Blogs For Victory

Mike Shedlock breaks it down in data of a lot of states – a sample:

Texas

Texas Sales Tax Collections

January 2010 State Sales Tax Collections To General Revenue

State sales tax net collections deposited to general revenue totaled $1,655.3 million in January 2010. Compared with the $1,928.3 million collected in January 2009, this represents a decrease of 14.2 percent.

December 2009 State Sales Tax Collections To General Revenue

State sales tax net collections deposited to general revenue totaled $1,653.1 million in December 2009. Compared with the $1,869.4 million collected in December 2008, this represents a decrease of 11.6 percent.

November 2009 State Sales Tax Collections To General Revenue

State sales tax net collections deposited to general revenue totaled $1,696.9 million in November 2009. Compared with the $1,983.1 million collected in November 2008, this represents a decrease of 14.4 percent.

Down, down, down they go – and Texas, keep in mind, is actually one of our healthier States. Out here in Nevada, we’ve had double-digit declines in sales tax revenue for months on end. Thus we have a nearly $900 million dollar budget shortfall our pinheads in Carson City are currently trying to deal with (for what I think of their efforts, go here).

In the linked article, you’ll find that there are some government statistics allegedly showing a rise in retail sales. This is because of things like the government counting same-store sales year over year…but if a company closes out half its stores, the closed half aren’t counted and given the lower number of stores, it is natural that the survivors would show an increase, even though total sales are down. It should also be noted that even the current figures for sales tax receipts are inflated because a lot of States and localities jacked up sales tax rates in 2009 – including out here in Nevada, going along with that bit of brilliant liberal economics which says the thing to do in a down economy is tax it more.

Other than government spending, there is nothing increasing in our economy. In spite of liberal fairy tales to the contrary, the spending FDR did in the 1930’s did not cure the Depression and, actually, made it longer and deeper. We’re trying to borrow, print and spend our way out of this when the only way to get out is to work our way out – we’re repeating the mistakes of the past, and we’re going to reap the same reward.

Smoke and mirrors, boys and girls, that is all we’ve got in the economy.

Because its becoming a nightmare for the Democrats:

Kent Hancock can’t remember tougher economic times in the two decades he’s sold used cars in California’s Central Valley.

He brings home less than half the money he cleared a few years ago and has dipped into savings to keep his business open. Hancock, 41, blames politicians for doing too little to get the economy back on track and hopes they are “sweating it a little bit. They should. It shouldn’t be a guaranteed job.”

Hancock’s frustration is evident throughout the nation’s most populous state. Just a year ago, the Democratic Party looked at California as a base for adding to its majorities in Congress. Now, it could be a the place where it loses them.

Even Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer, widely viewed just six weeks ago as a shoo-in for re-election to a fourth term, now faces the toughest race in her 28 years representing California in Congress…

…Republicans…have expanded their takeover list.

Rep. Kevin McCarthy, who’s recruiting Republicans to challenge incumbent California Democrats, said he has no worries that the GOP will lose any of the House seats it now holds in the state. Democrats, he said, will have to focus on keeping seats in perennially competitive districts in other states.

“They have too many of their own members playing defense and needing money,” McCarthy said.

Democrats were, of course, working from the assumption that their wins in 2006 and 2008 were a positive vote in favor of Democrat policies. The truth is they were a negative vote against President Bush and, far more importantly, against business as usual in Washington. Now that Bush is gone, the only thing people have to vote against is business as usual – Democrats had about a 6 month window of opportunity in 2009 to show they were going to change things.

They didn’t. All they did was show that they are even worse than the Republicans who were rejected. It is not now a matter of can the Democrats win in 2010, but whether or not they can limit their losses to something manageable – limit them to keeping a narrow Congressional majority, that is. It is getting ever more questionable that they’ll be able to do this in the House, and there are starting to be some road maps to a GOP Senate majority, though that is still a 10-1 against prospect (much better than the 1000-1 prospect it was even 6 months ago).

As I said, 2010 is all about The People vs The Powerful – or, to use Senator Brown’s better formulation, The People vs The Machine. Anyone who can cast themselves as the agent of reform in 2010 will win unless running against the most entrenched liberals in the most overwhelmingly liberal districts in the nation – the vote for the PATRIOT Act reauthorization told the tale on how many such there are: less than 100 votes against.

2010 is getting to be very fun…

They don’t care, as long as they stay rich:

A secretive group of Wall Street hedge fund bosses are said to be behind a plot to cash in on the decline of the euro.

Representatives of George Soros’s investment business were among an all-star line up of Wall Street investors at an ‘ideas dinner’ at a private townhouse in Manhattan, according to reports.

