Reportar MensajeSocialist Obama Envisions A Socialist America
Right Side News ^ | 4/9/2012 | J. D. Longstreet
Socialism IS Slavery -- To The State!
so·cial·ism NOUN: 1. Any of various theories or systems of social organization in which the means of producing and distributing goods is owned collectively or by a centralized government that often plans and controls the economy.
2. The stage in Marxist-Leninist theory intermediate between capitalism and communism, in which collective ownership of the economy under the dictatorship of the proletariat has not yet been successfully achieved. (SOURCE)
The definition above clearly describes Obama's agenda for America. Socialism.
Every time those of us who clearly see America's President for what he is and dare to speak out publicly about the dangers to American freedom and liberty Mr. Obama's agenda presents -- we are attacked as ignorant boobs. The attacks themselves are a key part of the way socialism works -- silence those who would warn of the danger socialism presents.
As Mr. Obama is campaigning for another chance to bring America to her knees, there are those on the socialist plantation in America preparing to flock to the polls and vote to draw the chains of socialism even tighter around themselves and all Americans. They are the people the fathers of Marxism and communism referred to as: “useful idi..ots.”
Future historians will write of the ignorance of the American electorate in the early 21st century and wonder at their lack of reasoning. I sincerely doubt those future historians writing about us will be Americans, however. By that time, the “American iron curtain” will have fallen and we will be engulfed in the darkness of communism.
My maternal grandmother had the ability to see short distances into the future and make accurate predictions. Nothing was made of it. In our family, it was something that was, well, just there. I grew up in an atmosphere in which groping into the future, mostly with little success, was not uncommon in our family. But, I sometimes think, a bit of my grandmother’s ability may have been attached to my DNA. Frankly, I rather hope it has not.
If I remark that I have a bad feeling about something, my family takes notice and plans accordingly. Me? I worry.
On one occasion, my family and I were going on a road trip. I felt awful about it. Something was telling me, literally shouting in my mind “don’t go.” My wife was driving that day. A few blocks from home, I demanded that she stop the car. She pulled over and I got out.
We had this protracted discussion at curbside as to why, I didn’t want to go, and I could not give a reasonable answer -- except that something was very wrong.
Finally, after a great deal of persuasion from both my wife and my daughter, I got back in the car and we continued our road trip. About ten miles down the hiway we had a head-on collision with a drunk driver attempting to make a U-turn in front of us.
We were all belted but my passenger seat broke away from its mount and my head crashed into the windshield smashing it (the windshield) and giving me one heck of a headache.
The car was totaled.
The local hospital cleared us all with bruises, contusions, and possibly a light concussion for yours truly.
That is just one example from many such, uh, “premonitions.” I hasten to add that I believe all human beings have the ability to sense danger. But it does seem to be more pronounced in some, for whatever reason.
True premonitions are rarely wrong. Science tells us that premonitions are based on human emotions. That alone should cause us to question them. But here’s the thing. Just being wrong once or twice causes one to wonder WHEN is the feeling right—and -- WHEN is the feeling wrong. See the dilemma? It will, most certainly, make a worrier of any person endowed (or cursed) with them. It is, in my opinion, truly a curse.
No, I am not about to make a prediction! But I am deeply worried/concerned about the coming Presidential Election -- and -- I am about to issue a warning.
I am just as concerned about the coming Presidential Election as I was over the auto wreck, I noted above. Those of us who live along America’s southeastern coast know when the Coast Guard runs up the hurricane warning flags, it is time to pay close attention and prepare for the coming storm.
I fear for America. A storm is coming. Here’s why I say that:
America is dangerously split. Our Congress is a very good example of where the American people are at this moment in history – split, divided. As a result, the election in November could just as easily swing one way as it could the other. Many will disagree with me. I expect that, I respect that, and I understand that.
The GOP has never gone up against a candidate as devious, unscrupulous, and self-assured as Obama. Obama is what I would call “neo-evil.” I do not think the Republicans are anywhere near ready for that with which they are about to be inundated.
Look. A man who will attack the Supreme Court in a State of the Union Address – with the court sitting right in front of him, and then issue thinly veiled threats at them, again, over the fifty-fifty chance that his signature achievement – Obamacare – might be ruled unconstitutional -- is capable of doing whatever he feels is necessary to **noallow** a second term as President.
