.626 trillion on the day Mr. Obama took office. The latest calculation from Treasury shows the debt has now hit $14.639 trillion

It’s the most rapid increase in the debt under any U.S. president.

The national debt increased $4.9 trillion during the eight-year presidency of George W. Bush. The debt now is rising at a pace to surpass that amount during Mr. Obama’s four-year term…

Obama has been President for 2 years, 7 months and 3 days…I calculate this works out to about $4 billion dollars in new debt each day Obama has been in office.  That is just an incredible figure – and made worse by the fact that all we’ve got for it is money for liberal interest groups.  No real economic growth, no real jobs, no real wealth creation.  Its all been a bust – and a bankrupting bust, in to the bargain.

So, what is the new plan, liberals?  Start piling up $8 billion in debt per day?  Would that work?  You tell us…how much further in to debt do we need to go in order to make liberal economic policy works?  And can you give us a date certain while we’re borrowing that much where we’ll be done and prosperity will result?

2012 can’t get here fast enough…

The Gaddafi-Go-Round

Mark Noonan4 Comments

He’s captured, he’s dead…his sons are captured, they’re not captured…they will give you a tour of Tripoli.  The Right Scoop has links to the television video.

Anyone have the foggiest notion of what is going on in Libya?  I sure as heck don’t….but let’s not count Gaddafi out until he’s strung up somewhere…

I guess it all depends on how much money Gaddafi has…has he enough to buy mercenaries, or buy off part of the  rebels?  I guess we’ll have to sit tight and see.

Obama Weak Against Romney, Perry, Bachmann…and Ron Paul

Mark Noonan9 Comments

Goodness, this is getting rather pathetic for a sitting President – from Gallup:

President Barack Obama is closely matched against each of four possible Republican opponents when registered voters are asked whom they would support if the 2012 presidential election were held today. Mitt Romney leads Obama by two percentage points, 48% to 46%, Rick Perry and Obama are tied at 47%, and Obama edges out Ron Paul and Michele Bachmann by two and four points, respectively.

When you’re going to have to dog fight with Ron Paul to retain the Presidency, you are really dealing with “anyone but Obama” as the prime choice for 2012.  Its getting so that we could nominate a ham sandwich and win.

Exit question:  what does Obama do to change the dynamic?

New Tone Update

Mark Noonan29 Comments

Feel the love – from PJ Tatler:

With all the conviction of a traveling preacher, and a bought and paid for audience, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) made sure her constituents understood that any conversation of a “New Tone” or “Civility” was meant solely for the political right, and would have no bearing on her, nor her devotees.

As Alexis wroter ealier, at a forum in Inglewood, CA, supposedly created to address the ever growing problem of unemployment in California – which is now at 12%, second highest in the Nation (2nd to Nevada at 12.9%) and significantly higher than the nation average – Rep. Waters told those in attendance that she was not afraid of a fight.

“I’m not afraid of anybody,” said Waters. “This is a tough game. You can’t be intimidated. You can’t be frightened. And as far as I’m concerned, the ‘tea party’ can go straight to hell.”…

Geesh, lady, what did the TEA Party ever do to you?  I mean, other than eject you from the House majority and thus lessen the opportunities for personal enrichment?

This is the modern left – pretending they are under fire and using that pretense to justify attacks on everyone who disagrees with them.  A corrupt, dishonest and blind Ruling Class limps to its destruction…

Fearfully, the Democrats Creep Towards 2012

Mark Noonan26 Comments

Clarice Feldman over at The American Thinker neatly captures the mood:

I think sentient Democrats are watching their party’s chances in 2012 slip away, and had they not made such a big deal of claiming all opposition to  Obama was racist in motivation and effect, they would now be urging him to quit and seeking a  new contender for his office.  Like Coleridge’s ancient Mariner, however, they can only stand on deck with that albatross around their neck watching both the White House and the Senate slip from their grasp just as did so many state governorships and the House of Representatives.

In the meantime the Ship of State runs  aground on the shoals of  incompetence,  corruption and laughable idiocy…

Ed Morrissey is also on the same wavelength, writing about the prospect of Obama not seeking a second term.  Farfetched?  Certainly…but it has happened before, most notably in 1968 when President Johnson surrendered to his foes (foreign and domestic) and withdrew from contention.  For Democrats it is the summer of discontent – nothing has gone right, and nothing looks like it will go right…and none of them really know what to do about it.

