● Obama's economic team considering new stimulus package... ● Kabul Bank called on Thursday for intervention by the United States to head off a financial meltdown.... ● Health insurance tax credit likely to affect small part of small-business workforce... ● Mixed reaction to new FEC rules on candidates, interest groups working together... ● Maryland Democrat Sen. Currie indicted on charges of taking bribes... ● Summer of Economic Discontent ... ● CBO Update... ● Obama administration appeals stem cell funding decision despite US Law... ● Gloom for Democrats as they look to November... ● U.S. troop deaths in Afghan war up sharply...
PositiveReform header image 4
When the people fear the government, there is tyranny; When the government fears the people, there is liberty.  ~ Thomas Jefferson

 

Entries Tagged as 'All About the Money'

Obama’s economic team considering new stimulus package

September 2nd, 2010 · Deception, Democrats, Money Lost, Obama's Scheme, Selling Out the US, Stimulus, Tax Dollars, Taxes, Terrorism from Within, Treason

White House considering major tax breaks for businesses, sources say

By Lori Montgomery – Thursday, September 2, 2010; 5:33 PM

With the recovery faltering less than two months before the November congressional elections, President Obama’s economic team is considering another big dose of stimulus in the form of tax breaks for businesses – potentially worth hundreds of billions of dollars, according to two people familiar with the talks.

Among the options are a temporary payroll tax holiday and a permanent extension of the research and development tax credit, say people familiar with the talks who spoke on the condition of anonymity in order to describe private deliberations.

Permanently extending the research credit would cost roughly $100 billion over the next decade, tax experts said. And depending on its form and duration, a payroll tax holiday could let businesses keep more than $300 billion they would otherwise owe the Treasury.

[View Complete Article →]

Tags: ···············

No Comments

Obama and the Democrat’s Social Security Bait and Switch

August 31st, 2010 · Deception, Democrats, Ethics, Federal Spending, Non-Transparency, Obama's Scheme, Selling Out the US, Social Security, Tax Dollars, Taxes, Unemployment

Associated Press

‘Harry, am I making this up?’ Yes, Mr. President, you are.

Democrats are trying to keep control of Congress by scaring the wig off grandma with a phantom GOP plot against Social Security. That is not news. Social Security scare tactics have been regular campaign themes since FDR. President Obama’s unique contribution is to do this even as he’s begging Republicans to help him reduce the deficit and reform entitlement spending.

On the one hand, Mr. Obama has charged his deficit commission with crafting a bipartisan plan to restrain entitlements. “Everything’s on the table. That’s how this thing’s going to work,” he said when he created the commission in February. “We now have to, in a gradual way, reduce spending, particularly on those big ticket items” like Social Security, he later added in Racine, Wisconsin. “That’s going to be our project for the next couple years.”

Yet even as Mr. Obama beseeches Republicans, he and his political allies are playing the Social Security card for all it’s worth in this campaign season. This has all the earmarks of a political bait and switch designed to ambush Republicans if they’re gullible enough to believe his bipartisan pleas.

Mr. Obama personally teed up the campaign theme earlier this month when he celebrated Social Security’s 75th anniversary by claiming that “privatizing Social Security” is “a key part” of the Republican “legislative agenda if they win a majority in Congress this fall.” He went on to say that this plan, which does not in fact exist, is “wrong for America” and “I’ll fight with everything I’ve got to stop those who would gamble your Social Security on Wall Street. Because you shouldn’t be worried that a sudden downturn in the stock market will put all you’ve worked so hard for—all you’ve earned—at risk.”

[View Complete Article →]

Tags: ··················

No Comments

Eddie Bernice Johnson, Texas Dem Rep., Steered Scholarships To Family And Friends

August 31st, 2010 · Corruption, Democrats, Ethics, Greed

WASHINGTON — A Texas congresswoman admitted that she wrongly steered thousands of dollars in college scholarships from the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation to her own relatives and the children of a staff member but said she did so unintentionally.

