If you receive this and you hate it and you don’t want to ever read it no matter what...that is fine; email me back and you will be deleted from my list (which is almost at the maximum anyway).

I attempt to post a new issue each Sunday by 2 or 3 pm central standard time (I sometimes fail at this attempt).

I try to include factual material only, along with my opinions (it should be clear which is which). I make an attempt to include as much of this week’s news as I possibly can. The first set of columns are intentionally designed for a quick read.

I do not accept any advertising nor do I charge for this publication. I write this principally to blow off steam in a nation where its people seemed have collectively lost their minds.

And if you are a believer in Jesus Christ, always remember: We do not struggle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places (Eph. 6:12).

Volcanic eruption in Iceland shuts down much of European air traffic for days. 16,000 flights were cancelled on Friday. This could last for several weeks. Of course, some have already blamed global warming for this; I have not yet read of anyone blaming Bush for this. According to one article, there are some places in Iceland where in the middle of the day, it is so dark, you cannot see your hand. Some have theorized that this could have a profound effect on lowering the earth’s temperature for a few years, if not decades.

Federal judge Barbara B Crabb declares that a national day of prayer is unconstitutional because it violates the separation of church and state.

President Obama held a nuclear summit; not attending, North Korea and Iran. He appeared to make a pledge not to use nuclear weapons if we are attacked by someone using bio-terrorist weapons.

Iran holds its own nuclear disarmament summit, and says that 60 countries were in attendance, including China and Russia were represented by 7 or 8 foreign ministers.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has accused Goldman Sachs of lying to investors about who was really behind junk mortgages securities it sold to clients. Some on Wall Street say that this is purely a political move in order to pass Obama’s Financial Reform Bill.

Dow Chemical, the US firm which now owns the leaking pesticides factory responsible for thousands of deaths in Bhopal, India, is sponsoring Life Earth events in 150 cities today in association with Al Gore.

Harry Reid (unedited): “When Republicans ran this town, they gave tax breaks to CEO’s, as we all know, many of those jobs were shipped overseas, and struggling families were told no.” And it appeared to me as if he was reading this.

President Obama, at a fundraiser: “So I've been a little amused over the last couple of days where people have been having these rallies, about taxes. You would think they would be saying, ‘Thank you!’ That's what you'd think!”

Michael Linden, director for tax policy at the Center for American Progress, a Democratic think tank, says, "it's also about responsibility. We have a big problem that we are facing in this country in terms of a large budget gap going forward. And I believe that the wealthy in the country have the responsibility to help solve that problem." Translation: tax the rich a lot more.

Bill Press on the Tea partiers: “I think they want something for nothing. I pointed out before, if you look at this crowd, most of them are older, white, on Social Security and Medicare.”

Ed Schultz, who did not know the right congressman who was "spit on" (that would be Emanuel Cleaver, who's since backed away from that claim): “So I wonder if that guy that spit on that congressman, John Lewis, if he thinks that actually Americans wanted him to do that? But of course O'Reilly says, well, you can't, you can't broadbrush. Oh yes you can. Absolutely you can. Because you can go from one rally to another rally to another rally to another rally all over the country and what are you gonna see? Hitler mustaches on the president. Socialism. Nazi talk. The whole lot.”

Mike Malloy also commented on the TEA party movement: “Well, today was the big April 15 Tax Day protest. Um, the uh, the crybabies and whiny-asses gather together all across the country protesting something. Of course, they have no idea what they are protesting! I'd love to hear some of the speakers, um, all white males, who get up there and say 'We want our country back' -- from whom, from what? Who -- who took your country, you silly goose? And 'We don't like our tax structure.' Why? Ninety-five percent of working households in this country this past year got a tax cut. We'll get into that in a second. These people are ignorant beyond belief; I'm [pause...] just amazed to watch these people. It's like they live in a parallel universe from normal people! The things they say! 'We want our country back!' ”

Cokie Roberts on ABC News: "You have these fourteen states attorneys general saying that they want to have the court overturn the recently passed health care law. I must say, I was just with my grand kids at Fort Sumter, and the notion of nullification made me extremely nervous because it was, of course, the first step toward the Civil War."

“I am proud to be a tax paying American, but I could be just as proud at half the money.” Arthur Godfrey.

Gingrich said we need a president, not an athlete, and Nora O’Donnell on MSNBC said that was saying all Black men are athletes, and that is racist. Dennis Miller commented, “That is a stretch akin to Michael Moore in a pair of ski pants...she was shocked; she thought she was in the echo chamber and they were going to give her a cookie, and you know its an overreach when you look over at Mike Barnacles’ chair for approbation, and you see a roadrunner cloud heading off into the distance.”

Gingrich, commenting on what is to be expected after we have passed all of Obama’s big-spending legislation: “And then they are going to tell us that we need to raise our taxes to pay for their spending.”

The President said that we are a superpower, “whether we like it or not.” Sarah Palin commented, “I would hope that our leaders in Washington, D.C., understand we like to be a dominant superpower. I don't understand a world view where we have to question whether we like it or not that America is powerful.”

Darryl Postel, Black TEA party attendee, when asked by NBC news if he was ever uncomfortable at these TEA party rallies: “No. No. These are my people! Americans.”

China is investing $20 billion into Venezuela for industrial and infrastructure projects.

In the second vid, Hannity and Morris look at which states are in play for the Senate (this is good if you are a political junkie).

Bill O’Reilly interviews Cathy Areu, after she said that Sarah Palin was like Larry the Cable Guy, but without the class and intelligence.

More Commitunes (without the interview above). Lots of contemporary footage (in a few instances, the editing is unfair):

A surprisingly reasonable and respectful David Letterman interviews TEA party head from Sandpoint, Idaho.

(there is a part II and III as well; there are a lot of angry comments below the vid)

A blast from the past: when then candidate Obama is asked about raising capital gains taxes, in view of the fact that the government gets more revenue when these taxes are reduced, he answers that he would increase the capital gains tax anyway, because that is fair.

I have posted this before, but it is worth re-posting: American Rising; send this link to everyone you know:

1) When an unbeliever hears some Christian, famous or not, saying that such and such a place was ravaged by an earthquake (tsunami, volcano, flood) because this is God’s judgment on that area and those people, they usually think to themselves “crackpot” and/or classify such speech as fear-mongering. Many believers have much the same response when an unbeliever blames such catastrophes on global warming.

2) FoxNews hiring Karl Rove was a stroke of genius, and if you have never seen him pontificate on political issues, you are missing something. The same is true of Newt Gingrich’s appearances on FoxNews. However, I must say that I have been disappointed with Sarah Palin’s appearances on FoxNews. I don’t disagree with much that she says, but she does not provide insight; she mostly appears to be running for office.

3) Do you know any liberal who is willing to put a number on the maximum percentage that any person ought to be taxed? 60%? 75%? Most conservatives can come up with some numbers quite quickly. Personally, I believe that everyone ought to pay taxes, and that our rates should be 10%, 20% and 30% (as the absolute maximum combined total of all taxes than anyone can be compelled to pay). If someone wants to participate in Social Security or Medicare, then there needs to be a rate which will actually pay for it in the future.

4) Speaking of medicare and other medical plans, the easiest way to keep people from using their benefits frivolously, keep doctor visits at full price, with a yearly checkup for the bargain basement price of $100.

5) And speaking of taxes, there are tax rates which are ideal and bring in the maximum amount of income, and I will guarantee you, these are not 50+% tax rates on the rich. Jude Wanniski suggested the Laffer curve, found at (although this is not original with Wanniski):

6) The problem with cutting back on our space program is, our enemies could weaponize space, if we are not there to keep our eyes on them.

7) One of the suggestions I have heard of late is, offering any person age 65 or older to not collect any taxes from them if they do not collect social security. This was suggested by a listener to Michael Medved’s show. This might help to ease the idea of a later retirement age.

8) In any case, premiums for Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid all need to be raised; taxes collected for same need to be raised; and eligiblity ages for Social Security and Medicare all need to be raised. The days of $5–25 co-pays needs to end as well.

9) At my age, I have a lot of friends in California who both worked for the state government and are at or near retirement age. At least one of them is reading this right now. Will they be willing to take less than what California has promised them in retirement? I realize that they have signed contracts with the state as to their salaries and benefits. Do they realize that they are part of the problem in California’s budget?

Do they realize that they are in the generation which broke California’s bank? What are they willing to give up to keep California solvent? Do they know that their state unions are the problem in California? Do they realize that they have been over-promised and now there is not enough in the state budget to give them?

10) On the left, they are trying to paint those attending TEA parties with a new moniker; they are not being called tea baggers as much (a vulgar, homophobic slur); now they are being called tea klan or tea klanners.

130 is the number of time the United States has gone to war. During that time, we have declared war only 5 times.

In an effort to raise revenues, President Obama intends to raise the tax rates rise for singles making more than $200,000 a year, and couples making more than $250,000. Greenstein says this will bring in $826 billion over the next 10 years. This will not cover Obama’s deficit for even one year.

Right now, 11 million people in the U.S. are receiving some sort of unemployment benefits.

There was a record of 2.8 million foreclosures in 2009, up 21% from 2008 and 120% from 2007.

Before the recession began, annual federal spending totaled $24,000 per household. President Obama would hike that spending above $36,000 per household by 2020

28% of the population paid no federal income tax in 1950; today, this is up to 47%.

60% of American families will as a group receive more in government spending than they pay in taxes

President Obama and his wife, Michelle, reported an adjusted gross income of more than $5.5 million in 2009 - much of it from the sale of Mr. Obama's books. They paid nearly $1.8 million in federal taxes.

Mr. Obama also won $1.4 million as the recipient of the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize, but he did not have to report it as income because he instructed the Nobel Committee to donate the money directly to charity, the White House said. This is interesting, as we do not get a 100% deduction for our charitable deductions. It does not matter that he gave away the whole prize; what matters is, the President gets a write-off which we do not.

Aside from the Nobel award, the White House said the Obamas donated $329,100 to charity; their largest gifts were $50,000 contributions to CARE and the United Negro College Fund.

Vice President Biden and his wife, Jill, reported an adjusted gross income of more than $333,000, and paid more than $71,000 in federal income taxes. The Bidens contributed $4,820 to charity, in both monetary and in-kind donations (this is less than 1.5% of their earnings).

74% of people questioned say that a lot of their tax dollars are wasted by the government;

92% of tea party members said they would prefer a smaller, less intrusive federal government to a larger one

Also, 92% of the TEA party members believe that Obama was turning the United States into a socialist country.

A news reporter asks a Black conservative if he feels uncomfortable at a TEA party rally. Are you kidding me?

Could the tremendous debt being run up by Congress and Obama be with the intent that a responsible (read Republican) Congress will have to raise taxes, and then Democrats can see, “See, we gave you all of these great programs and all the Republicans are doing are taxing you.”

Dueling nuclear conferences: the one in the United States and the one in Iran. The president talks about how worried we have been about the moderately secured radioactive material in Mexico and Canada, interspersed with Iran president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad poking fun at Obama and how Iran will destroy the big and little Satan with nuclear weapons, adding, from time to time, “Oh, did I just say that out loud?”

I wanted to give Obama props for securing some nuclear waste, but the real threats—Iran and North Korea—are simply not dealt with.

Tax cuts = tax credits (if you do not understand the difference, you might be a liberal)

[I sent this set of questions on to Jake Tapper, who is the only person who asks the President tough questions]

Mr. President, many of your critics have been calling you a Marxist and a socialist, so I would like to ask you some questions along these lines. By your own admission, in college, you preferred the radical and Marxist professors. During your campaign, you told one man that you wanted to spread the wealth around. You have spoken negatively about our constitution as being one of negative rights, and that you appeared to favor the government saying what it will provide for its people, which is a communist idea (guaranteed job, guarantee medical care, etc.). I would like you to explain to us what aspects of communism that you like and what aspects that you do not like. Has your view of communism changed over the years, and, if so, how? Are some governments better off being communist? Should the United States be more like European governments, which are socialist democracies or should they try to emulate us instead?

If I give money to my church, I can only write off a portion of it; but you were able to give your peace prize money away to the charities of your choice and write off 100% of it; how come?

Obama has no clue as to what to do about North Korean and Iran. In Iran, there are ways that we could foment revolution, and we have armies on both sides of Iran, so it is not as if there are no solutions.

If you think that the proposed Cap and Trade is all about limiting carbon emissions. It is all about government revenue.

FoxNews will hire Hiwa Alaghebandian next year after she graduates, probably for their business channel.

There will be demonstratable cooling over the earth for the next 10 or so years, but global warming enthusiasts will not dial their rhetoric or climate change proposals down.

What some parties seem to be doing is enacting legislation which will have ill effects in the next administration (which they assume will be the other party). All of the bad loans, mandated by ACORN activism and the Community Reinvestment Act, began to go bad at the end of the Bush presidency. Paying for all of these massive programs passed by Obama, Reid and Pelosi will have to be paid for; are they simply waiting for Republicans to be elected, so that they can blame the Republicans for tax hikes?

Have you noticed the evolution of the media and the TEA parties? When the first TEA parties broke out, it was a virtual media blackout. The media, who will send 24/7 reporters to cover 35 people protesting George Bush at his ranch, completely ignored millions of people who spontaneously erupted all over the United States. Only FoxNews covered the first wave of TEA parties. I called home to my mom, who is a liberal, and asked her what she thought of the TEA parties (there had been a huge one in her hometown). She had never heard of them; did not know who or what they were.

Despite thousands of people demonstrating in hundreds of cities, there were no news reports on television, despite all of the available video; there were no on-the-spot reporters asking around as to what was going on; and there were no news stories in any of the newspapers. 3000 people demonstrating in your hometown, and so you get the next day’s newspaper, and there is nothing there.

Because of FoxNews, the media realized that they could not ignored millions of demonstrators. What happens when Charlie Brown drives by several thousand demonstrators downtown, and he turns on the news to find out what was going on, and there is no news. It was if these people did not exist. So he flips through the channels and finds out the only news about these people is on FoxNews.

The alphabet media figured, if we don’t cover it, then it didn’t happen. Well, that philosophy did not work. So they changed tactics, because they lost a lot of viewers to FoxNews because of this.

So, during the next wave of TEA parties, the media covered them, but they were very snarky and combative. They didn’t ask typical people in the crowd why they were there, they challenged them to on-air debates, with professional reporters, trying to skewer these people in any way that they could. No one engaged in a debate with Code Pink outside of Bush’s ranch; but these protestors—the media needed to challenge them because they appeared not to like Obama and Obama’s approach to things.

The media found the most extreme people and focused on their signs and interviews with them. The media was also very selective in how they presented this material. They focused on the lack of African Americans. All of their crowd shots were of white people. There was the gun nut who was carrying a gun, and there was a photo which was ubiquitous in the media, of the sidearm this one guy carried....but did you notice, they never show this man’s face or arm. Why? Because he was Black, and there were no Blacks at these TEA parties, so the news media could not show film or photos of Black people who attended these rallies. So that famous photo carefully edited out this man’s racial identity.

What else did the media carefully leave on the cutting room floor? Black entertainers and Black speakers at these TEA party events. Since the media template is, this is a bunch of angry white people, they could not show any Black people in their coverage.

