Blogs For Victory

From CNN:

Saying it is “unfair for Florida taxpayers to subsidize drug addiction,” Gov. Rick Scott on Tuesday signed legislation requiring adults applying for welfare assistance to undergo drug screening…

…Under the law, which takes effect on July 1, the Florida Department of Children and Family Services will be required to conduct the drug tests on adults applying to the federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. The aid recipients would be responsible for the cost of the screening, which they would recoup in their assistance if they qualify. Those who fail the required drug testing may designate another individual to receive the benefits on behalf of their children…

Pretty short and sweet, right? I mean, if we’re going to pass out the cash to the needy, we want to at least ensure that funding for children goes for the children (rather than, say, being exchanged on the black market for drugs) and, also, we should provide every incentive for people on drugs to clean up. Where is the problem with this common sense bit of legislation? Well, here is how Democrats view the matter:

…”Governor Scott’s new drug testing law is not only an affront to families in need and detrimental to our nation’s ongoing economic recovery, it is downright unconstitutional,” said Rep. Alcee Hastings. “If Governor Scott wants to drug test recipients of TANF benefits, where does he draw the line? Are families receiving Medicaid, state emergency relief, or educational grants and loans next?”…(report edited to indicate just what sort of person Hastings is)

To which question we reply: why aren’t such recipients already required to undergo drug testing? If your taking taxpayer cash then we have a duty to ensure that at the minimum it will be used properly. Just to make it clear to Hastings, it is unlikely that a person addicted to drugs will properly use welfare or Medicaid or educational grants. This is not a move against providing aid, it is a move against wasting aid.

But that isn’t the point – Democrats live and die by the number of people they can pass the taxpayer cash to. The more on welfare, the better and if a portion of it goes up in crack smoke, then that is ok. As long as the money keeps flowing, as long as Democrats can preen themselves over being generous, as long as highly paid government union workers keep donating to the Democrats, all is well. And how dare any Republican try to stop this gravy train!

Well, enough is enough – it is time for a bit of morality, not just syrupy “caring” as a masquerade for pillaging the Treasury.

From the AP:

The Obama administration said Wednesday that the government will lose about $14 billion in taxpayer funds from the bailout of the U.S. auto industry…

But, don’t fret, Barry and the boys are telling us that it could have been worse…we could have lost even more money. Heck, for a Democrat to cause a mere $14 billion loss to the taxpayer is actually the height of fiscal probity.

Yeah, we want four more years of this! I mean, if we only lose $14 billion every time we bail out a union-dominated industry, we’ll only lose hundreds of billions on the deal…and what is that when compared to the amount of campaign donations and hired goons Democrats will get in return? Geesh, this is a no-brainer…

How we know that Weinergate has become a big issue – the MSM is saying the GOP did it:

Ok, guys, I need everyone to check their Republican Weiner and make certain it is accounted for…’cause the MSM is convinced that it is one of ours which has escaped!

HAT TIP: Jammie Wearing Fool

UPDATE: Iowahawk strikes again:

…The Weinergate facts, as we so far know them: on May 28, @RepWeiner, the verified Twitter account of US Congressman Anthony Weiner (D-NY), posted a tweet of a y.frog photo of a slightly-built white male straining to pitch a pup tent in a pair of grey Hanes Underoos. Within seconds, Congressman Weiner arrived at the scene of the cybercrime and instantly recognized it as the work of a hacker who had simultaneously broken into his Twitter, Facebook and y.frog accounts. Working quickly, and without regard to his own safety, Congressman Weiner used his elite law school-honed internet security coding skills to wrest back control of his accounts, delete the offending tweet and photo, as well as unfollow a Seattle coed to whom it was sent. His Twitter perimeter once again secured, the intrepid Congressmen sent out a new tweet explaining how he was victimized by an Internet criminal mastermind…

The original Weinergate:

Now that I’ve just re-watched that, I have to say it is still one of the funniest scenes ever put in a movie.

Too bad it is a theologically unsound song…but for pure Americana, it can’t be beat…

What is wrong with our legal system, demonstrated:

Rescue workers in Alameda, California were forced to watch as a man drowned after they realized they could not save him because they did not possess the proper certifications for water rescue required to legally do so.

Had the workers attempted a rescue without the legal certifications, they could have faced lawsuits leading to massive fines and career ending rulings.

The victim was a suicidal man who waded into the waters to take his own life. Onlookers, including police, firemen and other rescue workers were forced to watch from the water’s edge hopelessly.