Some liberals out there, I’m sure, are hoping that the downfall of the Gaddafi regime will give Obama a boost.  It will – but not much, and not for long.  Thing about “leading from behind” is that any attempt to take credit for success looks silly…as if you were afraid to stick your neck out, but them leap to the front, claiming credit when things work out.  Also, if handing us bin Laden’s head on a platter only gave Obama a temporary boost, the downfall of Gaddafi doesn’t look to do more than move the needle for a a day or two (yesterday, Rasmussen had Obama approval/disapproval at 44/55…we’ll watch and see).

It must feel a bit like being in a car driven by a maniac…you want to reach out and grab the wheel, but you’re afraid if you do, the car will crash. All sensible Democrats must realize by now that Obama was massively oversold.  Also, that the concept of spending money to cure a recession/depression leaves much to be desired.  Having now a clearly unfit leader and an economy which can only be fixed by ditching 80 years of liberal politico-economic policy, they are rather boxed in.  They have to stay in the car, they have to let Obama hold the wheel…and they have to defend policies which have clearly failed.  Can’t be fun for them.

Unless there is an unforeseen turn around in our economic picture there is a huge hurdle to Obama being re-elected next year (stories that his personal popularity will trump distaste for his actual policies are asinine…no one will re-elect a likeable failure).  How Democrats will play it remains to be seen…but if by May of next year you start seeing Obama fund raising drying up while Senate Democrats are awash in cash, then you know what has happened:  the party is writing off Obama and trying to keep the GOP below 60 Senators, if not out of the majority.

And, of course, Morrissey could be right – Obama might quit.  About 1000-1 again, but it is a real possibility.  So, too, is a real primary challenge.  It could get mighty interesting next year (we’ll leave the prospect of a GOP split – and still having a GOP victory – for another day).

 

 

Economy Open Thread

Mark Noonan12 Comments

As I write this (8:36 pm EDT, Sunday), the market futures have been swinging from negative to positive and back to negative.  Rumors abound – some saying the Bernanke will print up bags of free money for the banksters, others holding that the end of the Libyan civil war will lower oil prices…but, meanwhile, gold continues its skyrocket towards $1,900.00 an ounce.  So, mixed bag.  Who in heck knows what will happen tomorrow?

Given this mystery, I can’t think of anything particular compelling to write…its all so messed up and so unpredictable that if I wrote something now, then by 9 am in the east, Monday, everything I said might be nonsense.  So, an open thread…watch what happens this glorious Monday…and feel free, even, to comment about non-economic things, if that is what you’d like here.  We’re really just along for the ride, anyways…

The Libyan Revolution

Mark Noonan7 Comments

Hot Air has the best running thread – but it does look like the end has come, and perhaps not just for the regime.  From Twitter:

Mohammed Gaddafi to Al Jazeera: (gun fire got louder here) “I..I… I am being attacked right now..inside, inside my house, inside”

So, now what?  No one knows – I don’t think anyone has anything but the haziest notion of what is going on among the rising power players in Libya.  The vacuum caused by the downfall of a 40+ year regime is bound to be large and difficult to fill.  All sorts of people with motives from noble to base and everywhere in between will be vying for power.  It could get messy.

Mostly we’re just going to have to be spectators – we can try to help (and certainly must help in humanitarian matters), but until at least some sort of nationally recognized authority emerges, there’s no “side” for us to take, as it were.

I would like to pause a moment here and remember – Gaddafi has been in power for most of my life.  He’s been reviled and lauded…hated and admired.  But in all the commentary I’ve ever seen on him, no one has dared to hit the nail on the head…he was merely a corrupt and cruel man who for his own, personal ambition took control of a nation and ran it as a private estate.  Everyone, as far as I can tell, took the man seriously – that he actually had something of an ideal in his mind that he was striving for, even if a mistaken ideal.  No one ever said, “hey, a man who claims he wants justice and murders his opponents, who claims he’s an Moslem purists but buys his arms from an atheist USSR; who claims to be a man of the people but sets his family up in a lavish lifestyle is nothing more than a lying sack of feces.”

