Obama: “Private Sector is Doing Just Fine” – A New Call To Socialism!

Recent pronouncements of President Obama and a three year trend of his administration have crystallized just where he stands on economics and job creation.

First, look at the three year history of his administration.  The never-ending onslaught of regulation on business and banking under the guise of protecting the consumer and the environment have used a regulatory and lending blanket to smother the small business job generator.  Small business has traditionally generated over 70% of the nation’s jobs.  Now small business is both being smothered by regulation and a dearth of lending availability from the nation’s banks.  The latter due to new banking regulations and Federal Reserve created opportunities to earn, outside of lending, by using the spread between borrowing from the Federal Reserve and then buying Treasuries.

The EPA is single handily ripping the life out of the coal industry, and its jobs.  Oil drilling has been seriously curtailed on federal land and off shore, killing high paying jobs.  Even fracking for natural gas and oil from shale is under attack by the EPA.  Have you wondered why recent reports of EPA action indicate that the EPA has armed SWAT teams and why EPA agents now are armed?  If this is true, what is next – armed truant officers and meter readers?

Now let’s look at two of the tenets of socialism.  In socialism:

• the government controls big business and the banking industry
• jobs come from big business with small business being generally non-existent

President Obama has recently provided additional insight to what he believes to be job creation.  His statement that the private sector is doing just fine was ludicrous but more so indicative of where he wants to take this country.  His new plan is his old plan.  He wants to create jobs by creating more non-federal government, but local government jobs, and we already know that federal jobs are up as well. CNN-Money reports: “…The number of federal employees grew by 123,000, or 6.2%, under President Obama, according to the White House’s Office of Management and Budget…”

To be fair and the article points this out that this is just a continuation of President Bush’s job growth in the federal government. I say, more of what is not good is bad.  A word about President Bush – he expanded government, yes, and this was the start of our move to bigger government.  This does not mean that it is good that President Obama doubled down on what was not a good trend in the first place.  My mother would have said: “Two wrongs don’t make a right”.

The article also points out a greater number of regulations were introduced during the term of Bush than Obama.  Don’t go by the number, but by the severity and impact.  The Obama administration is masterful at private sector killing regulation and the regulations that place big business under the thumb of the federal government – Affordable Health Care is one and Dodd Frank is another.  Each of these laws authorizes the bureaucrats of Obama’s administration to write extensive, binding, impactful regulations that destroy small business and gives the federal government unprecedented power over big business and the banks – key tenets of socialism.

Back to Mr. Obama’s pronouncements about creating jobs.  Rather than unleash the private sector and small business to grow and truly create economically productive jobs, he is pushing for a repeat of the failed $800+ Billion stimulus which was going to create police, fire, and teaching jobs, as well as apparently non-existent shovel ready jobs, by doubling down and borrowing more money to pour into local government, government sector unions, and economically unproductive jobs.  Remember the reason why police, fire, and teachers have been laid off is the inability of local government to pay the benefits and pensions resulting from these government sector union jobs.  More socialism!

Apparently Mr. Obama is incapable of or has no desire to foster private sector jobs, even private sector union jobs, and he just has to feed the government sector unions with more stimuli.  His solution to unemployment and the stagnant economic growth is to move into the only direction he knows and believes in; and that is to grow government, foster government sector unions, minimize or eliminate small business, have the banks do the bidding for the federal government, and ultimately raise taxes.  His desired action requires more taxes and more taxes shrink economies.

I can only suggest that anyone who disagrees with me look up how failed socialist states operated.  The plan Obama is using is the failed plan of the past, worldwide.  There has not been one socialist economy in history that has improved and sustained the quality of life and standard of living of the populace.  Government jobs, while a necessary pill which must be taken in great moderation, are not economically viable contributors to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and the standard of living of any economy – they require more taxes and again taxes shrink economies.  Yet he steadfastly refuses to unleash the 70% job creator – small business.

 

Read Full Post »

The Great American Education Heist!

Are our school districts/systems, run by educated education professionals, spending your money wisely?  Has the U.S. Department of Education had a positive impact on our kids?  Has too much money gone to support the teachers’ unions’ demands, and bigger government; has too little information gone into the area between the ears of our kids? You be the judge.

 

Many thanks to the brilliant folks at the Cato Institute for the work they have done on so many important issues.  This work was done by Andrew J. Coulson and the complete Cato article can be found at President to Call for Big New Ed. Spending Here’s a Look at How that’s Worked in the Past.  Charts republished with the permission of the Cato Institute.

Let’s start with the U.S. Department of Education, elevated from the Office of Education in 1979.  The Department’s website  states “The Department’s mission is to serve America’s students— to  by fostering educational excellence and ensuring equal access.”  How is this working for you?