Next step, Nancy Pelosi and several members of the Black Caucus walked through the TEA party demonstrations in Washington D.C. the day the healthcare bill was to be voted on by the House. They had never done this before. These politicians did not normally walk through crowds. And Nancy Pelosi carried a huge gavel with her, so, in case you did not recognize the lack of expression, you would see the gavel she carried. Why? The template was, these people are a bunch of racists who reject president Obama out of hand. Therefore, put some Black Congressmen in their face, and all hell was going to break loose.

Accusations of spitting and the use of the N-word was front page news on almost every newspaper and one of the top 3 stories on the networks and CNN and MSNBC. And there was footage; tons of footage; footage from every angle of this provocative walk toward the House; and what did this footage reveal? No N-word; no spitting. One very ticked-off guy talking passionately to one of the Congressmen, where there may have been some saliva in his enthusiastic discourse, but not intentionally. It was clear to anyone with an open mind that this guy was impassioned, but he was not uncouth.

And all the time, the media ignored many of the facts. TEA partiers were often older people, like your mom and dad, or like your grandparents. Most had never protested before. And, in contrast to the Obama campaign, where there was a sea of identical pre-manufactured signs, everyone at the TEA party carried a sign that they made on their kitchen table the night before. What was remarkable about these signs were their clever original sayings, with far less than 5% representing the views of birthers or truthers or people with a questionable message. The media ignored police reports about these demonstrations, where the people were kind, considerate, and never was there an act of violence, apart from those perpetrated by those from the outside (like the SEIU thugs who beat up a Black man at a townhall meeting; who used the N-word repeatedly). Or how about photos of a TEA party after the people left? Did we see any of those? These demonstrators typically pick up after themselves. They don’t litter. They don’t toss their signs on the ground and leave. They don’t drink sodas and toss their cans or bottles on the ground.

Now we are about to enter into a new phase. Liberals and leftists are going to infiltrate the TEA parties and carry misspelled signs. Who knows? Maybe they will cause some violence; maybe they will use the N-word. Maybe they will carry signs, “Obama, go back to Kenya.” And how will the media cover it?

I did not see a lot of media on the TEA party crashers, but then, there were not a lot of them, and TEA party members were ready for them.

After several days of hype and hand-wringing about liberal plans to infiltrate Thursday's tea party rallies, the great 2010 Tax Day Tea Party Crash did not produce much of a bang in Washington.

To be sure, a handful of obvious crashers engaged in some mostly non-confrontational back-and-forth with tea party activists at a Thursday evening rally that drew thousands to Washington's National Mall near the Washington Monument. And some less overt crashers subtly mocked activists from amidst their ranks at both the evening rally on the Mall and an earlier event at Freedom Plaza near the White House. And there could have been other infiltrators who evaded immediate detection.

But activists and organizers interviewed by POLITICO said the mischief was nowhere near as widespread or disruptive as they feared earlier in the week, when a wave of attention focused on a website called CrashtheTeaParty.org that encouraged liberals to pretend to be tea partiers, attend rallies and voice fringe sentiments to marginalize the movement (the website appears to have been stripped of most of its content Thursday).

A small group of folks from CrashtheTeaParty were rumored to be in the crowd on the Mall Thursday night with a sign disparaging lower income people.

And a group of five American University students, who were on average probably at least 25 years younger than most attendees at the FreedomWorks rally, waded through the crowd with signs ranging from the direct and challenging ("Embrace the state") to the satirical ("I have a sign" and "Loud noises") to the malapropically mocking ("No $ 4 educatoin. I don't wnt it").

But aren't these signs far more damning of their makers than they are of the Tea Party?

Kurt Beyer, a 21-year-old student at Pennsylvania's Muhlenberg College wearing a short-sleeve flannel button down open wide enough at the collar to expose an infinity cross tattoo on his chest, was a little more subtle.

He attended with two of classmates and held aloft a sign reading "Palin 2010. One people. One Nation. One Leader." Not only is Palin not running for anything in 2010 (she's rumored to be considering a presidential bid in 2012), but the slogan is a translation of one used by Adolph Hitler in 1938.

And a self-described infiltrator at the afternoon rally, who dressed as a monk and carried a sign reading "God Hates Taxes," said many tea partiers lauded him for his sign.

"I thought I'd be getting drummed out of here by somebody who just thought I was here to agitate and start trouble," he told a POLITICO videographer. "In fact, it turns out it's very empowering. People really love this sign," he said, adding "the whole idea that God hates taxes is an absolute absurdity, however it's always good to know that God is on your side." .

We suspect that God is against any injustice, which is what the Tea Partisans were protesting.

Brooks Alexander, a 23-year-old Olney, Md., hotel worker and Obama supporter who wore an Obama t-shirt to the evening rally, said infiltrators were being disrespectful.

"They're doing a disservice not only to themselves, but to the people who are here trying to express their views," said Alexander, who is African American and said he traveled to the rally to verify for himself liberal accounts blasting the tea party as racist.

"All my friends told me I was crazy to come down here in an Obama shirt," he said. "Obviously I have political disagreements [with the tea party], but I cannot lie. I cannot say that people have been anything but nice to me. They have been shaking my hand. One guy told me I had a lot of [guts] for coming down here. I will definitely walk away from this with a new understanding of the tea party."

But you can be sure that the media won't have learned anything from the exercise.

There were others who tried to infiltrate, and TEA party people picked them out and isolated them (there are photos as well as several other links to stories of those attempting to infiltrate the TEA parties):

1 out of 138 homes are in foreclosure, and there are 2 reasons for this which are ignored: a lack of information and a lack of morality.

When you drive a new car 10 feet off the lot, it decreases in value some 10% or so (I just made up that number). The same is true of buying a new house. Once you live in a house for any amount of time, it decreases in value, at first. Although most people can sell their homes within 5 years, if they bought new, and break even at the closing table, in a market like today’s, that may take 10–15 years. Those who sell new homes rarely mention this to their buyers, so when they find out that someone down the street, 2 years after moving in, sold their house at a loss, they panic somewhat.

However, more often, people walk away from a house that is underwater (they owe more than the house is worth) simply because they think that is the right thing to do. The mortgage company is a 3^rd party to your purchase of a house. They do not guarantee the value of your home. They do an appraisal to protect themselves, but in a volatile market, this appraisal might not be any good in 6 months or a year. So, when a house goes underwater, it is not the fault of the mortgage company, but often, the buyer blames the mortgage company, walks away from their own house and sticks the mortgage company with bill, so to speak.

Here is what they need to know, and no one is telling them this: this is wrong. It is not the fault of the mortgage company. They cannot look into the future and guarantee the value of your home. Therefore, if you can pay your mortgage, then that is what you ought to do, if you believe that people ought to be moral. This is an obligation that you have taken upon yourself. You signed a mountain of paperwork promising to pay this debt and that is what you ought to do.

When morality and personal integrity are no longer important to us, that signals the end of a nation. When your every action is done only to benefit you, that is a mistake of personal integrity. When significant portions of the population have this kind of thinking, economic chaos ensues.

This is why mortgage companies, apart from the influence of government, did not give mortgages to people who were irresponsible (= economically immoral).

This also helps to explain why our economy fell so far so quickly: government forced mortgage companies to give loans to people who would not repay them. Economic immorality has led us into a recession.

Part of the solution is to get the government out of the mortgage business; and part of the solution is educating people that, fulfilling a contractual obligation is moral, and that walking away from something you have agreed to is immoral.

When he released his new budget proposal on February 1, President Barack Obama asserted that the government "simply cannot continue to spend as if deficits don't have consequences; as if waste doesn't matter; as if the hard-earned tax dollars of the American people can be treated like Monopoly money; as if we can ignore this challenge for another generation."[1]

Yet the President's new budget does exactly that-- raising taxes by $3 trillion and federal spending by $1.6 trillion over the next ten years. If enacted, this budget would increase the 2010 deficit to more than $1.5 trillion, and leave a deficit of more than $1 trillion even after an assumed return to peace and prosperity. Overall, the President's budget would double the national debt over the next decade.[2]

•Would permanently expand the federal government by 3 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) over 2007 pre-recession levels;

•Would raise taxes on all Americans by nearly $3 trillion over the next decade;

•Would raise taxes for 3.2 million small businesses and upper-income taxpayers by an average of $300,000 over the next decade;

•Would run a $1.6 trillion deficit in 2010--$143 billion higher than the recession-driven 2009 deficit;

•Would dump an additional $74,000 per household of debt into the laps of our children and grandchildren; and

Source: Heritage Foundation calculations based on U.S. Office of Management and Budget, Budget of the United States Government, Fiscal Year 2011 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 2010), pp. 146-179, Tables S-1 through S-14. Also includes the cost of House-passed cap-and-trade bill, which President Obama endorsed yet excluded from his budget tables.

Before the recession began, annual federal spending totaled $24,000 per household. President Obama would hike that spending above $36,000 per household by 2020--an inflation-adjusted $12,000-per-household expansion of government. (See Chart 1.) But even these steep tax increases would not finance all of this new spending: The President's budget would lead to trillions in new debt over the next decade.

In fact, the President's new budget proposal contains even more spending and debt than last year's proposal. Over the 10 years in which both budget projections overlap (fiscal years 2010 through 2019) this year's budget would add an additional $1.7 trillion in spending and an additional $2 trillion in budget deficits. (See Table 1.)[3] Overall, this year's proposal shows annual budget deficits as much as 49 percent larger than last year's proposal--raising the debt by an additional 6 percent of GDP over the same period. It is a spending spree that will drive up both taxes and deficits.

In a triumph of hope over experience, the President proposes spending $267 billion on yet another stimulus bill. Last year's $787 billion stimulus bill (now estimated to cost $862 billion)[4] was supposed to create (not just save) 3.3 million net jobs. Since its passage one year ago, more than 3 million additional net jobs have been lost, pushing the unemployment rate to 10 percent. This failure was utterly predictable--as the United States during the Great Depression and Japan in the 1990s have shown that governments cannot spend their way out of recessions or depressions.[5]

The proper response from the government would be to repeal the unspent portion of the stimulus and stop piling more debt onto future generations. Instead, President Obama prefers to borrow an additional $267 billion from the more productive private sector so that politicians and bureaucrats can spend those dollars. This move would only weaken the economic recovery, increase the debt, and eventually push interest rates higher by draining funds from global capital markets as a massive and growing federal government competes with the private sector for resources.

President Obama's misplaced budget priorities may be the result of his Administration's misdiagnosis of the cause of the deficit. During his State of the Union speech in January, the President asserted that "by the time I took office, we had a one-year deficit of over $1 trillion and projected deficits of $8 trillion over the next decade. Most of this was the result of not paying for two wars, two tax cuts, and an expensive prescription drug program."[6] That is simply not true. The various policies mentioned by President Obama were implemented in the early 2000s. Yet even with all those policies in place, the 2007 budget deficit stood at only $161 billion. The trillion-dollar deficit did not begin until 2009 (driven by financial bailouts, stimulus, and declining revenues) as the recession hit its trough.

The wars, tax cuts, and prescription drug program mentioned by the President certainly could not be responsible for most of the trillion-dollar deficits projected for the next decade, given that most war spending will be phased out by then, and the tax cuts and Medicare benefit are expected to cost a combined 2.4 percent of GDP by 2020--even as the baseline budget deficit rises past 8 percent of GDP. (See Table 2.)[7] That even ignores whatever portion of the lost tax cut revenues is replenished by economic growth.

By contrast, the rising costs of Social Security, Medicare (beyond just the drug benefit), Medicaid, and net interest are responsible for nearly 5 percent in additional deficits as a share of GDP by 2020. Yet the President failed to mention this spending as driving long-term budget deficits.

There is also some hypocrisy at work in that President Obama does not want to "pay for" more than a fraction of these initiatives, either. Just like President George W. Bush, President Obama has proposed continued funding of the Medicare drug entitlement as well as the costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan without any offsets. He has also proposed extending more than three-quarters of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts without offsets. Thus, President Obama has opened himself up to the same criticism that he heaped on President Bush.

President Obama has harshly criticized the $3.3 trillion in budget deficits accumulated in eight years under President Bush.[8] Yet President Obama is now proposing to borrow $7.6 trillion during what would be his own eight years in the White House. (See Chart 2.) In fact, President Obama would add more to the national debt than every other President in American history from George Washington through George W. Bush combined.

The President has claimed that his budget deficits are a temporary result of the recession. Yet his budget would increase the deficit in 2010 even as the economy moves out of recession. The Obama budget fails to achieve his goal of cutting the budget deficit in half by the end of his first term. Even by 2020--a time of assumed peace and prosperity-- the annual budget deficit would still top $1 trillion. By that point, the debt would reach 77 percent of GDP (nearly double the level before the recession).

Eventually, this unprecedented surge of debt would increase interest rates. The United States government would find itself competing with other big-spending, deficit-ridden nations and the productive private sector to borrow massive amounts of money from the pool of global savings. Although U.S. Treasury bills are a popular investment for domestic and international investors in these uncertain economic times, many investors will shift into higher-return investments (such as stocks) when the economy fully recovers, thereby forcing Washington to offer higher interest rates to induce purchases of its debt. Eventually, this could cause a vicious circle where rising interest rates push up the cost of servicing the national debt, forcing the government to borrow even more money from the private sector--thus raising interest rates further. Moody's Investors Service has noted this potential debt-and-interest-rate spiral, and signaled that it may cost the United States government its prized AAA bond rating.[9] These high interest rates would also slow down the economic recovery by making it more costly for businesses to invest and more difficult for families to afford home and auto loans.

In the long run, Washington is dumping a colossal amount of debt into the laps of Americans' children and grandchildren. Between 2011 and 2020, President Obama's proposed budget would add $8.5 trillion ($74,000 per U.S. household) in new government debt. By 2020, 35 cents of every dollar paid in individual income taxes would be used to pay interest on this debt. Moreover, given the unsustainable costs of paying Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefits to 77 million retiring baby boomers, the federal debt will continue to expand after 2020.[10] Without real reforms, the federal government will undertake the greatest intergenerational transfer of debt in American history. Younger generations, not old enough to vote when most of these policies were enacted, will be relegated to staggering tax increases, deep government debt, and slower economic growth in order to pay for their parents' and grandparents' retirement benefits. The President's budget not only does nothing to prevent this fundamentally immoral situation--it makes it worse.

Last year, President Obama promised that "if your family earns less than $250,000 a year, you will not see your taxes increased a single dime. I repeat: not one single dime."[11] Yet even before the budget was released, he signed into law a 62 cent tobacco-tax increase that has a disproportionate negative effect on lower-income smokers. He has endorsed the $846 billion cap-and-trade tax passed by the House in 2009, which electric utility companies, oil refiners, natural gas producers, and other energy producers would immediately pass on to consumers, including those earning less than $250,000.[12] Consequently, President Obama's budget would raise everyone's taxes. (See Table 3.)

The President has pared back some tax cuts proposed last year (the making-work-pay tax credit would now expire in 2013). He also proposes new tax cuts, some of which are helpful (automatic enrollment in Individual Retirement Accounts would help more people save for retirement) and others that are not (expansion of the child and dependent care tax credit is biased toward those who choose paid child care over staying home with their children).

A nearly $1 trillion tax increase is reserved for couples earning more than $250,000 and individuals earning more than $200,000. Beginning in 2011, the President's budget will increase these Americans' taxes by:

•Raising the top two income tax brackets from 33 percent to 36 percent, and from 35 percent 39.6 percent ($364 billion);

•Raising capital gains and dividends tax rates from 15 percent to 20 percent ($105 billion);

•Phasing out personal exemptions and limiting itemized deductions ($208 billion); and

•Reducing the value of tax deductions by approximately one-fourth ($291 billion).