Obama’s machine, and it is as huge and powerful a political machine as this nation as ever seen (far exceeding anything Romney and the Republicans can muster) has been at work since his first election. They are dug-in in all 50 states just awaiting the word to begin shredding the Republican nominee.
Obama has no problem comparing himself to Abraham Lincoln, even Ronald Reagan when, in fact, he resembles Hugo Chavez in Venezuela more than ANY past US President. Obama’s efforts within his administration all seem to indicate that he is attempting to recreate a Chavez regime here, in America.
A socialist is a person who has decided that capitalism doesn’t work and is striving toward communism. Socialism is only the middle phase between capitalism and communism. That middle phase is where Obama is today and he is striving toward the latter -- and he intends to drag America into the cesspool with him.
I am not going to predict that Obama will win in November. I don’t think I need do that. I think just watching the campaign the next few months will be all that is necessary to convince you that I am not just whistling Dixie. Of course, by that time, it will be too late.
J. D. Longstreet is a conservative Southern American (A native sandlapper and an adopted Tar Heel) with a deep passion for the history, heritage, and culture of the southern states of America. At the same time he is a deeply loyal American believing strongly in "America First".· He is a thirty-year veteran of the broadcastingbusiness, as an "in the field" and "on-air" news reporter (contributing to radio, TV, and newspapers) and a conservative broadcast commentator.
Longstreet is a veteran of the US Army and US Army Reserve. He is a member of the American Legion and the Sons of Confederate Veterans.· A lifelong Christian, Longstreet subscribes to "old Lutheranism" to express and exercise his faith.
Articles by J.D. Longstreet are posted at: "INSIGHT on Freedom",· "Hurricane Alley... by Longstreet",· "The Carolina Post" and numerous other conservative websites around the web.·
Zimmerman family challenges Holder on New Black Panthers, says no arrests ‘based solely on your race’
By Matthew Boyle - The Daily Caller 04/09/2012
In a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder on Monday, obtained exclusively by The Daily Caller, a family member of George Zimmerman asked the nation’s top law enforcement officer why he has chosen to not arrest members of the New Black Panther Party for their rhetoric — some of which may fit the federal government’s definition of a hate crime — throughout the Trayvon Martin case.
The family member believes the reason Holder hasn’t made those arrests is because he, like the members of the New Black Panther Party, is black.
“I am writing you to ask you why, when the law of the land is crystal clear, is your office not arresting the New Black Panthers for hate crimes?” the family member wrote to Holder.
“The Zimmerman family is in hiding because of the threats that have been made against us, yet the DOJ has maintained an eerie silence on this matter. These threats are very public. If you haven’t been paying attention just do a Google search and you will find plenty. Since when can a group of people in the United States put a bounty on someone’s head, circulate Wanted posters publicly, and still be walking the streets?”
The New Black Panthers have issued ultimatums to the Sanford authorities, saying they want Zimmerman arrested “dead or alive.” They have placed a bounty on Zimmerman’s head, and have called for the building of an army of vigilantes to track him down and effect a citizen’s arrest.
Most recently, the New Black Panther Party has called for violence.
In a conference call recorded over the weekend, the militant group said it planned to “suit up and boot up” and prepare for the next stages of the “race war.”
So far, however, no members of the New Black Panther Party have faced legal consequences.
After citing the U.S. Department of Justice’s published definition of a “hate crime,” the Zimmerman family member wrote that there is “no other explanation” for Holder’s failure to authorize arrests of New Black Panther Party members, other than the fact that Holder himself is black.
“I would surmise that, based on your own definition of a hate crime, you have chosen not to arrest these individuals based solely on your race,” the family member wrote to Holder, insisting too that the was “NO racial component” to the “tragedy” that occurred on the late February night when Zimmerman shot Trayvon Martin.
The Daily Caller has confirmed the identity of the Zimmerman family member but is withholding that person’s identity out of concern for the family’s safety.
The family member also criticized members of Congress who have forcefully criticized police for failing to arrest Georgfe Zimmerman, as well as “the Congressional Black Caucus, the NAACP, Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Spike Lee, [and] President Barack Obama,” adding that “many” who have commented on the case without having a complete understanding of the facts “no doubt understand the laws of our great nation.”