It has a $67 Billion budget, over 4,000 employees and distributes another $100 Billion in education support.  By the way, this $167 Billion is derived from tax revenue taken from tax payers in the fifty states and territories.  If this money is left in the states, the states can then collect and use this money as they see fit and not as directed by educators with a progressive bent on how our children should learn.  There are almost 60 million students enrolled in K-12 education in this country.  The elimination of the Department of Education’s operating budget would ensure another $1,100 per student in education funding.  Would you contribute to a charity that had a 40% overhead rate as does the Department of Education?  How much of your district’s budget is spent on U.S. Department of Education compliance?  Add these compliance expenses to the overhead and the amount freed up for students climbs even higher.

The states do not need the U.S. Department of Education; the states’ PhD’s are just as smart as the PhD’s at the Department of Education.  The department has miserably failed its mission because we have an abysmal return on our Federal investment and a relatively zero increase in student achievement and preparation for global competitiveness, as is the mission since 1979.  There is no education excellence in our children.  We need to shut it down and despite numerous tweaks by Congress it is an abject failure and a gargantuan waste of money.

Is money the answer in itself – No!  Much of the money provided to the students has gone to support the teacher unions’ contracts.  We cannot remove a bad teacher, we cannot improve work rules, and the unions even call the shots on how our children are prepared for the future.  Unless you consider socialist propaganda prepared, they are simply not prepared for the future.  We are not making widgets here; these children are the nation’s greatest resource.  They are not a cog in the wheel of a union contract.  The unions have benefited financially from favorable union contracts; have the children benefited?  If you think so, look at the charts again.  Are there good teachers?  Yes of course.  Are these good teachers allowed to innovate, no!

Stop throwing money at the problem and change the paradigm.  We need to focus heavily on English, Math, Sciences, History, and Social Studies above all else.  Yes art and music and others have their place, but the Titanic is sinking, so let’s not rearrange the deck chairs.  First we need a good hard look at the content of the books and then we need to actually teach our kids that passing or failing is important in life.  The real world requires critical thinking skills and believe it or not in non-government or non-academic careers success matters, so why not truly prepare our kids for the future.

Parents who care need to pressure their school boards to become totally transparent.  Put all budgets and salaries online.  Put the progress of each class online.  We need to measure our teachers by testing their classes at the start of the semester/school year and then again at the end of the semester/school year to judge whether the teacher has adequately promoted student achievement and preparation for global competitiveness. Since our children are important and our future lifeblood, we need to compensate our teachers based on quality control.  If they actually deliver student achievement  and prepare these kids for the global economy – pay them well.  General Electric became very successful after Jack Welch instituted a policy that each year the bottom 10% of managers were let go and replaced by new hires – remember this is the real world.  Why shouldn’t this real world accountability be applied to those entrusted to prepare our to children succeed for themselves and for this country?

 

 

Read Full Post »

The Radical Transformation Of America Starts November 3rd, 2010.

I have not been delivering posts for this blog of late for a number of reasons, but this is one that I must write.  Normally, I provide solutions, but in this case I have no solutions to offer.  Now that the primaries are underway and some have finished, we begin to see the landscape shaping toward a removal of incumbents in both parties.  While the removal of incumbents, especially those who are progressive socialists / large central government heavy spending types is essential, we are headed to a dramatic radical change in this nation; one that we have never experienced, at least in my lifetime.  When we complete the purge of the Congress in both the House and Senate (only one-third of the senate is up for reelection) in the general election, we will have created a powerful lame-duck beast.

From November 3rd through and including January 3rd 2011, we will have between 40 and 50 unseated politicians who have nothing to lose by doing President Obama’s bidding.  The draconian severity of the legislation these lame ducks will pass for their President to sign will be earthshaking.  We will see amnesty and citizenship for illegal aliens, and a bailout of the union pension funds. Keep in mind that the unions have unsustainable pension problems because they simply cannot fund the promises made and they have used their available funds to get socialist progressive candidates elected.  During this dark period we will see our government collected tax money used to reimburse unions for the vast sums they poured into the campaigns of the folks who will now pay them back with our money.  This means that these unions will have dramatically transformed our America from what we know with our own money.

You might say that when we have replaced these incumbents with fresh faces we can reverse the legislation of the 111th Congress.  Well we will need two-thirds of each house to override the President’s veto.  During this period of lame duck representation, those who are shy right now in the campaign period to increase our deficit and our debt will be unshackled from the fear of being voted out.  They will now be able to set a record for stimulus, earmarks, and progressive big government legislation, along with a massive cap-and-trade bill to solve an imaginary man-made climate problem – it is really a worldwide wealth redistribution tax that will be imposed.

We will see Puerto Rico as our 51st state, an end to drilling for oil in this country, and the beginning of serfdom for the citizens of the United States of America.  We will also see an intentional further opening of the border with Mexico.  Every dream that the  progressive wealth redistribution activists have ever had will become a reality during this lame duck period – they will have nothing to lose.

President Obama will be served his radical transformation of America on a silver platter – he will only have to sign legislation.  During the revolution lame-duck period there will be no checks and balance system that we need to protect this country from ruin.

Read Full Post »