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 5 or 6 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).

So far, there is no deal on the table to raise the debt limit. The President has placed no specifics as to what he is willing to cut.

8 Democrats want to repeal the second of Obamacare which establishes an unelected, 15-member, healthcare rationing panel. This is also known as the death panel, which we have been assured over and over by our media, does not exist. If this is not the infamous death panel, why remove it?

The White House launches Strong Cities, Strong Communities this week. Bureaucrats are sent to failing cities to help city officials figure out how to apply for federal grants and then said bureaucrats will remain in these cities to help the city officials spend the money and to organize their cities better.

Republicans are pushing a “Cut, Cap and Balance” bill, which should pass the House this upcoming week. The recommendation is for deep cuts in present-day spending, capping federal spending at 18% of GDP, and passing a balanced budget amendment, which would then require a super-majority of Congress to raise tax rates.

The California Legislature passes a gay history bill, which is signed by Governor Brown. It is called the Fair Act, which is stands for the Fair, Accurate, Inclusive, and Respectful (FAIR) Education Act. History in education must include references, apparently, to the sexual acts and interests of historical American figures. This is to begin in the year 2013, and it is unclear about what age level such indoctrination/education begins to take place. However, a financially stressed California will have to purchase a whole set of new history books. It is also unclear when the contributions of pedophiles, polygamists, and others will be required to be added to the curriculum. These same books will find their way into classrooms all over the United States.

Another large group of Chrysler union workers were filmed drinking and smoking marijuana during their break time.

On at least 2 occasions, I have explained our economic precipice and how we got here. Gretchen Morgenson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning business reporter and columnist at The New York Times, and Joshua Rosner, an expert on housing finance, trace the beginnings of the housing collapse to the mid-1990s, when the Clinton administration called for a partnership between the private sector and Fannie and Freddie to encourage home buying. They do so in a book recently released called Reckless Endangerment.

The Sarah Palin movie, The Undefeated, opened to universally negative reviews (what a surprise) in 10 cities across the United States. The most interesting article I read on this was, someone pointed out that a Harry Potter movie was coming out, that would eclipse the Palin film. There is, apparently, a huge overlap in the audiences for both films, at least in the mind of one writer/reviewer.

Fifty-nine-year-old Jerome Ersland, an Oklahoma pharmacist, was been sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole for first-degree murder in the shooting death of a teenager who tried to rob the Oklahoma City pharmacy where he worked. Ersland had no reaction and said nothing as the sentence was handed down. As he left the courtroom, he responded to a reporter's shouted question by calling the sentence "an injustice of a monumental proportion."

A group of Harvard University researchers are proposing that child welfare agencies be authorized to take severely obese children away from their parents.

UN researches release a report saying that the world needs $1.9 trillion/year for the next 40 years for the world to go green.

More Obamacare waivers are granted (the total now being around 1500), with a bill to be introduced this week allowing individuals to opt out of Obamacare.

It comes out via e-mails that there were those in the White House who were out to not only discredit FoxNews, but to freeze them out of the media circle. This was quite obvious at the time, and it is clear that there is a better relationship between the White House and FoxNews today.

Pornographer Larry Flynt, in Sunday’s Washington Post, lectures Rupert Murdoch on media ethics, in a piece called"The people vs. Rupert Murdoch: Hustler magazine founder Larry Flynt says his fellow media mogul has gone too far."

A British Islamic group known for its provocative publicity stunts says a borough in northeast London will be the first target of a campaign to establish "emirates" in the country - Muslim enclaves where shari'a law is enforced.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai's brother was assassinated this past week by a bodyguard. Most news reports I have read and seen indicate that he was very corrupt and involved heavily in the drug trade. It now appears that his assassin is possibly working for the CIA.

Iran's Supreme Court says an evangelical pastor charged with apostasy can be executed if he does not recant his faith, according to a copy of the verdict obtained by a religious rights activist group.

President Barack Obama: "I cannot guarantee that those [social security] checks go out on August 3^rd if we haven't resolved this [debt ceiling] issue."

President Obama: "It turns out we don't have to do anything radical to solve this problem. Contrary to what some folks say, we're not Greece, we're not Portugal. It turns out that our problem is we cut taxes without paying for them over the last decade. We ended up instituting new programs, like a prescription drug program for seniors that was not paid for. We fought two wars, we didn't pay for them. We had a bad recession that required a Recovery Act and stimulus spending and helping states, accumulated, and there's interest on top of that. And to unwind that, what's required is that we roll back those tax cuts on the wealthiest individuals.” President Obama has spent over $4.5 trillion dollars in only 2 ½ years which is two trillion more than Bush did during his eight years in office.

Obama: “[Coming to an agreement on raising the debt ceiling is] not going to get easier. It's going to get harder. So we might as well do it now -- pull off the Band-Aid; eat our peas. Now is the time to do it."

Obama: "You have 80 percent of the American people who support a balanced approach. Eighty percent of the American people support an approach that includes revenues and includes cuts. So the notion that somehow the American people aren't sold is not the problem." Unfortunately, 65–70% seem to favor this approach.

Obama: "The truth is, you can't solve our deficit without cutting spending. But you also can't solve it without asking the wealthiest Americans to pay their fair share"

President Obama to Republican Eric Cantor, after 5 days of a budget impasse: "Eric, don't call my bluff. I'm going to the American people on this.”

Obama: “I'll be turning 50 in a week.” He said this about 3 weeks before his birthday, which is August 4^th.

The head of the Democratic Governors Association Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley: "I think that there is an extreme wing within their party who have as their primary goal not the jobs recovery, but the defeat of President Obama in 2012. They know that their formulations, their policies of less revenues and less regulation badly failed our country and plunged us into this recession. So their only way of evening the playing field is to keep the president from being successful in the jobs recovery."

President Bill Clinton: "There has never been in my lifetime, since we got rid of the poll tax and all the voter Jim Crow burdens on voting, the determined effort to limit a franchise that we see today...[Voter ID laws are designed to] keep most of you [young people] from voting next time." Jim Crow laws were all about racial segregation.

Congressman Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.): "The fact that all these states came up with these [voter ID laws] laws at the same time was not spontaneous generation, it was Rovian...This was an obvious Republican attempt to hurt our vote in 2012 and to hurt the President of the United States' chances of reelection, which is the entire agenda of the Republican House, is to defeat Barack Obama even if they take down the United States economy while they do it."

Congresswoman Marcia Fudge (D-Ohio): "I guess they don't think that we understand that they're trying to keep poor people from voting, minorities from voting, the elderly from voting, students from voting, we are not stupid." Who apparently thinks that poor, minority and elderly Democrats are too stupid to have ID cards.

GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt and Obama jobs man: "The people who are part of the business sector, the people in this room, have got to stop complaining about government and get some action underway. There's no excuse today for lack of leadership. The truth is we all need to be part of the solution."

Chris Van Hollen: “I did not vote for the corporate jet loophole.” who voted for the corporate jet loopholes.

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas): "I do not understand what I think is the maligning and maliciousness [toward] this president. Why is he different? And in my community, that is the question that we raise. In the minority community that is question that is being raised. Why is this president being treated so disrespectfully? Why has the debt limit been raised 60 times? Why did the leader of the Senate continually talk about his job is to bring the president down to make sure he is unelected?" In case you do not understand what Black caucus member Lee is saying, she is saying that Republicans are voting against raising the debt ceiling because Obama is Black.

Adam Green, co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee: "Today for the first time, President Obama made clear that he's considering benefit cuts - even for Americans that currently depend on Medicaid and Medicare. Even Paul Ryan didn't say that much publicly. President Obama needs to support the overwhelming will of the American people. Our position is the position of the overwhelming majority of Americans: It's time to raise taxes on the rich."

Rep. Keith Ellison: "This is an era of extremism. These same people that want to shrink government so that you can drown it in a bathtub also want Mom to get back in the kitchen and take her shoes off and get pregnant. You understand? They are offended by strong, powerful women. And here's the sad part: some of them are women themselves. Michele Bachmann would be an example."

Jesse Jackson: "Here we are at this time trying to strip the number of days [allowed for voting], make voting more expensive and less accessible. This is the part of the anti-Barack Obama-mania that's sweeping the country. These are the same people, you know who, under Bush, raised the debt limit 19 times, 4 trillion dollars . . . this is not about raising the debt limit, this is about in fact another way to undermine this President. We as a people, as a nation, ought fight back."

CNN political analyst Paul Begala: “[Michele Bachmann] should be asked about this theory. She's a candidate for president. One out of 10 Americans is gay. She should be asked if she wants to lead a country where at least 10 percent of us are gay or lesbian, does she believe in this crackpot, bigoted theory that somehow there's something to be repaired in our brothers and sisters and sons and daughters who happen to be born gay?” In all actuality, about 1.7% of the population are lesbian or gay and 1.8% of the population identify as bisexual.

Jane Fonda’s blog: "Bottom line, this has gone on far too long, this spreading of lies about me! None of it is true. NONE OF IT! I love my country. I have never done anything to hurt my country or the men and women who have fought and continue to fight for us." Hanoi Jane was photographed sitting on an enemy anti-aircraft gun during a visit to Vietnam in 1972.

Ma Zhaoxu, a spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry: "By allowing the Dalai Lama to visit the U.S. and arranging the top leader [President Obama] to meet him, the United States has seriously violated basic principles of international relations and its own repeated solemn pledges, and harmed Sino-U.S. relations. China therefore expresses its strong indignation and firm opposition."

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, when leaving for Cuba to begin chemotherapy: "It's not time to die. It's time to live."

Charlie Rose: How is he [President Obama] doing overall in your judgment, the president?

George Stephanopoulos: Solid. I mean, it`s hard to imagine -- I`m trying to think in our lifetime if anybody has been dealt a tougher hand coming into the White House. And given that, I think he has done remarkably well. The fact, if you just looking at the politics first, the fact that he`s been able over the course of two years now to maintain a personality favorability for most of the time above 50 percent when he has had most of the time nine percent unemployment, that is pretty remarkable. That's pretty steady. I think people respect him even more than they like him.”

ABC correspondent Jeffrey Kofman, about Rupert Murdoch apologizing to the family of the 13-year-old murder victim whose phone had been tapped by his newspaper: “You know, I was trying to figure out what analogy works here - is this Shakespearean, his fall? But, actually, it reminds me of A Christmas Carol when Ebenezer Scrooge comes and approaches Tiny Tim and tries to atone for his past sins.”

Entertainment Tonight anchor Thomas Roberts framed a question about tax policy in this way: "Why do you think the top 2% of America has a chokehold on the other 98%?"

ET anchor Contessa Brewer on the Republican position against raising tax rates: "They ignore the fact that we've been under Bush-era tax cuts and we've seen the unemployment rate skyrocket. The big corporations are sitting on megabucks in cash, they're not spending it on hiring."

NBC4 (local Washington, D.C. station) anchor Jim Vance asks President Obama the “tough” questions: “Mr. President, you are in a titanic struggle with Eric Cantor and others over the debt ceiling, but just a couple of miles from here, are thousands of people, a lot of them black men, who are in another struggle: for their lives, for dignity, don't have a job, can't find a job, don't have skill sets to even get one and keep one if they could. What do you tell those people with regard to what you're going through with your struggle, about their struggle and why they should be hopeful?”

Vance: “ You mention Washington and one of the things that I have to take advantage of with this opportunity, even with the half a million people here, those who may have a job, what we don't have is what most of this country takes for granted. We don't have a vote. What can you tell those half a million people that would make them feel better about being Americans in a democracy where they can't vote?”

Vance: “When you get done with Karzai and Cantor and others, will you be able to be our public champion on that regard, do you think?”

Vance: “I gotta ask you one more question. You're a Chicago guy. Have you found it in any way, can you call Washington at least maybe your part-time home now? I mean, you've been here a couple of years. Are you in the groove?”

Vance: “There's some people that asked me to ask this question. You have a Congress that has proudly proclaimed the posture of "just say no." You have haters out there unconscionable in their expressions. You have two wars. You have crazy people with their fingers on bomb weapons and others who are trying to get them. It's assumed that you want to run again but the question is: Why would you want to put up with that for four more years, that and more?”

MSNBC. co-host Mika Brzezinski criticizing Republicans for not caving on tax increases to make a debt-limit deal: "I think the Republicans look stupid and mean. I'm sorry, this is stupid. This is a no-brainer in terms of a deal. This is a no brainer and they look mean and they look difficult and they're going to lose this."

MSNBC host Chris Matthews: “And to say there's no issue with climate? You know, a friend of mine is talking about, she lives up in Alaska, she says we're going to be able to, maybe this is good for shipping, we're going to start having trade routes across the Arctic Circle! We're going to start having, you know what I mean?, people are going to be going to Norway in boats and we're going to have shipping lanes doing it. Don't tell me we don't have a climate thing going on. There's something strange going on.”