A spokesman for Soros Fund Management said the legendary investor did not attend the dinner on February 8, but did not deny that his firm was represented.

At the dinner, the speculators are said to have argued that the euro is likely to plunge in value to parity with the dollar.

He’s your hero, liberals. He’s been the moneybags behind all sorts of liberal activism for years now. He’s oh, so caring and wonderful and he just wants to save the world…and now he’s about to prey upon the wealth of the common man. Because he can. Because he can make a killing. Because all of his actions are based upon the need to keep George Soros on top.

The real reason he opposed President Bush? Bush was unlikely to allow a greedy man like Soros to rake it in hand over fist – rational economic policies tend to stymie the desires of people like Soros. And so he gins up this liberal opposition and manages, in the end, to get a guy in the White House who allows the Banksters to run wild…and you liberals bought it. Hook, line and sinker.

Now, why did you buy it? Because he was saying the words you liked to hear. You didn’t analyze anything. You didn’t think about just why someone like Soros – a convicted felon who had been greedily wrecking things for years to enrich himself – would want to back your side. He just had to say those magical words – those liberal talking points – and cut the checks, and you were enthralled. It is high time you on the left stopped asserting you’re the thinkers of the world and actually start thinking.

You helped elevate this man – now, help us bring him down, and all those like him. You have your chance in November – your votes can help us take our country back, or you can continue to slavishly follow your liberal leaders.

At part of the liberal coalition – this from Rocket Shoes regarding the refusal of the vastly overpaid union workers in the San Francisco public transit system to agree to some givebacks during the financial crisis:

Dear SF Muni,

(Expletive Delted) you.

Let me start over.

(Expletive Deleted) you.

You are the public transportation system. Say that out loud. You are, supposedly, the way I should transport myself. You know, to places like “everywhere” and “anywhere”. So let me just say I’m a little bit confused…

…I’m done with your lies.

You show up late. When you do show up, you’re a total (expletive deleted). Your driver acts like it’s a serious inconvenience that I’ve burdened him with the “driving people around in a bus” part of his “driving people around in a bus” … job. I mean, I wouldn’t take a job at the ice cream store and sigh when people asked for a (expletive deleted) sugar cone. Also, I would like to figure out where you are training your drivers. Have they used brakes on a bicycle before? Same theory. Just ease up a bit. If you push it lightly, the brakes are going to work. There’s no need to play the “can I catapult Drew into the awkward guy who’s mouth breathing in sweat pants” game. That was fun when you were on time. Hell, at the beginning of the relationship? It was one of those weird reasons I liked you: it was kind of cute in some effed up way.

It now costs me two dollars to be late to everything. Which seems like a really (expletive deleted) deal. When did you become the cable guy, telling me vaguely that you’d be over at my place sometime between the morning and roughly any time ever, including never?…

Now we’ll have to see if this guy puts two and two together and figures out that the problem is that its a government-run transportation system. A private bus system would cost less and get you there on time – because if they didn’t, some competition would come along and scoop up the customers. Of course, that would involve all sorts of freedom and individual choice, which is not really wanted in San Francisco outside of whom to have sex with, and what gender to be.

But I point this out because its yet another sign that the fury is growing out there – and its growing against government, even if its not articulated exactly that way. Everyone is mad at government and quasi-government entities raking in the taxpayer’s money and providing bad or non-existent service…meanwhile, the well-connected make out like bandits (which is, in a way, an insult to bandits – at least they put themselves at personal risk for what they steal).

2010 is all about fighting against the machine of politics – that machine which has wrecked the country and needs to be brought to heel by the people. This will, by default, work to the GOP’s advantage in November – but the warning is there: if the GOP doesn’t serve the people – and the people see and feel that the GOP is serving the people – then we’ll just repeat this all over again in 2012; and keep repeating it until we do get a government of, by and for the people.

Over the massive commercial real estate bust:

…Unlike the largest banks, such as Citigroup and Wachovia, that got into so much trouble early on, the community banks in general fared better in the residential mortgage crisis. But their turn is coming: Not only did community banks issue a higher proportion of commercial loans, but they also have held on to them rather than sell them to other investors.

Nearly 3,000 community banks — 40 percent of the banking system — have a high proportion of commercial real estate loans relative to their capital, said Warren, whose committee issued a report on commercial real estate last week. “Every dollar they lose in commercial real estate is a dollar they can’t use for small businesses,” she said. Individuals — who saw their home values drop in the residential mortgage crisis — would not feel that kind of loss, but, Warren said, a large-scale failure would “throw sand into the gears of economic recovery.”…

…Nationwide, at least $1.4 trillion in commercial real estate debt is expected to roll over during the next three years. Warren said that half of commercial real estate mortgages will be underwater by the beginning of 2011. A fifth of residential mortgages are underwater now, she said.