Noting President Obama’s White House event last week celebrating the 1960 novel “To Kill a Mockingbird,” Zimmerman’s family member drew a novel comparison to the American literary classic.
“Strangely enough this case has a lot of parallels to those of Harper Lee’s ‘To Kill a Mockingbird,’” the letter to Attorney General Holder read. “George Zimmerman has been treated much like Tom Robinson was, chastised for not being the right (or wrong) color and found guilty based on race factors.
“You have the opportunity to act as Atticus [Finch] and do the right thing. Your boss would refer to this as a ‘teachable moment.’”
DOJ spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler has not responded to The Daily Caller’s request for comment on why Holder hasn’t authorized the arrest of any New Black Panther Party members, nor has she answered whether that decision is related to Holder’s race.
How Obama Destroys His Enemies
By Ben Shapiro On April 9, 2012 In Daily Mailer,FrontPage
President Obama has always disliked free speech as a general matter, particularly for those who oppose him. He frequently suggests that those who disagree with him simply lack the power of reason; he constantly attacks those who do not bow to his opinions. In the last month alone he has directly castigated the Supreme Court (it would be “unprecedented,” he said, for them to strike down Obamacare); Rush Limbaugh (he called up Sandra Fluke to tell her how out of line Limbaugh was); and Congress (if they don’t act on whatever it is he wants, he will go it alone).
But he has one problem: the First Amendment does not allow him, as president, to use the power of government to fight his enemies. Obama’s solution to this dilemma lies in 501(c)3 charitable organizations working in close tandem with the federal government.
Here’s how it works. First, President Obama forges deep and abiding connections with like-minded charitable organizations. These are theoretically supposed to be non-partisan, but they are typically not – they have a direct line to the White House. So, for example, Media Matters for America coordinates routinely with the White House on important issues of the day. And they are experts at initiating so-called secondary boycotts.
Their expertise was honed in the Don Imus affair, as the Daily Caller reported. When Imus made offensive comments about the Rutgers women’s basketball team, Media Matters sprang into action, coordinating with other allies and pushing for a boycott of advertisers on Imus’ show. Soon, Imus was gone.
They quickly moved on to Lou Dobbs. They attempted to force his advertisers to stop buying time on his radio show; in particular, they looked to put pressure on Ford. And they were successful. By November 2009, Dobbs had moved on from CNN, to Media Matters’ delight.
All this time, Media Matters was working with the Obama Administration. Anita Dunn, the White House communications director, met regularly with Media Matters to plot strategy. Media Matters had weekly calls with the White House.
The stage was set. The actors were in place.
Their first joint target was Glenn Beck. While the White House claimed that Fox News wasn’t a “real” news channel, Media Matters worked the back channels, coordinating with Color of Change to “expose Glenn Beck’s racist rhetoric in an effort to educate advertisers about the practices on his show.”
Once again, it had impact: Beck’s advertisers began dropping out. Fox stuck with him anyway, and Beck, being a terrific businessman, came up with alternative revenue strategies. But that didn’t stop the Obama Administration.
Next, they moved into a joint attack on Rush Limbaugh. The Sandra Fluke affair was entirely coordinated from the first. While Rush’s comments on Fluke weren’t expected, they also weren’t particularly controversial – leftists have routinely called conservative women sluts. And Rush quickly apologized for the comment. Nonetheless, the President and his allies in the 501(c)3 world went into full attack mode, with Media Matters leading the charge, working covertly with third party groups to lead astroturfed boycotts on Rush’s advertising base.
Now Obama is moving his strategy to the next level: he’s targeting major corporations for working with political groups of any stripe. This week, Democratic legislators began calling for a boycott of Coca-Cola over their funding of the American Legislative Exchange Council, which pushes for voter ID laws. The Democratic Party, which courts voter fraud, despises voter ID laws. Thus, Coke entered the crosshairs. Lo and behold, within five hours of the boycott announcement, Coke caved.
This is all fine and dandy under the First Amendment, of course. Private 501(c)3’s can lead boycotts. Government officials can speak on issues of public importance. But the Obama Administration’s secret dealings with such 501(c)3’s to impose non-governmental sanctions on companies that sponsor those with whom they disagree doesn’t pass the smell or sight test. The odor is rancid and the transparency nonexistent.