Marc Maron on the Bill Maher show speaking of the Bachmann marriage: "I hope [he—Bachmann’s husband] takes all that rage that comes from repression and denial into the bedroom with her. . . and I hope he f___ her angrily, because that's how I would."

Bill Maher: “Republicans have to stop thinking up intricate psychological explanations for why liberals don't like Sarah Palin or Michele Bachmann. Let me save you all some time. Are you ready? Because they're crazy people, people who are not that bright and full of awful ideas. Pretty much the exact same reasons we didn't care for George Bush and made jokes about him. So trust me, it's not because they have breast. It's because they are boobs...[when I say] Sarah Palin is a vainglorious braggart, a liar, a whiner, a professional victim, a scold, a know-it-all, a chiseler, a bully who sells patriotism like a pimp, and the leader of a strange family of inbred weirdos straight out of "The Hills Have Eyes," that's not sexist. I'm saying it because it's true, not because it's true of a woman.”

President John Kennedy: "It is a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high today and tax revenues are too low and the soundest way to raise revenues in the long run is to cut rates now."

Ahmed Ezz el-Arab, vice chairman of Egypt's flagship Liberal party: "The Holocaust is a lie."

David Brooks, who poses as a conservative on liberal media, wrote: “Republican leaders have also proved to be effective negotiators. They have been tough and inflexible and forced the Democrats to come to them. The Democrats have agreed to tie budget cuts to the debt ceiling bill. They have agreed not to raise tax rates. They have agreed to a roughly 3-to-1 rate of spending cuts to revenue increases, an astonishing concession.”

Goldman Sachs pronouncement: “Following another week of weak economic data, we have cut our estimates for real GDP growth in the second and third quarter of 2011 to 1.5% and 2.5%, respectively, from 2% and 3.25%. Our forecasts for Q4 and 2012 are under review, but even excluding any further changes we now expect the unemployment rate to come down only modestly to 8¾% at the end of 2012...But the slowdown of recent months goes well beyond what can be explained with these temporary effects....final demand growth has slowed to a pace that is typically only seen in recessions... Moreover, if the economy returns to recession - not our forecast, but clearly a possibility given the recent numbers.”

California Governor Jerry Brown, in signing the FAIR Act: "History should be honest. This bill revises existing laws that prohibit discrimination in education and ensures that the important contributions of Americans from all backgrounds and walks of life are included in our history books."

Randy Thomasson, president of SaveCalifornia.com, a conservative family group "Jerry Brown has trampled the parental rights of the overwhelming majority of California fathers and mothers who don't want their children to be sexually brainwashed at school,"

David Brooks: “If the debt ceiling talks fail, independent voters will see that Democrats were willing to compromise but Republicans were not. If responsible Republicans don't take control, independents will conclude that Republican fanaticism caused this default. They will conclude that Republicans are not fit to govern. ”

CNN's Candy Crowley: "More immediately, you'd have to make some spending priorities - payment priority decisions: Social Security benefits, and federal worker pay, and defense contractors. What are your priorities should the debt ceiling not be raised on the 2nd, when you have the bills that immediately come due? Social Security checks, federal worker pay, defense contractors?"

Jacob Lew, WH Budget Director: "Our plan is for Congress to do its work and the President to sign into law legislation that will make it possible for the United States as it always has, to keep its obligations. We'll be ready to deal with whatever happens. There is no plan other than meeting our obligations."

Crowley: "Surely you must have discussed priorities, though, we have to pay this?"

Lew: "The truth is this is a different situation the United States has ever faced. We've never gone into a situation where we didn't have enough money to pay our bills. We borrow 40 cents on a dollar right now. And if the time comes when we lose the ability to pay our bills, there will be a cash flow issue that is very real, and that's why it's critical that Congress take action before August 2nd."

Crowley: "Would you allow it to happen that those the Social Security checks would not go out? Would you allow that to happen?"

Lew: "As the President has indicated, it's not a question of what we allow and what we don't allow -"

Lew: "I think that once someone gets into the business of trying to ask about setting priorities it misses the question. Which is that it's unacceptable for the United States to be in a place whether it's Social Security recipients, or a soldier or somebody who is just owed money by the government can't be paid because we have not done our job."

Jake Tapper to Jay Carney: Which Is Worse? Default or Voting to Raise the Debt Ceiling Again in 2012? . . . The worst-case scenario here is a default, right?

Carney: The uncertainty created by regular votes on whether or not, for the first time - you know, and if you think it's - there's - there are political -

Carney: So - but Jake, let me answer the question. We do not think that that is the way that this country should operate. The president's made it very clear.

Tapper: Really? They - it - you can't. Default might not be as bad as voting on this next year?

When Speaker of the House John Boehner was asked if the debt talks impasse was mostly political, he answered: "There's a difference between Republicans and Democrats. You know, I sit in this room, over the last several weeks - and frankly, over the last several years - and it's like two groups of people from two different planets, who barely understand the language of the other one. Two remarkably different visions for what the appropriate role of the Government should be in our society - how our country operates - it's stark, and it would shock most Americans."

John Boehner, regarding dealing with President Obama on the debt ceiling: "Dealing with them [the Democrats] the last couple months has been like dealing with Jell-o; some days it's firmer than others."

Mich McConnell: "I have little question that as long as this president is in the Oval Office a real solution is probably unattainable."

Senate Minority leader Mitch McConnell: "If we go into default, [the president] will say that Republicans are making the economy worse ... The president will have the bully pulpit to blame the Republicans for all of this destruction...I refuse to help Barack Obama get reelected by marching Republicans into a position where we have co-ownership of a bad economy."

Allen West: "What people have to understand, there's one simple reason why we're in this situation right now. There has been close to $4-and-a-half trillion dollars of new debt that has come about in two-and-a-half years since President Obama took office. So this is a catastrophic situation. That's more debt than from, I believe, 1776 up to 1994 almost. So that's what we're contending with. We're also contending with three years of an exorbitant amount of deficits - $1.42 trillion, $1.29 trillion, and then this year possibly $1.65 trillion. So those are the types of things that the president needs to admit: that his economic policies, his tax policies have failed this country."

Jonathan Hoenig (FoxNews commentator and small business head): “Business wants to profit; they want to provide a value and make a profit; they are self-interested. The president kinda doesn’t like self-interest—he likes self-sacrifice—that’s why his version of the free market has government as an integral role, subsidizing this and demeaning that. Jeff Immelt is a big part of that. If you don’t have political pull these days, you’re screwed.”

John Layfield (FoxNews commentator and business owner), referring to government being concerned to the private business has not been hiring enough: “Is their only job plan to hire workers they don’t need?”

Herman Cain: “[My name is spelled] Cain, like in the Bible, but I didn’t kill anybody.”

Sarah Palin tweet: “Obama lies, economy dies. He says "default's catastrophic" then opposes deal to avert it. Nonsense. Gold stars to GOP trying to deal w/this.”

James Taranto, news commentator: “No one has said that requiring an ID in any other context than voting is discriminatory.” (Quote from memory).

Rush Limbaugh: "After running up all this debt, after breaking the bank, after destroying the US economy, Obama gets to sit up there like he had nothing to do with any of this and gets to play the adult while the kids who broke it come in here and have to fix it with his approval."

Rush Limbaugh: "Obama knows that John Boehner is his lifeline -- and if Boehner caves, Obama gets reelected."

Rush: "We know exactly who we're up against. We know exactly the kind of people the liberals are, and we know that the last thing they have on their side is the truth. We know that we have the truth on our side."

With the economy sliding deeper into a recession, panelists discuss whether it's time to stop throwing our money into a massive pit out in the desert (preceded by a short commercial).

Frank Luntz with a focus group of the debt ceiling (this is on Hannity, but Sean Hannity does not even play a significant supporting role):

The Club for Growth warns Republicans about what they choose to do. The electorate is no longer ignorant of these deals, which used to occur only behind closed doors.

This is fascinating; the church in China by David Airman (there are commercials included) (he just wrote a great WSJ article, but it is not available unless you are a subscriber):

I missed this one; Dr. David Aikman on what is probably happening in Egypt (this was given at the beginning of this year, and he seems to know what was going on):

Jimmy Carter’s Malaise speech intermixed with things which President Obama has said:

Jodi Miller: “President Obama said that the economic challenges were not created overnight, and he’s right. Most of our economic challenges were created 2½ years ago.”

Jodi Miller: “Bill O’Reilly will play a murder suspect in the TNT series Rizzoli & Isles. It’s expected to be the best portrayal he’s ever receive in the mainstream media.”

1) It should be obvious that, since federal spending has gotten dramatically large that, few Congressional leaders are willing to actually cut waste, fraud and abuse—this requires a lot of work. The only way it seems to remove waste, fraud and abuse is to remove the government program itself.

2) I do see another option—in Washington, we see the same players over and over again, who are appointed to control this or that federal bureaucracy. Many of them serve for only a couple of years and walk away with a lot of money (like Franklin Raines of FNMA). All large federal organizations need to be headed with a real, private-enterprise CEO who will be given 2 years during which he will reduce his bureaucracy 20% each year.

3) Even from Republicans, I have not heard, when they talk of a one-to-one cuts for a debt limit increase. Is this for one year? 5 years? 10 years?

4) So far, President Obama has, at various times, indicated to the remainder of the Stimulus spending, Obamacare, high speed rail projects and Medicare are off the table when it comes to spending cuts.

5) I simply cannot believe that Obama does not recognize that the revenues which he speaks about in public (e.g., corporate jet loopholes on a bill which he pushed and signed) are meaningless when it comes to closing the debt gap.

6) I come from the baby boomer generation. We were indulged as children—probably over-

indulged—and we grew up to be pretty selfish adults. Most of us expect to see our social security and our medicare; many of us, if threatened that these benefits are modified in any way, would vote for the other guy telling us that everything is fine, and we are going to get what we expect. Our country is heading for some difficult financial times, particularly for baby boomers. If Democrats have their way, and the debt ceiling is raised, without significant cuts, we could possibly see the dissolution of these entitlements in our lifetimes; for some of us, when we most need them. There will come a time—possibly this year—when the U.S. will not longer be seen as a good credit risk. I don’t see that we can continue to borrow from ourselves indefinitely, as we have been doing. I do not even understand that. If the debt ceiling is not raised, even though this imposes an immediate balanced budget, it will be painful. It will be immediately painful. Of all generations of Americans, I don’t know any other which feels so entitled to so much. Maybe those who follow us will surpass us in that attitude...but I wonder if there will be much left once we die off.

7) There has been a great deal of dishonesty on the left when it comes to the debt ceiling deadline of August 2^nd; but this distortion has not been met with good information from the far right. Debt obligations, social security, medicare and the military can all be funded in November (and all subsequent months) with our present level of income. However, at that point, things become dicey. Very little else can be covered. So far, Karl Rove has been the only person who produced a realistic chart on this (on his white board) and the only thing I found on the internet was an article from the American Thinker which addresses this problem precisely. “F” to news media sources who have lied about this; “C+” to FoxNews for one segment where Karl Rove explains this honestly.

8) On Chris Wallace, on FoxNews Sunday, today, he also made mention of what would happen if we got to August without raising the debt ceiling. He covered this accurately and dispassionately when he interviewed presidential candidate Herman Cain. So, let’s give FoxNews a B– now. This is a topic which needs to be covered accurately, and, so far, FoxNews has done this at least twice.

9) Newt Gingrich has proposed a month-to-month plan where, each month, the debt ceiling is raised by $100 billion along with $100 billion in cuts. Even though President Obama wants this issue off of his place before the election, this would keep the debt in the public eye for months to come.

10) I have heard over and over again about how big business has $1.3 trillion (or so) sitting on the sidelines, not being invested, and that is one of the reasons our economy is experiencing a slow growth. People invest money when they think they can make a profit. With the uncertainty in the market, it is unclear that this money can be parlayed into profits, and, therefore, it is kept on the sidelines. Furthermore, much of this money is outside of the United States, and would be horrendously taxed if brought back into the U.S. to invest. Finally, if it were up to our government, they would just seize this money and it would almost pay for one year’s deficit.

11) Washington bureaucracies are run by Washington bureaucrats who work for a few years and walk away with a lot of money. Promise to put a real CEO in charge of the Department of Energy, the Department of Education, FNMA and FHLMC (all of which ought to be abolished), and charge them with responsibility of reducing their budget by 20% a year for 2 or more consecutive years. Obviously, these CEO's will have to be appealed to on the basis of their patriotism, as they could make far more money in the free market.

12) One of the reasons I like Herman Cain is, he is a realistic businessman, who understands what a true bottom line is (something most government-types do not grasp). I think that he is one of the few candidates that would actually be able to cut waste, fraud and abuse in our governmental agencies, as well as eliminate some agencies entirely.

13) Obama’s 3^rd year in office will apparently have a record deficit between $1.6–1.7 trillion. Democrats knew that they could spend without having a submitted budget. Without a budget, the military, the debt, Social Security and Medicare ought to be funded automatically. Nothing else should be, including all the salaries of the legislative and executive branches.

