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posty

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Posts posted by posty

  3. Posted

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...opinion/columns

     

    To those who believe that Barack Obama is a different kind of politician -- more honest, more courageous -- please don't examine his administration's budget. If you do, you may sadly conclude that he resembles presidents stretching back to John Kennedy in one crucial respect. He won't tax voters for all the government services they want. That's the main reason we've run budget deficits in 43 of the past 48 years.

     

    Obama is a great pretender. He repeatedly says he is doing things that he isn't, trusting his powerful rhetoric to obscure the difference. He has made "responsibility" a personal theme; the budget's cover line is "A New Era of Responsibility." He says the budget begins "making the tough choices necessary to restore fiscal discipline." It doesn't.

     

    With today's depressed economy, big deficits are unavoidable for some years. But let's assume that Obama wins reelection. By his last year, 2016, the economy presumably will have long recovered. What does his final budget look like? Well, it runs a $637 billion deficit, equal to 3.2 percent of the economy (gross domestic product), projects Obama's Office of Management and Budget. That would match Ronald Reagan's last deficit, 3.1 percent of GDP in 1988, so fiercely criticized by Democrats.

     

    As a society, we should pay in taxes what it costs government to provide desired services. If benefits don't seem equal to burdens, then the spending isn't worth it. (Exceptions: deficits in wartime and economic slumps.)

     

    If Obama were "responsible," he would conduct a candid conversation about the role of government. Who deserves support and why? How big can government grow before higher taxes and deficits harm economic growth? Although Obama claims to be doing this, he hasn't confronted entitlement psychology -- the belief that government benefits once conferred should never be revoked.

     

    Is it in the public interest for the well-off elderly (say, a couple with $125,000 of income) to be subsidized, through Social Security and Medicare, by poorer young and middle-aged workers? Are any farm subsidies justified when they aren't essential for food production? We wouldn't starve without them.

     

    Given an aging America, government faces huge conflicts between spending on the elderly and spending on everything else. But even before most baby boomers retire (in 2016, only a quarter will have reached 65), Obama's government would have grown. In 2016, federal spending is projected to be 22.4 percent of GDP, up from 21 percent in 2008; federal taxes, 19.2 percent of GDP, up from 17.7 percent.

     

    It would also be "responsible" for Obama to acknowledge the big gamble in his budget. National security has long been government's first job. In his budget, defense spending drops from 20 percent of the total in 2008 to 14 percent in 2016, the smallest share since the 1930s. The decline presumes a much safer world. If the world doesn't cooperate, deficits will grow.

     

    The gap between Obama rhetoric and Obama reality transcends the budget, as do the consequences. In 2009, the stock market has declined 23.68 percent (through March 6), says Wilshire Associates. The Wall Street Journal's editorial page blames Obama's policies for all of the fall. That's unfair; the economy's deterioration was a big cause. Still, Obama isn't blameless.

     

    Confidence (too little) and uncertainty (too much) define this crisis. Obama's double talk reduces the first and raises the second. He says he's focused on reviving the economy, but he's also using the crisis to advance an ambitious long-term agenda. The two sometimes collide. The $787 billion "stimulus" is weaker than necessary, because almost $200 billion for extended projects (high-speed rail, computerized medical records) take effect after 2010. When Congress debates Obama's sweeping health-care and energy proposals, industries, regions and governmental philosophies will clash. Will this improve confidence? Reduce uncertainty?

     

    A prudent president would have made a "tough choice" -- concentrated on the economy; deferred his more contentious agenda. Similarly, Obama claims to seek bipartisanship but, in reality, doesn't. His bipartisanship consists of including a few Republicans in his Cabinet and inviting some Republican congressmen to the White House for the Super Bowl. It does not consist of fashioning proposals that would attract bipartisan support on their merits. Instead, he clings to dubious, partisan policies (mortgage cramdown, union card check) that arouse fierce opposition.

     

    Obama thinks he can ignore these blatant inconsistencies. Like many smart people, he believes he can talk his way around problems. Maybe. He's helped by much of the media, which seem so enthralled with him that they don't see glaring contradictions. During the campaign, Obama said he would change Washington's petty partisanship; he also advocated a highly partisan agenda. Both claims could not be true. The media barely noticed; the same obliviousness persists. But Obama still runs a risk: that his overworked rhetoric loses its power and boomerangs on him.

  6. Posted

    Too tired... Gee what next...

     

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/...rdon-Brown.html

     

    Sources close to the White House say Mr Obama and his staff have been "overwhelmed" by the economic meltdown and have voiced concerns that the new president is not getting enough rest.