OBAMA'S MAFIA GET RICH WITH THE GREENBAKC ENERGY PROGRAM
THE NEW CLASS OF OBAMA'S PROTECTED BILLIONARES
Some get rich off taxpayers in Obama's greenback energy program
Under the Obama Energy Department, a lot of people are winning big by losing the taxpayers’ money. In the government-sponsored green energy industry, working Americans have effectively handed millions in salaries and bonuses to executives of companies on the road to bankruptcy. At the most famous failed solar company, Solyndra—to which the Obama administration gave a $530 million loan guarantee—several executives were making nearly half a million dollars a year, including large bonuses taken in the months before the company filed for bankruptcy. For them, the failed endeavor was extremely lucrative. Solyndra was hardly the only taxpayer-backed firm that paid big bonuses while stumbling to bankruptcy, however. As ABC News and the Center for Public Integrity recently uncovered in a report, Beacon Power, which received a $43 million loan guarantee, paid bonuses of about $260,000 to three individuals before going bankrupt last year. Another company, Ener1, the recipient of a grant worth $118 million, paid its CEO a $450,000 bonus. In January, it, too, filed for bankruptcy. Supposedly, the Department of Energy approved these loans to foster an industry which the market didn’t come close to supporting. Certainly most Americans, if they knew about the program at all, did not imagine leaders at these startups paying themselves millions in taxpayer dollars.
In 2009, after bailing out many of the country’s financial institutions, President Obama made executive compensation a major political issue, proposing rules to limit it for firms that had received the taxpayer money. He observed that “what gets people upset — and rightfully so — are executives being rewarded for failure. Especially when those rewards are subsidized by U.S. taxpayers.” He said these words just weeks before his administration made its half-billion dollar commitment to Solyndra. Later that same year, President Obama demanded executives at AIG return their bonuses, asking “How do they justify this outrage to the taxpayers who are keeping the company afloat?”I have a couple questions of my own. Why isn’t the President just as concerned about the looting of failed energy startups at taxpayer expense? Why isn’t he demanding that executives at Solyndra and the other bankrupt green energy firms return their bonuses, since we were keeping those firms afloat with gigantic and unjustified loans? In truth, the real scandal goes far beyond bonuses and salaries. Many of these companies were dependent on an enormous amount of government support all along—far more than just a little boost to get them going. Two numbers give you a sense of the scale of the bad energy bets the Obama administration is making. Several weeks ago, in my newsletter on the transition to liquefied natural gas as a less expensive source of fuel, I reported that Chesapeake Energy had invested more than $150 million to build a national network of LNG truck stops—an investment by a private company to be supported by genuine demand. President Obama, on the other hand, is putting taxpayer money into dozens of risky ventures. Last week yet another green energy firm, Solar Trust of America, declared bankruptcy after having received a $2.1 billion loan guarantee from the Department of Energy. That loan guarantee is more than the value of Regal Entertainment, the nation’s largest chain of movie theaters, and about the value of HSN, the Home Shopping Network. It’s one heck of a loan for a startup. And it put taxpayers on the hook for 14 times the amount Chesapeake invested in its far more viable project to build a nationwide natural gas highway.Of course, there could be a lot more where all this came from. The Energy Department’s current loan program has approved nearly $35 billion in total—more than $110 from every American citizen. Feel like you’re getting your money’s worth?
OBAMA'S WAR ON MOTHERHOOD, DESPICABLE ATTACK ON MRS. ROMMEY
Obama Advisor Attacks Cancer Survivor, Mother, Grandmother Ann Romney
By Katie Pavlich 4/12/2012
There's a war on women going on alright. Last week, I predicted the Left's next attack would land on Mitt Romney's wife, Ann Romney. Turns out I was right. Appearing on Anderson Cooper 360 last night, DNC and Obama advisor Hilary Rosen claimed Ann Romney had never "worked a day in her life," dismissing her work to raise five healthy children. In case you're wondering, stay at home moms are worth at least $500,000 per year.
