What a mess

Less than two hours ago, I returned from a truly relaxing five-day trip to Harwich Port in Cape Cod.   Trying to actually enjoy a relaxing time, I tried as hard as I could to stay away from Mets baseball, the status of the NFL lockout, and more importantly, the debt ceiling negotiations on Capitol Hill.

As I was driving back earlier today, I realized that the Mets just swept a four-game series with the Reds, the lockout is officially over and…well, yeah.

The debt ceiling deadline has been staring Washington in the face since last year.  Neither President Obama nor the Democrats in Congress bothered to address the issue, even when they had their majorities in both chambers.  So of course, the big news today is that Speaker Boehner and the Republican leaders, not to mentioned the so-called Republican “conservatives” in the pundit class, are willing to shoot the Tea Party conservatives in the back of the head, figuratively speaking of course, in the name of waiting for 2012.  Or something.

Heckuva job guys. 

An update of today’s events here.

Bachmann’s migraine “problem”

It doesn’t get much dumber than this.  Caught this screenshot last night off of the WaPo website.  Idiocy on parade:

This is from a  ”serious” political pundit, people us rubes need to really listen to and take seriously when it comes to politics in Washington.  Apparently forcing a conservative Republican woman to release a doctor’s note confirming she has migraines, and that said migraines might negate her ability to be President are of paramount concern to our media overlords.

When you want to see Obama’s birth certificate however, or ask questions about his past drug use, well then clearly we need to STFU because we’re all racists.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A reminder on the evil that is Obamacare

I was reminded of one of the more egregious features of Obamacare while watching this interview with one Julie Rovner from NPR, on News Hour last night.

The new health care reform law that President Obama signed last year not only expands the number of people who get coverage, it also requires the secretary of health and human services to determine which preventive benefits should be provided by all insurers. 

[...]

There were three categories of preventive care that were automatically covered [under the new law]…

There was a fourth category that was listed — that came about because Sen. Barbara Mikulski from Maryland actually got an amendment added that the secretary would have discretion to add, and these would be preventive services for women, because over the years preventive services for women have thought to have been left out by the Preventive Health Services Task Force.

And those were left to the secretary’s discretion.

[The HHS Secretary] is determining — first she’s going to determine whether this will be part of this preventive health package that will be made available with no co-pays, but she’s also determining these essential — what kind of things will be included in the essential benefits package.

The story focuses on contraception being left to the HHS Secretary’s discretion as to whether it’s included in government-subsidized healthcare, ie taxpayer-funded healthcare.  But let’s not kid ourselves.  Going forward, this will morph into other controversial services being covered at the whim of the HHS secretary.  Someone who’s unelected and unaccountable to anyone, playing politics with an industry that accounts for nearly 15% of the economy.

Where are the liberals screaming about imperialism in the government?

White Christian man verbally assaults elderly Muslim on a train

Well, not really.  More like a middle-aged Muslim man verbally abusing an elderly non-Muslim woman on a train in Denmark for…um, “destroying” his bike:

As others on the train defend the woman, the Muslim douchebag starts bloviating about his “rights” and how the woman should respect him.  Radical Islamofascism personified. 

UPDATE.  More from Pam Geller: “This is the sharia”

Sheila Jackson Lee goes all Democrat, implies Republicans are racist in debt ceiling negotiations

Because President Obama is half-black of course and perhaps, they know they are losing the argument:

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) used the race card this afternoon to assess blame in the debt ceiling fight. Jackson Lee, a black Congresswoman, believes the disagreement over raising the debt ceiling is because of President Obama’s race.

“I am particularly sensitive to the fact that only this president, only this president, only this one has received the kind attacks and disagreements and inability to work. Only this one,” Jackson Lee said on the House floor this afternoon.

“Read between the lines.”

Raising taxes and race-baiting.  Apparently there’s nothing else Democrats are good for and nothing else they can bring to the table in this debt ceiling debate.  Is anyone really surprised?

UPDATE.  In rushing to get this post up yesterday, I didn’t include the key portion of Jackson-Lee’s floor speech.  Here is the key bit from a Fox News piece:

“What is different about this president that should put him in a position that he should not receive the same kind of respectful treatment of when it is necessary to raise the debt limit in order to pay our bills?” she added. . . .

“In the minority community that is the question that is being raised. Why is this president being treated so disrespectfully?”

[Hat Tip:  Stacy McCain]

Someone just invented an Iron Man-like, palm-mounted laser weapon

Finally, Iron Man lives:

On a rainy weekend last year, Patrick Priebe, a German lab technician and Iron Man fanatic who rewatches the film and its sequel every week, decided to build a compact yet powerful laser inspired by Tony Stark’s repulsor-beam weapon. In the U.S., the maximum strength for consumer laser pointers is typically five milliwatts; Priebe’s handheld laser is 1,000 milliwatts, enough to instantly blind anyone not wearing special safety glasses.