     

    British officials, meanwhile, admit that the White House and US State Department staff were utterly bemused by complaints that the Prime Minister should have been granted full-blown press conference and a formal dinner, as has been customary. They concede that Obama aides seemed unfamiliar with the expectations that surround a major visit by a British prime minister.

     

    But Washington figures with access to Mr Obama's inner circle explained the slight by saying that those high up in the administration have had little time to deal with international matters, let alone the diplomatic niceties of the special relationship.

     

    Allies of Mr Obama say his weary appearance in the Oval Office with Mr Brown illustrates the strain he is now under, and the president's surprise at the sheer volume of business that crosses his desk.

     

    A well-connected Washington figure, who is close to members of Mr Obama's inner circle, expressed concern that Mr Obama had failed so far to "even fake an interest in foreign policy".

     

    A British official conceded that the furore surrounding the apparent snub to Mr Brown had come as a shock to the White House. "I think it's right to say that their focus is elsewhere, on domestic affairs. A number of our US interlocutors said they couldn't quite understand the British concerns and didn't get what that was all about."

     

    The American source said: "Obama is overwhelmed. There is a zero sum tension between his ability to attend to the economic issues and his ability to be a proactive sculptor of the national security agenda.

     

    "That was the gamble these guys made at the front end of this presidency and I think they're finding it a hard thing to do everything."

     

    British diplomats insist the visit was a success, with officials getting the chance to develop closer links with Mr Obama's aides. They point out that the president has agreed to meet the prime minister for further one-to-one talks in London later this month, ahead of the G20 summit on April 2.

     

    But they concede that the mood music of the event was at times strained. Mr Brown handed over carefully selected gifts, including a pen holder made from the wood of a warship that helped stamp out the slave trade - a sister ship of the vessel from which timbers were taken to build Mr Obama's Oval Office desk. Mr Obama's gift in return, a collection of Hollywood film DVDs that could have been bought from any high street store, looked like the kind of thing the White House might hand out to the visiting head of a minor African state.

     

    Mr Obama rang Mr Brown as he flew home, in what many suspected was an attempt to make amends.

     

    The real views of many in Obama administration were laid bare by a State Department official involved in planning the Brown visit, who reacted with fury when questioned by The Sunday Telegraph about why the event was so low-key.

     

    The official dismissed any notion of the special relationship, saying: "There's nothing special about Britain. You're just the same as the other 190 countries in the world. You shouldn't expect special treatment." The apparent lack of attention to detail by the Obama administration is indicative of what many believe to be Mr Obama's determination to do too much too quickly.

     

    In addition to passing the largest stimulus package and the largest budget in US history, Mr Obama is battling a plummeting stock market, the possible bankruptcy of General Motors, and rising unemployment. He has also begun historic efforts to achieve universal healthcare, overhaul education and begin a green energy revolution all in his first 50 days in office.

     

    The Sunday Telegraph understands that one of Mr Obama's most prominent African American backers, whose endorsement he spent two years cultivating, has told friends that he detects a weakness in Mr Obama's character.

     

    "The one real serious flaw I see in Barack Obama is that he thinks he can manage all this," the well-known figure told a Washington official, who spoke to this newspaper. "He's underestimating the flood of things that will hit his desk." A Democratic strategist, who is friends with several senior White House aides, revealed that the president has regularly appeared worn out and drawn during evening work sessions with senior staff in the West Wing and has been forced to make decisions more quickly than he is comfortable.

     

    He said that on several occasions the president has had to hurry back from eating dinner with his family in the residence and then tucking his daughters in to bed, to conduct urgent government business. Matters are not helped by the pledge to give up smoking.

     

    "People say he looks tired more often than they're used to," the strategist said. "He's still calm, but there have been flashes of irritation when he thinks he's being pushed to make a decision sooner than he wants to make it. He looks like he needs a cigarette."

     

    Mr Obama was teased by the New York Times on Thursday in a front page story which claimed to have detected a greater prevalence of grey hairs since he entered the White House.

     

    The Democratic strategist stressed that Mr Obama's plight was nothing new. "He knew it was going to be tough; he said as much throughout the campaign. But there's a difference between knowing it is going to be tough and facing the sheer relentless pressure of it all."

  9. Posted

    Pot kettle, kettle pot...

     

    The only difference between the two was that one just wants his leftist policies to fail and the other is that they wanted the US to lose or bail the Iraq war...

     

    http://www.foxnews.com/politics/first100da...nted-bush-fail/

     

    Rush Limbaugh took a lot of heat for saying he wants President Obama to fail -- but a lot of Democrats felt the same way about former President George W. Bush during his second term.