The attack was predictible because Ann Romney is capable of connecting to women on a very personal level. She's a breast cancer survivor, lives with multiple sclerosis, raised five children, has 16 grandchildren and has been happily and faithfully married to a successful businessman for 42 years. No wonder the Left sees her as a a threat, especially the feminist Left, who have been pushing women away from and demonizing motherhood for decades. Not to mention, Ann Romney is a fighter. She created a Twitter account last night to respond to Rosen's attacks. Romney's son also jumped to defend his mom. Twitchy has more reaction.
Rosen implies Ann Romney isn't a qualified expert on women and the economy, but somehow "inside the Beltway looking out" Rosen is qualified? Please. Conservatives respect a woman's decision to choose a career, motherhood or both. Liberal feminists on the other hand see choosing motherhood over a career as a sin. Not to mention, maybe if liberals weren't always demonizing and punishing success, raising children and having a career wouldn't be as hard as they like to complain about. It is hard, but would be easier without liberal policies holding women and families back.
Also, First Lady Michelle Obama has made herself an "expert" by trying to reach out to military families when neither she nor her husband Barack Obama ever served in the military. Where is Rosen on that?
Obama Abuses Words as Clinton Abused Women
By John Ransom
4/13/2012
The most dangerous trend for the country over the last several years isn’t the GDP trendline or the unemployment rate.
No.
It’s rather how liberals- especially Obama- have devalued and degraded words into having different meanings than their original intent.
In fact, they have perverted some of our best and most innocent words in a way not unlike someone who seeks to corrupt a virgin.
Words like “justice,” “fairness,” “racism,” “reform” and “equality” no longer can be used to support liberty and tear down barriers to success. Instead they are erected like armed forts in the midst of an occupied population.
Liberals have destroyed what is best and most innocent about these words: their ideals.
In doing so, they have carefully corrupted some of the country’s best ideals into political whores with only one purpose: to satisfy a political desire in return for money.
It doesn’t matter to progressives. They’ll take cash, tax credit or tax increase. You pick.
Today, for example, the word “justice” no longer has a moral or **noallow** value.
Instead, “justice” demands that we convict someone of a crime before an investigation is even complete, as we see with George Zimmerman. It demands the lynching- either in fact or in effigy- of “white” people as atonement for the sins of the past in a kind of political Passion play.
“Justice” demands that race and gender become a determining factor in the outcome of everything- court proceedings, elections, tax reform and the debate about entitlements.
It means that the Associated Press can write that whites’ negative feelings about blacks could cost Obama the election while completely ignoring the statistical fact that for blacks the single most important attribute driving black votes is skin color. 95 percent of blacks voted for Obama, while 4 percent voted for McCain.
So, the word “racist” now means any person who stands against destructive, progressive ideas, like confiscating wealth.
The word “racist” can only apply to white males- or female turncoats who support conservative causes. The word “racist” can be applied selectively by progressive bigots who want to shame “race traitors” by labeling them “monkeys in the window.” But despite the progressive bigots’ overt “all-racism-all-the-time” they can’t be called racists.
“Now, it is clear that the decline of a language must ultimately have political and economic causes,” wrote George Orwell in Politics and the English Language. “It becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts.”
It also makes it easier for us to have corrupted ideals. Obama is using language carefully to corrupt our ideals, as Orwell demonstrated would happen in an undefined progressive future in both Animal Farm and 1984.
The word “profit,” too, has been corrupted by Obama.
Obama has reverted “profit” to the discredited Marxist definition that all profit is just excess value produced by workers and then raked off by capitalists; capitalists who now need to pay their “fair share.” Even as Karl Marx acknowledged that his theory of profits had gone wrong, it hasn’t stopped Obama from ripping free market capitalism’s “greed.”
"It was tried in the decades before the Great Depression. It didn't work then. It was tried in the last decade. It didn't work," Obama said about free markets and income growth.
He says this despite objective evidence that the “free markets” that we have had under each administration prior to Obama’s have been responsible for the steadiest increase in average income in the history of the world.
We have had a century of prosperity. And Obama calls it “greed.” Obama says it doesn’t work. Sure income growth may have leveled off a bit. But it’s still growing, as is our standard of living if you discount the Obama years.
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“Greed” is now synonymous with the dirty word “profit” as long as it’s associated with capitalists. Greed by union workers in the form of rising taxes, unaffordable entitlements and state spending, however, is pur-fect-ly fine for progressives.