This $1 trillion tax hike would fall on the backs of only 3.2 million tax filers--an average tax hike of more than $300,000 per filer over 10 years on a group that is already shouldering an increasing portion of the income tax burden.[13]

Moreover, businesses and upper-income individuals would also pay a substantial burden of the proposed $743 billion in new taxes to finance the President's health care reform. American businesses, trying to compete globally despite the world's second-highest corporate tax rate, would also face an additional $468 billion in various new taxes at a time when they are--according to the White House--supposed to be getting back on their feet and begin hiring new employees.

Such tax increases would significantly reduce economic growth by reducing people's incentives to work, save, and invest. Specifically, higher investment taxes may prevent the economy from receiving the investment capital it needs to recover. Because most small businesses pay the individual income tax, they would face new barriers to expanding, investing, hiring, and even staying in business. Wealthier individuals would be more likely to allocate their wealth to wherever they can avoid these new taxes, instead of in areas where their wealth would be most productive for the economy.

While there is never a good time to raise taxes, President Obama's proposal to raise taxes at the beginning of a tenuous recovery is especially problematic. Even if the tax increases are not implemented until 2011, many businesses planning investment and hiring will likely begin scaling back their plans in anticipation of the coming tax hikes.

One could, ostensibly, defend this $3 trillion tax increase as necessary to rein in the staggering deficits contained in the President's budget proposal. But even stipulating that argument, President Obama would still use more than half of these tax increases to expand government instead of reducing the deficit. Nearly $600 billion would go toward a new health care entitlement. More than $800 billion would go toward cap-and-trade energy legislation. An additional $168 billion would be spent on more failed "stimulus" spending, and $52 billion would create educational entitlements. While the President would reduce the growth of non-security discretionary spending by nearly $250 billion over 10 years, all the savings would go toward other discretionary spending.

The rest of the tax increases would be needed just to keep pace with a portion of the new automatic increases in Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. Once the President's $3 trillion tax increase reduced the $1.6 trillion in new spending, the additional $1.4 trillion in new revenues will cover just one-fourth of the additional costs of these three programs.

As a result, the President's budget would raise tax revenues to approximately 1.8 percent of GDP above the historical average--yet leave spending more than 3.5 percent of GDP above the historical average. Simply put, surging spending is driving the budget deficits.[14]

President Obama does deserve credit for reversing President Bush's policy of not budgeting for the Alternative Minimum Tax patch (the annual reform to prevent a large tax increase), the global war on terrorism, and future unanticipated emergencies. But the Obama budget contains numerous large gimmicks, too:

•Cap-and-Trade Costs Are Not Included. Last year, the President simply left the cost of his health plan out of his aggregate budget tables.[15] This year, he budgeted for his health care plan, but removed the costs of his cap-and-trade plan. Given that the President has endorsed the House-passed bill that would raise taxes by $846 billion, and spending by $822 billion, The Heritage Foundation has incorporated this government expansion into its presidential budget estimates.[16]

•The Baseline Assumes War Spending Rises Forever. Repeating his much-maligned gimmick from last year's budget, the President first creates a baseline that assumes the Iraq surge continues forever (which was never U.S. policy), and then "saves" $728 billion against that baseline by ending the surge as scheduled under his policies. It is like a family "saving" $10,000 by first assuming an expensive vacation and then not taking it. This paper does not give credit for such savings relative to a fantasy baseline.

•The $132 Billion "Magic Asterisk." The President's budget claims $132 billion in savings over 10 years from "program integrity" reforms. Basically, this means unspecified reforms to fight waste, fraud, and abuse. The "Budget Process" section in the budget's Analytical Perspectives volume contends that such savings can be found chiefly from stronger IRS enforcement of tax laws, with some additional savings from the Social Security Administration and federal health programs.[17]Of course, government waste is easy to identify and difficult to eliminate. The federal government's track record on rooting out waste is abysmal, and promises to close the "tax gap" of unpaid taxes have not translated into progress. While the President should be applauded for trying to root out waste, it is unrealistic to assume $132 billion in savings to offset additional entitlement spending.

•The $23 Billion Terminations and Cuts. The White House is advertising $23 billion in proposed spending cuts and terminations. Given the multitude of outdated and failed programs, many of these cuts are necessary. Yet if last year is any indication, they will not save taxpayers a dime.

Last year, Congress and President Obama agreed on $7 billon worth of terminations and spending cuts (mostly in defense)--and then plowed 100 percent of the savings into new spending (mostly non-defense). Not a dollar went toward deficit reduction.[18] There is no reason to expect this year will be any different.

•The President's largest savings proposal ($8 billion in 2011), for instance, would come from eliminating the subsidized student loan program (run by banks with federal subsidies), and shepherding all students into direct loans run by the federal government. Yet the President would use all $43 billion in savings to help finance a $69 billion expansion of Pell Grants. The deficit would not be reduced at all. Using "low hanging fruit" budget cuts for new spending means that more of the higher taxes or spending cuts down the road will have to come from the remaining higher-priority policies.

•The Lowballing of Discretionary Spending. President Obama deserves credit for proposing to freeze a small sliver of discretionary funding for the next three years (albeit at an inflated level).[19] However, the President's budget projection clearly lowballs discretionary spending over the next decade--especially for the seven years following the freeze. Over the next decade, the President assumes that discretionary spending (excluding emergencies like war and "stimulus") will expand by 30 percent, just slightly faster than inflation. But in reality, discretionary spending surged by 104 percent during the past decade. Given that the Democratic congressional majority has increased non-emergency discretionary spending by 25 percent over the past three years, there is no reason to expect sudden austerity. If discretionary spending instead grows at the same rate as the economy (about 5 percent nominally per year), it would add about $400 billion to the 2020budget deficit.[20]

•PAYGO. Much of the President's budget couples specific spending increases with vague, process-based calls for future spending restraint. One example is his endorsement of the new Pay-As-You-Go (PAYGO) law (since signed into law). While the PAYGO concept--that Congress must offset the cost of any new initiative--sounds promising, its glaring loopholes will not reduce the deficit at all. PAYGO exempts all discretionary spending (which comprises 40 percent of the budget) from its constraints. It exempts the automatic annual growth of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid that threatens Washington's long-run solvency. It exempts the endless stream of emergency "stimulus" bills. When PAYGO is violated, nearly all spending is exempt from being cut to offset the new expansions. PAYGO is designed to serve more as a talking point than as a tool for deficit reduction.[21]

•Deficit Commission. Another example of choosing process over substance is the President's "deficit commission" that will recommend a set of policies to reduce the deficit by 2015. Although such commissions can be useful, the one appointed by the President suffers from three weaknesses: (1) The commission's recommendations are not guaranteed legislative "fast track" protections--or a congressional vote at all; (2) if Congress does vote on these recommendations, the most likely time will be after the November 2010 elections with a lame duck Congress; and (3) there is no indication that this commission will include any public hearings and thus will be more likely to create its recommendations in a back room without public input. Putting it all together, this commission will likely become a partisan exercise that fails to bring down deficits and merely kicks the can down the road. The President should lead the national dialogue by offering a specific set of entitlement reforms to bring long-term sustainability to the federal budget. If a commission is to be set up, Congress should take the responsibility to create one that solves the three problems listed above.

•Rosy Economic Scenario. Just like last year, the President's new budget assumes a rosy economic scenario. For 2011, the White House projects that the economy will grow by 3.8 percent, twice the 1.9 percent growth rate forecasted by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). Over the next decade, the President's budget assumes 43 percent real growth, compared to the CBO estimate of 37 percent. The difference is not trivial-- The White House projects that in 2020 the economy will be nearly $1 trillion larger (adjusted for inflation) than the CBO estimates. But if the economy performs closer to the CBO projections, it will raise budget deficits even higher.[22]

President Obama has offered a budget that does nothing to address the nation's serious short-term and long-term fiscal problems--and indeed makes them worse. By doubling the national debt above pre-recession levels, America could be heading toward the tipping point when debt levels will become too large for global capital markets to absorb, potentially triggering a financial crisis, an interest rate spike, and crippling tax increases.

Countries that finance U.S. debt will note that President Obama's budget includes no plan for long-term fiscal sustainability. While he talks of controlling entitlement spending, his budget would do the opposite. By supporting a trillion-dollar health care expansion that is partially offset with tax increases and Medicare cuts, he essentially takes those policies off the table for any future deficit reduction. That means higher taxes and deeper spending cuts down the road.

The President who declared to the nation that "I didn't come here to pass our problems on to the next president or the next generation--I'm here to solve them,"[23] would, over the next decade, drop an additional $74,000 per household in debt onto the laps of our children and grandchildren.

A responsible budget must rein in runaway spending and deficits. It must reject expensive cap-and-trade and health care proposals, and repeal the remaining stimulus and Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) funds. A responsible budget must reject devastating tax increases during a fragile recovery, and instead cap the growth of government spending at a reasonable rate. Most important, a responsible budget must propose specific reforms to address the unaffordable Social Security, Medicare, and Medicare spending trends. Congress's budget should aim to meet these standards--even though the Obama budget fails to do so.

If the financial regulation bill that passed the House last year becomes law, President Obama and his Treasury Secretary will acquire the right to take over any financial institution they wish to, provided that, in their sole opinion, it is both "too big to fail" and on the brink of insolvency. The House bill provides for no judicial review and does not require any objective evidence of imminent failure to trigger the takeover provisions.

Once the government takes over such a company, it will acquire the right to replace the entire board of directors, fire the management of the company, wipe out stockholder equity and even sell off divisions of the company.

Essentially, this bill permits the government to launch an unfriendly takeover of any financial institution it wishes without risk and with no poison pill or other counter-measures possible.

This legislation, essentially, confers on the federal government police powers that, under our system, are the exclusive preserve of state and local government. The blank check the bill gives the feds to take over any financial institution is really more of an exercise of eminent domain than it is an extension of traditional federal regulatory power.

This grant of power to the executive branch is unprecedented and potentially totalitarian. Consider:

• Will Obama, or any future president, target companies that are particularly vocal in their opposition to his policies or generous in funding his political opponents? Will the fact that Obama would have this power force companies, investors, CEOs and managers to self-censor their opinions and political involvement because they fear the wrath of a vengeful president?

• Will this grant of authority force companies to hesitate before they grow and expand? Will it function the same way the antitrust powers of the Justice Department do in making companies re-examine mergers and acquisitions with a view toward what Justice will think of their resulting market share? In antitrust situations, where a specific action brings companies under scrutiny - like a merger - such concern is not unreasonable. But when the simple act of making money, showing a profit and expanding in size puts a company in federal crosshairs, does this not have the potential to attenuate the capitalist focus on growth?

• In an environment where the feds are looking over the shoulder of every financial institution to see if they should take it over and shut it down, will this not force financial companies to follow the most risk-averse lending policies possible? Doesn't this mean that it only makes sense to buy government paper, since consumer loans, mortgages and business lending could be considered risky and lead to a federal takeover? Isn't this policy precisely the opposite of what we need to catalyze economic growth?

• In a political world where contributions from financial institutions are sought and widely given, doesn't this power give the president and his party unlimited fundraising ability, simply by baring its teeth and showing the power it has to take anybody over and fire anybody? Given the fact that Goldman-Sachs was the second-largest donor to Obama's campaign, giving $954,795, doesn't this new power raise the specter that the federal government could take over financial institutions so as to make the competition lighter for its donors? Already, there is considerable evidence (cited in our new book, 2010: Take Back America - A Battle Plan) that Goldman profited handsomely from the decision of its former CEO - Bush's Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson - to allow Lehman Brothers to fail. Now that the Treasury secretary will have the takeover power, might it not be used as irresponsibly and with as many bad consequences as Paulson used his power in the Lehman crisis?

While the focus on the regulatory bill has been on the consumer protection provisions, which I tend to support, there has been far less scrutiny on these horrific expansions of federal power.

1. It is without question a landmark bill, among the most far-reaching pieces of social legislation in our history. For President Obama to be able to have resurrected it in the midst of enormous public opposition and deep concerns among Democrats, especially in the aftermath of the Massachusetts Senate race in late January, is politically quite impressive. When he was being told to pare down his plan, Obama instead doubled down and, in terms of winning passage of his signature domestic initiative, he won. As a result, the media coverage will be overwhelmingly favorable to Obama and Democrats. Among the political class, he instantaneously goes from being seen as a weak president to being seen as a strong president, from inept to imposing. Barack Obama has certainly left his stamp on history.

2. This legislative victory, though, comes at quite a high cost. Among other things, the health-care debate has utterly shattered the impression of Obama as a post-partisan, fresh, unifying, and attractive political figure. All his talk about "turning the page" in American politics was cynical nonsense. The deals that were cut to pass this legislation were tainted and ugly. The deceptive and misleading arguments used by proponents of health-care reform was extraordinary. And the level of disgust that this whole effort has created among Americans may be unprecedented in our lifetime. The means used to pass ObamaCare will, for many Americans, become shorthand for political corruption. That impression will not soon fade away.

3. The operating assumption for Democrats is that people will forget the ugly process once they come to understand the wonders of the legislation. Republicans argue the opposite; what until now have been merely theoretical concerns about ObamaCare are about to become real-world and deeply personal ones. And opposition to the plan, which has grown since the summer, will get more, not less, intense, as they feel the harmful effects of what Obama and the Democratic party have done (in taxes, premiums, rationing, the quality of care, doctor shortages, government spending, and more).

4. The substance of this legislation will determine whether what happened yesterday is historic and laudatory -- or historic and calamitous. Those of us who are conservative are in the latter camp. Time will tell who is right and who is wrong. But we do know this: the nationalization of American health care has set up a debate about first principles unlike any we have seen since 1980. The political swords are drawn; the fight will be intense and protracted, and it will offer the country two fundamentally different views of the relationship between the individual and the state.

The Democratic party is now, more than ever, the party of big government, at a time when trust in government is near historic lows. Democrats engineered a federal takeover of the American health-care system at a moment when confidence in Washington is virtually nonexistent. And at a time when the deficit and debt are white-hot concerns with the public, the Democrats -- with the stroke of Barack Obama's pen -- will claim ownership for the fiscal wreckage that awaits us.

5. Some of us have been arguing that passage of ObamaCare would do even more damage to the Democratic party than its failure. This view is predicated on the belief that when you take extremely unpopular legislation, pass it through means that are widely seen as corrupt, and make the health-care system worse rather than better, you will pay a high political price. Democrats already have, simply during the debate about health-care reform. But ObamaCare has now landed. It is what the Obama presidency and the Democratic party now stand for. And I suspect what they have experienced so far, in races in Virginia, New Jersey, and Massachusetts, will seem like glory days compared to what will happen to them on the first Tuesday of November, and beyond.

Our government has become drunk with power, and they spend our money like drunken sailors. There is no restraint any longer! Billions are squandered on such inane projects as "potato research", and "turtle tunnels", and my fave of late, 3.5M to teach Chinese whores how to "drink responsibly". Why? What do these people possibly hope to gain by this kind of lunacy?

We pay huge corporate farms NOT to grow food, which has resulted in a massive transfer of agriculture from the family farm to big corporations. The land is laying fallow, and we waste billions to keep it non-productive.

Beck has uncovered numbers that are mind boggling; some 70B in "improper payments", and in that figure, billions that the DOD has wasted on unused air fares, tickets they never used, and even though they were refundable, they never turned in for a refund.