In fact, because of certifications and laws, rescue workers could not even legally enter the water to retrieve the body after the man had died. The police asked an onlooker to do it for them…

Forced to watch? No, not really – but when you know there are lawyers out there just waiting to sue, it takes a great deal of moral courage to just do the right thing. These are people who watched a man die because they feared a lawsuit…and you know what may happen, now? There is probably already a lawyer out there wondering if he can sue these people for failure to rescue.

Our liberals keep insisting that we dare not provide any tort reform – that if we in any way, shape or form clip the wings of the lawyers then people will lose their rights. How about their right to be rescued when dying? Or the right of people who act in a humane manner when they see suffering? Don’t help that person you’ve found on the street – you’ll be sued! We’ve been warped – normal actions of human beings have become impossible because someone one there will try to make a buck off the tragedy.

Tort reform, now. Most important part – loser pays. I also suggest jail time to any trial lawyer who loses more than two cases a year…if he loses that much, he’s clearly filing frivolous lawsuits and that should be illegal. Really, its a matter of whether or not we’re going to keep allowing ambulance chasers to get rich, or will we have a decent, moral society?

From Rasmussen:

…The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that in a hypothetical 2012 presidential matchup, a generic Republican candidate earns support from 45% of Likely U.S. Voters, while the president attracts 43% of the vote…

The Rasmussen survey here has kind of bounced around of late – Obama a little ahead, Obama a little behind…but no matter how you slice it, Obama is right on the edge were a President can head straight for loser. All it takes is a little more bad news or another Obama screw up, and he can tip over in to “anyone but Obama” territory.

From Bloomberg:

Mark Mobius, executive chairman of Templeton Asset Management’s emerging markets group, said another financial crisis is inevitable because the causes of the previous one haven’t been resolved.

“There is definitely going to be another financial crisis around the corner because we haven’t solved any of the things that caused the previous crisis,” Mobius said at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan in Tokyo today in response to a question about price swings. “Are the derivatives regulated? No. Are you still getting growth in derivatives? Yes.”

The total value of derivatives in the world exceeds total global gross domestic product by a factor of 10, said Mobius, who oversees more than $50 billion. With that volume of bets in different directions, volatility and equity market crises will occur, he said…

You see, we really did need financial reform in the wake of the 2008 meltdown. Unfortunately, liberals are running our government so all we got is a lot of hot air about hitting the fat cats while those same fat cats (who are, often, heavy donors to liberal causes) wrote a financial reform bill which did nothing to address the underlying problems.

There is nothing wrong with buying and selling stocks and bonds. Nothing wrong with trying to work out an investment strategy to maximize returns. There is something wrong, however, in a nauseating mish-mash of government, quasi-government and private actors working together to create financial instruments of no known provenance or worth and then selling and re-selling them in a game of “greater fool” until some piece of financial chicanery called “derivatives” is worth more than all the GDP of the world. I think Mobius is right – we’re going to have another crash. I had thought it would have happened, already. I am astounded they’ve held it off as long as they have…but it will crash. It can do nothing other.

Now, what should we do? Not much we can, at present. With Obama in the White House and Reid running the Senate, genuine reform cannot be enacted. But we should come up with a plan for financial reform which we can run on in 2012…and it would tremendously useful if, come 2012, we have both “I told you so” and “here’s the fix” if the crash happens between now and November of 2012.

The most important part of the fix is to shut down the casino on Wall Street and return it to investing. You might have noted that the economic news was garbage today – and yet the Dow rose 1%. Why? Because the European Union is working out a way to screw the taxpayers and bail out the bankers over Greece’s financial crisis…this pretty much means, at the end of the day, more money printing and this, in turn, caused people to bet on stocks today in hopes of an even higher rise as this goes forward. But we need investors, not gamblers. Investors carefully weigh risks – both long and short term – and try to figure out the way to protect and grow assets. Gamblers look for a quick killing – and they can do it, for a while. Eventually they bet wrong and the whole thing falls apart.

My solution to this aspect of the problem is not to get down in the weeds and, say, ban derivatives or what not. Anyways, even if you did them some gambler would just invent something else to gamble on. The best thing, I think, we can do is to punitively attack the up-and-down, all-through-the-day buy and sell like mad aspect to the markets. Lay a punitive tax on capital gains if a financial instrument is held, say, less than 24 hours. Progressively lower the tax on capital gains the longer it is held. Essentially, you’d force people to think…force them to cease being gamblers and start being investors.