A tax credit going for the purchase of a government-approved automobile into the pockets of a family making more than $200,000 isn’t “greed” at all- it’s noble even.
It’s all part of the general “reform” package of progressives.
They are “reforming” healthcare, which is already a huge, ungovernable bureaucracy, by making it even more unwieldy, bureaucratic and ungovernable.
When we have to pass a “reform” bill and see it in operation before even knowing what the effect will be, that’s the definition of ungovernable. And of course anyone who opposes the melding of the meaning of the word “ungovernable” with the word “reform” is “racist.”
We’ve had energy policy “reform” as well.
That variety of “reform” has led to higher gas prices at the pump and less availability of our most abundant domestic energy sources, coal and oil.
And the billions in subsidies given out to Obama’s cronies to support our anti-energy energy policy has just been the chump change of “reform.”
In no way should we confuse the green energy “greed” with the “greed” showed by the bankers who tried to get everyone to buy a home- as directed by the federal government in the name of “equality.”
For Obama progressives, words have stopped being noble things, valuable things, despite the high-sounding rhetoric in which words are always carefully corrupted by them.
Words for liberals have instead become a deconstructed and debased metal that is meant to glitter in the eye, even as it corrodes from the inside.
“As man sows, so shall he reap,” said Charles Chestnutt, who wrote about racism in post-Civil War America. “In works of fiction, such men are sometimes converted. More often, in real life, they do not change their natures until they are converted into dust.”
While Chestnutt has a point, progressives pondering his meaning would likely choose to change the meaning of the word “dust” rather than change their own nature.
There’s an election coming up after all.
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Darrell Issa: Fast and Furious Far From Over
By Katie Pavlich 4/14/2012
ST. LOUIS- Entering the Edward Jones arena to an applauding audience at the NRA Annual Convention in downtown St. Louis Friday, Congressman Darrell Issa made it clear his congressional investigation into the Operation Fast and Furious scandal isn’t going away until the Obama Justice Department comes clean. “The investigation of Operation Fast and Furious will not end until the full truth is exposed to every American,” Issa said, adding senior officials at the Department of Justice will be held accountable for the lethal program, including Attorney General Eric Holder. “Eric Holder’s contempt for Congress and his failure to comply will not go unanswered, and you can count on me,” Issa said as a woman yelled, “Thank you!” It is not news that the Obama Justice Department has, and continues to, stonewall Issa’s House Oversight Committee in their constitutional quest for DOJ documents and information.
“They have been disingenuous in their answers, they have in fact ignored exactly what this president promised not to ignore,” Issa said. “He promised we would have the most open and transparent government everywhere.” Many on the Left have tried to brush the scandal off as unimportant, not significant and a waste of time to discuss. Members in Congress have called Issa’s motives “politicized,” but the facts tell a different story. During a conference call with bloggers last September, Issa said he planned to wrap up his investigation by the end of 2011, but because of continued stonewalling and hostile behavior from the Obama Administration, we still don’t have answers and the investigation is ongoing. Issa attempted to end the investigation months ago, before the political season started. “Many will say this is a witch hunt, I will tell you, Brian Terry’s family has told me just the opposite,” Issa said. “They cannot believe a family dedicated to law enforcement cannot get answers from its own country.” Issa also touched on the motivations behind Operation Fast and Furious and how liberal Democrats in Congress have reacted to revelations in the scandal. “Fast and Furious can be seen as nothing else but a needless attack on our right to keep and bear arms,“ Issa said. “When the facts began to come out about Fast and Furious, no surprise, Democrats in Washington, immediately seized on the opportunity to talk about the need for additional gun control laws.” For months, I have been stressing the importance of understanding Operation Fast and Furious was not a “botched” program or an accident. Instead, DOJ officials made calculated decisions to allow some of the most ruthless criminals in the world to help themselves to American guns, while throwing law abiding gun dealers under the bus. “Understand that federally licensed gun dealers warned ATF about wrong doers, expressed their concerns and were forced to sell anyway," Issa said. “Emails made it clear that Fast and Furious was an organized program from the start to walk guns into the hands of drug cartels in Mexico." Issa promised to get to the bottom of Fast and Furious in the coming few weeks, but made it clear setting a timeline wasn’t going to stop him from getting the truth. “I will not quit until both families [Brian Terry and Jaime Zapata] get the answers they deserve.”