     

    An August 2006 poll conducted by FOX News/Opinion Dynamics showed 51 percent of Democrats did not want Bush to succeed. Thirty-four percent of independents also did not want Bush to succeed.

     

    By comparison, 90 percent of Republicans said at the time that they wanted Bush to succeed, and 40 percent of Democrats said the same.

     

    Conservative radio talk show host Limbaugh says he doesn't want the economy to fail -- just Obama's policies. But his comments last month at the Conservative Political Action Conference drew sharp criticism from the White House.

     

    After CPAC, White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel told CBS' "Face the Nation" that Limbaugh's stance was the "wrong philosophy for America."

  11. Posted

    http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/nation/6300831.html

     

    SILVER SPRING, Md. — Montgomery County police say 16 people were arrested after a fight broke out during a concert held to promote nonviolence and to remember a Silver pring teen killed last year.

     

    The free Stop the Violence youth concert was held Saturday night on Ellsworth Street in downtown Silver Spring in memory of 14-year-old Montgomery Blair High School student Tai Lam, who was shot to death in November.

     

    Police say fighting broke out near the stage toward the end of the concert and at least one person resisted arrest. Police say 16 adults and juveniles were arrested for offenses such as assault and disorderly conduct.

  17. Posted

    Found out through an inside source that I will be laid off tomorrow or early next week.

     

    In the Custom Home/Commercial building industry and after a peak of about 200 employees only years ago we are down to 90...they let about 40 go in November and this one is another big one...heard they are cutting 1.5 million in overhead :thumbsup:

     

    WOW times are tough these days :doublethumbsup:

     

    Any geeks out there with and Denver or area connections :dunno:

     

    Custom Home Estimator/Buyer with about 5 years experience.

    :lol: :banana:

     

    Sorry to hear man... I found out on the 24th of February that I will be getting laid off on March 31st...

     

    It sucks...

     

    Good luck...

  18. Posted

    http://drudgereport.com/flashco.htm

     

    Caracas - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on Friday called upon US President Barack Obama to follow the path to socialism, which he termed as the "only" way out of the global recession. "Come with us, align yourself, come with us on the road to socialism. This is the only path. Imagine a socialist revolution in the United States," Chavez told a group of workers in the southern Venezuelan state of Bolivar.

     

    The controversial Venezuelan leader, who taunted the United States as a source of capitalistic evil under former president George W Bush, added that the United States needs a leader who can take it to a "higher" destiny and bring it out of "the sad role that it has been given, as a murderous, attacking power that is hated all around the world."

     

    Chavez said that people are calling Obama a "socialist" for the measures of state intervention he is taking to counter the crisis, so it would not be too far-fetched to suggest that he might join the project of "21st century socialism" that the Venezuelan leader is heading.

     

    "Nothing is impossible. Who would have thought in the 1980s that the Soviet Union would disappear? No one," he said.

     

    "That murderous, genocidal empire has to end, and some day there has to come a leader ... who interprets the best of a people who also include human beings who suffer, endure, weep and laugh," the outspoken Chavez said.

     

    Developing...

  24. Posted

    http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20...00.html?cnn=yes

     

    Cool mom alert!

     

    When it comes to discussing sex, Zac Efron says and he and his mother are comfortable having that conversation. After photos surfaced of the High School Musical star, 21, and girlfriend Vanessa Hudgens, 20, looking at what appeared to be sex toys, it was time for a chat.

     

    "My mom is like, 'Zac, what did you buy in a sex shop?'" Efron tells Elle for its April issue. "'I was like, 'Mom, calm down, it's not a sex shop.' "

     

    "She wouldn't have any of it," he says. "She's like. 'I knew you were being sexual!' But she understood."

     

    And she followed through, too. "My stocking was full of condoms this Christmas," he says. "She buys me the economy box."

  25. Posted

    http://mydeathspace.com/article/2009/02/28...eath_underwater

     

    A 23-year-old man who told his friends he could hold his breath underwater for a long period of time drowned while trying to prove it Sunday evening.

     

    The Corpus Christi resident was swimming with a group of friends in the 14300 block of South Padre Island Drive. When he did not come up for air, his friends became worried so they jumped in to retrieve him, police said.

     

    Police and paramedics responded to the scene about 9:45 p.m. The man's girlfriend told police she was a certified lifeguard so she gave him CPR until medics arrived.

     

    The man was taken to Corpus Christi Medical Center-Bay Area Hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 10:08 p.m.

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