AP Aug 4: President Barack Obama points to visitors singing “Happy Birthday” to him as he walks with White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel towards Marine One helicopter on the South Lawn of the White House. CHICAGO — President Barack Obama says he is confident the nation will not suffer the “double dip” of back-to-back recessions. The rebound of the U.S. economy appears to be slowing, prompting fears that the nation will slide into recession again after a brief period of growth. Obama told a CNBC interviewer he was confident that won’t happen. He acknowledged that much work remains on problems such as long-term unemployment

Originally posted here:
CanadaFreePress.Com

Few American voters like the new health care law — and most want it changed or repealed. In addition, according to a Fox News poll released Wednesday, almost twice as many voters think changes in the law “go too far” as think they “don’t go far enough.” Nearly half of voters — 45 percent — think the changes go too far, while 25 percent think the changes don’t go far enough. Some 16 percent think the law includes the right amount of change. Just 15 percent of voters like the new health care law and think it should be implemented as is. Most don’t like the law in its current form: 42 percent think it needs to be changed, and another 36 percent would repeal it all together. Click here to see the poll. Two-thirds of those who think the law goes too far think it should be repealed all together (66 percent). A similar number of those who think the law fails to go far enough think changes should be made to it (64 percent).

View original post here:
FOXNews.com

WASHINGTON — President Obama is giving himself a grade of “incomplete” for his presidency even though he says he has a “pretty good track record.”  Obama tells CBS television’s “Sunday Morning” that his grade is incomplete because the economy has yet to fully rebound.  Still, Obama cites accomplishments — preventing a complete collapse of the economy, saving the financial markets and the auto industry, and passing the health care law.  The president says he feels sometimes that his administration isn’t getting the credit it deserves, but he says that’s because Americans remain scared, angry and frustrated.

Here is the original post:
FOXNews.com

California is facing nearly The Toughest of Times .  We face historically high unemployment, perennial budget crises and more.  Don’t think it could get any worse?  Think again.  If Jerry Brown is elected, in one short stroke, he could deal a potentially crippling blow to the California economy before it gets a chance to get back on its feet. Even for a committed political observer, volunteer and commentator such as myself, it seems implausible – but true – that the stakes for elections grow with each successive election.  For California, the 2010 gubernatorial election unquestionably could be the most important election ever – and not necessarily for a good reason.  If Jerry Brown is elected, he and his fellow socialists could deliver a devastating blow to California. We well know that California’s unemployment rate is above 12%.  We also know that well over 100,000 people are leaving California on a yearly basis.  Beyond that, California faces an exodus of businesses – large and small alike.  So it can be no surprise that state revenues have declined nearly $40 billion over the last three years as a result of the declining taxpayer base. We also well know why California is having a tougher time than many other states.  In recent years, California is consistently ranked near the bottom of states in which to do business.  According to Joseph Vranich, president of JV Executive Consulting Inc. in Irvine:  “It’s no mystery what causes companies to leave California: High taxes, undue regulation, workers’ comp costs, a legal environment stacked against businesses and lengthy and costly construction permitting requirements.”  Indeed, California finished tied for last in the Country in Forbes’ Overall Tax Burden survey measuring tax burdens and structure. Could thinks get worse?  Under a Brown Governorship, the answer would have to be: YES. Keep in mind that Brown has no published or unpublished plan for dealing with California’s many crises – and that uncertainty hurts California businesses as much as anywhere else.  But that won’t be the worst of it.   If Jerry Brown is elected Governor, every business owner in California can be sure that socialists under Brown would roll back worker’s compensation reform in California to pre-2004 rates. California small businesses and large employers simply cannot afford the cost explosion that that would entail.  Recently, a Bay Area business owner told me that his company’s workers comp rates rose from $650,000 to $4 million per year before the reforms were passed.  Now his rates are around $950,000 per year in his labor intensive business.  Already facing cash flow issues, he believed that any workers comp roll back would more than jeopardize the jobs of his workers.  Obviously, his company is not alone in that predicament. Don’t think the socialists would do such a thing?  Know that they have pushed at least partial rolls backs every year since workers comp was reformed.  Or perhaps you would like to ask the Central Valley, which features cities with unemployment rates more than double the state average, just how bad government policy can be. Don’t think Jerry Brown would allow it to happen?  Well, given that the unions are funding his campaign and the negative ads on Meg Whitman – do you really think Brown could say no to them?  Are you willing to take that chance? In sum, the environment for California employers could get worse if Jerry Brown is elected – much worse.  The resulting higher unemployment and higher deficits (even higher than today) could leave California in deep trouble for at least another 6 years – four years of Brown and at least 2 more to recover from that. Can your business afford that?  Can you afford that?  In my view, California can’t and so we cannot afford Jerry Brown under any circumstances – this year or any other.