14) In March of 2006, every Democratic Senator voted against raising the debt ceiling and every republican Senator voted in favor of raising the debt ceiling.

15) Things happen when a president takes office. Bill Clinton had no idea how much opposition he would get for Hillary-care; nor did he realize that most of his years in office would be working with a Republican Congress. He was able to deal with this challenge. President Bush had 9/11 thrust upon him, and realized that he oversaw a dozen law-enforcement agencies who did not communicate with one another. He rose to the challenge. He was less successful in dealing with FNMA and Social Security, challenges that he recognized, but did not really go to the people on these issues. President Obama has a Republican House and a serious debt crisis. When he walked into the office of presidency, he believed he could direct federal spending to liberal causes, pass Obamacare, and this would fix everything. By this time, he has to know that he was wrong. He faces one of the greatest challenges faced by any president before him. Is he able to rise to the occasion? He’s got about a year to show that he is able to transcend his ideology and liberal plans.

16) This will not be a newsflash to many of you: throwing hundreds of billions of dollars at the Department of Education is not going to improve education in the United States.

GE got $128,072,407 in stimulus contracts...and paid $0 in taxes. Jeffrey Immelt is the CEO of GE.

100% of the income of the rich would be $1.3 trillion, which is not quite enough to pay for one year’s deficit. Since the rich are already in a 35% tax bracket, what remains, $845 billion, would pay for a little more than half one year’s deficit. No matter how you cut it, the rich don’t make enough money to close the deficit gap.

The number of millionaires in the U.S. nearly doubled between 2003 and 2006, from 181,000 to 354,000...during the time of the Bush tax cuts.

44% of voters see themselves as conservative on fiscal issues such as taxes, government spending and business regulation.

40% of voters see themselves as conservative on social issues like abortion, public prayer and Church-state topics,.

Respondents were asked about US President Barack Obama's statement that "there should be two states: Palestine as the homeland for the Palestinian people and Israel as the homeland for the Jewish people."

66% said the Palestinians' real goal should be to start with a two-state solution but then move to it all being one Palestinian state.

Out of 45 reports on the broadcast network's evening news programs (ABC, CBS and NBC) between June 16 and July 12, only one mentioned a poll that showed public opposition to raising the debt ceiling.

NBC Highlights Bachmann trouble: flubbed yiddish, slavery controversy, sting by gay activists

The media was all over Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann over some statements which they made which may or may not have been historically accurate. However, President Bill Clinton just said that state voter ID laws were like Jim Crow laws of old. They are not the same, as Jim Crow laws were primarily about segregation. Will we hear on NBC, CBS, or CNN a history lesson about Jim Crow laws after playing a clip of Bill Clinton? Not likely. Democrats can make the most factually inaccurate statements possible, and the Obama Media Complex will ignore such remarks. Some “fact-checking” groups will try to show how these statements are basically correct.

These debt ceiling talks are probably the most important negotiations of this decade, and who of the Obama Media Corps is correctly handling it. Last Sunday, they simply allowed Tim Geithner to come on the Sunday programs and warn that the sky was falling, as he made innumerable false remarks. Let Sarah Palin or Michele Bachmann make any accurate or inaccurate statement on 200 year-old history, and this is all over the news. Let the treasury secretary lie without being challenged, without being fact-checked, and where is the media scrutiny?

CBS brings in real Minnesotans to discuss the government shutdown there, to get a balanced perspective. 2 are state workers and 1 is a moderate.

How much news has been out there on OMC about Operation Gunrunner? About Eric Holder, and what he said 2 years ago and what he says today?

How many times, on Obama Media, have you heard, “If seniors do not get their social security, that is Obama’s call.”

Although Saturday Night Live is on summer break, David Gregory’s interview of Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner would have been a great item to spoof. David Gregory, as an interviewer, is somewhere between partisan and so-so. Now and again, he asks some tough questions. However, throughout most of his interview with Timothy Geithner, he gave him softball questions, and when Geithner warned the sky would fall without a budget agreement, Gregory went right along with it. So Gregory would begin with a list of questions to ask, faxed to him by the White House, and anytime he strayed from that list, say, to call Geithner on this or that inaccurate statement, Geithner would bring him back to the list, and ask, “Is that an approved question?” “No.” “Therefore, you cannot ask it.” Meanwhile Geithner would wax poetic on the great evil which would befall seniors and those on medicaid, as well as present false charts and graphs.

Senator Mitch McConnell: "If the American People have learned one thing over the past few years, it's that they need to bring their decoder rings to any debate in Washington these days. When Democrats say `investment', they mean `government spending'; when they say `revenue', they mean `higher taxes'; and when they say `shared sacrifice', they mean they want you to take a hit, not Washington."

Increasing revenue certainly means increasing taxes, but it does not always mean increasing revenue. Since changes in taxes is not done in a static environment, taxes could be raised to any percent, without an increase in revenue, because behavior changes. If I am charged an inordinate tax for investing money, I will not invest money; if working a second job bumps me up to the next tax bracket, I drop the second job. This is not rocket science: pull money out of the private sector, and the private sector slows down, at a minimum, the amount of money the government took out. Tax profit and investment, and you will simply get less profit and less investment.

Have you ever once, in your private talks with Boehner and McConnell, requested closing the private jet loophole? Do you have any idea how much revenue this would actually produce? Do you realize that the end result could be a lot of middle class jobs being lost as fewer jets are purchase? Do you know that, when government chooses to tax this or that particular item, that people will change their behavior and buy fewer of that item, whether a yacht or a private jet? Do you know that we have many historical examples to prove that this is true?

Surely Obama and his economic advisors realize that taxing the rich an extra few percept will do next to nothing to reduce the deficit. However, if they can get the Republicans on board, even for a small tax increase, there will be hell to pay for incumbent candidates, which means that weaker more ideologically-fixed conservative candidates would challenge them in the primaries, which takes away the greatest advantage an incumbent has over his opponent—name recognition. So, the President is not just ideologically married to taking more money away from the rich; but this works for him politically as well, as long as he can get some Republicans to sign on.

Senate Minority leader McConnell offered up a plan to let President Obama unilaterally raise the debt, as long as he matches it with cuts The idea is, to saddle Obama with the responsibility of the entire economy and the raising of the debt ceiling. The problem with this is, the Obama Media Complex is anti-Republican and anti-Conservative, no matter what. So, the headline would be, “Republicans unilaterally abdicate responsibility.” Or, “Republicans unable to compromise, and walk away.” Luckily, there have been enough Republicans to dissuade McConnell from this approach.

If it turn’s out that the assassination of President Hamid Karzai's brother was a CIA operation, or that there are clear ties between the assassin and the CIA, the media will make very little out of this, because Obama is president. It is okay for the CIA to carry out assassinations under a Democratic president but not under a Republican one.

Democratic Maryland governor Martin O’Malley has tipped the hand of the Democrats for the upcoming election: blame the Republicans for intentionally sabotaging the economy. This is not a difficult thing to do, because most of the media will participate in this strategy.

The circus surrounding the debt ceiling makes interesting theater but all the babble is irrelevant. How the debt ceiling is eventually resolved only changes the timing and extent of the economic collapse. In that sense, it has no bearing on the ultimate fate of the nation.

But what a spectacle! Politicians fight for political points while blaming the opposition for unreasonableness, cruelty, and wanting the world to end. Journalists keep score as to which side is winning as if they were covering a major sporting event. Economists propose solutions to problems they still don't understand.

The irreverent H.L. Mencken must be chuckling in his grave over this theatre. Politicians are making P.T. Barnum proud with a performance only equaled by Nero and his fiddle.

The debt ceiling will almost certainly be raised although Gallup suggests only 22% of the public supports such action. This action might prevent some short-term discomfort but only at the expense of longer-term tragedy. Both time frames are explored below.

August 2 is the date that Treasury Secretary Geithner estimates the government runs out of money. That apparently is when the federal government exhausts its ability to "steal" from governmental retirement and other sundry accounts. July 22 has been mentioned as the "drop dead" decision point in order to prepare for a government spending scale-back.

August federal government revenues are anticipated to be $172.4 billion; spending, $306.7 billion. This shortfall of $134 billion is no surprise. The monthly shortfall annualized represents a yearly deficit of $1.6 trillion, in line with the deficits of the last two years.

If the debt ceiling is not raised the government will have to cover the shortfall in two ways:

Additional revenues cannot be obtained for the month of August. Nor is it likely revenues could be raised for subsequent near-term months. Thus a decision to not raise the debt ceiling leaves government only the option of cutting spending.

Which payments will be honored if spending must equal revenues? This chart from Zerohedge details August government spending and offers one possibility:

Contrary to much of the wailing, government need not default on its debt obligations unless it chooses to do so. They can easily be met within the expected revenue stream. The claim that we will default on debt payments is a political red herring.

The items below the dotted line could not be paid in the scenario shown above. Other scenarios might differ in terms of priorities, but the fact is that there is a $134-billion shortfall in August and similar shortfalls in subsequent months. All one can do is move items around, an exercise akin to furniture rearrangement on the Titanic.

The quandary shown above is what will likely lead to an increased debt ceiling. That does not solve the country's problem, yet it solves the politicians' problem. It appears to make the problem go away, but only cutting spending will solve the real problem. That hard decision recognizes that resources are limited. It kills the image of government as Santa Claus, something politicians are unwilling to do.

Raising the debt ceiling may provide a third option. However, the key word is "may." Just because it becomes permissible under US law to borrow more does not mean that markets will cooperate.

There are disturbing signs the US is close to being unable to borrow in credit markets. Our profligacy has been criticized by major buyers of Treasuries like China and Russia. Both maintain they are cutting back their holdings. Allies like Japan and Britain are defending against their own financial apocalypses leaving little money available for anything else.

The profligacy of the US government cannot continue. It cannot continue to spend 42 cents more than every $1.00 it collects. We are potentially close to the point When Lenders Stop Lending, perhaps one event away from a financial catastrophe that will reduce us to Greece.

Markets may have already made a judgment. QE2 ended June 30. For the prior six months the Fed purchased about 75% of US deficit financing. Absent the Fed's involvement, would these bonds have been purchased in traditional credit markets? If so, what interest rates would have to be offered?

A debt ceiling increase does not guarantee a short-term solution to US deficit financing. If others decide they will no longer continue to support our Blanche Du Bois lifestyle, a rise in the debt ceiling is meaningless.

Two factors are likely to prejudice the rest of the world against additional Treasury purchases:

Congress' behavior has not been confidence-inspiring. Their behavior is more like that of the Keystone Kops rather than responsible borrowers. Even their "aggressive" proposal, expecting to cut spending by $2-4 trillion, is weak.

It is backloaded over a ten-year period and could be changed by any future Congress. It would not even cover the costs of interest rates returning to normal levels. Lawrence B. Lindsey, former economic advisor to President Bush, estimates a return to "normal" interest rates of the past two decades would result in a ten-year cost to government of $4.9 trillion. He used a gradual "ramp-up" in interest rates to estimate costs:

Markets may not cooperate with Mr. Lindsey's scenario. It is not difficult to imagine the US in an accelerating debt death spiral where debt must be added just to service existing debt. In an upset condition, fear and panic would cause interest rates to spike suddenly. Greek debt, for example, now yields 25-30%, ten times what we currently pay. A mere 5% overall rise from current levels would increase annual government interest cost by $700 billion. That widens future deficits by a like amount.

Adding to the risk of financing the increasing and continuing deficits is rollover risk. Since the days of Robert Rubin's term as Treasury Secretary the government has used primarily short-term funding. While this strategy minimizes the interest expense, it requires frequent refinancing of debt that matures magnifying the risk of being unable to meet obligations.

The US government must fund both its deficits plus the maturing debt. In August that amounts to $600 billion. Can this be done month after month? Not indefinitely! Annualized, the US government must sell new and rollover debt of about $7 trillion this year. Next year the amount will be larger.

QE3 is almost certainly coming. It is not because it will help the economy. Additional QE is coming because the US government is unable to finance additional deficits at reasonable interest rates. Is that a condition of bankruptcy? Technically no, but it is usually the final event before sovereign bankruptcy.

The US condition is very close to the condition of Greece. They are unable to raise funds in credit markets so request that the European Central Bank "print" money for them. The US government has the Federal Reserve purchase debt when markets refuse to buy. That is money-printing and virtually identical to what Greece is asking for.

Late breaking: As I finish this article Ben Bernanke has admitted that QE3 is likely coming in testimony before the House. Markets have responded dramatically, especially gold.

Assuming the short-term obligations can be navigated with additional debt, the longer-term outlook becomes even gloomier. Buying time, even if possible via a debt ceiling increase, does nothing to solve the real problem. It only adds to it.