The list goes on, enough so that I could spend a couple years researching, and write a tome the size of Webster's, and I still wouldn't account for all the waste and idiotic spending.

You know what I think this is, 'cause there's no rational explan- ation. I think these bureaucrats are spend crazy because they can. THEY CAN. It's that simple! It gives them a sense of power to sign a check for millions, and the dumber the project, the greater the sense of power, like; "Look at me! I'm spending 10 million on a study for worm reproduction!"

I fervently pray that one result of the grass roots movement that is sweeping America will be an electorate that scrutinizes EVERY dime these nose pickers spend! We need to hold them accountable, and if they step out of line, YOU'RE FIRED!

I have a few suggestions, and the first is on the top of the list for 78% of The People..."foreign aid". We would save 700B if we simply recalled our military from Japan, Germany, Britain, and every other podunk country on earth. It's time for the rest of the world to start defending themselves.

We send enormous sums on our enemies, or countries that should stand on their own, like Lebanon. We spend billions in China, Russia, and every nation on earth, and all because it assures our politicians a say in what they do. POWER!

It is high time we, The People, reclaim our destiny, and vanquish the spendocrats. If there was a way, without violating the Constitution, I would say confiscate the fortunes of our elected officials who have fed at the trough for years, like Pelosi's 100M, and her vineyard in Simi Valley.

Another big cut; The United Nations...close them down, and let some other country pay for them. The Dept of Education, The EPA, HUD, and a dozen other wasteful agencies need to go.

Social Security....we need to pay those we have promised, but raise the retirement age, and refuse SS to people with a railroad pension, or civil service, or auto maker retiree. Anyone with a net worth of, say, 500K don't need SS! My sister in law and her husband get 6K a month on a teacher's pension, and a railroad pension, and they both collect SS. They don't need it!

We need to revamp our tax system, simplify it to ONE PAGE...10% across the board, no loop holes, no exceptions.

We predict in our new book 2010: Take Back America - A Battle Plan, Republicans will takeover of both Houses of Congress. The question is: once they achieve power, what will they do with it?

Clearly the dominant issue for the new Congress in 2011 will be how to bring down the deficit. Democrats will, of course favor tax increases and Republicans will resist them. But drowning out the partisan rhetoric will be the editorial drumbeat from the economic and journalistic establishments that will call for compromise, splitting the difference between the two.

Here is where the Republicans' new Congressional majorities must hold the line. Every single GOP member of the House and the Senate must make a firm commitment to oppose any and all tax increases. In the coming Congressional and Senatorial primaries, it is our duty as voters to support only those Republicans who sign the no-tax pledge of the Americans for Tax Reform (ATR.com).

When Obama took office, he had one paramount goal in mind - to increase the size of the federal government. as we point out in our new book 2010: Take Back America - A Battle Plan (Go here to order a signed copy), Socialism is not an epithet or even an economic philosophy. Whether a nation is socialist or not is determined by a single, simple statistic - what percent of the economy (GDP) goes to the public sector? When Obama took office, the U.S. public sector (federal, state, and local) spent about 30% of GDP. Now it is 36%. If Obamacare lives to be fully implemented, it will pass 40%.

The United Kingdom has a public sector that accounts for about 40% of its economy. Germany is at about 48%. France is at 50% and Sweden at 54%. If Obama is allowed to let the public sector expand to 40% of our GDP, we will become a European socialist democracy, to our everlasting detriment. We will thereby inherit the sclerosis that afflicts Europe - permanently high unemployment and low economic growth. (Again fully documented in our book 2010).

But after his swearing-in, President Obama couldn't say that he was going to raise taxes to move us toward socialism. So, instead, he raised spending to do it and borrowed the money to pay for it. Now, with interest rates set to rise (because the Fed is not printing money as fast as it was), our debt service burden will be so onerous that it will become obvious to everyone that the deficit Obama has created is unsupportable.

Now, we pay an average of 3.5% interest on our $12 trillion national debt. That works out to an annual debt service bill of about $400 billion. While large, it's not impossible. Defense spending, for comparison, is $550 billion, Social Security is $400 billion, Medicare is $300 billion, Medicaid about $200 billion.

But, when interest rates rise to 7-8 percent - as they must now that the Treasury cannot just borrow newly printed money but must get real loans from real lenders to finance its deficit - the burden will grow to close to $1 trillion, about a quarter of our budget. Put differently, the entire take of personal income taxes in the United States comes to about $900 billion. All of it will go to debt service.

The United States will become just like the subprime mortgage holders who borrowed at low teaser rates only to see their interest grow until they had to sign over their entire paychecks to the mortgage company.

Obama has been expecting this outcome all along. It is how he will achieve socialism in the United States. He will use the pressure his deficit creates to force higher taxes that will permanently expand the public sector.

To quote from 2010: Take Back America - A Battle Plan, Reagan increased the deficit to force liberals to stop spending. Obama has increased it to force conservatives to vote for higher taxes.

Once a spending increase is matched by a tax increase, it lasts forever. That is how Obama plans to move the government's share of the GDP permanently over 40% - into socialist territory.

But the Republicans can and must stop him. By refusing to vote for a tax increase and cutting back Obama's crazy spending, slicing his stimulus package and ratcheting back federal Medicaid payments (by zero funding the increases built into Obamacare), Republicans can cut the deficit without higher taxes.

Indeed, the party should commit to lowering taxes by cutting Capital Gains levies to stimulate investment, jobs, and revenues. The only tax that works economically is a tax cut!

Such a defiant stand, in the face of withering criticism from the media, economists, and the Federal Reserve, can only be made by hardy souls. Indeed, such a stance by a Republican Congress will lead to exactly the same sort of government shutdown - when Obama vetoes the budget - as discredited the GOP in 1995-1996 and led to Clinton's re-election.

But history will not repeat itself. The Republicans will win this confrontation with the White House. Everybody in America knows that Obama has increased spending out of all proportion. Everyone knows that higher taxes would be devastating. And the Republicans must capitalize on these convictions so deeply held by the vast majority of voters to prevail in the coming deficit wars.

For now, our job as conservatives is to nominate only those Republicans who have taken the pledge not to raise taxes. Some may break their word. But we can be quite sure that those who do not give it in the first place, will not hesitate to cooperate with the Democratic tax hikes the spell socialism for America.

In the coming days, millions of Americans, fed-up with political hubris, sink-hole spending and the imposition of "values" coerced into law, will exercise their right to peaceably assemble. In Washington D.C., the Mall will be packed, as will municipal plazas, capitol steps and civic band-stands from Alaska to Maine. This, the Tea Party, is stirring the Left to fits of neurosis rarely seen beyond clinical settings.

"Crash the Tea Party" is the latest example. Part spy fantasy, part senior prank, its manifesto will doubtlessly undermine the conservative movement and permanently anoint a Democratic Elite.

WHO WE ARE: A nationwide network of Democrats, Republicans and Independents who are sick and tired of that loose affiliation of racists, homophobes and morons, who constitute the fake grass-roots movement which calls itself "the Tea Party."

WHAT WE WANT: To dismantle and demolish the Tea Party by any non-violent means necessary.

HOW WE WILL SUCCEED: By infiltrating the Tea Party itself!! In an effort to propagate their pre-existing propensity for paranoia and suspicion, we have already sat quietly in their meetings and observed their rallies

ACTION: Whenever possible, we will act on behalf of the Tea Party in ways which will exaggerate their least appealing qualities (misspelled protest signs, wild claims in TV interviews, etc.) to further distance them from mainstream America and damage the public's opinion of them. We will also use the inside information that we have gained in order to disrupt and derail their plans. Sound like FUN? It is!! If you'd like to join us, just click the word "crash."

Impressive, huh? At last check, the site had 500 registered users, among them: George Washington, Tea Party Texan, Obama Your Mama, and Don't Tread On Me.

Meanwhile, polls say that Tea Partiers have a better understanding of the issues than do congressmen, 52% to 30%. Voters say their views are closer to Tea Party principles than the principles of Congress, 47% to 26%. These same voters believe the Tea Party is more ethical, 46% to 27%.

In other words: BREAK OUT THE SIGNS. Might as well party before we're "derailed."

ACORN, HuffPo Organizing Efforts to Infiltrate Tax Day Tea Parties to Shape Media Coverage

Acts of protest tend to be synonymous with the left and are usually considered unsurprising on the right. However, when conservatives demonstrate - liberals take notice in a big way.

On Fox News Channel's April 7 "Your World," host Neil Cavuto reported that the Tax Day tea party protests on April 15 will be "infiltrated" by their political opponents and led by left-wing activist organizations. He specifically named Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN).

"Only eight days before a nationwide tea party, some over-caffeinated crashers aiming to lay waste to it," Cavuto said. "Reports of very well-organized infiltrators trying to mix in and rain on this parade. Talk about taxing."

One organizer, Mark Meckler of the Sacramento Tea Party, dismissed the counter efforts and said they were to be expected.

"We don't take them seriously at all, and I'll tell you why," "It's not that they don't exist - we expect people to attempt to infiltrate," Meckler said. "We expect people to attempt to disturb what we are doing, but the reality is that this is a very broad-based grassroots movement. There is no leader at the top. There is no individual event that they can disturb that would cause us a problem nationwide."

Meckler explained that everyone was invited - even if they come to promote a philosophy that runs counter to what the tea party movement is attempting to convey.

"So also, the people - we trust the grassroots," Meckler continued. "We know, the people are skeptical of anyone approaching at these events, and we believe that people are going to handle it well. And in fact, we invite everybody to come to our events. We don't care if they are from ACORN, The Huffington Post or the Daily Kos. We want them all there. We're excited to have them attend."

In fact, The Huffington Post has even set up a Web site for so-called citizen journalists to infiltrate the protests.

"The Huffington Post wants to have citizen journalists at as many of these events as possible," Arthur Delaney wrote for The Huffington Post on April 7. "If you think you'd be interested in attending one of the Tea Parties and reporting back to us with dispatches, photos, or video, click here to sign up. We'll contact you shortly with further instructions."

If you sign-up, you receive an automated message from Matthew Palevsky, the Huffington Post's associate editor of citizen journalism.

"Thanks for becoming a Tea Party Reporter," the e-mail from Palevsky says. "This e-mail is just a quick confirmation that we have received your contact info and will email you our plans during the coming week. In the meantime, we'd love to hear your thoughts. Whether they be questions, suggestions or story ideas, share them with us at submissions+ideas@ huffingtonpost.com."

John O'Hara, organizer of the Chicago Tea Party said he wasn't worried either about these sorts of efforts and specifically named ACORN, calling them out of touch with mainstream America.

"Neil, I'm not worried about it at all," O'Hara said. "This is a genuine grassroots movement. If ACORN wants to send some of their paid, pretend activists to show up - that's fine. They don't have a message that resonates with the American people or resonates with this broad coalition that's upset with this spending that's going on in Washington."

Cavuto explained the early reports of the "so-called infiltration plan" were an attempt to make it look like fringe-group efforts and in some case appears as a "racist undertaking."

"The people understand what these movements are about," Meckler said. "The people who are involved understand that they're not racist. They are not fringe. They're not even partisan. I mean, these are events where we have people across the board - Democrats, Republicans, conservatives, liberals, Libertarians - you name it."

In "The March of Folly," Barbara Tuchman asked, "Why do holders of high office so often act contrary to the way reason points and enlightened self-interest suggests?" Her assessment of self-deception -- "acting according to wish while not allowing oneself to be deflected by the facts" -- captures the conditions that are gripping President Obama and the Democratic Party leadership as they renew their efforts to enact health-care reform.

Their blind persistence in the face of reality threatens to turn this political march of folly into an electoral rout in November. In the wake of the stinging loss in Massachusetts, there was a moment when the president and the Democratic leadership seemed to realize the reality of the health-care situation. Yet like some seductive siren of Greek mythology, the lure of health-care reform has arisen again.

As pollsters to the past two Democratic presidents, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, respectively, we feel compelled to challenge the myths that seem to be prevailing in the political discourse and to once again urge a change in course before it is too late. At stake is the kind of mainstream, common-sense Democratic Party that we believe is crucial to the success of the American enterprise.

First, the battle for public opinion has been lost. Comprehensive health care has been lost. If it fails, as appears possible, Democrats will face the brunt of the electorate's reaction. If it passes, however, Democrats will face a far greater calamitous reaction at the polls. Wishing, praying or pretending will not change these outcomes.

Nothing has been more disconcerting than to watch Democratic politicians and their media supporters deceive themselves into believing that the public favors the Democrats' current health-care plan. Yes, most Americans believe, as we do, that real health-care reform is needed. And yes, certain proposals in the plan are supported by the public.

However, a solid majority of Americans opposes the massive health-reform plan. Four-fifths of those who oppose the plan strongly oppose it, according to Rasmussen polling this week, while only half of those who support the plan do so strongly. Many more Americans believe the legislation will worsen their health care, cost them more personally and add significantly to the national deficit. Never in our experience as pollsters can we recall such self-deluding misconstruction of survey data.

The White House document released Thursday arguing that reform is becoming more popular is in large part fighting the last war. This isn't 1994; it's 2010. And the bottom line is that the American public is overwhelmingly against this bill in its totality even if they like some of its parts.

The notion that once enactment is forced, the public will suddenly embrace health-care reform could not be further from the truth -- and is likely to become a rallying cry for disaffected Republicans, independents and, yes, Democrats.

Second, the country is moving away from big government, with distrust growing more generally toward the role of government in our lives. Scott Rasmussen asked last month whose decisions people feared more in health care: that of the federal government or of insurance companies. By 51 percent to 39 percent, respondents feared the decisions of federal government more. This is astounding given the generally negative perception of insurance companies.

CNN found last month that 56 percent of Americans believe that the government has become so powerful it constitutes an immediate threat to the freedom and rights of citizens. When only 21 percent of Americans say that Washington operates with the consent of the governed, as was also reported last month, we face an alarming crisis.

Health care is no longer a debate about the merits of specific initiatives. Since the spectacle of Christmas dealmaking to ensure passage of the Senate bill, the issue, in voters' minds, has become less about health care than about the government and a political majority that will neither hear nor heed the will of the people.

Voters are hardly enthralled with the GOP, but the Democrats are pursuing policies that are out of step with the way ordinary Americans think and feel about politics and government. Barring some change of approach, they will be punished severely at the polls.

Now, we vigorously opposed Republican efforts in the Bush administration to employ the "nuclear option" in judicial confirmations. We are similarly concerned by Democrats' efforts to manipulate passage of a health-care bill. Doing so in the face of constant majority opposition invites a backlash against the party at every level -- and at a time when it already faces the prospect of losing 30 or more House seats and eight or more Senate seats.

For Democrats to begin turning around their political fortunes there has to be a frank acknowledgement that the comprehensive health-care initiative is a failure, regardless of whether it passes. There are enough Republican and Democratic proposals -- such as purchasing insurance across state lines, malpractice reform, incrementally increasing coverage, initiatives to hold down costs, covering preexisting conditions and ensuring portability -- that can win bipartisan support. It is not a question of starting over but of taking the best of both parties and presenting that as representative of what we need to do to achieve meaningful reform. Such a proposal could even become a template for the central agenda items for the American people: jobs and economic development.

Unless the Democrats fundamentally change their approach, they will produce not just a march of folly but also run the risk of unmitigated disaster in November.

As we have been reporting, America's broke. Not only do the feds owe $13 trillion, but cities and towns all over the USA are going bankrupt.