Follow this link:
Big Government

There are many battle fronts in the war for human freedom, but perhaps the least-appreciated of these is the battle over America’s communications and media marketplace and whether free markets or government mandates will ultimately rule them.  This battle takes on added importance since all other public policy debates depend upon an unfettered press and robust, independent channels of communication. What many on the far Left have long understood, and many defenders of freedom have failed to appreciate, is that the battle for control of media and communications policy is fundamentally tied up with the broader war for control of our economy and society. “Instead of waiting for the revolution to happen, we learned that unless you make significant changes in the media, it will be vastly more difficult to have a revolution,” argues the prolific Marxist media theorist Robert W. McChesney . “While the media is not the single most important issue in the world, it is one of the core issues that any successful Left project needs to integrate into its strategic program.” Normally we wouldn’t need to pay attention to what unrepentant ‘60’s radicals or neo-Marxist university professors think about media and communications policy. In this case, however, it is essential we pay attention. First, McChesney is right in one sense: history reveals that almost every successful effort to impose sweeping controls over an economy / society was accompanied by government efforts to control press and communication systems. If the State is going to have any luck gaining widespread and far-reaching control of an economy, gaining more control over “the Press” — which means all of us these days — becomes an essential part of the “strategic program” for control. Second, we need to pay attention to these radicals because McChesney and the group that he and John Nichols of The Nation co-founded — the insultingly misnamed Free Press — have given this fight new immediacy with their relentless agitation for media and communications policy “reform.”  And they are not the only ones. Worse yet, as I pointed out in my previous essay here , these reformistas now have an audience with the Obama Administration.  They are regularly invited to testify before the FCC, FTC, and in Congress or have a private audience with policymakers and regulators, and some of the central figures from this movement (and Free Press in particular) now hold key positions within the government and have the ear of key tech policymakers at the highest levels of power. It is time, therefore, for us to better identify and understand the growing “cyber-collectivist” threat to our liberties, for this threat is real and imminent.  We see this threat manifest itself in policy battles over “Net neutrality” regulation of communications networks; efforts to “save journalism” through a massive infusion of State subsidies; proposals to impose a variety of “localism” or “diversity” requirements on local media outlets; efforts to abolish virtually any sort of copyright / IP protection; and in a renewed war on commercial advertising and marketing, which have traditionally sustained a free, independent press in America. These are just a few of the fault lines in a battle that puts our core First Amendment values and capitalistic freedoms at stake.  We have to understand the enemy before we can repeal its advances and make the case for real media freedom. What is real media freedom?  If we were to believe radicals like Free Press, McChesney, and Nichols, “media freedom” means a media and communications world wrapped in regulatory red tape and shackled at every juncture with meddlesome mandates handed down from Beltway bureaucrats. Of course, such a contorted view of “media freedom” shouldn’t be shocking coming as it does from an organization founded by an avowed Marxist like McChesney, who has said that “the ultimate goal is to get rid of the media capitalists in the phone and cable companies and to divest them from control” and that “What we want to have in the U.S. and in every society is an Internet that is not private property, but a public utility.”  Sure, because public utilities have been soooo efficient and innovative in other contexts! There is another — and much more accurate — view of what “media freedom” is really all about.  In our 2008 book, A Manifesto for Media Freedom , Brian C. Anderson of the Manhattan Institute and I defined “media freedom” as follows: For media consumers, it’s the freedom to consume whatever information or entertainment we want from whatever sources we choose, without government restricting our choices. For media creators and distributors, it’s the freedom to structure their business affairs as they wish in seeking to offer the public an expanding array of media options, for both news and entertainment. And for both consumers and creators, media freedom is being able to speak one’s mind without restraint, and without the threat of FCC or FEC bureaucrats telling us what is “fair.” What would an agenda for real media freedom or media policy reform look like?  Again, Brian Anderson and I mapped one out in our Manifesto for Media Freedom : Embrace the dazzling variety of modern media—a media cornucopia that gives people the freedom to choose among a rich and growing array of information and entertainment options. Never has it been easier to become an informed democratic citizen. Reject any effort to re-impose the Fairness Doctrine, either within Congress or at the FCC—it is anti-free speech, subject to political abuse, and would substantially reduce the variety of voices (especially on the right) contesting in the modern agora. Liberate media operators from archaic restrictions and mandates that limit their flexibility to respond to the radical changes taking place in the media marketplace. Say no to new “localism” or “public interest” mandates that would impose yet greater regulatory burdens on broadcast television and radio operators already struggling to remain competitive in the new media universe. These mandates should also be dismissed as sly attempts to re-impose Fairness Doctrine-esque content controls on the market. Allow Broadband Internet providers to manage more actively the data pulsing through their cables, fiber optics, phone lines, and wireless connections and so create a twenty-first century telecommunications infrastructure. Net Neutrality is a bad idea — a form of infrastructure socialism that will stifle innovation and threaten a big Web slowdown. Don’t fear new media! Reject “a la carte” mandates on cable and satellite providers that would decimate the vibrant diversity of programming on pay TV today, and hit family-friendly and religious broadcasters particularly hard. Reject federal, state or local efforts to regulate video game content, or get rid of the industry’s excellent voluntary rating system and impose a government ratings system in its place. Parents have all the tools they need to monitor their children’s video-game consumption without expanding the Nanny State. Encourage parental empowerment and education-based strategies to address concerns about online child safety instead of banning social networking websites or other online content. Take steps to roll back the most onerous elements of modern campaign finance law and, at a minimum, protect new media outlets and forms of political expression from speech-stifling restrictions. And there are many other priorities, but these are the big fights for now.  We must remain vigilant in our fight to protect our First Amendment freedoms and capitalistic rights from radical cyber-collectivists like Robert McChesney, Free Press, and their allies within the Obama Administration.