In a spiraling debt crisis, time is the enemy. The problem worsens as time passes. This is especially so with regard to the spiraling costs associated with US unfunded liabilities. These represent the hole in the boat that cannot be plugged.

The total obligations of the US government include the funded debt (about $14.5 trillion) plus the unfunded liabilities associated with Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. The trustees of these programs estimate the present value of these obligations to be over $100 trillion. These estimates have traditionally trailed reality. Recent deterioration in the funds flowing into these programs and the increase in healthcare costs as a result of ObamaCare is likely to require significant upward revisions in the estimates.

The magnitude of numbers in the billions or trillions is incomprehensible to most. To reduce these numbers to measures that can be understood, the following assumptions are used:

By converting government obligations to individual and household portions, the numbers become understandable (and unconscionable):

These numbers represent pro rata shares of government debt. Any personal debt like mortgages, car loans, credit cards, etc. would be on top of these numbers.

The government has promised to pay about $120 trillion. The total net worth of the country is estimated at half of this amount. Thus, the government could confiscate every car, home, savings account, etc. and still not be solvent in terms of what it has borrowed or promised. That would leave all people and corporations with nothing, including the likelihood of not receiving future healthcare or Social Security as they are now structured.

Solving the debt ceiling problem in ways floated before the American public is nothing but a political fix. It is not a solution to the underlying insolvency/bankruptcy problem facing the US government. A series of similar political fixes is why we are in this position.

The US government has been insolvent for years. Now bankruptcy is a risk because it is potentially "borrowed out."

QE3 is not a solution. It is currency destruction that leads to eventual hyperinflation which wipes out fixed incomes and most savings. It is nothing more than a temporary political escape from reality. It ensures the ultimate political and economic collapse of the country.

Government has no one to blame but itself for this problem. No one but government is capable of solving it. Unfortunately, government knows how to create problems but not solve them.

The only solution is to pare back government to where it is no longer destructive to the productive sector. It must be defanged and caged.

Immediate cuts of 50% in spending would be my starting point. Additional cuts would follow.

He could do a lot for his re-election prospects by getting more serious about spending cuts.

The weaker the hand Barack Obama has to play, the more sanctimonious he becomes. That was clear in his news conference last week when the president lectured Congress that "there's no point in procrastinating," and argued senators and representatives "need to do their job" and raise the debt ceiling. He presented himself as a model of fiscal discipline, the one serious adult in a city full of distracted children. This claim is detached from reality.

It is Mr. Obama who proposed-and Democratic congressional majorities that passed-the spending bills in 2009 and 2010 that are pushing the federal government up against the current debt ceiling of $14.3 trillion. It is Mr. Obama who started the year by demanding Congress pass a "clean" debt ceiling increase to $16.7 trillion-"clean" meaning no cuts or restraint, just a blank check to keep spending. Mr. Obama is the one without a budget, the Senate having sent his to the bottom of the Potomac by a 97-0 vote. And he has yet to publicly offer a real plan to cut spending, as House Republicans did months ago.

Thus, in backroom negotiations recently, the administration offered roughly $1 trillion in phony savings-mostly money that would never have been spent in Iraq and Afghanistan over the next 10 years anyway, along with $500 billion in interest savings on the trillion. It has also offered another supposed trillion in domestic and entitlement savings, but with cuts starting in 2014 and unlikely ever to be realized.

If the administration's spending cuts are mostly fake, its desire for tax increases is not. While the proposals are constantly shifting, you can be sure the president is looking to grab big chunks of cash from lots of people (and small businesses) who make less than a million a year.

There's still time for the president to make history's largest debt-ceiling increase a moment when spending is curbed, a debt crisis averted, entitlement programs saved, and a fraying social safety net repaired.

As a liberal Democrat, this could be Mr. Obama's Nixon-to-China moment. He could draw on ideas with fairly broad bipartisan support, including changing the way benefits are indexed for inflation, raising the age at which people start receiving benefits, and modest means-testing. These reforms wouldn't make Medicare or Social Security permanently solvent, but they would put the programs on firmer financial ground for decades. It would be good for the country, to say nothing of Mr. Obama's re-election chances.

To date, the president has convinced himself his political self-interest is best served by savaging his GOP opposition and insisting, as he did in last week's press conference, that gigantic tax increases must be part of any "balanced approach."

In fact, there is zero appetite on the Republican side for tax increases and little enthusiasm among Democrats either. If there were, Majority Leader Harry Reid would already be moving tax legislation through the Democrat-controlled Senate.

Even former President Bill Clinton called for lower corporate tax rates at last weekend's Aspen Ideas Festival. His remarks are evidence that comprehensive tax reform could be accomplished with a bill that cleaned out preferences, erased carve-outs, and killed special provisions in return for lower rates on the corporate and personal side. This, in turn, might actually result in more revenue through faster economic growth.

Mr. Obama could secure America's future prosperity and, perhaps, even his own re-election by reining in spending. He'd find receptive allies in his political opposition. Instead, he is blustering and preening for the cameras, demanding action of others and pressing for measures that will further hinder an already anemic recovery.

Americans want their president to agree with them on important issues and demonstrate strong leadership. But when there is disagreement, a strong executive can create confidence and change public opinion, especially if he performs well in crisis. The debt-ceiling debate is such a test for Mr. Obama. The odds are against him seizing this opportunity, but stranger things have happened.

It doesn't help that he's declared high-speed rail and even unspent stimulus funds as untouchable.

President Barack Obama and Congress face a mess if the federal government hits the debt ceiling Aug. 2. The Bipartisan Policy Center, a Washington think tank, projects that the government will receive $172 billion in revenues between Aug. 3 and Aug. 31, but it is on the hook to spend $306 billion, leaving a shortfall of $134 billion.

On Tuesday, Mr. Obama told Scott Pelley of CBS News that "there may simply not be the money in the coffers" to issue Social Security, veterans and disability checks after Aug. 3.

Not so. The $172 billion in revenues collected over the rest of the month can pay the $29 billion interest charges on the national debt, Social Security benefits ($49 billion), Medicaid and Medicare ($50 billion), active duty military pay ($2.9 billion), Department of Defense vendors ($31.7 billion), IRS refunds ($3.9 billion), and about a quarter of the $12.8 billion in unemployment checks due that month.

There will, however, be no cash for highway construction, no checks for federal workers or retirees, no agriculture payments, no open national parks. Interest rates are also likely to rise if U.S. debt is downgraded, adding massively to the deficit and further damaging the economy. This would be a disaster with no political winners.

The president wants a $2.4 trillion debt-ceiling increase to get him past next year's election-and the deal he's proposing is based on promised future cuts paired with substantial tax increases on households earning more than $250,000 a year.

House Speaker John Boehner proposed matching a debt-ceiling hike with substantial spending cuts. The Congressional Budget Office estimates federal spending at $46.1 trillion over the next 10 years, a dramatic escalation from projections before Mr. Obama took office. Mr. Boehner's modest proposal was to trim that back 5.2% over the decade, but the president balked.

Yet the $4 trillion in deficit reduction that Mr. Obama talks about is shy on details. No one who's attended his frequent negotiating sessions knows what his proposal really is.

The president has made a bipartisan agreement even more difficult by declaring certain spending off-limits to cuts. Mr. Obama's "untouchable" list includes his $1 trillion health-care reform, $128 billion in unspent stimulus funds, education and training outlays, his $53 billion high-speed rail proposal, spending on "green" jobs and student loans, and virtually any structural changes to entitlements except further squeezing payments to doctors, hospitals and health-care professionals.

Mr. Obama has offered no evidence since becoming president that he wants to restrain the upward trajectory of government spending. He does want higher taxes to pay for significantly higher federal spending. But he wants Republicans to deliver the tax increases, since Democrats couldn't pass them last year despite controlling both chambers of Congress.

Republicans have wisely declined. Demanding the GOP vote for immediate tax increases that would be offset by vague, future tax cuts conjures up images of Charlie Brown, Lucy and the football. The tax increases would be real-the future tax rate cuts would be imaginary. And Mr. Obama has opposed any serious spending enforcement mechanisms, such as a balanced budget amendment or hard caps on spending.

His tone also hasn't helped achieve a comprehensive agreement. The president's two most recent press conferences, in which he accused the GOP of foot-dragging, convinced Republicans that he was interested in scoring political points and attracting independents, not facilitating a deal. Convening high-profile White House meetings without offering substantive concrete proposals and then having his aides leak madly (and inaccurately) to the press afterward further squandered trust.

There's still time for a deal, but it could come after the Aug. 2 deadline, and after much damage has been done to America's financial standing. Then the key political question will become who gets the blame. By then, it should be obvious that the man who promised to transcend petty politics and legislative gridlock made things worse.

Washington is dysfunctional. And to paraphrase the president's senior adviser, David Plouffe, Mr. Obama owns the dysfunction. The president has not only governed as a liberal-he's governed as an incompetent liberal, thereby reminding voters that electing a Republican Congress and president next year is the only way to change direction.

President Obama's cap-and-trade bill died in the Democrat-run 111th Congress, but that hasn't stopped the chief executive and Lisa Jackson, his U.S. Environmental Protection Agency administrator, from finding regulatory paths to achieve the same goals.

Topping those goals is the abolition of coal as an electrical power-generating fuel. More than half of the electrical power used every day by Americans is generated by power plants fueled by coal. And 90 percent of all the coal consumed in the U.S. goes to electrical power generation.

But that doesn't matter to Obama and Big Green, they are determined to kill the coal industry because of its alleged contribution to global warming.

It appears that Jackson's EPA has now found the perfect regulatory tool to accomplish that goal - the proposed Mercury and Air Toxics Standard (MATS), which, according to the agency, would apply to all "Coal and Oil-Fired Electric Utility Steam Generating Units and Standards of Performance for Fossil-Fuel-Fired Electric Utility, Industrial-Commercial-Institutional, and Small Industrial-Commercial-Institutional Steam Generating Units."

The MATS proposal has sparked massive opposition from among energy industry groups and conservative think tanks, but now a huge coalition of unions that normally are vocal supporters of Obama are warning of the loss of millions of jobs, substantial power-generation capability, and other harmful consequences radiating throughout the entire U.S. economy.

The group is the Unions for Jobs and the Environment (UJAE), a 501(C)(4) foundation whose 15 member-unions represents "more than 3.2 million workers in electric power, transportation, coal mining, construction and other industries."

Naturally, the union coalition's first concern is the impact of MATS on employment. In a July 8 letter to EPA, UJAE notes that, while some"tens of thousands of jobs" would be created by the proposed rule's requirement for installation of new emissions equipment, "on the other hand, a potentially much larger number of permanent jobs may be lost in the mining, electric utility, and transport sectors if large numbers of coal-fired generating plants were closed in response to the rule. We regard this risk as real and substantial."

The UJAE also cautions EPA that its proposed three-year grace period for compliance with MATS is "utterly inadequate for designing,financing, permitting, and constructing the multitude of retrofit pollution controls needed to comply with the rule."

Most worrisome for UJAE's members, however, is the terrible impact MATS would have on the ability of the U.S. to build new electrical power-generating plants in the future. The proposed rule would effectively ban construction of any new plants using coal:

"The proposed MATS rule would preclude the construction of any new coal-based electric generating units due to the severity of its emission limitations for mercury, acid gases and particulate matter ('PM.')," UJAE said in its letter.

"Data provided by EPA on June 8, 2011, show that no unit in EPA's sample of more than 200 coal-based generating units meets the combined MATS new source emission limits for mercury, acid gases and PM."

It appears that UJAE posts selected examples of its comments on proposed federal regulations on its web site, but the MATS letter is not yet there. If the letter is posted, I will add a link here.

For more information and analysis on the role of coal in the U.S. economy, check this out from the Institute for Energy Research. Also, this page from the UJAE web site, which is based on data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

When the Founders at the Constitution Conventional in 1787 created the House of Representatives, it was fashioned to act as the voice of the people within the institutional checks and balances of the Federal Government. That's why the entire House faces reelection every 2 years. That's why Constitutionally, you don't have to even be a member of Congress to serve as speaker. And that's why the Constitution allows for thousands of members of the House for our current population. It is the people's house, and the people spoke last November. They cried out against a government completely out of control. After President Bush grew the U.S. debt by $7 trillion dollars in 8 years in office, and President Obama added $4 Trillion in just 2 years in office, the people cried out against big-government policies that are sabotaging the economy and taking over our lives. And because they cried out, you are no longer just John Boehner from Ohio. You are now the second in line to succeed to the presidency. You are the Speaker of the House of Representatives.