This is what bothers be about the world – the way we go along with whatever someone says.  No one is courageous enough to say the emperor has no clothes.  Utter BS draped in rhetoric and aping rationality is treated as the real thing.  It isn’t just Gaddafi…it is all such regimes we’ve seen..starting with Lenin’s Russia, Mussolini’s Italy and Hitler’s Germany.  Here’s the truth about someone like Lenin – he kept a stash of western cash and a fake passport with him while he was ruling Russia, in case he had to make a quick getaway.  People who do evil know full well they are doing evil…they dress up their wickedness in fine words because it works…it hoodwinks people.

Stop being hoodwinked – the next Gaddafi to happen along, treat him as he is…a thief, a murderer, a liar, a philanderer…a complete creep who managed to gain power, and nothing more.

Crony Capitalism

Mark Noonan4 Comments

From Bloomberg:

…Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke’s unprecedented effort to keep the economy from plunging into depression included lending banks and other companies as much as $1.2 trillion of public money, about the same amount U.S. homeowners currently owe on 6.5 million delinquent and foreclosed mortgages. The largest borrower, Morgan Stanley (MS), got as much as $107.3 billion, while Citigroup took $99.5 billion and Bank of America $91.4 billion, according to a Bloomberg News compilation of data obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests, months of litigation and an act of Congress…

Describing it as an effort to stave off depression is being overly generous…though, giving the benefit of the doubt, Bernanke, himself, might have thought that is what he was doing.  The reality is that a bunch of well-connected banks gambled, lost and then were bailed out by the taxpayers.  The whole effort, in reality, was to ensure that those at the top of the financial industry heap didn’t pay the price of their folly…and they managed to get all that money because, as I’ve said, Big Government and Big Corporation are two sides of the same coin…they are run by the same people and have the same basic worldview:  the people are lunch.

We have to ensure that in the future no one ever falls for “too big to fail”.  If a corporation has screwed up, then let it fail.  In this, there is a gigantic issue we Republicans can run on because, right now, Obama and his Democrats are hip deep in this nonsense.  There was no fundamental difference between the bail out of GM and the bail out of Morgan Stanley…both were run by idiots who deserved to lose and both were bailed out because of excellent political connections.

We can tie the whole nauseating mess in to a neat, little package and explain to the American people that the “Bigs” have to go, because both of them are bad.  Thing is – do we have the courage to do it?

Obamunism! Failing America’s Youth

Mark Noonan6 Comments

From the LA Times:

…Call it Generation Vexed — young Americans who are downsizing expectations in the face of an economic future that is anything but certain. Career plans are being altered, marriages put off and dreams shelved.

“You can’t reach for the stars at this point,” Thomas said.

Fewer than half of Americans believe that the current generation will have a better life than the last, according to a Gallup poll this spring. It was the most pessimistic showing for that barometer in nearly three decades.

Another poll, of Americans ages 18 to 29, found that three-quarters of them expect to delay a major life change or purchase because of economic factors…

So, just how is that hopey-changey thing working out for you?

Sorry, liberals, fake money and debt just don’t do it…they allowed us to pretend for a while, but now the piper has to be paid.  We can provide a future for these young people, and those who are children, today…but only if we build and economy based upon hard work, thrift and careful investment.

2012 really can’t get here fast enough.

Sunday Morning Open Thread

Mark Noonan7 Comments

Just haven’t got anything to write about for the AM.  Does it seem to you that we’re kind of waiting on the edge of a precipice?  Like the world is holding it’s breath, waiting for some big event which will clarify and give direction?

We do seem to be in a bit of a bad way…economy faltering, leadership incompetent, enemies strengthening, wars and rebellions in abundance, starvation stalks some lands, disease takes its toll…it is said that grave crisis often throws up the person needed to lead out of it.  One thinks of Lincoln and Churchill and how they were superbly matched to their hour…will we get such?

At any rate, regardless of what happens, remember that all will come out right, in the end.  It isn’t, ultimately, in our hands:

I will give thanks to you, O LORD, with all my heart,
for you have heard the words of my mouth;
in the presence of the angels I will sing your praise;
I will worship at your holy temple.

I will give thanks to your name,
because of your kindness and your truth:
When I called, you answered me;
you built up strength within me.

The LORD is exalted, yet the lowly he sees,
and the proud he knows from afar.
Your kindness, O LORD, endures forever;
forsake not the work of your hands. – Psalm 138:1-2,  2-3, 6, 8

Have a great day!