Original post:
Big Government

WASHINGTON — Determined to keep showing the economy is on his mind, President Barack Obama is dashing into Ohio for the groundbreaking of a road project, hoping to remind the nation that the massive, costly stimulus act is still churning out jobs. Millions of unemployed people have yet to feel the relief. Obama was to be on the ground in Ohio for only about 90 minutes Friday, long enough to celebrate what the White House calls a significant moment: the start of the 10,000th road project launched under the recovery act. The president’s message is that a summer season of more help is on the way. Rather than delegating the symbolic occasion to someone, Obama is going to display a consistent, public focus on the matter people care about most. The economy remains the top worry of Americans this election year, people are glum about the country’s direction, and unemployment hovers close to double digits. The oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico is consuming Obama’s time. He calls it his singular focus, even as he has described economic recovery his top task, too. Obama’s transportation secretary, Ray LaHood, said the personal attention to the stimulus milestone is important. “The economy is still lousy,” LaHood said Thursday. “I mean, we have unemployment around — a little over 9 percent. And all of us believe that the way to get people back to work is to continue our progress on the recovery act. The idea that we are celebrating the 10,000 project is great news.” The president has made a practice of quick trips out of Washington to explain to local workers that the economy is growing again and that companies are hiring workers instead of shedding them in mass numbers, as they were when he took office. Each stop is meant to show he is working to help struggling people. Friday’s visit will be to the Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, where a $25 million project will add turn and bike lanes and widen sidewalks. The splash of attention is part of a broader campaign by Obama’s government to promote a burst of jobs-heavy construction activity. Improvements to national parks, drinking water systems and energy plants are all on the list. A growing body of independent economic analysis suggests the $862 billion stimulus law has boosted jobs and kept people off the unemployment line. Exactly how many jobs is a matter of dispute. Much of the money went to programs — tax breaks, Medicaid and unemployment insurance are among them — that don’t lend themselves to easy head counts. Vice President Joe Biden said Thursday that the federal effort deserves credit for protecting or creating about 2.5 million jobs so far and is on track to save or form 3.5 million jobs by the end of this year as promised. Independent economists have offered a range of estimates. Republican critics say the White House has not kept its promises, including that the jobless rate would not top 8 percent if the stimulus bill was passed. It is now at 9.7 percent. In Ohio, the economy has been sluggish, with automakers and suppliers closing factories. Unemployment hit 11 percent in March, the state’s highest rate since September 1983. But the most recent data in April showed a slight improvement, with the jobless rate dipping to 10.9 percent. The state is also politically significant, often in the center of national elections. Obama won Ohio in 2008 with 51 percent of the vote. Less than half of Americans, 45 percent, approve of Obama’s handling of the economy, a new Associated Press-GfK poll finds. White House officials say the economic signs are plenty encouraging, particularly given the state of the economy they inherited. Biden said polling that shows a dim public view of the stimulus law is unsurprising because people don’t follow the details of federal investment programs or statistical measures. “The measure of it is, is it feeling better? Are they more confident? … Can I take a vacation? Am I going to buy this car? Do I feel better, am I going to make my mortgage payment?” Biden said. “That’s what’s happening in America.”