For example, in Los Angeles, some murder investigations have stopped, as detectives are being sent home

to balance out overtime costs. In Ohio, Ashtabula County authorities have cut so many cops from the payroll, they're telling citizens to arm themselves, that they can't protect them. In Colorado Springs, a third of the street lights have been turned off. Residents are being asked to donate money to get the lights back on. And in Chicago Heights, Illinois, emergency services may charge you if you need help. Recently a guy involved in an accident, not his fault, was billed $200 bucks.

All of this is happening because of the wild government spending over the past decade, and things are going to get worse.

Here's what you can expect. A national sales tax. The Obama administration can't pay its bills, so expect a European-style VAT on stuff we buy. The states will start issuing more tickets: parking, speeding, anything they can think of. The states will also raise fees on everything. And you'll be taxed on anything that moves, including out-of-state purchases.

So far under President Obama, personal income has fallen more than three percent. That means we are making less money and the government's taking more of less. The state of California is bankrupt. New York state can't meet its obligations. New Jersey is bleeding. The list is endless.

On Long Island, where I live, they're even closing the pool at Jones Beach State Park. You can't even go in the pool anymore because they don't have any money.

This is what the entitlement culture brings. This is what high union pensions and unsupervised disability payments bring. The states don't have any money. The feds owe trillions. Yet, spending continues to rise.

Even the uber-left in America now understands what Gov. Schwarzenegger understands: You can't spend money you don't have without creating a disaster.

'He got us out of the Great Depression." That's probably the most frequent comment made about President Franklin Roosevelt, who died 65 years ago today. Every Democratic president from Truman to Obama has believed it, and each has used FDR's New Deal as a model for expanding the government.

It's a myth. FDR did not get us out of the Great Depression-not during the 1930s, and only in a limited sense during World War II.

Let's start with the New Deal. Its various alphabet-soup agencies-the WPA, AAA, NRA and even the TVA (Tennessee Valley Authority)-failed to create sustainable jobs. In May 1939, U.S. unemployment still exceeded 20%. European countries, according to a League of Nations survey, averaged only about 12% in 1938. The New Deal, by forcing taxes up and discouraging entrepreneurs from investing, probably did more harm than good.

What about World War II? We need to understand that the near-full employment during the conflict was temporary. Ten million to 12 million soldiers overseas and another 10 million to 15 million people making tanks, bullets and war materiel do not a lasting recovery make. The country essentially traded temporary jobs for a skyrocketing national debt. Many of those jobs had little or no value after the war.

No one knew this more than FDR himself. His key advisers were frantic at the possibility of the Great Depression's return when the war ended and the soldiers came home. The president believed a New Deal revival was the answer-and on Oct. 28, 1944, about six months before his death, he spelled out his vision for a postwar America. It included government-subsidized housing, federal involvement in health care, more TVA projects, and the "right to a useful and remunerative job" provided by the federal government if necessary.

Roosevelt died before the war ended and before he could implement his New Deal revival. His successor, Harry Truman, in a 16,000 word message on Sept. 6, 1945, urged Congress to enact FDR's ideas as the best way to achieve full employment after the war.

Congress-both chambers with Democratic majorities-responded by just saying "no." No to the whole New Deal revival: no federal program for health care, no full-employment act, only limited federal housing, and no increase in minimum wage or Social Security benefits.

Instead, Congress reduced taxes. Income tax rates were cut across the board. FDR's top marginal rate, 94% on all income over $200,000, was cut to 86.45%. The lowest rate was cut to 19% from 23%, and with a change in the amount of income exempt from taxation an estimated 12 million Americans were eliminated from the tax rolls entirely.

Corporate tax rates were trimmed and FDR's "excess profits" tax was repealed, which meant that top marginal corporate tax rates effectively went to 38% from 90% after 1945.

Georgia Sen. Walter George, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, defended the Revenue Act of 1945 with arguments that today we would call "supply-side economics." If the tax bill "has the effect which it is hoped it will have," George said, "it will so stimulate the expansion of business as to bring in a greater total revenue."

He was prophetic. By the late 1940s, a revived economy was generating more annual federal revenue than the U.S. had received during the war years, when tax rates were higher. Price controls from the war were also eliminated by the end of 1946. The U.S. began running budget surpluses.

Congress substituted the tonic of freedom for FDR's New Deal revival and the American economy recovered well. Unemployment, which had been in double digits throughout the 1930s, was only 3.9% in 1946 and, except for a couple of short recessions, remained in that range for the next decade.

The Great Depression was over, no thanks to FDR. Yet the myth of his New Deal lives on. With the current effort by President Obama to emulate some of FDR's programs to get us out of the recent deep recession, this myth should be laid to rest.

In another lifetime, I was a teacher, and there were many things which Texas schools did right. If a kid brought drugs on campus, that child was expelled. Other major problems brought expulsion from the school district. There was not a series of in-district suspension centers. The end result was, even the worst parent would be stuck driving their little Johnny every single morning 30–45 minutes to another school district, and one might imagine that, from time to time, the parent would express to the child what a pain in the butt this ordeal was. This daily hands-on approach was perfect, because it took the people responsible for misbehavior—the children and his or her parents—and put them in a car every single day together for at least an hour. This was great for school discipline. Another thing which Texas did right was paddling. Kids from age 5 on up to age 18 might find themselves being paddled for this or that offense, and principals or teachers who did the paddling went out of their way to make this an unpleasant experience. However, some of the very best principals were the toughest, and I can still remember a no-nonsense principal whom the students loved, feared and/or respected. In the 1990's to the 2000's, our discipline at the school where I taught began to fall into the crapper. Paddling was phased out and in-school and in-district suspension centers were set up. A bad kid knew that (1) no one was going to paddle him and (2) he would just about have to physically kill someone in order to be expelled. In one of the most encouraging things which I have seen in a long time, Texas City, which is south of Houston, is bringing paddling back:

President Obama, who has never run a business before in his life (along with 94% of his cabinet appointees), has determined that he knows how to reform business restrictions and to prevent us from having another financial meltdown. These are the same people who spend 5x more than anyone in U.S. history on a stimulus bill which did not stimulate the economy.

This is quite slick. By increasing tax rates and decreasing the benefit of charitable giving, President Obama will both increase revenue to the government (ostensibly) and reduce or keep flat charitable giving. Raising tax rates alone will often stimulate charitable giving.

How much does the new Healthcare Law redistribute income? That has been worked out by the Tax Foundation:

In case you wondered, when individual provisions of the healthcare bill go into effect:

Teacher who started a web page in order to infiltrate and demolish the TEA parties turns out to be a far left middle school teacher, and he has been put on leave from his school:

Here's John in Richmond, Virginia. John, thank you for calling, great to have you on the program.

CALLER: Thank you, Rush. First of all I'd like to thank you for the opportunity to talk to you and your listening audience. I'm a 21 year Air Force veteran and I'm also a 21 year Rush veteran. The subject of my call is social program entitlement and the cost creep associated with that. My message is, be careful what you ask for. Rush, I just returned from Germany for a ten-day visit with family and friends, and this time I went back to Germany, I had been stationed there before, but this time I went back with all of current events in mind and I began to ask my family and friends some questions about their social programs and the costs associated with that. And I wanted to share with you some of the things that I learned. First of all, I talked to a woman who is an architect, not a rich woman. I'd say she makes a good living. I asked her what her income tax bracket is, and her answer to me was 58%. And included in that 58% is 3% church tax and a 2% east tax. And I asked her what the east tax was. And she said that all German citizens are required to pay 2% to the east in the rebuilding effort after the wall fell. And I had commented to her, I said, "That was 21 years ago," and she said, "Yes, and we continue to pay the taxes."

CALLER: (laughing) Well, Rush, in addition to the income tax, the Germans are paying the US dollar equivalent of $7 a gallon for fuel.

CALLER: And one of the gas stations there had a sign up that said 80% of that amount is taxes.

CALLER: In addition to the income tax and the fuel tax that they pay on top of that, all of the products and services in the country are taxed at a 19% national sales tax or value-added tax which is called Mehrwertsteuer in German language. So the people of Germany, in order to support their social programs, are paying a huge income tax, huge taxes on the cost of fuel, and on top of that a 19% value-added tax. By the way, when I was stationed there back in the late eighties that 19% was 14%. So these programs are continuously tapping into the German economy, if you will, chipping away at it because people over there are smothering in these --

RUSH: Well, that was my next question. The Germans that you ran into and spoke to, are they just resigned to it, they comfortable with it, or did you run into people unhappy about it?

CALLER: They're unhappy about it. They're used to it because social programs have been there for --

RUSH: Given what you just told us, it's interesting to note that of all the European Union countries being asked to bail out Greece, they're all going to Germany. They're all telling the Germans, "You better bail out Greece, you're the largest contribution to bailing out Greece," and Merkel is not happy about it. Germany is considered one of the least of the social Democrat republics in the European Union.

CALLER: Well, I'm just concerned about the currents in this country from the left, if you will, to increase our obligations to the social programs --

RUSH: This is exactly what the left in this country looks at. They look at Germany and they see their dream. I mean Bill Clinton even said so, when he was talking about some program of his, might have been health care or something, but he looked at Germany, Germany was what we wanted to emulate. This is clearly what Obama and the regime are looking at. And they can't afford -- well, not they can't afford one, we don't allow them to have a military. I mean that's part of the deal. That's why we have air bases still in Germany after World War II. They're not allowed to have an army, free standing, so forth. I mean that's part of the price that they paid. Look, I appreciate that, John, thank you very much. A very succinct and concise report.

RUSH: Okay, we just had the last caller with a review of the German social welfare state. Do any of you recall reading or hearing recently that Angela Merkel just won reelection in Germany in a landslide? Do you recall reading that, Mr. Snerdley? Angela Merkel just won reelection in Germany in a landslide. Do you know what her platform-leading item was? Tax cuts. Slashing. (interruption) See, well, you're kidding like I was kidding about something that comes true. Angela Merkel and her reelection landslide was totally ignored by US government run media. It was back in October. And her lead platform item was running on tax cuts, 'cause the Germans are fed up with all this.

RUSH: So I'm watching TV this morning, and what a wonderfully great nuke seminar we had. Would somebody explain, we've disarmed Canada, we got another pronouncement waving a piece of paper like Neville Chamberlain, "Yeah, Canada has agreed to disarm," as though they were ever going to attack us. Meanwhile, you want to be haunted? We had a call the other day from somebody who wanted to know why Syria is never held to account for anything going on in the Middle East. Guess what Syria just did? Syria just transferred a large number of Scud missiles to -- dadelut dadelut dadelut dadelut -- wait for it -- Hezbollah. These scuds have a 400-plus-mile range. They can hit Tel Aviv; they can hit Jerusalem. The rockets, the scuds that the Hezbos were launching last time they attacked from Lebanon and so forth had a range of 40 to 60 miles. And of course they had lousy guidance systems, the Hezbos had no idea where they were going to go, aimed them in a certain area and let fly. But now Bashar Assad has transferred a bunch of scuds, 400 mile range, 450 mile range. Who cares? Obama is not worried about it. I'm sure Obama might even not find a problem with it.

What is this nuke business? Why all of a sudden are we ramping up and talking about nukes? Why? Out of nowhere we have this giant nuke summit. And then after the nuke summit was over yesterday Obama proudly proclaiming, "China has agreed to join us with sanctions on Iran." And so the ChiComs said, "Oh, yeah? Well, watch this." They didn't join us with sanctions on Iran, nor have the Russians. And just today, a Chinese, a ChiCom state oil company has sold two full cargos of gasoline to Iran, one day after Obama's summit in which he came out and said, "Yeah, they're going to join us out there, they're gonna join us in the sanctions movement against Iran." So after it's been announced that the ChiComs sold two full cargo ships, big tankers full of gas -- because the Iranians cannot refine it, they don't have a refinery. They have all that oil but they have to ship it out and have it refined and reimported. The ChiComs, I mean, is this not a slap in the face? "Oh, yeah, you're telling the world that we're joining you in sanctions in Iran? Ha. Watch this." Two full cargos of gasoline.

So the Obama administration is now saying, "Well, it's going to be very difficult to get China and Russia to agree to sanctions." Of course they're laughing at us. There's a story today, I think it's the Washington Post, on how marvelous Obama was, he's at his best when he's teaching, he's at his best when he's lecturing, and it's not very many presidents who could assemble all these rogue nations in one place for two days. Meanwhile, Dana Milbank, have you seen this in the Washington Post? Dana Milbank says -- I'm paraphrasing, I'll get to the piece in a minute -- says, "I feel like I'm living in Moscow. The press is being shut out; the press is being shunned; Obama doesn't want us anywhere near. If I didn't know any better, I'd say this was the old Soviet regime." It doesn't matter. What are they going to do? They're just trying to get Bam to be nice to 'em, that's all it is. But it's interesting, I'm watching TV today after the nuke summit yesterday, there's a giant meeting at the White House over this financial regulation reform bill, Chris Dodd's, which if this thing passes, it dumps into Obama's lap veritable power to take over or shut down any American business based on his impression alone of whether or not it's risky or it's making too much profit or it might be in danger of going under. Congress has ruled themselves out. They've written themselves out of this. So he said something that is just typical at the White House, meeting with a bipartisan congressional leadership to discuss financial reform.

OBAMA: I'm also going to be interested in talking to them about our ability to move quickly on a financial regulatory reform package. I think all of us recognize that we cannot have a circumstance in which a meltdown in the financial sector once again puts the entire economy in peril, and that if there's one lesson that we've learned, it's that an unfettered market where people are taking huge risks and expecting taxpayers to bail them out when things go sour is simply not acceptable.

RUSH: Now, one of the things that -- and Pete Wehner writes about this -- Obama is going to run for reelection, the Democrats are going to run for reelection on trashing Wall Street all over again, demonizing Wall Street because they're convinced that a majority of the American people hate Wall Street, especially when Wall Street is announcing big bonuses and big profits like JP Morgan Chase announcing $3 billion first quarter profit today, that's not going to sit well, they think, so they're going to milk that for all it's worth. But this is very typical of Obama. He's just said here, we cannot have a circumstance in which a meltdown in the financial sector once again puts the entire economy in peril. He wants to be in charge of that, making sure that the peril doesn't happen, by closing down a business or firing the board of directors, he's going to have unrivaled power over regulated financial institutions in the country. And then he said if there's one lesson that we've learned, it's that an unfettered market where people -- we don't have an unfettered market. We haven't had an unfettered market in I don't know how long.

See, this is the Obama tactic. You create straw men and run against them, you act against them. So what's he running against now? An unfettered free market. We don't have an unfettered free market. We have a massive regulatory and entitlement state right now. We have over 50 years of laws built upon laws, departments built upon departments, taxes built upon taxes, and he acts as if we're living in a theoretical free market where all these robber baron types are allowed to steel and anything else they want to do from middle class, unsuspecting people. And when he says things like this it demonstrates his willingness to say anything to advance his agenda. Can anybody in this audience name for me a single industry that is unfettered? Name for me a single industry that's not regulated or that is not taxed or that is not worried about being regulated or taxed. Government. That's it. Government gets away with all kinds of things that if they occurred in the private sector the CEO would go to jail. Name for me an unfettered business, name for me an unfettered industry. Big Oil unfettered? Big Pharma unfettered? Big Tobacco unfettered? Big Finance unfettered? Big Retail unfettered?