“Greenbacks” energy boondoggles versus real energy
Government tax and subsidy schemes waste billions. We need real energy and jobs.
- Paul Driessen April 14, 2012
Having had it with $4-per-gallon gasoline and the Obama Administration’s squandering billions of taxpayer dollars on phony “green” energy schemes, angry voters have told their senators “Enough!”
Their calls provided sufficient spinal implants in enough senators to defeat three proposals to extend the wind energy “production tax credit” (PTC). The credit gives wind project developers taxpayer greenbacks whenever they generate high-priced electricity, even if there is no market for the power at the time it’s generated. Worse, the PTC is paid on top of other subsidies, fast-tracking of wind projects through environmental review processes, and exemptions from endangered species, migratory bird and other laws.
Confronted by the gale of public outrage, Senate Democrats tried a new tack.
They offered an amendment that would eliminate various tax deductions for five major oil companies, turn the supposed new revenue stream into more subsidies for wind turbine, solar panel and electric car makers – and use any leftover crumbs to “pay down” the skyrocketing budget deficit they helped engineer.
The ploy needed 60 votes – but got only 51, despite President Obama’s vocal support. “Members of Congress,” the president said, “can stand with big oil companies, or with the American people.”
Not exactly. The American people are no longer buying the partisan rhetoric. They increasingly understand that new taxes and restrictions on oil companies are not in their best interest. In fact, a recent Harris Interactive poll found that over 80% of US voters support increased domestic oil and gas production to create and preserve jobs, lower pump prices and increase government revenues.
They realize that only 12% of what they pay for gasoline goes to oil companies for refining, marketing and distribution. Another 12% is state and federal taxes. Fully 76% is determined by world crude oil prices – and thus by global supply and demand, and confidence or fear about world events.
They know that eliminating tax deductions for expenses incurred in producing and refining oil is the same as imposing new taxes. Those taxes would result in curtailed drilling and production, reduced royalty revenues, worker layoffs, still higher gasoline prices, and increased costs for everything we grow, make, transport and do with petroleum. Blue collar, poor and minority families would be hurt worst.
Every US business claims deductions for new equipment, facility depreciation, utilities, payroll, research and other expenses. This ensures that businesses, like individuals, recover their costs and get taxed only on their net incomes. Five oil companies should not be punished as the sole exception to this rule.
Legitimate expense deductions are very different from subsidies. Subsidies involve government taxing individuals and profitable companies, and transferring their money to politically favored companies and products that could not survive without perpetual support.
The system is even more insidious when subsidized entities return substantial portions of their taxpayer largesse as campaign contributions to President Obama and other politicians who arrange the wealth transfers. It’s still worse when hard-earned taxpayer money is used to reduce risks for wealthy investors who buy into boondoggles arranged by bureaucrats who are much better at choosing losers than winners.
As voters are learning, the Solyndra, Evergreen, Fisker, A123 and dozens of other “green energy future” scandals and insolvencies are only a small part of the subsidy cesspool.
Subsidies, punitive taxation schemes and “alternative,” non-hydrocarbon energy are often justified by claims that we face imminent man-made catastrophic global warming. In reality, virtually no empirical evidence supports hypotheses, assertions or computer model projections about melting polar icecaps, average global temperatures, storm frequency and intensity, sea levels and other natural phenomena.
Wind, solar and biofuel energy are also justified by claims that we are running out of oil and gas. In fact, America is blessed with vast proven petroleum reserves and even greater undeveloped prospects that government has made off limits. The natural gas and hydraulic fracturing revolution is merely a hint of the energy, jobs and revenues Americans could produce, if certain politicians would end their obstinacy.
“Renewable” energy is further justified by claims that petroleum “keeps us trapped in the past.” In truth, we need to worry about the present, especially our unemployment and debt crises. Oil and gas provide 60% of America’s energy. By contrast, despite untold billions in subsidies, wind and solar combined still provide barely 0.60% – and are unlikely to do much better for decades to come.
The $2-billion Shepherds Flat wind project in Oregon’s Columbia River Gorge area involved $500 million in outright subsidies, plus a subsidized loan guarantee of $1.1 billion for General Electric, plus production tax credits. At the whim of the winds, its 338 gigantic turbines will generate electricity for California, in wild swings between zero and their combined rated capacity of 845 MW – chopping up eagles, falcons, herons, bats and other protected species as they spin.