See the article here:
FOXNews.com

The public’s concern about disaster response and relief has catapulted as a result of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill but still trails in people’s minds behind the economy and jobs, a new Gallup poll finds. Eighteen percent of Americans surveyed list natural disaster recovery as the most important problem facing the nation, an increase of 17 points since early May when the severity of the oil spill caused by an April 20 BP oil rig explosion was first being realized. However, it still is not as big a problem as the economy and the need for jobs, with nearly half of voters picking those two topics as the most important problems the country must resolve. The economy is the biggest problem for 28 percent of those surveyed. Jobs capture the attention of 21 percent. That’s up 2 points and down 1 point, respectively, from the May poll, according to Gallup.  Dissatisfaction with government captured the top problem for 14 percent of those surveyed. Health care rounded out the top five, with 10 percent, though that marked a considerable decline since the congressional debate over the health insurance overhaul. The survey taken June 11-13 of 1,014 adults had a margin of error of 4 percent.  Click here to read the results .

See original here:
FOXNews.com

Even though the Obama Administration  claimed that squandering $800 billion on so-called stimulus would  keep the joblessness rate below 8 percent , the unemployment rate today is almost 10 percent. There are many reasons for the economy’s tepid performance, including a larger burden of government spending and the dampening effect of future tax rate increases (tax rates will jump significantly on January 1, 2011, when the 2003 tax cuts expire). A closer look at the unemployment data, though , suggests that minimum wage laws also deserve a big share of the blame. In this Center for Freedom and Prosperity video, a former intern of mine at the Cato Institute (continuing a great tradition ) explains that politicians destroyed jobs when they increased the minimum wage by more than 40 percent over a three-year period. Mr. Divounguy is correct when he says businesses are not charities and that they only create jobs when they think a worker will generate net revenue. Higher minimum wages, needless to say, are especially destructive for people with poor work skills and limited work experience. This is why young people and minorities tend to suffer most – which is exactly what we see in the government data , with the teenage unemployment rates now at an astounding (and depressing) 26 percent level and blacks suffering from a joblessness rate of more than 15 percent. Since the video is focused on economics, it does not examine why politicians would enact legislation that destroys jobs. There are probably several factors involved, including economic ignorance, but a key factor is that politicians are responding to pressure from union s. This raises a separate question. Union members invariably make more than the minimum wage, so why do union bosses put so much muscle behind lobbying campaigns for higher minimum wages? The answer is simple. As Walter Williams has explained , unions want to make it more expensive for employers to hire other forms of labor. For all intents and purposes, the union bosses are throwing the less fortunate and more vulnerable members of society under the bus. In a free society, there should be no minimum wage law. From a philosophical perspective, such requirements interfere with the freedom of contract. In the imperfect world of politics, thought, the best we can hope for is that politicians occasionally do the right thing. Sadly, the recent minimum wage increases that have done so much damage were signed into law by President Bush . It’s worth noting that President Obama’s hands also are dirty on this issue, since he supported the job-killing measure when it passed the Senate in 2007. When the stupid party and the evil party both agree on a certain policy, that’s known as bipartisanship. In the real world, however, it’s called unemployment.