Other things would help. Don’t allow mortgages to be sold; this would force banks to actually underwrite loans because they wouldn’t be able to push the bad paper off to a “greater fool” (which, as it turns out, almost invariably winds up being Uncle Sam). Forbid interest rates greater than 20% on credit cards; this would price out “non prime” consumers…they simply wouldn’t be able to borrow money on credit cards; might piss them off a bit as they can’t buy the new TV, but in the long run it protects them and protects the rest of us. Break up investment and regular banking, as we used to. Also, break up the big banks…a little good, old fashioned Populist GOP trust-busting would be a good thing, here.

The main thing is to understand that our problem is not the free market, nor is it in the fact that some people get rich buying and selling stocks. Our problem is that people were permitted – nay, encouraged! – by government to create all sorts of economic scams which led to the 2008 crash and which are leading us right back there. In order to just pile up personal wealth, some in the financial industry and in government took us for a ride…a ride which ended up at the poor house. If we want to get out of it, then we’re going to have to think about what we want, and then demand it be done…because you can lay bets on it that the banksters and bureaucrats will never do it voluntarily.

HAT TIP: Zero Hedge

From JS Online:

State election officials on Tuesday approved recall elections against three Republican senators but put off decisions on certifying recall petitions against three Democrats.

That decision by the Government Accountability Board drew cries of partisanship from Republicans and set up the possibility that two sets of recall elections would be held a week apart, rather than all on the same day.

“This is an example of a supposedly neutral government agency acting in a blatantly partisan manner to further the objectives of a particular political party,” said Dan Hunt, who led the effort to recall Sen. Bob Wirch (D-Pleasant Prairie)…

No need to get really angry, yet – but this does seem a bit screwy. Over at Hot Air is it noted that some of the GOP petitions arrived prior to the Democrat petitions. So it is extraordinary that all three Democrat recall initiatives are a “go” while all three GOPers are in limbo. Let’s hope it is just a bizarre coincidence. But if it otherwise, then we should get ready to flood Wisconsin with protests – especially if bureaucratic shennanigans kill all three GOP recall efforts (remember, if it is three and three then, more than likely, it’ll be a wash…no change in the Senate majority; but if three GOPers are faced with a massive, all-out leftist effort with no counter-punch by the GOP against the Democrats, then that could be a political game-changer).

We know Democrats cheat. While the Government Accountability Board is supposedly non-partisan, if the majority are Democrats, then the chances of cheating rise exponentially. Since all three Democrat recall efforts have been ok’d, if even one of the GOP efforts is rule out of bounds then there had better be massive and conclusive evidence to show why this should be so. For the moment, it is just a bureaucratic oddity…but we watch and see if becomes the spark for a rising of the TEA Party like no one ever imagined.

You can see the tally here – what does this tell us?

Well, first off, 97 Democrats are absolutely certain they can survive no matter what bit of nonsense they vote for. On the other hand, 82 Democrats fear losing their seats next year and so won’t vote for anything which comes across as either Democrat or Obama policy. These are the seats we should immediately target and start fundraising for – sure, they ducked out on this bit of tax and spend liberalism, but you can bet they haven’t dodged all of it over the years.

Very importantly, every Republican voted against it – which means that we are getting through their thick skulls that deficit reduction is far more important than any manufactured, MSM-driven “crisis” which requires Republicans and conservatives to check their principles at the door. We skill have a lot of knocking them about the head and shoulders before they are thoroughly instructed on what we want, but we’re getting there. No matter what else happens in 2012, it is a worthwhile effort to back these GOPers and do everything we can to increase their numbers.

Most importantly, now both Obama and Reid know that some sort of deficit reduction package will have to be part of the budget – and this is just going to kill them. They’ll hate every minute of it. I mean, think about it: they’ve made raising the debt ceiling a priority for the sole reason that they want to borrow and spend more money…but if we get deficit reduction coupled with a debt ceiling increase, then they now they’re beaten. It won’t matter if we raise the ceiling after cuts – we’ll never hit the ceiling. It won’t be the end of Big Government, but it will be the end of the growth of Big Government (especially as they know that even if Obama gets re-elected next year, Democrats are almost certain to lose the Senate and see an even larger GOP House majority; this was their one, last chance to go on a spending binge, and they’ve lost it).

We’re winning the fight, boys and girls. Slowly but surely and in spite of numerous set backs, things are coming our way. Just keep fighting.

http://videos.mediaite.com/embed/player/?layout=&playlist_cid=&media_type=video&content=QVW38H2DT8L62BQX&read_more=1&widget_type_cid=svp

While having a Free Willy is not necessarily a concern for public policy, it can become so when the owner of the organ in question is an idiot.

Of course, we should note that if Weiner were a Republican, he would have already been forced to resign, by his fellow Republicans…but the party of John Edwards, Eliot Spitzer, Ted Kennedy and Barney Frank is ok with such things…