Other People Say Smart Stuff, Too - Part XXXI

From Lurita Doan's recent column, "The New Desperation of Team Obama."

"Any but the most die-hard sycophants now realize that Obama's ideological policies have been failures"

You can't say you weren't warned.

An ad from the Cato Institute run in January 2009, before the trillion-dollar Democrat stimulus bill was passed.  That month's unemployment rate was the lowest it's been since Obama's been in office.  Obama told us millions of jobs were "shovel ready," then after the legislation was passed and the jobs failed to materialize, he said "shovel ready was not as shovel ready as we expected." You can't say you weren't warned.

The good news is....

...it feels like only 102°.

"General, that's a hell of an act"*

Actor Peter Falk, known to most people as Columbo, died today.  While Columbo was great, I remember him best as CIA agent Vince in the movie The In Laws.


"Serpentine, Shel, Serpentine!"




*This is what Vince says to General Garcia upon seeing the general's "Señor Pepe" act:

Now I'm reassured about Social Security

Jack Coffee, professor of law and securities law expert at Columbia University, quoted in a story in USA Today:  "Social Security is not a Ponzi scheme because it wasn't an intentional fraud."

"A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation that pays returns to separate investors, not from any actual profit earned by the organization, but from their own money or money paid by subsequent investors. The Ponzi scheme usually entices new investors by offering returns other investments cannot guarantee, in the form of short-term returns that are either abnormally high or unusually consistent. The perpetuation of the returns that a Ponzi scheme advertises and pays requires an ever-increasing flow of money from investors to keep the scheme going." -- Wikipedia

"Good intentions" seems to be a common excuse for disastrous Liberal Democrat policies.

Everything Great About YouTube

Note: NSFW (language)

Milton Friedman on Greed

Economist Milton Friedman, in a 1979 interview with Phil Donahue: "There is no alternative way, yet discovered, for improving the lot of the ordinary people that can hold a candle to the productive activities that are unleashed by a free enterprise system." Donahue does his best to argue against capitalism, and extol the virtues of socialism -- and Friedman absolutely crushes him.

Pledges of Allegiance Across America

Obama vs Obama

The results of Barack Obama's actions are the worst enemy of Barack Obama's words. In the latest incarnation, last week Obama cited a Columbus, Ohio restaurant near an auto plant as a beneficiary of the auto bailout.  The restaurant, New Chet's, will close its doors for good on Sunday.   Here's the story.

As if that weren't good enough, the story cites a voter-imposed smoking ban imposed in 2006 as a major reason for the 31-year-old restaurant's decline in business. 

Remember this:
February 11, 2009: Barack Obama, trying to win support for the Democrat trillion dollar stimulus legislation, claims that heavy machinery manufacturer Caterpillar will rehire thousands of workers it laid off.
February 12, 2009: Caterpillar CEO Owens, asked if the stimulus would cause them to rehire workers, said, "Realistically, no. The truth is we're going to have more layoffs before we start rehiring again."

or this:
February 9, 2009: Obama, once again stumping for his stimulus plan, touts thousands of "shovel ready" jobs that will benefit from the legislation.
October 13, 2010:  In a magazine interview, Obama admits that "there's no such thing as a shovel ready project."

Obama's caught-with-his-hand-in-the-cookie-jar moments would be funny if the consequences weren't so serious.

One of my greatest fears...

...is that I'll wake up some morning and think I'm Ringo Starr.

Obama in trouble in '12?

The UK Telegraph published an article by foreign affairs analyst and political commentator Nile Gardiner with the title "Why Barack Obama may be heading for electoral disaster in 2012."  Gardiner reflects on the problems caused by Obama's policies, and how in our current economy -- growth sluggish, if not non-existent; house prices down 33% since 2006; the stock market just took a huge tumble; people feel terrible about the economy and about Obama's performance -- the "hope and change" promises of Obama now taste bitter.


The biggest electoral problem for Obama, however, is the political makeup of Americans.  A Gallup poll showed that most Americans are Conservative. As Gardiner puts it:   "America is unquestionably a conservative country ideologically, but one that is ironically led by the most left-wing president in the nation’s history."

Indeed

"The unemployment rate in 2009 was 7.8% it is now 9.0%. The [national] debt was $10.7 trillion, it's now $14.3 trillion. Gas was $1.80 a gallon, it's now $3.80. Why should the American people continue a Democrat in the White House with that kind of record?"
Good question.