Mr. Speaker, the House of Representatives has just 8 working days left before the August 2nd debt ceiling deadline, and by wide margins in whatever way the question is asked, Americans do not want to see the debt ceiling raised. They're sick and tired of paying interest on borrowed money; money borrowed in their name. The Federal Government borrows so much money from so many sources, Mr. Speaker, that no-one knows for sure just how much it owes to its lenders. It already appears that it has exceeded the legal limit set by the congress at $14.294 trillion, and they actually at this moment in time are closer to $14.5 trillion. The White House is putting intense pressure on you and on Congress to raise that limit. The President's apologists have even suggested invoking the 14th amendment to bypass the will of Congress and borrow money without legal authority. Given the way the White House has run roughshod over your House in the matter of the "not-war" in Libya that our military is still "not" engaged in, the word of the President's lawyers that there is no presidential power in the 14th amendment to borrow money on his own can hardly be trusted. This is a president who does not regard the Constitution as a limit on the exercise of governmental power. But the President can only get away with violating the Constitution, Mr. Speaker, if you let him do so.

If you stand up for the will of the people, you will restrain him. This is the moment of truth for the Congress, Mr. Speaker. The scare-mongers and the chicken-littles in DC will tell you that the sky will come tumbling down if the debt ceiling isn't raised, even though your colleagues, Senator Pat Toomey and Rep. Tom McClintock, have introduced legislation that would prevent the United States from defaulting on its debt obligations.

I have two words for you, Mr. Speaker. Stop it. That's right, just stop it. For too long our government has spent beyond its means and in our names, sinking us and generations as yet unborn into deeper and deeper debt. And you, Mr. Speaker, can stop it. The President stands with the big-business, big-banks, big-government complex, and against the American people. He's even prepared to defy the laws of economics. But the American people are not ignorant as he thinks they are, and you know that.

Mr. Speaker, you have the opportunity to do something that no standard bearer of small government has ever been able to do in our modern era; get the government to live within its means. You can do it by standing firm with your colleagues in the Congress who are leading the call for change. You can stop it. You can force the Federal Government to make the difficult decisions to bring itself within its means and begin to loosen the chains of debt that have been foisted on our country by a centuries worth of progressive big-government architects. End it this summer, Mr. Speaker. Stop it. Tell the President, "not a penny more." Stand up for the American people, bring government within its means, and begin the restoration of our republic.

If you do this Mr. Speaker, if you restrain the federal beast, you will become one of history's great champions and heroes of freedom. If you don't, we'll all go through this again the next time a president wants to spend beyond the government's means and chain us all down to more debt.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/05/opinion/05brooks.html?_r=2&hp (If you are a liberal and do not quite grasp this, the internal conflict is between the Country Club Republicans and the Sam’s Club Republicans, represented by the TEA party and people like Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, and Sarah Palin).

Now, further than we've discussed previously in the interview with Obama, Pelley said -- like all of this, this is so the predictable, this question: "Ronald Reagan, Tip O'Neill were on opposite sides of the political spectrum, but they respected each other, they liked each other, they got things done." What a cliched question. This is something the left throws out all the time, Tip O'Neill and Reagan got along. They went out and had beer after work. No, they didn't. Anyway, question: "Do you like Speaker Boehner?" Here's Obama's answer.

RUSH: Stop the tape. Stop the tape and recue it. Do you hear the tone there and the arrogance? I do. (imitating Obama) "And I think John would like to do the right thing." Meaning I know what the right thing is. It's my way or the highway. And I think John wants to do the right thing. I'm not really sure, John may be an idiot, but I think John wants to do the right thing and see to it that I get reelected. I think John knows that he's got to cave if I have any chance of getting reelected. I think John knows that. I think John would like to see me reelected. Here's the rest of it.

OBAMA: I do. And I think John would like to do the right thing. His challenge right now is inside his caucus, but I think Ronald Reagan and Tip O'Neill are a great example. Ronald Reagan repeatedly took steps that included revenue in order for him to accomplish some of these larger goals. And the question is, if Ronald Reagan could compromise, why wouldn't folks who idolize Ronald Reagan be willing to engage in those same kinds of compromises?

RUSH: You know, we've answered all this this week, too. Reagan did it one time 'til he found out he got lied to and never, ever did it again. They are forgetting that, doing everything they can to continue their history revisionism of the 1980s, and here's Gloria Borger on CNN last night, Anderson Cooper 9, said, "Gloria, you're referring to this as a defining moment or a definitional moment for the Republican Party. How so?"

BORGER: The president was offering three dollars of spending cuts for every dollar in tax increases. I believe even Ronald Reagan probably would have taken that deal. But there are all these Republicans, 230 of them in the House who have taken a no tax pledge, and they couldn't even sign on to that, so I think they've made a choice, and the choice is, taxes are more important than deficit reduction.

RUSH: I think Reagan would have taken that deal. The president was offering three dollars of spending cuts. If I don't go to a break I'm gonna really say some offensive, insulting things and every damn one of them would be true, but I just don't want to say it.

RUSH: Let me tell you about Tip O'Neill. You know, all this is revisionist history. Tip O'Neill called Ronald Reagan "the most ignorant man who had ever occupied the White House." O'Neill, I think, is the author of the phrase "amiable dunce" in describing Reagan. O'Neill also said that Reagan was "Herbert Hoover with a smile, a cheerleader for selfishness." He said that Reagan's policies "meant that his presidency was one big Christmas party for the rich." Tip O'Neill was a leading opponent of the Reagan administration's policies, domestic and foreign; defense, what have you. Following the 1980 election, Republicans won the Senate along with the White House. O'Neill became the leader of the congressional opposition. He called Reagan, "The most ignorant man who had ever occupied the White House."

Now, all this talk about how these guys are good friends and they went out and drank beer after work every day? It's a bunch of poppycock. It's just another pack of lies. Gloria Borger, we were discussing in the break. I don't know how old this woman is, but it seems like she's been around as long as I have. I mean, ever since I have been paying attention to stuff in Washington, she's been there, and most of that time at Newsweek. So I know that in 1980 during the Reagan administration she was in Washington covering the events. If she doesn't know what TEFRA is, if she doesn't know that Reagan took $3 of spending cuts for every new dollar of tax increase -- and that he did it one time; when it was discovered he was lied to, he never, ever did it again. These guys want to act like Reagan was making those deals all the time with Tip O'Neill, but I'm saying... (sigh) What? She was is there for crying out loud! Does she not remember or is she just purposely obtuse (and that's being polite)? Okay, Gloria Borger was born in 1952, so that means that she's 59. We're gonna go to the phones here. Somebody has to bail me out here 'cause I'm getting steamed. My patience wearing very thin.

RUSH: I always get this wrong. It was Clark Clifford that called Reagan an "amiable dunce." Clark Clifford. But, you know, I don't care. Clark Clifford, Tip O'Neill, Averell Harriman, Lyndon Johnson, it doesn't matter. They're all the same. They're interchangeable. Any one of them would have call Reagan "amiable dunce" or worse so I'm really not wrong.

RUSH: Okay, time to savage another myth here. Here is a couple of audio sound bites. Tip O'Neill in 1984 talking about Ronaldus Magnus in Washington on WETA Eyeball 7, "Lawmakers" was the name of the show. Paul Duke. Remember Paul Duke? He was PBS guy. He was also an anchor, a correspondent who reported NBC for a while (not to be confused with Bill Malone). Paul Duke. He interviewed O'Neill, and listen. Here's O'Neill talking about Ronaldus Magnus.

O'NEILL: I think that he thinks he's in a grade B movie fighting the Indians or something. I really get frightened about it! I don't believe he does his homework. I don't believe that he does his study. I don't believe that he puts the time in on it. I know his working habits such that, uh, I don't believe he works over three-and-a-half hours a day. He works off three-by-five cards at all times. You take him away from them and he really, duhhh... He can't discuss the issue that you're talking about.

RUSH: He can't discuss the issues. Take away the three-by-five cards. These are the guys who were best buddies, Gloria Borger says! This is after four years of the Ronaldus Magnus administration. 1984. "Oh, yeah, best buddies! They mighta gone at it during the day, but when the day was over they went to the pub and had a beer and God bless 'em!" Paul Duke said, "Mr. Speaker, the critics might say that a lot of this is politics. You're left-wing Democrats; he's a right-wing Republican. What would your response be to that?"

O'NEILL: I don't think that the president of the United States is truly in tune with the average American citizen. You know, he likes to say, "You want to come back to the old days?" The old days. You know, we're in the same age vintage. That's a myth talking about the old days, when the breadwinner of the family worked six days a week and saw the family on -- on -- on -- on, duhh, once -- once a week. He's forgotten from where he came.

RUSH: Well, but he didn't take the Social Security thing off the front page. Senator McConnell, announcing his proposal, did not take the Social Security issue that Obama raised off the table.

Yesterday during this program, CBS released excerpts of an interview with Obama. Scott Pelley (pompously): "Can you guarantee, Mr. President, Social Security checks will go out?" "Oh, no! I don't know, Scott! Not just Social Security, veterans checks." Boom: President Can't Guarantee Social Security Checks! That hasn't been taken off the table. That's still out there. Now, here's Dingy Harry this morning on the Senate floor talking about the McConnell deal.

REID: (whispering) I believe that the Republican leader's proposal combined with the ideas he and I have been discussing (unintelligible) and deficit reduction proposals could go a long way toward resolving the impasse we now found ourselves [in]. We both agreed a long time: The problem is not the president's; it's our problem.

RUSH: Well, folks, I don't know how many of you would still be here if I came in and endorsed this thing today. With Dingy Harry -- I personally know what a reprobate the guy can be after the "phony soldier" business. Sitting here and saying that he and Senator McConnell agreed a long time this is not Obama's problem? Yeah, folks, here, listen to Dingy Harry. This is what a great deal it is! It has not taken the Social Security thing off the front page. It didn't "divert" anything. All it did was fire up the left. You know, when the media starts saying, "This is a deal everybody can live with," you know that it's a win for Obama.

Now, "Senator McConnell's plan would allow Obama to increase the debt ceiling and overall debt $2.5 trillion," between now and the 2012 campaign. It doesn't propose any structural entitlement reform or real spending reform to stop this train that we're on. It just takes us down the road to further bankruptcy and tries to blame Obama for it. I'm all for that, but who do we actually want blaming Obama? We want voters blaming Obama. We don't care, because we know who the media's gonna support and who they're not going to support. So that basically is my summation of this. I mean, you might disagree. You might like it, and have at me if you wish.

I just don't know how the Republicans are gonna explain to their constituents, especially Tea Party supporters, why they are reneging on their 2010 campaign promise to address this debt crisis in a positive and courageous way. 'Cause this just doesn't do it. Look, nobody would love for Obama to take the blame on this more than me -- nobody -- but I think it's happening. Where it matters most. You know what this boils down to (and I should not forget this)? I learned this a long time ago, and it's one of these things that I should not have to remind myself of, but we do live in two different worlds. My concern is you. I'm in the arena of ideas, the court of public opinion.

I don't think Washington cares about public opinion any more than what the recent polling data says about it. But their day-to-day existence is not with us in mind. It's just like the people that write for TIME don't really care about us; they care about what the people at Newsweek think of what they write, or Politico, or versa vice. I mean it's an incestuous culture there, inside the Beltway -- and that's what I keep forgetting. I need to remind myself that we're actually talking about two different audiences, and I assume, mistakenly so, that elected Republicans look at all this through the same prism that I do -- and that's you, the court of public opinion.

To me it only makes sense. I mean, who votes for 'em? The media doesn't vote for 'em; we do. They still have this notion the media is gonna influence how you vote. So in the court of public opinion right now, Obama is not looking good. But the Republicans don't have any clue. They don't have any idea. The court of public opinion somehow doesn't get to 'em, insulated as they are in Washington. So whatever the prevailing attitudes or opinions are that they hear each and every day -- polling data, television news shows, whatever it is -- is what they think prevailing opinion is. Now, there's a Gallup poll out today: "US Debt Ceiling Increase Remains Unpopular with Americans -- More Americans want their member of Congress to vote against raising the debt ceiling than for it."

It's 42 to 22: No increase in the debt ceiling -- 42-22! Why do you need anything else? If you're a poll watcher, why do you need any more than that? "Independents tilt heavily against raising the debt ceiling" so why come out with an idea that lets Obama do it three times? Well, I can answer that. They might look at this poll and say, "Okay, the public doesn't want the debt ceiling raised. So let's come up with a plan that forces Obama to initiate it, 'cause the public doesn't want it, and that way the public will blame Obama." I understand their frustration, folks. I really do. If I were one of them, I would be as frustrated as I have ever been in my life.

Obama, a man-child, gets to sit up there and not present anything specific and he doesn't take one hit in the media. He does all this spending, he does all this ruination, and after he does that he sits there and acts like he's the only adult in the room and he's the guy that's gonna be the referee and he's the guy that's gonna decide what happened from now forward. I can understand being literally fried over that, and I would be looking for a way to ram it down his throat myself. I'd be looking for a way to make him pay. I can understand the frustration totally. But this, to me (the timing and everything), does not do that because even beyond the substance of the details, it just...