In 2010, GE generated over $5 billion in US profits – but paid no US income taxes, and no fines for the thousands of protected birds and bats that its Cuisinart wind turbines slaughtered.
By contrast, White House villain ExxonMobil (one of the companies targeted by the failed tax bill) earned $30.5 billion in profits that year, on revenues of $383 billion, paid $1.6 billion in US income taxes, and made combined lease bonus, rent, royalty, tax and other federal payments of almost $10 billion. When a few birds are killed on oil company property, companies pay substantial fines.
President Obama promised that he would “fundamentally transform” America and ensure that electricity prices “will necessarily skyrocket.” His Energy Secretary has said Americans should pay $8-10 per gallon for gasoline. His Environmental Protection Agency and Interior and Agriculture Departments have systematically foreclosed access to our nation’s oil, gas, coal and uranium resources.
Meanwhile, Mr. Chu’s Department of Energy recently awarded $10 million of taxpayer money to Philips Lighting for making an “affordable” light bulb – that costs $50 per bulb!
And it is working overtime to promote, subsidize and install thousands of onshore and offshore wind turbines that generate too much ultra expensive electricity when it’s not needed and too little when it’s most needed, require too much land and too many raw materials, kill too many birds, cost too much money, and require perpetual subsidies and exemptions from environmental laws that apply to all traditional forms of energy.
This “green” energy “future” is unsustainable.
Oil companies do make a lot of money because they produce, refine and sell enormous quantities of fuel and other petroleum products. But they pay billions in taxes and royalties – and produce real energy.
Wind, solar, algae and switchgrass companies take billions in Other People’s Money. They pay virtually no taxes, and provide virtually no usable energy, except in the minds and press releases of their promoters.
Expecting that higher taxes on oil companies will produce more oil at lower prices is like saying we will get cheaper bread, and more of it, by eliminating tax deductions for bakeries’ electricity and equipment.
American voters and consumers understand this. It’s time our elected officials and unelected bureaucrats did likewise.
Unbelievable: Jon Corzine still bundling mega-bucks for Obama’s campaign
Hotair ^ | 04/20/2012 | AllahPundit
The information's hiding in plain sight but it’s still a nifty catch by the Standard’s Daniel Halper. You know why? Because the idea that Jon Corzine is still raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for The One is so insane and implausible, virtually no one would have thought to check. Of coursethat's not happening. Of course.
And yet.
He's in the $500,000+ club for the first quarter of this year, the most elite group there is among O's cash cows. You know what else happened during that quarter? News broke that more than a billion dollars in MF Global client funds had apparently been “vaporized” in the firm’s collapse, with investigators clueless as to where the money might have gone. As recently as last month, new evidence emerged pointing to Corzine’s direct involvement in using clients’ cash to cover the firm’s debts. And yet, presumably, he was squeezing his rich friends for dough for Obama the whole time. Ace asks a good question: “Why is a man under investigation by a government agency permitted to raise money for the man who controls that agency?” Wouldn’t be the first time Corzine’s used his political leverageto personal advantage.
If you missed it a few days ago, read Ed’s post on Patrick Kennedy claiming that the White House rewards its rich donors with certain quid pro quos. Can’t wait to see what Jon Corzine gets in return for his extreme diligence on behalf of the “Not a Republican” reelection effort. Exit question: Does Team O understand that transparency is supposed to act as a deterrent to impropriety or the appearance of impropriety? They love to pat themselves on the back for voluntarily disclosing the names of their bundlers, but the point of disclosure is that it dissuades you, at least in theory, from dealing with cretins lest you be scrutinized for it. Where’s the dissuasion, guys?
LA MADRE DE TODOS LOS DEFALCOS, CORZINE DONA MILLONES A OBAMA MIENTRAS DEFRAUDA ¡$1,800 MILLONES A SUS CLIENTES!!!
OBAMA/ CORZINE, UNA MANO LAVA LA OTRA...
LA MAFIA DEMOCRATA EN PLENA ACCION
QUID PRO QUO... LA MAFIA DEMOCRATA