Retail analyst: “Obama depression continues to explode”

Even the dollar stores aren’t immune to the failures of Keynesianism on steroids, porkulus, Obamanomics and Decmocratic economic stewardship:

While the demand at stores like the 99-Cent Store or Dollar Tree is still relatively high, the biggest chains in the nation have fallen short of Wall Street’s expectations for several months, a trend that may prove even more ominous for the economy at large.

“I think what’s going on in those stores is that we are in a depression for 80 percent of Americans,” top retail analyst Howard Davidowitz told KNX 1070.

America’s three largest discount chains — Dollar General Corp., Family Dollar Stores Inc. and Dollar Tree Inc. —  all recently missed their quarterly earnings targets.

Davidowitz pointed to the weakness of the dollar and a gloomy consumer outlook as some of the factors behind the stores’ slump.

“In other words, the economy is continuing to be worse, the Obama depression continues to explode,” he added.

Here’s hoping Peggy Joseph was able to get her mortgage and gas money before the cash runs out.

Goldman Sachs lowers earnings expectations for S&P companies

More depressing economic news:

Goldman Sachs Group Inc., the bank with the highest equities-trading revenue, said its rivals are too enthusiastic about second-quarter earnings prospects for Standard & Poor’s 500 Index companies.

Operating profit will total $23.75 a share for the period, or 2.3 percent less than the average Wall Street estimate, said David Kostin, an equity strategist at New York-based Goldman Sachs. He said 2011 and 2012 earnings-per-share forecasts will be reduced by 2 percent and 8 percent, respectively.

[...]

U.S. corporations are set to report the slowest earnings gain since the recession ended as companies from Ford Motor Co. to McDonald’s Corp. struggled with rising oil and commodity prices and a slowdown in consumer confidence that may continue to hamper spending this year.

 If people wouldn’t use those darn ATMs so much, we wouldn’t be in this mess.

June’s employment report is not so good, smells like recession and…QE3 coming?

There was nothing good in June’s job report released this morning.  The unemployment rate inched up to 9.2% and the economy added about 18,000 jobs for the month.  And what’s that odor  in the air?

It’s the foul stench of recession:

The U.S. economy generated just 43,000 jobs in the last two months, perhaps taking the world’s largest economy skating closer to recession territory.

It was difficult to find a bright spot in the U.S. Labor Department report. Many key labor market signals deteriorated, and the jobless rate rose unexpectedly to 9.2 percent even though the work force actually shrank.

Shaun Osborne, senior currency strategist at TD Securities, summed it up: “The number stinks.” Watch for forecast revisions to second half U.S. gross domestic product.

The Obama administration has run out of silver bullets, as the Democrats perverse experiment with Keynesian economics has failed miserably.

So what to do?  The experts are leaving the door open for the Fed to fire up the printing presses again:

[The Labor Department's report] could raise questions about whether the Fed should take additional actions to support growth.

Yes.  Because it’s worked so well with QE1 and QE2.

Politically, the Obama campaign administration has got to be in full panic mode now.  Time is of the essence, but even over a year away from the election, the economy will have to show some strong monthly employment gains to bring that rate down.  Some broad tax cutting would be in order to accomplish that, along with some bold moves to cut spending.  But I wouldn’t bet on that coming from this White House.

Speaking of panic, the President is holding a press conference to speak about this morning’s employment report at 10:30 this morning.

Portugal is the new Greece

The proverbial dike is buckling:

Moody’s Investors Service on Tuesday became the first rating agency to cut Portugal below investment grade, causing the 10-year Portuguese government bond yield to leap more than 1 percentage point to euro-era highs.

The agency cited worries that administrative problems and slow economic growth might prevent the Portuguese government from hitting ambitious targets to shrink its budget deficit over the next three years under a 78 billion euro international bailout.

But Moody’s also said efforts by the European Union to have private investors bear part of the burden of supporting Greece, through a “voluntary” rollover of maturing Greek debt, threatened investor confidence in Portugal as well.

If investors believe the EU may follow the Greek model and pressure them into bearing part of the cost of future aid to Portugal, they may become less willing to lend to Lisbon, reducing the chance that it can resume borrowing from markets in 2013 as planned, Moody’s said.

Saner heads in Europe are sounding the alarm:

 

Government bureaucrats in centralized Euro-capitals, picking winners and losers in a so-called free market never works.