I don't know. It portrays weaknesses. "Independents are against raising the debt ceiling 46 to 18; 36% of 'em have no opinion," and "A follow-up question finds that Americans are more sympathetic to the Republicans' arguments than Obama's. Specifically, when asked to say which is their greater concern, 51% say 'raising the debt ceiling without plans for major future spending cuts' concerns them more." Do you realize to get a 51% result on that question on a budget question...? Do you realize, folks, five years ago or ten years ago you couldn't get 5% of the American people to even understand that question, and those 5% would have 4% that wouldn't care. That's how much progress has been made on educating and informing the public here. We're on a roll, and we can get it back. We gotta go right for Obama.

RUSH: Checking the e-mail as I always do during commercial breaks, a couple of snarky comments, which I understand, by the way, "So what would you do? You sit there and you're saying you have all the answers and you do all this criticizing, and you just get to sit there and nothing ever harms you." Okay, what would I do? In context, what happened? Where are we? The Republicans are holding firm. No tax increase, no tax increase, no tax increase, nothing. The White House calls Scott Pelley, new anchor, CBS. "You want an interview with the president?" Pelley goes (panting) takes his tongue off the floor, says sure, anything you want.

They sit down in the White House, somehow Pelley asked the magic question: "Mr. President, can you guarantee that Social Security checks are gonna go out?" President: "It's not just Social Security checks, Scott," thanks for reading the transcript right. "It's veterans checks, too, out there, Scott. I can't guarantee that this is gonna happen." (gasping) "You personally can't guarantee that Social Security checks..." "No. We need a balanced approach." Fine. You are the Republicans, and you are in the House, and you run the place, so what do you do? You immediately put together a bill that pays veterans in the case of default, pays Social Security, services the debt, whatever other priorities you want to put in the bill, and you pass it and you send it over to Dingy Harry, and he passes it or not, and then you send it up to Obama, and he signs it or not. But you put the pressure on them. Obama says, "I can't guarantee Social Security checks will go out." "Well, we the Republicans will. Here's our bill."

Instead we reacted, "Okay, well, gosh, my God, that's it, Social Security, veterans, we're dead, we better set up some proposal here that tries to get Obama at least the blame for this," rather than pass a bill. You run the House of Representatives. You've got the American people behind you. Where did we leave off in this Gallup poll? Right here. Follow-up question finds Americans more sympathetic to the Republicans' argument than Obama's. Fifty-one percent say raising the debt ceiling without plans for major future spending cuts concerns 'em more. Well, that's profound. You start polling on the budget and the respondents run away from you, they don't even answer it, it's such boring stuff, but now they're in there.

So the Gallup conclusion, the bottom line, "Despite intense lobbying of Congress by President Obama, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, and others in the administration about the economic urgency for raising the nation's debt limit, fewer than one in four Americans favor the general idea of raising it." I think Gallup is entering the Scott Pelley sweepstakes and sending a message here to the White House, "Hey, you guys better understand where you are and what's going on here. You have lost the public on the debt ceiling business." Of course, Obama was asked about that, and what did Obama basically say? They're too stupid to understand. So Obama is willing to be arrogant and condescending to the voters. I don't care what the public thinks, they're too stupid, they don't care about any of this. So we have 'em. They are on our side.

Let's go to the audio sound bites. Here's Obama January 29th in 2010. Remember there was a Republican House issues conference in Baltimore, and the Republicans invited Obama to show up at this thing, January 29, 2010, basically his 12th month in orifice. I remember saying it's January and the House is gonna go away for a conference and they go to Baltimore. Anyway, they did, they invited Obama up there, among all the things he said was this.

OBAMA: We're not gonna be able to do anything about any of this entitlements if what we do is characterize whatever proposals are put out there as, well, you know, that's the other party's being irresponsible, the other party's trying to hurt our senior citizens, that the other party is doing X, Y, Z, that's why I say if we're gonna frame these debates in ways that allow us to solve them, then we can't start off by figuring out, A, who's to blame, B, how can we make the American people afraid of the other side?

RUSH: What did he just do yesterday? Just the opposite. Everything he says is a lie or has an expiration date or he doesn't mean it. Everything he says is for public consumption at that moment in time and no further. He just said this January of 2010, he just said we're not gonna come together on this with entitlement reform if we start trying to scare old folks. What did he do yesterday? Scare the old folks and the military and blame the other side, in direct contravention of what he said he thinks is the right way to do it in January of 2010. Monday morning, press conference, White House, Q&A, Chip Reid, CBS News, said, "You said everybody in the room is willing to do what they have to do to get something done by August 2nd, but isn't the problem the people who aren't in the room? In particular, Republican presidential candidates, Republican Tea Partiers on the Hill, the American public. The latest CBS News poll show only 24% of Americans said you should raise the debt limit to avoid an economic catastrophe, almost the same number in the Gallup poll."

OBAMA: This is part of the problem with a political process where folks are rewarded for saying irresponsible things to win elections or obtain short-term political gain.

RUSH: And he went on to say -- we played the further answer to this on Monday -- he went on to say people don't care. Chip, the American people don't care. They're not paying attention to this, exactly what David Plouffe said he was gonna say. They're not watching unemployment, they're selfish, the American people only care about themselves, they don't care about any of this. So just Monday he's out there condemning politicians for saying irresponsible things for the sake of politics, expiration date, 24 hours, is what he said yesterday. Last night, here's the Pelley interview, Pelley, "Can you tell the folks at home, no matter what happens the Social Security checks are gonna go out on August 3rd? They are about $20 billion, the Social Security checks that have to go out the day after the government is supposedly gonna go into default. Can you guarantee the folks out there that no matter what happens, those checks, Mr. President, are gonna go out?"

OBAMA: This is not just a matter of Social Security checks. These are veterans checks, these are folks on disability and their checks. There are about 70 million checks that go out.

PELLEY: Can you guarantee as president those checks will go out on August the 3rd?

OBAMA: I cannot guarantee that those checks go out on August 3rd if we haven't resolved this issue because there may simply not be the money in the coffers to do it.

RUSH: Now, we ought to parse that, too, because he didn't actually say they wouldn't go out. He didn't really say that. "I can't guarantee they go out if we haven't resolved this issue 'cause there may simply not be the money in the coffers." There will be money in the coffers, folks. There is the money coming in to pay these obligations. We've been there, done that, and 'splained it. That's not even the point, the money here, the substance is not the point, and if he doesn't he can just print some. Bernanke is out there talking about a third stimulus, which means more printing of money. And, of course, the stock market, they love it, I mean they're going nuts, it was before the program started. More stimulus, folks, more printing of money. That's all that is. So there will be the money to pay for it.

RUSH: Here's Steven in Dallas, Pennsylvania. Welcome to the EIB Network and with El Rushbo. Hi.

CALLER: I just want to know if President Obama can't get the Social Security checks out on August the 3rd, maybe it's time that we try and go back to privatizing Social Security --

RUSH: Let's just go all in. I mean, that's right. Just go all in! "Okay, if you can't get the checks out, we'll handle it."

CALLER: We'll take care of it. Candidate Sharron Angle wanted to have Social Security choice, wanted to go privatize or have the government do it.

CALLER: All these ideas are coming home to roost. We should start taking care of ourselves if the federal government can't do it for us.

RUSH: Well, don't forget the importance of Ramadan in all this, too. Now, Ramadan is August 1st -- and, you know, there's respect for Ramadan. There's not a whole lot of work you can do. What does it last, Snerdley, 15 day days? Ramadan might be a month. Besides raising taxes, what did Tip O'Neill ever do? What's so damn great about Tip O'Neill? What did he ever do? Here another example. Tip O'Neill cared, was compassionate. Do you realize "compassion," the whole concept of compassion, has led us to this point of destruction? Liberal Democrat compassion and what it means. Now, Ramadan's a whole month. (snorts) It's a factor. (interruption) I don't know that you have a party for Ramadan.

I don't know anything about Ramadan other than when it starts and what you don't do. (interruption) No, you're not supposed to offend 'em. I remember when I first heard about this is 1990, the Gulf War, and we had to suspend operations for a month or we had to make sure that we had completed operations by the start of Ramadan. It was almost like an automatic truce. You have a party at the end of Ramadan, I guess for having survived it. I don't know. I shouldn't say that 'cause I don't really know. Now, I've been saying for the past three or four days that all of this notion that the government shuts down with a default is poppycock.

Terry Jeffrey, Cybercast News Service: "President Barack Obama told CBS News [yesterday] that there may not be enough money in the U.S. Treasury to cover Social Security checks after Aug. 3... However, according to the Daily Treasury Statements published by the U.S. Treasury Department, the ongoing flow of federal tax revenue since the Treasury declared that it had hit the debt limit on May 16 has been more than sufficient to cover the combined costs of federal spending on interest payments, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, the Veterans Affairs department and federal workers wages and insurance benefits (including wages and insurance benefits for military personnel)."

You know, this is an interesting point, and I'm glad he made it. It totally slipped my mind. We are at a debt limit! We are at a debt limit, and the world is still turning. We are at a debt limit, and every payment is being made. The world did not come to an end and country didn't, either. "Specifically, according to the Daily Treasury Statements, as of the close of business on May 16, the federal government had taken in $1.333454 trillion in tax revenues since the beginning of fiscal 2011," which is October 1. "By the close of business on July 7, tax revenues for fiscal 2011 had grown to $1.629630 trillion.

"Therefore, between May 16," when we hit the debt limit, "and July 7 the federal government took in a total of $296.176 billion in new tax revenue," some of it mine. "In that same time period, total interest payments on the national debt equaled $14.632 billion." So the income was $296 billion; the interest payment on the national debt was $14.6 billion. You make the payment with ease with just income and outflow, just tax revenue coming in, which comes in every week. "Also during that same period, the federal government's combined expenditures for interest payments on the national debt, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, the Veterans Affairs department and federal workers wages and insurance benefits equaled $270.151 billion.

"Thus, since hitting the legal limit on the federal debt on May 16, the federal government could have spent its $296.176 billion in new tax revenues to pay for its combined $270.151 billion in expenses for interest, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, Veterans Affairs and federal workers wages and insurance benefits and still had $26.025 billion in additional tax revenue to spend on other government activities. For another $2.198 billion, for example, the government could have covered all Justice Department programs between May 16 and July 7...

"For another $11.233 billion, the government could have covered all its Housing and Urban Development programs between May 16 and July 7 -- thus bringing its surplus revenue for the post-debt-limit period down to $12.594 billion. For another $6.988 billion, the government could have covered all its Federal Highway Administration ... between May 16 and July 7..." All these calculations "are based on numbers reported in the U.S. Treasury Department's Daily Treasury Statements," government figures. The revenue is there. There's no reason not to pay Social Security or Medicare or the interest on the debt or anything else. We can pay our debts even beyond the debt limit.

CALLER: I just wanted to... I was wondering how much latitude the President really has in choosing his priorities for spending. Under the full faith-and-credit clause, he's gotta service the debt. Well, isn't Social Security a trust fund that the government has borrowed against? So doesn't he have to honor those commitments?

RUSH: Well, in truth, entitlements are not items that must be serviced. They are not debt that must be serviced. Those are contractual obligations. When we talk about servicing the debt we're essentially talking about paying bonds come to mature, roll over, or what have you. That's essentially what we're talking about. If there's money left over, of course, to spend on these other things, it can be done, but he does have some discretion over what can be paid off. To answer your question: Yeah. That's why we're in the driver's seat. It can be up to him. He's the one that has to prioritize. If there's a default, he's the one that has to prioritize what gets paid then. He's the chief executive. He pays the bills.

CALLER: Well, I don't see any default here. Default means not paying any service or anything.

RUSH: Well, you're absolutely right. There isn't gonna be a shutdown. We gonna have money coming in to service the debt. That's been one of the frustrating realities about this all along. That's why what Senator McConnell is saying doesn't compute with me because there we're at the debt limit now, and we're servicing the debt.

CALLER: Well, and the other thing: On Social Security, there was actually borrowing against the Social Security --

RUSH: Comes from a trust fund, exactly right. Social Security, by law, has to be paid.

CALLER: You know, it got me to thinking about all of the things that government is required to do -- you know, mentioned in the Constitution. Isn't the military mentioned in the Constitution? How about protecting the borders? In other words, there are things that are required, and there are things that are not. Education department? There's no mention in the Constitution.

RUSH: I know. That's why it would be fun. We had a good caller on this yesterday. He said, "Okay, if Obama chooses not to pay Soc. Security and the veterans, let's publish a list of all the people who are getting their government checks," 'cause some people are gonna be getting their checks if he chooses not to pay Social Security. But by law, recipients must be paid. Good points out there Chris.

RUSH: I don't know how many government shutdowns there have been. They are more frequent than you know. But even in 1995 when that giant government shutdown happened -- and in every government shutdown -- Social Security checks go out. They just do. All of this is patent lies, full-fledged misinformation, a scare tactic, economic terrorism, lies, scaring senior citizens and all that; and it's time to stop reacting to it and call 'em on it.

RUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, I know that after the next five or six minutes or so I will never, ever work or appear or have anything to do with anybody at NBC. Well, you know, they still own a portion of it, Comcast owns majority, but I think GE still owns some of NBC, right? I think they do. Well, their CEO of GE, Jeffrey Immelt, sits on Obama's private sector job creation council, and Immelt has come out with a jobs summit at the US Chamber of Commerce yesterday. And he said businesses need to take the lead on job creation, and, furthermore, Jeffrey Immelt, the CEO of General Electric and now a minority owner of NBC, says that businesses need to stop complaining about government. This is the guy who runs a company with five, what was it, billion dollars in profit and paid no federal income tax.

Now, I have an idea. Let Obama give every company in America the same tax breaks that he's given General Electric and let's see how many people they hire. If you tell every American business, "Hey, you know what, no taxes, earn whatever you want, wherever you want to earn it, no income taxes," you think they might start hiring people? So it's easy for Immelt to sit up there and tell businesses at a Chamber of Commerce jobs summit to stop complaining about government. He's got no complaints with government. Obama and Immelt, you know what they're like? They're like a couple of radical Islamic Imams telling these business owners to go out and sacrifice themselves for the cause. They're bringing them into the room and they're saying, "Here's the cause, you guys go out, blow yourselves up, destroy your businesses and you with it, go out and hire people."

Do you think that if businesses could expand by hiring more employees, if that was the magic bullet, going out and hiring workers was the ticket to profits, if hiring new workers was the ticket to expansion, don't you think they would do it? No, they're not doing it because it's not the ticket to new profits by itself. That comes after expansion and growth. That's when you start hiring people, to keep up with the new demand. It's what's happening to us at TwoIfByTea.com. But I'm telling you, this is absurd. A guy running a company, five billion-dollar profits paying no taxes tells everybody else at the Chamber of Commerce to stop complaining about business, government, and then says go out and start hiring people? Look, business owners are not gonna kill their businesses just so Obama's approval numbers will go up. And they're not gonna go out and kill their businesses just so Immelt looks like he knows what he's doing with Obama's commission.

Now, I happened to look up something. I'm holding what I looked up right here in my formerly nicotine-stained fingers. I found it at CNNMoney.com. CNN Money publishes what it calls the Global 500. Counting down here in about two minutes I will probably never set foot inside an NBC property. We got Jeff Immelt, minority stakeholder, General Electric, Obama's private sector job commission Chamber of Commerce telling these businesspeople, "Stop complaining about the government. Go out and hire people." Pays no taxes, easy for him not to complain, right? "Go hire people. It's up to you, go out and get more workers on the payroll." Jeff Immelt, CEO, General Electric. CNN Money publishes what it calls the Global 500. It's a snapshot of the country's largest companies. One of the quick facts they note is the number of employees. I want to look, what's the hiring trend at General Electric?

In 2009, CNN Money ranked GE number 12 on the Global 500 with 323,000 employees. In 2010 they were ranked 13, dropped a point from number 12, and they had 304,000 employees. So Mr. Immelt got rid of 19,000 employees from 2009 to 2010. So I kept looking. In 2011 ranked 16. Employees, 287,000. So I didn't do the math here but at 2009 we're at 323, this year 287,000. Since 2009, GE has reduced its payroll by 36,000 employees. While paying no taxes on $5 billion of income, its CEO tells businesses at the US Chamber of Commerce to stop complaining about government and start hiring people while he is firing people.

CALLER: I think that you have presented some misleading information regarding GE's employment and tax situation. Now, regarding the employment situation, you just provided the raw numbers. But you have to take into account businesses that GE might have sold to other people during the period such as you said they got rid of NBC. So those NBC employees --

CALLER: Okay, minority stake, okay, but not a majority stake. Not a majority stake.

RUSH: No, no. If you count it that way, they'd have fired a lot more than 36,000. I mean they got NBC Universal, they've got movie production, they got all kinds -- no, no, no. That's not how accounting works, Richie, I'm sorry, nice try but it doesn't work.

CALLER: Oh, well, it sounded like you were just reporting raw data and not data after accounting for dispositions and sales of businesses to other people. That's what it sounded like.

RUSH: What are some of the businesses that GE sold? I'm using numbers provided by CNNMoney.com and the total employees in the GE universe.

CALLER: But do you know if those figures include accounting for GE dispositions of businesses to other people, to other companies?

CALLER: We don't know. Right. You don't know anything, you just reported the raw data.

RUSH: No, I didn't say I don't know anything. I know plenty. I know that there are between 36 and 50,000 fewer people working at General Electric now than there were in 2009.

RUSH: General Electric is the parent and whatever they own comes under the umbrella. Richie, give it up. What's the next attempt?

CALLER: Okay. Now, regarding GE's tax situation, it's not only legal but also ethical because in 2008 GE lost $32 billion. Now, when you make money, you pay tax. The IRS' way of refunding to you taxes when you lose money is that they allow you to take your loss in the year you lost money and carry it back three years and forward five years until GE --

RUSH: Look, I'm not suggesting that they did anything illegal. I never said that. I don't think that they would be that bold as to cheat on $5 billion of taxes. I'm just saying they didn't pay any income -- they didn't owe, however it happened. And the guy up there now that runs that company is telling everybody to stop complaining about government. I said, "Look, I'm a CEO, give me the same deal. I'll start hiring people, yeah, I'll have the same deal."

RUSH: We had a call from a nice guy in the Bronx, Richie, who wanted to take issue with some of my reporting, quote, unquote, about General Electric. I pointed out that General Electric CEO Immelt, Obama's private sector hiring commission is telling businesses to just start hiring people, stop complaining about government. GE has fired or laid off between 36 and 50,000 people since 2009. He said, "Well, you're not counting on the dispensations of jobs brought about by the sale of various entities." No, I am because it's all underneath the GE umbrella. So here the details on the no tax business, and he also said, "You're saying that they broke the law." No, I'm not saying they broke the law. I didn't say they're cheating anybody. I think the number's actually $3.2 billion that they didn't pay in taxes, just like corporate jet owners aren't cheating anybody, just like corporate jet owners don't need to be hit on.

At any rate, from no less than the New York Times, March 24th of this year: "General Electric, the nation's largest corporation, had a very good year in 2010. The company reported worldwide profits of $14.2 billion, and said $5.1 billion," that's where I got confused. That's their US profit. Worldwide profits of $14.2 billion, $5.1 billion of it from the United States, zero taxes. No, I was right, it is 5.1. Here's where I got confused. GE claimed a tax benefit of $3.2 billion. New York Times quite understanding here, by the way. I mean they want desperately to understand how this is possible. "That may be hard to fathom for the millions of American business owners and households now preparing their own returns, but low taxes are nothing new for GE. The company has been cutting the percentage of its American profits paid to the Internal Revenue Service for years, resulting in a far lower rate than at most multinational companies. Its extraordinary success is based on an aggressive strategy that mixes fierce lobbying for tax breaks and innovative accounting that enables it to concentrate its profits offshore."

So, folks, it's even better than we thought! (laughing) Creative accounting, innovative accounting, aggressive lobbying. All those things. We're heretofore told we are supposed to despise, we're supposed to hate lobbyists, and we're supposed to love things like Sarbanes-Oxley. We're supposed to hate Enron-type accounting, right? Gimmicks, we're supposed to stand up and give GE a standing O and put its CEO on the private sector hiring commission and then get stories in the New York Times, "Hey, there's nothing to see here. Move on. Nothing to see here." (laughing) I don't recall the last time the New York Times was unmoved by aggressive lobbying, fierce lobbying for tax breaks and innovative accounting.

By the way, ladies and gentlemen, Obama has just announced -- I'm paraphrasing this now -- but he's just announced that he can't guarantee that Social Security checks will go out if the debt ceiling isn't raised on time. CBS News: "I cannot guarantee that those checks go out on August 3rd if we haven't resolved this issue. Because there may simply not be the money in the coffers to do it." It's in an interview with Scott Pelley, the new info guy, according to excerpts released by CBS News. Folks, that's just an utter lie. Social Security checks are not affected by the debt limit. The debt limit, we had all the details yesterday, the debt limit does not deal with entitlements.

Entitlements are not debts. Treasury bonds, T-bills, those are the kinds of debt we're talking about. Social Security isn't on the table. If there is a default, Social Security checks all the way out to the end of the year because it would take that long for the Social Security bunch to change their computers. This is all BS. He personally can't guarantee. That's why I tell you, they're the ones feeling the heat at the White House. The pressure is on them. They're the ones that are in the state of disarray. It's not the Republicans.

RUSH: Ralph in Buford, South Carolina, nice to have you on the program, Ralph. Hi.

CALLER: I wanted to stay on point with Jeff Immelt, the CEO of GE, I don't know why he can get up there and no one takes him to task about he shuts plants in Rochester, New York. You know, the lightbulb plants?

RUSH: Private sector jobs, creating private sector jobs. Yeah, he's on that commission.

CALLER: Yeah, he's on this commission and no one takes him to task there. He sits there, yuks it up with the president about "shovel-ready," okay, which was absolutely pathetic. Not only from Immelt but from the president of the United States yucked it up about shovel-ready wasn't shovel-ready.

CALLER: So not only does he spend money on this thing, he doesn't create one job.

RUSH: I know. Well, we took him to task the first hour. I told a friend of mine in an e-mail note I'm surprised I'm actually still alive. We pointed this out -- profoundly, by the way -- in every which way possible, two or three different times. So he is being held accountable, at least here.

RUSH: We welcome to the EIB Network Senator Marco Rubio from Florida. It's great to have you on the program, sir, and welcome.

RUSH: I want to play for you... I know you heard this, but I want to play for you Speaker Boehner at his press conference yesterday in Washington talking about you.

SPEAKER BOEHNER: If you want to see an increase in government revenues, then let's grow the economy and create jobs, broaden the tax base and lower rates. As Senator Rubio said last week, "We don't need more taxes; what we need are more taxpayers."

RUSH: And you are also on record as saying, "Every aspect of life in America is worse since Obama took over." Republican voters aren't used to hearing this from elected Republicans. Congratulations to you.

SENATOR RUBIO: Well, maybe I just haven't been here long enough to know better, but... (laughing)

SENATOR RUBIO: You know, the first part about it, Rush, is something you know on this debt limit thing. I said to somebody earlier today in the hallway, one of these media types that waits out in the hallways to interview you. They wanted to talk about the debt limit. I said, "The debt limit is a symptom. It's not our problem. The core problem is our debt and the fact that our government borrows 40¢ out of every dollar and has no idea how it's gonna pay it back; and that's a combination of spending -- we just spend way too much as government -- and loss of revenues."

Again, not loss of revenues 'cause our taxes aren't high enough. Loss of revenues because we have too many people that are out of work that are not paying taxes. So the solution seems to me to be a combination of fiscal discipline on the spending side -- which you have to enforce through spending caps and a Balanced Budget Amendment and cuts starting right now -- and, at the same time, some sort of pro-growth measures that get people back at work that create not new taxes but new taxpayers: People that are working, paying their taxes, adding revenue to government so that government can use that revenue not to grow government, but to pay down the debt and put us on a sustainable path.

That just seems to me to be the commonsense approach to this, and, instead, we've got this President's obsession with raising taxes -- and what bothers me the most about it is not just that it will kill jobs and is bad for our economy. What bothers me the most is there isn't a single tax package out there that's reasonable and realistic that would even put a dent on this debt crisis. I mean, people have no idea what you'd have to raise in taxes in this country to just to begin to make a difference. Of course you never can raise it to that level because you won't be able to collect them because, you know, people aren't dumb enough to work for free. I mean, if you're gonna tax all their money, they're not gonna keep working. So these are the things I just don't get and I wish we had done a better job earlier of outlining these choices to the American people.

SENATOR RUBIO: I hope it's not too late. I mean, you know, part of the game, the play-up here is, "Wait 'til the last minute. Wait 'til the final days or weeks and then basically tell everybody, 'Well, guys, you know, it's either take it or leave it. Either we do this, you know, the world falls apart. The government falls apart. We default on our debt.'" We've known about this for months, for years. This is an ongoing issue and I think part of that is strategy; part of that is just a political process that hopes someone's gonna come in and solve it for them.

RUSH: Well, we know what they do. This is as old as the Democrat the playbook and a lot of us wonder: Why do Republicans continue to fall for it? Why are we so afraid that something... You just articulated it. I'm sure if you know it, every other Republican on Capitol Hill knows it. Why, then, is it such an over-the-cliff thing?

RUSH: If we know what they're trying to do to us, if we know what their plan is -- we know they're gonna have newspaper stories coming soon praising Republicans that disagree with Boehner and McConnell -- why is it so hard to resist this if we know what their plan is?