Unlike residential mortgages, which often can be paid over 30 years, commercial real estate mortgages typically must be paid off or refinanced within five years. Commercial properties mortgaged in 2005, 2006 and 2007, at the height of the boom, are reaching their maturity date. “Do the math on this,” Warren said. “This is a significant problem.”

Yeah, no kidding. Only a rapid and sustained turn around in the US economy can soften the blow. Keep that in mind – the crash cannot be avoided. It can merely be very bad, or it can be catastrophic.

In 2009, there were 140 bank failures – about 1 every 2.6 days. So far in 2010, we’re slightly slower at 1 failure every 2.7 days. Unless things start to go astoundingly well, we can expect over the next two years or so to lose at least 1,000 of the at-risk banks over a couple year period – about 1 per day, or more. Getting the picture?

Now, Obama and the Fed can try to bail out these banks – but that would take, probably, something close a trillion dollars, on top of all the money we’re already spending. Additionally, Bernanke at the Federal Reserve and Geithner have shown themselves mostly concerned with keeping the big banks afloat – and Obama simply might not see this coming. Additionally, if there was a bail out, it would just delay the inevitable.

A shake out is necessary as we are over loaded with office and strip mall space. Too much of it was built and some of it will have to come down, and a lot of banks simply will have to fail (even if Obama and Co put them on life support to make more “zombie” banks). But a recovery is possible if we put in place, very quickly, the policies needed to restore wealth creation in the United States. The bad news is that Obama and Co don’t understand the phrase “wealth creation”, let alone any of the policies which will encourage it.

Get ready for a long and bumpy economic ride.

HAT TIP: Mish’s

Another attempt to astro-turf themselves something like the TEA Party:

I’ve read the WaPo profile, looked at their website, watched the two videos below, and I still don’t quite get it. They’re claiming, essentially, to be nonpartisan and less interested in pushing particular policies than in “dialogue” and “cooperation” for their own sake. Which, given the realities in the Senate, is a very thinly veiled way of calling for fewer filibusters and more Democratic — sorry, I mean bipartisan — legislation. Here’s their statement of principles, for what it’s worth; assuming they stick around, it’ll be fun to watch how this changes once the GOP has a majority in both chambers again.

We want the political process broken down into three steps:

1) open and respectful dialogue

2) thoughtful and informed deliberation

3) competent and decisive execution.

Yeah, that’ll all be in the trash can the minute the Democrats lose their majority – then it will be a time to stand firm on principle and not bargain away the core values of the Progressive movement, blah, blah, blah…

I kind of feel sorry for them – they just don’t know how to gin up a popular movement. Doing such requires courage, a willingness to sacrifice one’s self, critical thinking capacity, a rational world view…that sort of thing. They’ve got their orders and if they are given enough cash and SEIU manpower, they’ll make splash…but they still won’t be the people telling government what to do. All they’ll be is yet another adjunct of the DNC and the Powers That Be.

Its a bit shameful that some of my fellow Americans have become that servile. Will you people please wake up? Snap out of your stupor – you don’t have to wait for your thoughts to come in an e mail from Media Matters or MoveOn! You can think, if you but try…

I recently came across a graph being put out by Barack Obama’s Organizing for America, which tries to graphically demostrate the success of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and suggest the under the Bush Administration job losses increased, while under Obama job losses decreased:

Look convincing?  Maybe to people who want to believe what it claims to say, but let’s really look at what’s going on.

These are job loss numbers… No matter how you slice it, these are negative numbers. The graph has some accompanying text that references the same CBO report that I recently proved was a flawed analysis.

Now, one thing to consider is that the cyclical nature of the economy means that  in a recession job losses will start off larger and slow down. The stimulus wouldn’t change that. and clearly, based the graph, the rate of decrease in the job losses hasn’t come any quicker that the rate of increase. Of course, if a double-dip recession occurs, as is feared, Obama’s minions will have a hard time using charts to paint the blame on Bush.

So, with job losses naturally declining, what numbers are more telling to look at? Well, let’s look at a chart of the unemployment rate for the same period of time in the graph above

The above chart, from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, shows an increasing unemployment at the same time the Obama graph shows a decreasing rate of job losses. Of course, the unemployment was supposed to stay below 8 percent and not hit double digits because of the stimulus… but Obama’s graph doesn’t say anything about that.

Another aspect of the Obama chart worth addressing is the misleading nature of the labeling. In other words, by simply saying pre-2009 in Bush and and post-2009 is Obama does not tell the story accurately in any way, shape or form. The facts are that Democrats have controlled Congress since January 2007. When they control legislation and the budget process, to ignore that when talking about the economy is foolish.