Will somebody tell me where we have this unfettered free market? Here's the dirty little secret, though. Obama's not so much attacking the free market or capitalism as much as he is attacking the individual and liberty here, because that's the ultimate loss when you start piling on more regulations and higher taxes, and then you build taxes on taxes and regulations on regulation, when you get to the end of the equation, it is individuals who lose liberty and freedom. What he's saying is, with this little sound bite, what Obama is saying is we cannot have a free people going about their own business anymore. That doesn't work. Reaganism doesn't work. We cannot have a free people going about their own business anymore. We need an all-powerful, centralized command government, command control economy where I and my ideological soul mates determine what's right and what's best for the masses. What Obama is saying in this little quote here, this little sound bite, individuals cannot be free to live and interact as they see fit because in Obama's view, that's what's caused the economic problem that we're in. You and freedom, individuals taking too many risks with not enough regulation, you can't be trusted to spend your money the wise way. Only Obama, with now a seven-minute career and no experience whatsoever anywhere in the private sector, has deemed himself to be the only one, and his ideological soul mates, qualified to make the most important decisions and priorities for the nation. It's that simple. Here, listen, play number 12 again. I'm just translating this for you. This is what statists believe when they say this.

OBAMA: I'm also going to be interested in talking to them about our ability to move quickly on a financial regulatory reform package. I think all of us recognize that we cannot have a circumstance in which a meltdown in the financial sector once again puts the entire economy in peril, and that if there's one lesson that we've learned, it's that a unfettered market where people are taking huge risks and expecting taxpayers to bail them out when things go sour is simply not acceptable.

RUSH: That's Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, two government-run private sector entities -- ha-ha-ha -- they're now just public utilities, as Barney Frank has said. So individuals, you and me, you and I cannot be free to live and interact as we see fit. Individuals cannot be free to do what we want unless it contributes to what Obama believes to be the most important priorities for the nation. So at the end of the day here, folks, Obama does not view himself as merely the president. He's delusional. He is power hungry. He is attacking each and every individual in this nation and is accusing all of us of being suspects. We are the reasons and our freedom are the reasons the US economy is where it is, and it all started with Reagan. There was too much freedom going on out there and too many of the wrong people got wealthy. So it's not only time to cut this nation down to size as a superpower around the world, it is also time to cut this nation down to size domestically and economically. He is attacking each and every individual in this nation. The free market, capitalism, if you will, is nothing more than a system by which people are free to pursue their economic interests, their dreams, and what have you and provide for their families. That's what it is.

RUSH: Okay, since the signing of the treaty over there in Russia (and this provided the Senate ratifies it) the Democrats and the rest of the left have seen to it that the United States cannot retaliate in a chemical or biological attack in kind. We cannot do it. They've even shut down the manufacturing -- the testing even -- of biological, chemical weapons just like they're about to do with our nuclear capability. So Obama is out there saying he's going to end business cycles. That's what this financial regulatory reform bill is all about. We're gonna end the business cycle. We're going to end the business cycle because we're going to end risk-taking. We're going to have a state controller. He's going to have a straight line. So that means, if we translate this literally, that Obama's going to fix it so that a political party can't destroy the economy to get themselves elected, because that's exactly what's happened here.

A political party set out to destroy the economy and damage it, starting in 2005, 2006 in order to win an election. You want to know why he bows to the ChiComs? He can't help admiring them. He admires the total control and power the ChiComs have over their people. Let's get something straight here. The housing market collapsed because of government regulation. The banks in this country are the most heavily regulated industry of all, and they were before Obama became leader of the regime. Same with insurance. The workplace is regulated in all businesses. Toilets, lightbulbs, water usage, energy production and use, the automobile, appliances, schools, all are heavily regulated. The Feds regulate clothing, baby seats, all kinds of products and devices. They regulate hospitals, highway speed.

They regulate blankets. They regulate food and drugs. They regulate hair spray cans. They regulate the oceans. They regulate lakes. They regulate rivers. They even regulate temporary ponds on your land from a heavy rainstorm calling it a wetland. They regulate the air. I mean, the question here isn't whether the government regulates but what the hell it does not regulate. For Obama to suggest that we live in an unfettered market and that people like you and me are the cause of the economic problems we face today shows just how radical this man is and ignorant as well as ideological. This is an interesting sound bite. Last night on PBS' Charlie Rose Show, he spoke with the White House correspondent of the New York Times, David Sanger, about China. And Charlie Rose said, "What's going to happen to the nonproliferation treaty review here?"

SANGER: The Chinese arrived here in Washington, and the first thing they asked for was a detailed briefing about the health care proposals that were underway in Congress. And everybody was a little bit shocked by this, and it became clear to them pretty soon that the Chinese didn't really care about the public option or anything else. They simply wanted to know how much they were going to be asked to pay for this. And they still want to know the answer to that question.

RUSH: That's why he's bowing down to Hu Jintao, the head ChiCom. You know, in fact if you take a look, if you go back and look at all these people Obama bows to, they all are filthy, stinking rich. The king of Saudi Arabia, Hu Jintao, the ChiCom guy: They are all filthy, stinking rich. So the ChiComs get off of their plane at the nuke summit, and the first thing they want to know is health care and who's gonna pay for it and how much they're going to have to pay for it -- and they still don't know. It is said they don't care about a public option? Well, they sure as hell better care about a public option. The sooner we get to public option, the sooner we get to single payer, the more expensive it's going to be for the ChiComs and the more expensive it's going to be for everybody else. Because, folks, the reason why it's gonna cost the ChiComs is we don't have the money for this. We're already running a $1.5 trillion deficit this year. We don't have the money for another $2.5 trillion program over ten years. So the ChiComs want to know how much it's going to cost them.

RUSH: Donna in Hanford, California, great to have you on the EIB Network. Hello.

CALLER: I was checking out Obama's numbers yesterday, and I got down to Iowa, and I just kind of quit looking because I'm not surprised his poll numbers are dropping like this, 'cause I figured maybe three years in that was what was going to happen. What amazes me is how fast it has happened. I mean he is basically in the toilet right now, if you look at his poll numbers. It's incredibly bad.

RUSH: Oh, yeah, well, Rasmussen doesn't have him as low. Somebody's got him at 43 out there, I forget -- maybe it is Rasmussen 43, Gallup's at 45 or 46. The numbers are cratering. The point of the financial regulatory reform bill which he started touting today, it's time now to start running against Wall Street. He's banking on the fact that you despise Wall Street and if you don't, he can make you hate them, because if you look right now, Wall Street is doing pretty well, the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The thing that Republicans need to do to counter this is that everybody is in Wall Street. We have an investment economy. If you have a 401(k), I don't care what's happened to it, you are in Wall Street. It makes no sense for you to hate the place that you park your money as an investment.

RUSH: Seth Leibsohn, National Review Online, sums up Obama's nuclear summit this way: "We had a summit that accomplished nothing except a) angering the American and international press corps, b) closing down Washington for two days, and c) misleading everyone for 24 hours that China and others were on board with something to help stop Iran when that just wasn't true. This just isn't serious foreign or defense policy. In fact, it's a dangerous, even Neronian policy -- except it won't be Rome that will burn." It will be America.

RUSH: Seth Leibsohn, I just read you his summary of the nuke summit. I'll read it to you again because he made a pretty apt illustration here. So in sum: "So, in sum: We had a summit that accomplished nothing except a) angering the American and international press corps, b) closing down Washington for two days, and c) misleading everyone for 24 hours that China and others were on board with something to help stop Iran when that just wasn't true. This just isn't serious foreign or defense policy. In fact, it's a dangerous, even Neronian policy -- except it won't be Rome that will burn." Nero is an actual great comparison to Obama. Nero wanted to destroy old Rome and build a new city state in his image. He couldn't think of any way to do it until he seized upon the happy idea of simply setting the whole place on fire and blaming his biggest opposition at the time, the Christians. So that's what he did, and he sat around and played the fiddle, hence the phrase Nero fiddles while Rome burns.

Now, we know from his two autobiographies that Obama has long sought to remake America in his image, and the way they chatted about the way things should be in the Harvard facility lounge. But before you can remake America in your own image you have to destroy its economy. And luckily, Obama has a convenient group to blame there: Wall Street, Wall Street bankers, everybody hates them anyway. And then when you lop onto the fact that they caused all of this economic stress, they're the ones, they got rich while everybody was losing their jobs, it's a built-in winner, he thinks, to start ripping into the bankers at Wall Street. So it's round two for that and it started today. But it wasn't the Wall Street bankers who set the fire that now sees the US economy burning. It was Obama and the rest of the Democrats who wanted to bring down the system to advance their own political agenda. It's very apt, this comparison to Nero. It's exactly what is happening here.

Now, from the Washington Times: "The Obama administration is warning that the danger of a terrorist attack with nuclear weapons is increasing, but US officials say the claim is not based on new intelligence and questioned whether the threat is being overstated. President Obama said in a speech before the 47-nation Nuclear Security Summit, which concluded Tuesday, that 'the risk of a nuclear confrontation between nations has gone down, but the risk of nuclear attack has gone up.' The two-day meeting concluded with an agreement by participants to take steps to prevent non-state actors like al Qaeda from obtaining nuclear weapons." This is patently absurd. If the Iranians ever do succeed in nuking up -- and now we're told it's going to be a year, wasn't long ago they told us it was going to be five years. Now they're saying it's gonna be a year. Other people say it's imminent, within weeks. Whenever and if ever Ahmadinejad and the mullahs get nukes, do you think they have any doubt, any problem giving Al-Qaeda nuclear weapons? And Iran, of course, doesn't show up at the summit.

"-- tougher security to prevent terrorists, criminals and others from acquiring nuclear goods. But Henry Sokolski, a member of the congressional Commission on the Prevention of

Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism, said that there is no specific intelligence on ongoing terrorist procurement of nuclear material. 'We were given briefings and when we tried to find specific intelligence on the threat of any known terrorist efforts to get a bomb, the answer was we did not have any.'" So we don't have any intel on increased threats, and yet Obama says the nuclear risk is growing. Why all this talk of nukes all of a sudden? I know the summit was scheduled for a while, but all of a sudden now nukes are on the front page as they were back in the eighties, and aside from continuing angst causing chaos, keeping everybody in the country unsettled, I think that's probably what all this talk is about, the more unsettled people are, the more filled with angst, the more chaos there is out there. In Obamaville, the view is that that will cause people to call on the regime for even more assistance to quell all of these threats and get rid of the chaos and bring order.

Then USA Today, interesting story here: "The White House has warned state and local governments not to expect a 'significant federal response' at the scene of a terrorist nuclear attack for 24 to 72 hours after the blast." Yes, that's exactly right. The White House, the regime, has told state and local governments not to expect a significant federal response at the scene of a terrorist nuclear attack for 24 to 72 hours after the blast. "President Obama told delegates from 47 nations at the Nuclear Security Summit on Tuesday that it would be a 'catastrophe for the world' if al-Qaeda or another terrorist group got a nuclear device, because so many lives would be lost and it would be so hard to mitigate damage from the blast. A 10-kiloton nuclear explosion would level buildings within half a mile of ground zero, generate 900-mph winds, bathe the landscape with radiation and produce a plume of fallout that would drift for hundreds of miles, the guide says. It was posted on the Internet and sent to local officials."

Now, this is interesting. What about after a hurricane like Katrina? Same thing? Don't expect the Feds for 24 to 72 hours? Tell me something, folks. What is the number one job of the federal government? Is it to spread the wealth? Is it to redistribute the wealth? Is it to nationalize industries? Is it to take over the doctor-patient relationship? Or is it to protect the public? See, the problem is the government is now so big, it is so involved in so many things, including the most minuscule aspect of our lives, it's not focused on what it's supposed to do and what it can only do. And this is what we get, a breakdown in failure, and they say, "Look, our number one objective here, the thing we are really chartered with, public safety, protecting the people, protecting the Constitution, but we want you to know, if you get nuked, we're not showing up for 24 to 72 hours." What has Obama actually achieved here, honestly? I mean, big deal. So Canada, Mexico, and other allies give us their uranium? Are they threats?

It's not the amount of nuclear material out there. It's who has it. That's why we care about Iran. That's why we care about North Korea. We don't care if the Canadians have it. We don't care the Israelis have it. Well, we do now. We don't care if Mexico, India. We don't worry about allies, but we are concerned about the ChiComs having these things; we're concerned about North Korea; we're concerned about Iran. It's who has the stuff. Obama's not accomplishing anything by having these countries that have no intention of ever attacking us to give us their uranium. He's just weakening everybody. And the people we do not want having nukes were not even at this summit, and a lot of our allies were not there. The Brits, the Germans, the French, they weren't there. No, they're less important than Nigeria. This man wastes so much time. You know, it's no wonder he gets nowhere when it comes to Iran building nukes or Venezuela trying to acquire advanced weapons from Russia.

Hezbollah is now being armed to the teeth in Lebanon, I mentioned this last hour. Syria has transferred a bunch of Scud missiles with 400-mile ranges. Now the Hezbos can launch these things if they want and hit Tel Aviv and Israel. And Obama is out there, "Look at what I've done, look at what I've done. I've got Canada, I've got Mexico to give us their uranium. Why, we've removed a threat." Doesn't matter. Those people did not threaten us. The people who threaten us and our allies are arming up. They're in the process of nuking up. Listen to this sound bite. (interruption) What is our foreign policy? Snerdley, where have you been all week? Our foreign policy is the United States has been the problem in the world. We are no longer going to be the problem in the world because I, Barack Obama, realize we've been the problem in the world and we're going to change the things about America that have made it the problem in the world. So, we're going to get rid of our conventional nuclear forces. We are going to stop standing up for freedom and liberty around the world. We're going to eliminate this notion of American exceptionalism. He was asked once, "Do you believe in American exceptionalism?" Oh, yeah, but I'm sure the Spaniards believe in Spanish exceptionalism. So we are no different, we're no better, we're no worse -- uh, take it back. We're no different, we're no better, and in fact we are worse than some other nations around the world.

So our foreign policy is based on a presumption that if Obama can show his morality, a morality that comes from leftist radicalism, with chitchat going back and forth in the Harvard faculty lounge, that will demonstrate to the bad guys of the world that they really don't need to fear us and they don't need to do these bad things anymore. American foreign policy today, Snerdley, is based on the assumption that we have created all of the bad guys in the world because of our superpower status, our allied status with Israel, our nuclear arsenal, our standing up for free people around the world. We don't just mind our own business. We try to make the world's business ours. It's none of our business so we're going to dial it back. That's US foreign policy. We're gonna stop being the problem of the world. And when people see that we're no longer guilty of all the things that have justified them in their terrorist actions or their aggressive actions then they'll stand down. There won't be any more reason to hate us. The only reason they're doing what they're doing is because they hate us and they have a legitimate reason for hating us because we were too big and too powerful and we squished 'em and stomped on 'em.

RUSH: Here's Brad in Naples, Florida, as we go back to the phones. Great to have you here.

CALLER: Thanks for taking my call. I just wanted to point out that I'm quite surprised that the president has not gone after Russia or China, let alone some of the other countries such as Pakistan or India for upgrading their nuclear weapons program -- specifically Russia for upgrading their anti-ballistic missile defenses around the Moscow. Now, I'm not a lawyer, but according to the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, both of our countries are allowed to have 100 interceptors to destroy incoming ballistic missiles. Now, Russia has continuously testified their new missile systems which have nuclear weapons to destroy ballistic missiles that would be coming into their country --

CALLER: -- which no one talks about. And it's just very confusing to me how we're disarming our ballistic missile systems which do not have nuclear weapons to destroy other missiles but we do not talk to Russia about this, and it's quite confusing to me.