SENATOR RUBIO: Well, part of the fear... I'll tell you what it is. Part of the fear that members have up here is they're afraid that at some point here soon Geithner and others are gonna start sending letters to benefits and Medicare beneficiaries and troops in the field and tell them, "You're not gonna be getting your paychecks because, you know, we can't pay you." So they're afraid of what the reaction to that would be.

RUSH: Let me interrupt you. Obama just did that. Obama just did that. They just excerpted his interview with CBS News, and he just said -- just released last ten minutes -- that he cannot guarantee Social Security checks will go out after August 2nd if we don't raise the debt limit.

SENATOR RUBIO: And, again, this was by design because he knows that these checks are due -- the majority of them -- to start getting paid August 3rd. So that's why August 2nd was picked as a date. It's as much a political ploy as anything else and that's the leverage they're gonna use -- and, again, the American people are being held hostage. But we have an advantage that I don't think existed in 1995 or another year that people are so traumatized by for whatever reason, I'm not sure. But the advantage is we have multiple ways to communicate that didn't exist back then -- and also I think thanks to programs like yours and others that are out there doing this service, people are more aware of this than they've ever been. I mean, they now I think clearly understand the choices. There's a much greater awareness in the American population about how government works and how government doesn't work, and what our problems are. So I think, ultimately, this problem is a big deal. I mean, this is not some small dispute that you can cut in the middle and everybody gets something. I mean, this is a major issue that -- if left unresolved -- is gonna lead to a sovereign debt crisis, and ultimately the redefinition of government's role in America and America's role in the world. This is as big as it gets and we need to treat it that way both in our solutions and in our approach.

RUSH: Now, a lot of Americans agree with every word that you've said, and they've thought this for a long time; and a lot of Americans just have a tough time getting their arms around the fact that they've elected a man who's leading the nation in this direction. Even after two-and-a-half years of demonstrable failure, after we couldn't be more clear about how wrong and destructive these policies are, he wants to continue them and increase them -- and a lot of Americans can't understand why. Who is this man?

SENATOR RUBIO: Well, here's the problem. He has to be measured by an objective standard that every president has to be measured by. When I look at the election next year, what he's really gonna be coming to the American people and asking for is an extension to his contract. He wants a four-year extension to his contract to be president of the United States. So we have to measure him, and how do we measure him? Well, unemployment. Unemployment is higher, significantly higher than when he took over. You know, what about the value of people's homes? The value of people's homes are down. How about the national debt? The national debt is up significantly higher with no solution in sight and none offered by him.

By every measure that you can measure a president by, things have gotten worse, and significantly worse, and that's what he has to be measured by, and part of it I think is a flawed ideology. His view of government and the people in his administration is a flawed view that takes us away from the things that have made America exceptional and part of it is, quite frankly, incompetence. I honestly believe, and I don't say this with any disrespect, I really don't know him, I have nothing personal against him but I honestly think there's a lack of competence in terms of being able to do the job and the ability to lead on some of these critical issues and the result is being paid by, you know, millions of Americans who can't find a job or are working twice as hard to make half as much, who see their country being bankrupted and no serious solutions being offered.

RUSH: Yeah, he sees it being bankrupted, too. This is the thing, he sees it's not working. I guess this is just the result of sitting around the faculty lounge at Harvard and talking about your theories all your life and finally getting a chance to implement them, and I want to go back to this Social Security business 'cause it's the playbook, as you said, hold the seasoned citizens and the military hostage, tell 'em that their payments aren't coming, that is economic terrorism. Tell me, can Congress prioritize the payments of the debt if we were to get to that circumstance --

SENATOR RUBIO: Senator Pat Toomey has a bill that does that, that actually directs them to pay certain things first, and I don't think Harry Reid, with all due respect, is gonna be giving it a hearing any time soon, but there is a bill out there that will direct that, and I am a cosponsor of it as are most of my Republican colleagues in the Senate.

RUSH: So we will only go into default if Obama makes us default. I mean he can stop this, right?

SENATOR RUBIO: Sure. He can stop it right now by basically saying, "You know what, we need to do something to grow our economy. Let's pass tax reform. Let's pass regulatory reform." He can stop this by also starting to implement some of the spending measures we think are necessary. He can also stop it by basically prioritizing spending on certain things if it comes to that. But let me tell you one thing, Rush, that no one said yet or maybe they have, the fact that payments on Social Security and Medicare may stop is a stinging indictment and a wake-up call. What Americans should realize, "Hold on a second, my Social Security check and my Medicare benefits are borrowed? The money that you're using to pay for my Social Security are borrowed? I thought I paid into a trust fund. I thought I worked my whole life to pay into some system and now you're paying my money back and you're claiming that the money is being borrowed?" That's what they're basically conceding when they're saying this.

RUSH: Yeah. You know, that's exactly right. We always thought Social Security was in a lockbox.

SENATOR RUBIO: Well, maybe a Chinese lockbox because that's what we're borrowing the money from. The point is if that comes to pass or he's threatening to do that, then the wake-up call and the message to Americans is, hey, your Social Security benefits, your Medicare benefits, what we're paying soldiers in the field, all these things that are being cut off, this is borrowed money. This is not money we have or money we saved for you. This is money we are borrowing from your children and your grandchildren, and we have no way of paying it back, and that alone should send a chill up the spine of millions of Americans.

RUSH: We're speaking, by the way, to United States Senator Marco Rubio from Florida. Speaker Boehner said today that he wants to see the president's plan, that the Republicans have presented plenty of specificity, haven't seen any from the president. What are your thoughts on the Republicans saying to the president, "You know what, we're gonna stop this endless parade of meetings, we're not accomplishing anything here. You get to play the adult in the room, you created this problem, and now you sit around and talk about fiscal responsibility and putting our house in order as though it's our fault. We've got some suggestions. You have no specificity. You let us know when you're really willing to talk about it and we'll come back."

SENATOR RUBIO: Yeah, I mean that's right, and that's exactly right. I would say the president has offered a plan already, it's the budget he offered earlier in the year that instead of reducing the debt actually increased it dramatically and increased taxes to boot. So it actually grew taxes and grew the debt, and that plan that the president put forward earlier in the year, his budget, you know how many votes it got in the Senate? Zero. Not a single Democrat voted for his budget, that's how outrageous and preposterous it was. So that's the president's budget that he put forward. So the bottom line is this president has not led on this issue. Again it's partial incompetence, part of it is just playing games with this politically. I think they've always designed it to come to this last moment where he can hold the economy hostage and say, "Look what's gonna happen if you don't give me my way on these things." But the reality is the long-term implications of the direction he's taking our country are hard to exaggerate.

SENATOR RUBIO: I have no idea other than to tell you that here's what I think is the worst possible outcome. The worst possible outcome is an increase in the debt limit without any corresponding fiscal discipline or cuts, because the message that's gonna send to the world is America is still borrowing more than it can pay back and it has no plans to reverse course, and if you think this debt limit problem is catastrophic, these guys go around thinking that, just wait 'til the rating houses downgrade us because they say America has no way to pay back this debt that they're taking out. Then you're gonna have a real catastrophe on our hands and, at that point, our options are virtually nil so I think that's the worst possible outcome. We can never allow that to happen.

RUSH: You bet. Senator Marco Rubio from Florida, hell-bent for leather. And that is why I wanted him to come on the program today. We need to hear this kind of thing from elected Republicans in Washington, not just from America's Anchorman. You know, they say that raising the debt limit is kicking the can down the road, but we're running out of road, is the point. I mean shovel-ready jobs in the stimulus, we're supposed to build new roads. We didn't build any new roads and the road the can is on is filled with potholes and doesn't have a whole lot of road left on it.

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.

Watts Up With That (a lot of recent scientific news is posted here—there were 9 stories for July 5^th alone):

If you are a small business and you want to air out your problems with how government has hampered your business, here’s the place to go (enjoy the video):

Framing the Dialogue (mostly individually produced blog postings and interesting articles):

Shadow Government Statistic; excellent economics site (some information is free, but this is a subscription site):

A George Soros funded site to go after specific Fox anchors through their advertisers (is there any parallel to this on the right?):

Men with Foil Hats (occasionally borders on conspiratorial without being completely nuts; mostly a repository of news stories from elsewhere):

iwatch news is a repository of interesting news items; there might be a slight left slant? It is hard to tell.

American Legislative Exchange Council (Limited government, free markets and federalism):

It is mostly libs who post here, but this way, you get their weird perspective on things political:

Translating Jihad. What is broadcast in the Arabic is one thing; and how it is said in English is something entirely different:

The right weather underground (blog, with some emphasis upon the phony green agenda).

The Other Half of History (the history which is ignored in the modern classroom):

Liberty’s Army (mostly economic and middle eastern revolutionary news right now):

The Iowahawk, which is a blog, at times, heavy with stats, and at other times, it is hard to tell:

In case you want to refer others to this; statistical comparison between gays and straights:

Meadia Research Center where the bias of mainstream news is exposed again and again.

Stuff you probably did not know about greenhouse gases (this is a good link for friends):

The Top 100 Effects of Global Warming (I am fairly certain that this is serious; but it is really hard to tell). It is saying goodbye to French Wines, glaciers, guacamole, mixed nuts, French fries, baseball and Christmas trees and saying hello to cannibalistic polar bears, jellyfish attacks, giant squid attacks, more stray kittens, suffocating lemmings, burning cow poop and acidic oceans.

Comprehensive List of Tax Hikes in Obamacare (this includes individual health insurance costing as much as $695/month by 2016—which is not the only cost):

The Publius Forum (more of a newscast than a blog; located in Chicago, I believe):

Political Affairs, which used to be called the Communist (in case you are interested in what the Democratic Par, I mean, the communist party is up to.

This is one of my favorite lists; this is a list of things which global warming causes (right now, it causes over 800 things—most of these are linked):

100 things we can say goodbye to (or, hello to) because of Global Warming (all of these are linked). They are very serious about these things, by the way:

Conservative blog, but with an eye to the culture and pop culture (there is a lot of stuff here):

Conservative and pop culture blog (last I looked, there were some Beatles’ performances here):

Send this link to the young people you know (try the debt quiz; I only got 6 out of 10 right):

PA Pundits, whose motto is, “the relentless pursuit of common sense” (I used many of the quotations which they gathered)

The anti-Jihad resistence (which appears to be a set of links to similar websites):

Mostly a liberal blogger, who says vicious things about most conservatives; and yet, says something sensible, e.g. posting many of the things which the healthcare bill does to us.

News Organization (I mention them because I have seen 2 honest stories on their website, which shocked and surprised me):

Even though this group leans left, if you need to know what happened each day, and you are a busy person, here is where you can find the day’s news given in 100 seconds:

Weatherman Underground 1969 “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.”

Janine Turner’s website (I’m serious; and the website is serious too). This is if you have an interest in real American history:

Judith Miller is one of the moderate and fairly level-headed voices for FoxNews:

This is an odd blog; conservativism, bikinis and whatever else posted by either a P.I. or the brother of a P.I.:

Info Wars, because there is a war on for your mind (this site may be a little crazy??):

The Magic Negro Watch (this is peppered with obscenities and angry conservative rhetoric):

Do you want to watch what is happening on our border? These are actual videos of observations cams along the border:

No matter what your political stripe, you will like this; evaluate your Congressman or Senator on the issues:

AC/DC economics (start with the oldest lessons first; economics in 60 second bites):

The Freedom Project (most a conservative news and opinion site which appears to concentrate on matters financial)

This appears to be a daily pork report, apparently as pork in Washington bills is discovered, it gets posted at Tom Coburg’s website:

Weekly poll, asking you to identify what we ought to cut in governmental spending:

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

This is indispensable: the Wall Street Journal’s guide to Obama-care (all of their pertinent articles arranged by date—send one a day to your liberal friends):

Obamacare class action suit (as of today, joining in on the suit costs you whatever you want to donate, if I understand the form correctly):

A Muslim apologetic site (they will write out letters to express your feelings, and all you have to do is sign them, and they will send them on):

Since this will be with us for a long time, the timeline of the BP gulf oil spill:

This is cool: a continuous timeline of the spill, with the daily info and the expansion of the oil, and the response:

Army Ranger Michael Behenna sentenced to 25 years in prison for 25 years for shooting Al Qaeda operative

Maybe the White House does not need to hold press conferences? It releases exclusive articles daily right here:

This is quite helpful; it is a list of all leftist groups, with links to background information on each of these groups (when I checked, 879 groups were listed). This is a fantastic resource.

In case you need to reference this, here are the photos of all those on the JournoList:

Are you tired of all the unfocused news and lame talking heads yelling at one another? Just grab a cup of coffee, sit back, and see what is really going on in the world:

Conservative New Media (it is so-so; I must admit to getting tired of seeing the interviewer high-fiving Carly Fiorina 3 or 4 times during an interview):

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 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.

We watch FOX so you don't have to). Be clear on this; they do not want you to watch FoxNews.

Conservative Review
Issue #187	Kukis Digests and Opines on this Week’s News and Views	July 17, 2011