View original post here:
Big Government

Teachers unions, the Obama administration, and most socialists in Congress want to spend another $23 billion that we don’t have to shore up public school employment. If we don’t go along, they tell us, it’ll be a “catastrophe” for American education. With fewer teachers our kids will supposedly learn less, further crippling our already wounded economy. They couldn’t be more wrong. Over the past forty years, public school employment has risen 10 times faster than enrollment (see chart). There are only 9 percent more students today, but nearly twice as many public school employees. To prove that rolling back this relentless hiring spree by a few years would hurt student achievement, you’d have to show that all those new employees raised achievement in the first place. That would be hard to do… because it never happened. Student achievement at the end of high school has been flat for as long as we’ve been keeping track— all the way back to 1970 . But we did get something in return for all that hiring: a great, big, fat, BILL. If you graduated from high school in 1980, your entire k-12 education cost your fellow taxpayers about $75,000, in 2009 dollars. But the graduating class of 2009 had roughly twice that amount lavished on their public school careers. The extra $75,000 we’re now spending has done wonders for public school employee union membership, dues revenue, and political clout. It’s done a whole lotta nothin’ for student learning (see chart). But, some readers may ask: were all those new employees teachers? About two thirds of public school employment growth has been teachers (41 percent) or teachers’ aides (23 percent). The remaining third was comprised almost entirely of support staff in schools and district offices. So, yes, a bit of public schooling’s employment bloat can be put down to a swelling bureaucracy. But given that adding a couple of million new instructional jobs did nothing to improve achievement at the end of high school, there’s no reason to expect that shedding a few hundred thousand of them would hurt it. Ed. sec. Arne Duncan and friends are thus mistaken if they really expect a negative academic or economic impact from reversing some of our costly and ineffectual public school employment growth. In fact, they actually have it backwards. In the private sector, jobs are created and retained only if they are believed to add value to the enterprise—if their salary and benefit costs are outweighed by the revenue they generate. By contrast, we know that the millions of new government school positions added over the past four decades have not added measurably to student knowledge or skills at the end of high school. So instead of boosting the U.S. economy, these jobs have actually been a drain on it. Returning to the staff-to-student ratio we had in 1980 would save taxpayers about $142 billion every year. Losing a job is a terrible experience, but the school hiring binge of the past four decades has been entirely disconnected from enrollment levels and unaccompanied by educational improvement. Foolish public officials and self-serving, empire building teachers’ unions have created millions of unproductive jobs that were never justified in the first place and that have been a terrible drain on the U.S. economy.  With the nation $13 trillion in debt and many state governments looking at red ink for years to come, we just can’t afford to perpetuate their mistake any longer. Throwing billions more at the system would only worsen the problem and delay the solution, which is to help ease the transition of these workers from their current unproductive employment back into the productive sector of the economy.

Read more here:
Big Government

The Obama administration has already bailed out everything within its sight in the United States, now we are looking at footing the bill for foreign nations. First we bailed out the insurance industry, the auto industry, the housing industry, the banking industry, along with other struggling sectors of our economy,  now we are turning our sights on bailing out Greece. This is wrong and the American people should not be asked to foot the bill for this bailout. An interesting point, Greece is under a Socialist President and Prime Minister.

Read the original post:
Big Government