CALLER: And furthermore, China is testing anti-satellite weapons openly -- and, you know, they're further modernizing their ballistic missile systems.

CALLER: Right. Absolutely. But even during president -- in all fairness -- President Bush did not approach Russia about this, either. You know, instead he increased our ballistic missile defense systems, which -- which I think was the appropriate measure to do.

RUSH: Of course. And Bush authorized the installation of a defensive missile shield in Europe to protect those countries against an attack from Iran.

RUSH: Guess who's just cancelled it? The regime, the Obama regime. People are going to have to get the fact that this man's transformation of America is to cut it down to size. He believes we have been the problem of the world. He's going to end our superpower status economically and militarily. That's his objective. He's not going anywhere 'til he gets that done, folks.

RUSH: I say it and they do it. Earlier in this program I warned you people that Obama and his regime were soon to revive blaming Wall Street for all of our economic ills as a means of advancing support for a financial regulatory reform bill that would give him unilateral power to shut down or fire any of the board of directors or executive officers of any financial institution he wanted, based on any arbitrary feeling he had that they posed a threat. They know that everybody hates the Wall Street bankers. They're going to ramp up and they're going to start running against Wall Street, as they push for this legislation. We mentioned last week that Chris Van Hollen, running the Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee, said (paraphrased), "Yeah, we're going to run against Reagan. We're going to run, we're going to say we run for seats in November. We're going to say, 'We cannot continue these policies of the past.'" That means Reagan. No sooner do I say it on this program this morning than later, an hour later at the White House, Austan Goolsbee, the White House economist for the economic recovery board went on with Andrea Mitchell (NBC News, Washington). She said, "What makes you think in the end it will be a bipartisan bill" meaning the regulatory reform bill, "Because seems to me that both sides are choosing to stick to their talking points on this?"

GOOLSBEE: We're going to go to the American people, and they're going to look at the bill, and it's now been more than two years since Bear Stearns collapsed. Given what's happened in the job market, what's happened to industry, nobody wants this to happen again -- and they know perfectly well that when the big banks are funding tens and hundreds of millions of dollars in lobbying, giving money to Republicans to get them to oppose the measures the president's calling for, I think they're going to be a lot of members of, uhh, Congress that maybe they aren't the leadership that are going to say, "W-whoa, wait a minute, I -- I -- I -- I don't want this to happen again," r-r-regardless of what party they're in.

RUSH: Okay, so there they are. This is Austan Goolsbee, less than an hour after I warned you what the strategery would be coming out and saying, "Oh, yeah! These banks, these Wall Street banks spend tens and hundreds of millions of dollars in lobbying, giving money to Republicans to get 'em to oppose the measures, the president's calling for." What he of course doesn't say is that all these people elected Obama! All these people donated to Obama in droves. Now that they say what Obama has in store for them -- basically with a stroke of the pen being able to take over their bank -- of course they're donating to Republicans to try to stop this. So they're going to try to recreate in people's mind that nothing's changed. "Wall Street never liked Obama. Wall Street's always hated our president. Wall Street and big money has always hated our guy because they know our guy is for the little guy. Our guy is for Main Street, and now the Republicans have joined forces with the bankers to try to stop our beloved president from saving the economy." That's going to be the campaign, and that's just been announced there by Austan Goolsbee, who himself has never held a job in the private sector, he's another one of these eggheads sitting around the Harvard faculty lounge throwing ideas around like spitballs in theoretical discussions.

RUSH: I say it, and they do it. Timothy Geithner this afternoon in Washington at the White House daily press briefing. The tax cheat spoke to reporters about Obama's bipartisan meeting today with Congress on financial regulatory reform, and during the Q&A Helen Thomas: "Is this a permanent answer now with more control of some financial institutions?"

GEITHNER: This is going to be the most sweeping set of reforms since those put in place after the Great Depression. But we let our system (pause) -- a system designed for a different era -- fall way behind the curve of risk and innovation in this market. Never should have let that happen. This is a very strong package of reforms. Again, I think we're very, very close. I think we're going to have very broad support for this because it's so important. Again, I think it's very hard for anybody to argue that -- that we can look at the devastation caused by this crisis and not say we -- we all share a huge responsibility to fix what was broken.

RUSH: So there's Timothy Geithner talking about the financial regulatory reform bill, Chris Dodd's bill, basically. Mitch McConnell came out of the White House today and said (summarized), "You know, the president pulled the rug out from under the Democrats and said, 'To hell with bipartisanship. You guys just go get it done. Forget the Republicans, just go get it done.' He thinks they've got enough support." I don't know what the Republicans are doing there. Mitch said, "Well, we think we should be allowed to negotiate here". I know they can't stop anything with numbers, but they want to negotiate? Why even accept the premise that we need this kind of sweeping financial regulatory reform? Dick Morris has written pretty well about this in TheHill.com.

"If the financial regulation bill that passed the House last year becomes law, President Obama and his Treasury Secretary will acquire the right to take over any financial institution they wish to, provided that, in their sole opinion, it is both "too big to fail" and on the brink of insolvency. The House bill provides for no judicial review and does not require any objective evidence of imminent failure to trigger the takeover provisions." It just allows the president and Geithner to take over any financial institution they want even if they have to make up some threat that it's about to become insolvent. They can fire the board of directors, they can fire management (snapping fingers) Like that, folks! Just like that.

If they get all this stuff done, one of these days a Republican is going to be elected president and is going to have all these powers at his disposal and that's what the Drive-Bys will call him a dictator. That's when the Drive-Bys will say that we have a dictatorship. "Once the government takes over such a company, it will acquire the right to replace the entire board of directors, fire the management of the company, wipe out stockholder equity and even sell off divisions of the company. Essentially, this bill permits the government to launch an unfriendly takeover of any financial institution it wishes without risk and with no poison pill or other counter-measures possible. This legislation, essentially, confers on the federal government police powers that, under our system, are the exclusive preserve of state and local government.

"The blank check the bill gives the Feds to take over any financial institution is really more of an exercise of eminent domain than it is an extension of traditional federal regulatory power." There's no other way to describe this. This is fascism. This is the government taking over companies. The companies will continue to be run like GM and Chrysler are by so-called private citizens, but they're owned by the government. That's not fascism. Command-and-control is what it is. Fascism was privately-owned, government-run. This is government's going to own it all! Any financial institution it wants it can just take over -- and the Democrats are going to run for reelection on the notion that we have to have this to protect ourselves from the dangers of Bush policies which led us here. Do you remember all the hoopla about Bush taking away our liberties under the Patriot Act?

Nobody -- back then, nobody -- could name one damn way in which anybody's rights were effectively limited in any meaningful way. Meanwhile, Obama is running roughshod over a thousand rights a day, and nobody who was concerned about Bush is raising an eyelash about this. This grant of power to the executive branch is unprecedented and potentially totalitarian. Consider. "Will Obama, or any future president, target companies that are particularly vocal in their opposition to his policies" Yes! "or generous in funding his political opponents?" Yes! "Will the fact that Obama would have this power force companies, investors, CEOs and managers to self-censor their opinions and political involvement because they fear the wrath of a vengeful president?" Yes! "Will this grant of authority force companies to hesitate before they grow and expand?

"Will it function the same way the antitrust powers of the Justice Department do in making companies re-examine mergers and acquisitions with a view toward what Justice will think of their resulting market share? In antitrust situations, where a specific action brings companies under scrutiny -- like a merger -- such concern is not unreasonable. But when the simple act of making money, showing a profit and expanding in size puts a company in federal crosshairs, does this not have the potential to attenuate the capitalist focus on growth? In an environment where the Feds are looking over the shoulder of every financial institution to see if they should take it over and shut it down, will this not force financial companies to follow the most risk-averse lending policies possible?

"Doesn't this mean that it only makes sense to buy government paper, since consumer loans, mortgages and business lending could be considered risky and lead to a federal takeover? Isn't this policy precisely the opposite of what we need to catalyze economic growth? In a political world where contributions from financial institutions are sought and widely given, doesn't this power give the president and his party unlimited fundraising ability, simply by baring its teeth and showing the power it has to take anybody over and fire anybody? Given the fact that Goldman-Sachs was the second-largest donor to Obama's campaign, giving $954,795, doesn't this new power raise the specter that the federal government could take over financial institutions so as to make the competition lighter for its donors?

"Already, there is considerable evidence ... that Goldman profited handsomely from the decision of its former CEO -- Bush's Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson -- to allow Lehman Brothers to fail. Now that the Treasury secretary will have the takeover power, might it not be used as irresponsibly and with as many bad consequences as Paulson used his power in the Lehman crisis? While the focus on the regulatory bill has been on the consumer protection provisions, which I tend to support, there has been far less scrutiny on these horrific expansions of federal power," and they are horrific. Dick Morris concludes: "Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez could only dream of this power." We are a nation hanging by a thread here, folks -- and this has passed the House. Financial regulatory reform has passed Pelosi's House.

None of this that Dick Morris says is untrue. Obama and Geithner can take over any company they want for any reason under the guise that they are protecting it from going belly up or because its board of directors is corrupt or because the management's making mistakes or simply because they don't like them. They'll never say that's the reason. There is not a process to appeal if your company is targeted. There is no judicial review, Mr. Snerdley. There is zero judicial review of anything in this regulatory bill. This is essentially a death penalty for companies if they don't behave as Obama wants them to in every way, shape, manner, or form: From their political donations to the work they do for Obama's friends versus enemies. Dick Morris did not lightly use the word "totalitarian" when describing the financial regulatory reform bill.

See, this is also how Obama will blunt a recent Supreme Court ruling which allows corporations to donate directly to political campaigns. Do you know how much they hate that? They're already working on legislation to try to stop that. They hate that. That's part of McCain-Feingold that got turned back, overturned. So now corporations can make political donations and the left is up in arms. Because to them all corporations are corrupt. Well, this puts Obama in charge of corporations. If he doesn't like who they are donating to or who they are funding -- and he makes it known to them he doesn't like it and he might take their company over and fire the management, fire the board of directors -- what is the guy running the company likely to do? Stop donating to political opponents of Obama.

In this case the regime, the Democrats. And notice here that financial reform was pretty much forgotten until that surprise Supreme Court ruling a couple months ago. Then suddenly this went back on the front burner. This sort of got put behind health care, put behind cap and trade. It was even behind amnesty. Now this thing has leapfrogged ahead of all of them. It is priority number one because of that Supreme Court ruling, and that Supreme Court ruling is instant, meaning in this upcoming election cycle in November corporations can be involved in the political process for the first time in a long time. They can't donate to candidates, but they can donate to causes, run TV ads. I think Chuck-U Schumer. Chuck, get this!

Chuck-U Schumer is working on legislation that will require any such ads to have a picture of the CEO in the ad, either a print ad or a television ad. So this thing is has leapfrogged ahead of every other legislative priority since that Supreme Court ruling. Whether they "go green" or not, by the way. Whether these companies go green, doesn't matter. Fox News just reported that the Henry Waxman show trials on health care costs have been canceled. We mentioned this mere moments ago. Somebody somewhere on his committee read the law and they realized that companies are required to take the huge charges they have been taking now due to accounting laws. This is why I essentially started calling these guys "the regime," 'cause they were obeying the law. Okay, the health care law passes, and they gotta take the charge in the quarter the bill passes, not when it's implemented.

So they did that and Waxman said, "No, no, no! This is going to lower costs. I don't know what you guys are doing but I summon you here," and he sent out a letter, basically a subpoena. "You bring your e-mail records with you, bring your books, you come up here and we're going to make you explain to us what the hell you're doing trying to sabotage our great health care bill." So you obey the law on one side and then if they regime doesn't like it they come for you on the other side. But now what we have is Waxman canceling this because somebody obviously told him, "I don't know what you're going to do here, Nostrilitis. They obeyed the law." So that's gone. Now all they care about is financial regulatory reform, and Mitch McConnell said, "Basically we were kicked out of the negotiations today." Obama said, "Look, you Democrats, just go ahead and ram this thing through." They want this done now to blunt the Supreme Court ruling. They know how hated and despised they are right now. They know. They can read their own polling data. They know it's bad. They know it's a bloodbath happening in November. They want to get as much of this stuff done before November as they can, and they think they've got the votes to do it even with Scott Brown over there in the Senate.

RUSH: Down in Miami at the home of Gloria and Emilio Estefan on Star Island, Barack Obama conducted a fundraiser. After he went and lied through his teeth to the people at NASA. (doing Obama impression) "Yeah, we're not going to land on the moon, no, we're going to land on an asteroid. We're gonna land on an asteroid." Gloria Estefan angered the Cuban exile community in Miami. They don't understand. They thought Estefan was one of them. They don't like Obama's policies. Gloria Estefan, "It's nothing political here, he's coming over for margarita or two, a mojito." Wrong. It was a huge fundraiser, and it cost you 30 grand to get into it. It was totally political. And at this event, the leader of the regime mocked and made fun of American citizens.

OBAMA: Since today happens to be tax day (laughter) I should just point out that one-third of the Recovery Act went to tax cuts, tax cuts that strengthened the cornerstone of the American dream. I've been a little amused over the last couple of days where people have been having these rallies (laughter) about taxes, taxes. You would think they would be saying thank you. That's what you'd think. (cheers and applause)

RUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, this is a classic illustration of authoritarian mocking control. He hasn't cut anybody's taxes. The Recovery Act, stimulus bill, it's more like loaves and fishes. There are no tax cuts in that. There were some tax credits. It's all bogus. But he wants to be thanked. Okay, I will oblige. Mr. President, I want to thank you for seizing General Motors and Chrysler. I want to thank you for appointing a pervert as our safe schools czar. I would like to thank you, Mr. President, for the generational theft that you have committed with all of this borrowing and spending. You have spent the wealth of two to three, maybe four generations in the future, before they're even born. I want to thank you, Mr. President, for insulting and endangering Israel. I want to thank you, Mr. President, for driving up the unemployment rate to near double digits for years to come. I want to thank you, Mr. President, for telling everybody that it's going to be double digits as the new norm. I want to thank you, Mr. President, for exploding the annual deficit to the level where it can never be repaid.

I'd like to thank you, Mr. President, for targeting and destroying private health insurance companies. I want to thank you, Mr. President, for pushing for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to stand trial in New York City and receive full constitutional rights at a cost of $200 million per year. I want to thank you for that. I want to thank you for helping to destroy the housing market, Mr. President. And, Mr. President, I would love to thank you for your arrogance, because arrogance is part and parcel of an authoritarian leader of a regime. I would like to also thank you, Mr. President, for your divisiveness. I would like to thank you for ignoring the public union pension time bombs waiting to explode out there. I would like to thank you, Mr. President, for mocking and disrespecting the American people. And I'd like to thank you for your never-ending support of the New Black Panthers and for ACORN. I'd like to thank you, Mr. President, for embracing our enemies and snubbing our allies. But most of all, Mr. President, thank you for arousing the sleeping silent majority because we have been asleep too long. November is coming, Mr. President. That is when we will really thank you.