So, I thought it be interesting to look at the unemployment numbers from 2005 to 2010, to see the trend and compare it to when power changed in Congress…

Interesting, isn’t it?  The economy appears to be quite stable and with low unemployment before the Democrats took over.  In fact, after the Democrats had power, unemployment slowly started trending upward, only to get worse in 2008. Democrats, once in power, made Republican spending look restrained, and one of their first big pushes was for an increase in the federal minimum wage, which, contrary to their claims, sent unemployment in the wrong direction, and in particular sent the unemployment rate of working age teenagers skyrocketing

So, Obama-bots ought not to read too much into the graph put out by Organizing for America… the millions of people who have lost their jobs under Obama probably aren’t comforted by meaningless statistics that offer no proof of success for legislation that he promised would keep them working.

UPDATE: This is another tellling graph. And be sure to keep this in mind.

UPDATE, by Mark Noonan: Fannie Mae seeks $15.3 billion more in bail out funds.

Just terrible news:

Early details coming in, some say it’s 8.5, others say it’s 8.3. [Update as of midnight Pacific time, now apparently mag. 8.8] Either way, that’s potentially devastating:

SANTIAGO, Chile (Reuters) – A massive magnitude-8.3 earthquake struck near Concepcion, Chile early on Saturday, USGS reported, shaking buildings and causing blackouts in parts of the capital of Santiago.

A Reuters witness reported shaking buildings and loss of electricity in Santiago.

Reuters is also reporting a “Tsunami warning in effect for Chile and Peru, Tsunami watch for Ecuador”, according to the MSNBC-affiliated Breaking News on Twitter.

Nothing we can do except pray, wait for details and gear up for relief efforts.

According to USGS, it struck offshore near Maule, Chile – a province with a population of a bit more than 900,000. The good news is that the depth of the quake was nearly 22 miles down (contrast to the recent Haiti quake of 5 miles down); the bad news is that the Haiti quake was 7.0 – meaning, I think, that this quake would be something like nearly 20 times more powerful. An 8.8 is rated as a quake which can cause serious damage across hundreds of miles.

UPDATE: Tsunami set to hit Hawaii about 4:19 pm Eastern, a little more than an hour from now. This is quite distant, and it may end up being nothing much, but maybe otherwise.

The sad story:

Various Iraqi bishops have issued a joint message denouncing the continual wave of Islamic violence against Christians in the country, which has left five people dead in the past week. The bishops are demanding that the government take concrete steps to stop the slaughter.

In an interview with the Fides News Agency, Syrian Catholic Archbishop Georges Casmouusa of Mosul called for authorities to “fully assume responsibility for protecting the Christian presence in Mosul. International intervention is necessary to force the central and local governments to act immediately.”

The fifth and most recent victim, a 57-year-old Christian orthodox man, was found dead two days ago.

This surge in violence moved the bishops to call for greater intervention by the local government. Archbishop Casmouusa provided Fides with a copy of the message which he signed together with Syrian Orthodox Archbishop Gregorios Saliba, and Chaldean Catholic Archbishop Emile Nona. The message denounced the violence against “our Christian sons and daughters in the city of Mosul,” with the killing of innocent and peaceful people, thus revealing “a premeditated plan to pressure the Christian Churches to carry out a particular agenda.”

It happens wherever there is an open, Christian community in the Moslem world – and there will be no peace between Islam and the West until it stops.

It is hoped that it will stop of its own accord – that as democratic government spreads around the Moslem world it will take away the ability of rabble rousers to work up anti-Christian pogroms (they would also do anti-Jewish pogroms, if they hadn’t already forced out all the Jews decades ago). First and foremost, Moslem leaders must emerge who will cease to consider Christians to be a pollution.

Of course, there is the fear – the Moslem leaders know that they’d lose a great deal of their adherents if a free choice was given, and such would have to be given, if Christians are to enjoy true tolerance in Islam. But if this change does not happen, then there will be war between Islam and the West, and eventually one or the other will have to succumb.

And rather overwhelmingly:

The House of Representatives reauthorized the Patriot Act for one year Thursday.

The vote was 315-97 .

Many liberals in the House opposed the controversial act, saying it tramps Constitutional protections and civil liberties.

Congress adopted the Patriot Act shortly after September 11th.

Many lawmakers wanted to rewrite or even kill some of the most controversial provisions in the act. But Congressional leaders didn’t have the appetite for a major battle with the economy and health care reform swinging in the balance.

Didn’t you liberals say the PATRIOT Act was shredding the US Constitution and was a tool of Bush’s horrific dictatorship?

Was that all just a talking point?