CLINTON 1995: We hear so many loud and angry voices in America today whose sole goal seems to be to try to keep some people as paranoid as possible and the rest of us all torn up and upset with each other. They spread hate. They leave the impression that -- by their very words, that -- violence is a acceptable. You ought to see -- I'm sure you are now seeing the reports of some things that are regularly said over the airwaves in America today. It is time we all stood up and spoke against that kind of (pounding podium) reckless speech and behavior.

RUSH: That was Bill Clinton, blaming me for the Oklahoma City bombing on April 19th, 1995. Yesterday we had the tea parties, and the Drive-By Media (I'm sure to its great chagrin) is filled with stories about how festive and how peaceful and how unthreatening all of the tea parties were. The effort to infiltrate these tea parties fizzled. They have stories on that that they probably do not like having to report. And, ladies and gentlemen, it's very clear that these citizen uprisings -- genuine grassroots citizen's uprisings -- are far more powerful than an attempt to drum up fake opposition to them from the White House. Yet, Bill Clinton is back in the game, expanding that threat via this sound bite.

CLINTON 2010: There was this rising movement in the early nineties that was basically not just a carefully orchestrated plot by people of extreme right-wing views but one that fell into fertile soil because there were so many people for whom the world no longer made sense. They wanted a simple, clear explanation of what was an inherently complex, mixed picture full of challenges that required not only changes in public policy, but personnel conduct and imagination about the world we were living in. So demonizing the government and the people that work for it sort of fit that -- and there were a lot of people who were in the business back then of saying that the biggest threat to our liberty and the cause of our economic problems was the federal government itself.

RUSH: So there you have it: Bill Clinton once again trying to rebirth his empty threat from 1995. He starts out tracing the plot that started in the eighties to "demonize government." I have a question. We have two more sound bites of the president here specifying right-wing talk radio, but I have a question: How come we're supposed to draw (on the basis of no evidence), a connection between conservatism and terrorism, conservative ideology and terrorism? Where is that connection? Yet we are told we must reject, despite tons of evidence, the connection between Islamist ideology and terrorism. So we can't call Islamist fundamentalists "terrorists." We can't even use the word. But we can have ex-presidents and current presidents running around trying to associate conservatives with nonexistent terrorism at peaceful tea parties. Somebody needs to explain this to me.

RUSH: Bill Clinton. By the way, these statements were this morning at the big left-wing think tank, The Center for American Progress. So we played the sound bite where he starts out tracing the "plot" that started in the eighties to demonize government. Next sound bite, Clinton says that right-wing talk radio has made money off of anger, aided by the Internet.

CLINTON 2010: When I became president, it's hard to remember this, there were only 50 sites on the World Wide Web. Among those who first saw its potential and made use of it were those who used the Internet to do all kinds of interesting things, including share information on how to make bombs. We didn't have blog sites back then, so the instrument of carrying this forward was basically the right-wing radio talk show hosts. They understood that emotion was more powerful than reason. They got much bigger listenership and more advertisers and more commercial success if they kept people in the white heat. For 99% of them, it was just that: Turn on the radio, listen to somebody say something you agree with, vent your anger.

RUSH: They just can't get away from it. We are living in their heads rent free. We are in their heads and on their minds. They -- and I'm going to throw they in there -- are out to destroy Western civilization, folks. Why do you think the tea party people are so reviled? Why is it that we can sit there and accuse nonviolent tea party people of committing terrorist acts? I mean that's what Clinton's doing. He's predicting that tea party people are going to blow up a federal building again, and in the process.... I'm going to state right now: If there is a future incident such as Oklahoma City, the blame is squarely Clinton's on the shoulders of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, who I'm sure is coordinating Clinton's appearance on this.

Bill Clinton, with the sound bite you just heard just gave the kooks out there an excuse to be violent. He just offered them an opportunity to be violent -- and lest we forget, the politics of the militia members that the FBI took down recently: One was a registered Democrat; the rest were not affiliated by party. Of course the New York Times has reported national security secrets. They are responsible for any terror attack on this country. They have published all kinds of battle plans. They have given up our military secrets in Iraq and Afghanistan and yet they sit here, Clinton and Obama, and try to blame me and us on the radio for something that has not happened, while setting the stage for it to happen? And let's not forget this. It's very important.

This is the president who pardoned and released a bunch of Puerto Rican terrorists on his last week in office. The FALN gang. He also pardoned the Weather Underground terrorists -- and he's now lecturing us on violence that hasn't happened, a peaceful tea party movement. We cannot even say "Islamic" and "terrorists" in the same sentence! We cannot associate radical Islam with terrorism but the president can go out and Obama can go out and try to associate the tea party -- genuine, peace-loving, middle-American citizens of this country -- with future acts of terrorism? The tea parties, you know why they're hated? I'll tell you why they're hated. If you're a member of a tea party, if you participated in one yesterday, why you're hated, why you're feared: This regime and the Clintons, everybody else knows that all you want to do is defend what's left of this country and try to rebuild it.

That's what they know you want to do. Frank Rich of the New York Times, he put it this way: "The America that is no more." The tea party people want to revise the America that is no more. Now, we know that militant Islamists hate Western civilization -- and by the virtue of some of the policies of this regime, we can figure that some aspects of Western civilization are not too pleasing to the people running the country right now. So here you have Clinton predicting something, ignoring violence that has happened and not being able to categorize it properly or identify the people engage in it but now trying to impugn the terrorist bunch, the tea party people with future acts of domestic terrorism. This is really sick. It is despicable, and it's indicative of a bunch of people who know that they are in the minority and can only hang on by virtue of authoritarian control over people. We have one more sound bite from our esteemed, distinguished former president.

CLINTON 2010: Doing things when you are mad is, by and large, a prescription for error. The only thing I can say is, "Have at it! Go fight. Do whatever you want! You don't have to be nice but you've got to be very careful not to advocate violence or cross the line." The Boston Tea Party involved the seizure of tea in a ship because it was taxation without representation. Because even the Massachusetts Bay Colony, which had been largely self-governing, had it stripped from them. This fight is about taxation by duly, honestly elected representatives that you don't happen to agree with that you can vote out at the next election and two years after that and two years after that. That's very different.

RUSH: Somebody tell me: What have I missed? Will somebody explain to me what tea party person has advocated violence? What have I missed here? What tea party has engaged in acts of violence? And, by the way, President Clinton, the fight is about taxation by duly honestly elect representatives that you don't have to...? We have had a number of pieces of legislation including the recent health care bill rammed down our throat. This regime is governing against the will of the people. There's nothing Democratic about what happened here. Bribes and kickbacks to members of Congress in order to get their votes for this thing? Let's go back also to April 28, 2003, in Hartford, Connecticut. The tea party people are peaceful. They are festive. They're described that way even by the regime's media. Festive and good cheer. They're not taunting anybody, they're not menacing anybody; they're not threatening anybody. All they are is dissenting. They disagree with the direction the regime is taking the country. Back in 2003, Mrs. Clinton went nuts at the annual Jefferson Jackson Bailey dinner. It's in Hartford, Connecticut. You remember this.

HILLARY 2003 (screeching): I am sick and tired of people who say that if you debate and you disagree with this administration, somehow you're not patriotic, and we should stand up and say, "WE ARE AMERICANS AND WE HAVE A RIGHT TO DEBATE AND DISAGREE WITH ANY ADMINISTRATION!"

RUSH: She sounds angrier than any tea party person I have ever heard. That is shocking. For those of you who can hear -- heh -- I apologize. Now, that's a shock to the system. But that's Mrs. Clinton. "We have a right do disagree! (harpy nagging)." I don't hear any tea party people talking that way. So all this outrage is selective and all of this is being orchestrated by people who know that they are in the minority, attempting to quell opposition to this regime by virtue of intimidation. In the process, Mr. President, Mr. Clinton -- unwittingly or purposely I'll give you the benefit of the doubt -- with this comment, you have just set the stage for violence in this country. Any future acts of violence are on your shoulders, Mr. Clinton. You just gave the kooks in this country an excuse to go be violent. Nobody on the right's doing this. Nobody in talk radio is advocating anything of the sort that you are predicting. You, sir, are predicting it. Maybe the regime wants something like that to happen. I wouldn't doubt it.

CALLER: Yeah, Rush, I just wanted to let you know I attended a great tea party yesterday in the city of Plymouth, Michigan.

CALLER: And the keynote speaker was a black Baptist minister, and his message was overwhelmingly supported, applauded, and we had a great time. And I think all these false accusations of racism and the tea party movement can be shredded, done away with.

RUSH: But they're not going to stop. They're going to keep on. That's why Clinton is ratcheting it all up because nothing happened yesterday. Nothing that they wanted to happen, none of what they predicted that the tea party was capable of happened yesterday. So what happens? Clinton comes out this morning and has to predict that because of me and others on the radio and now the Internet, and because of these uncontrollable mobs in the tea party, we can look forward to more domestic terrorism. I mean, it's just infuriating to associate peaceful people with acts of terrorism that have not happened. And yet we cannot associate real terrorists with acts that have happened because we might offend them. But we can go ahead and offend decent American citizens who simply are trying to save what's left of their civilization.

HILLARY (screeching): I am sick and tired of people who say that if you debate and you disagree with this administration, somehow you're not patriotic, and we should stand up and say, "WE ARE AMERICANS AND WE HAVE A RIGHT TO DEBATE AND DISAGREE WITH ANY ADMINISTRATION!"

RUSH: All these stories on foreclosure, and they're all over the place. I must have three or four stories on the foreclosures and how they are at a record high and how we're all upset. Let me tell you what this is. A coordinated effort from the White House and in the highest offices of the regime, all the way down to the State-Controlled Media because if it's not happened yet, what has happened, and you're going to notice it, there is a big push to make the banks forgive the principal on mortgages, not the interest, but to forgive the principal. That's where Obama is headed next. And the financial regulatory reform bill that is lingering there in the Senate, it's passed the House, it's even got people like Jamie Dimon, JP Morgan Chase. I mean the signal has been sent. "You are going to run the financial industry the way we want it to or we are going to run it for you." And so Obama's making a big push now for these banks and lenders to forgive the principal on the mortgage. The banks say they can't afford to do it. The question the banks are going to face, "Can we afford not to do it if our only option is Obama coming in here and threatening to shut us down if this regulatory reform bill ever gets signed into law."

So we can't give the bank CEOs a national forum, we don't dare call hearings with those guys up there. But Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his merry band of terrorists? Oh, yeah, you want a public forum, sheik, fine, we'll give you you a $200 million trial a year in New York, or wherever you can do it and you can rail against this country for as long as it takes us to try you, but we can't have any CEOs come up there and give them a national forum in front of Waxman's committee about the costs associated with the new health care reform bill. You know, bankers, bankers, are far more evil than the biggest mass murderer of Americans in our nation's history. Don't you understand that? Bankers and CEOs. Yeah, they're far more dangerous. We can't let the country hear from them. But Khalid Sheikh Mohammed murdered 3,000 Americans, fine, bring him up, give him a trial. America is the problem in the world. And we're going to tell everybody that we know it. And we're going to let the people who think we're the problem in the world have a forum. And we're going to pay them to let 'em run off at the mouth, and we're gonna hire their lawyers for them to boot.

But let CEOs come up and tell how the health care bill is hurting, ah, ah, ah, ah, let bank CEOs come up and explain why you really want us to just give away the principal on these mortgages? We can't afford to do that. Has there ever been such a -- somebody help me out here because we've been hearing this for a year, going to be a jobless recovery. Has anybody ever heard of that before? I have not, either. I have never heard of a jobless recovery. I guess it's just part of the newspeak, the newspeak for Obama. And the banks say, "If you make us forgive the principal, that's going to dry up credit completely. We can't loan to anybody if you do that because if they can't pay 'em back you're turning us into public utilities; you're turning us into instruments of redistribution." Which, by the way, is the objective. And the banks, of course, Wall Street, that's the reason for the bad economy. You heard Little Timmy Geithner say so yesterday. You've heard others in the administration and the Democrat Party say that that's going to be their campaign technique.

RUSH: In case you missed this yesterday: "Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., has canceled a hearing intended to grill CEOs who took a charge against profits because of the health care reform bill. The cancellation came after they realized what everyone already knew -- that the companies were required to do what they did because of accounting rules. Waxman and others had reacted with outrage and accused the companies of doing it ... to make health care reform look bad." So he sent 'em a letter, the equivalent of a subpoena. People like AT&T, Verizon, John Deere, Caterpillar: You get your butts up here, you bring all your e-mails and you bring all of your books, and we want you to explain because Obamacare is supposed to lower costs. Everybody knows that these costs are going to be lowered and you're just doing this to embarrass us and our brilliant young president.

And then somebody got hold of Waxman and said, "Uh Henry? Two things, Henry. They were required by law, SEC. Ever heard of Sarbanes-Oxley? They required by law to do what they did, Mr. Chairman, and also, Mr. Chairman, you might want to rethink this, because these guys have the law on their side and the last thing you want, Mr. Chairman, is for these people, these CEOs to come up here and have a national forum to explain how your regime is operating." So they got to Waxman and they said, "Look, you don't want these guys coming up here launching full barrel on you. You don't want it 'cause they're in the right, they're obeying the law, and they're going to say, 'You're nothing more than a bunch of harassers,' and they're gonna be right." So Waxman has sort of wimped out here and has decided to cancel the whole thing.

John Boehner put out a statement yesterday: "House Democrats canceled this hearing because they don't want to give America's employers a forum to tell Obama how America's new health care law is already hurting the economy and hampering job creation. Chairman Waxman thought he could intimidate businesses into keeping quiet about this new job killing health care law. When they called his bluff by continuing to speak out, he chose to pull the plug." Amen. Right on.

Democrats take a pass on the budget this year (this could, potentially, be very good news):

Since there are some links you may want to go back to from time-to-time, I am going to begin a list of them here. This will be a list to which I will add links each week.

One of the more radical people from the right, calling for the impeachment of Obama:

The Center for Freedom and Prosperity, a free enterprise site (there are several videos on the flat tax):

This is a pretty radical site which alleges that Obama is a Marxist hell-bent in taking over our country:

1982 interview with Larry Grathwohl on Ayers' plan for American re-education camps and the need to kill millions

This is an interesting site; it seems to be devoted to the debate of climate change:

This is a news site which I just discovered; they gave 3 minute coverage to Obama’s healthcare summit and seemed to give a pretty decent overall view of it, without slanting one way or the other:

I have glanced through their website and it seems to be quite professional and reasonable. They have apparently been around since 1942.

This is fantastic; Florida (the Sunshine State) is now putting its state budget online:

Suzanne Somers s supposed to be older than Bill O’Reilly? He interviewed her this week, and she looked, well, hot. She is big into vitamins and human growth hormones.

The National Journal, which is a political journal (which, at first glance, seems to be pretty even-handed):

And I am hoping that most people see this as non-partisan: Citizens Against Government Waste:

This website reveals a lot of information about politicians and their relationship to money. You can find out, among other things, how many earmarks that Harry Reid has been responsible for in any given year; or how much an individual Congressman’s wealth has increased or decreased since taking office.

This is an outstanding website which tells the truth about Obama-care and about what the mainstream media is hiding from you:

Politico.com is a fairly neutral site (or, at the very worst, just a little left of center). They have very good informative videos at:

On Obama (if you have not visited this site, you need to check it out). He is selling a DVD on this site as well called Media Malpractice; I have not viewed it yet, except pieces which I have seen played on tv and on the internet. It looks pretty good to me.

Conservative Review
Issue #123	Kukis Digests and Opines on this Week’s News and Views	April 18, 2010