Democratic Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson said in a statement Monday that she will reimburse the foundation by the end of the week. She did not state how much money was involved. The Dallas Morning News reported Monday that 23 scholarships she has handed out since 2005 violated the foundation’s eligibility rules.

The Morning News reported on its website that Johnson had arranged scholarships between 2005 and 2008 for two grandsons and two grandnephews and the son and daughter of a Dallas-based aide, Rod Givens. The newspaper placed the amount of those scholarships at up to $20,000.

In 2009, according to the foundation, Johnson gave two grandsons and the aide’s two children two scholarships apiece from foundation funds, the newspaper reported.

Relatives of members of Congress are ineligible to receive scholarship funds from the foundation because of anti-nepotism rules. The scholarships also violate a foundation rule that recipients need to live or study in the district represented by the Black Caucus member who awards the scholarship.

“As previously stated, I was unaware of being in any type of violation and never intentionally violated the CBCF’s rules,” Johnson said in a statement sent by e-mail by her office. She said she would appoint a third party to examine her office’s practices in distributing scholarship money.

[View Complete Article →]

Tags: ·········

No Comments

The Folly of Subsidizing Unemployment

August 30th, 2010 · Accountability, Deception, Democrats, Federal Spending, Money Lost, Non-Transparency, Obama's Scheme, Selling Out the US, Tax Dollars, Taxes, Treason, Unemployment

My calculations suggest the jobless rate could be as low as 6.8%, instead of 9.5%, if jobless benefits hadn’t been extended to 99 weeks.

By Robert Barro

Congressman John Boehner recently suggested that President Obama replace his top economic advisers. I think he may have a point. The economic “recovery” has been disappointing, to put it mildly, and it has become increasingly clear that the blame lies with the policies of the Obama administration, not with those of its predecessor.

In general, the current administration has been too focused on expanding government, redistributing more from rich to poor, and stimulating aggregate demand. I have previously criticized the stimulus package as cost-ineffective. In particular, whatever tax reductions were in the package did not involve the cuts in marginal income tax rates that encourage investment, work effort and productivity growth.

Now the administration wants to kill the 2003 income-tax cuts, at least the parts that reduced marginal income tax rates for high-income earners and for all recipients of dividend income. This proposal is particularly disturbing because the 2003 law was George W. Bush’s main economic achievement; unlike most of Mr. Bush’s policies, this one was well-conceived and effective.

I want to focus here on another dimension of the Obama administration’s policies: the expansion of unemployment-insurance eligibility to as much as 99 weeks from the standard 26 weeks.

[View Complete Article →]

Tags: ·················

No Comments

Minority leader Boehner: Fire Obama’s economic team, extend tax cuts

August 24th, 2010 · Accountability, Corruption, Deception, Democrats, Federal Spending, Foreign Policy, Greed, Money Lost, Non-Transparency, Obama's Scheme, Selling Out the US, Tax Dollars, Taxes, Terrorism from Within, Treasury

By Paul Kane and Michael D. Shear – Tuesday, August 24, 2010; 12:21 PM

CLEVELAND — House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) called Tuesday for the mass firing of the Obama administration’s economic team, including Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner and White House adviser Larry Summers, arguing that November’s midterm elections are shaping up as a referendum on sustained unemployment across the nation and saying the “writing is on the wall.”

Boehner said President Obama‘s team lacks “real-world, hands-on experience” in creating jobs that are needed for a full economic recovery. The Republican lawmaker cited reports that some senior aides complained of “exhaustion,” including the recently departed budget chief Peter Orszag.

“President Obama should ask for – and accept – the resignations of the remaining members of his economic team, starting with Secretary Geithner and Larry Summers, the head of the National Economic Council,” Boehner said in the morning speech to business leaders at the City Club of Cleveland. The mass dismissal, he added, would be “no substitute for a referendum on the president’s job-killing agenda. That question will be put before the American people in due time. But we do not have the luxury of waiting months for the president to pick scapegoats for his failing ‘stimulus’ policies.”

Vice President Biden lashed back at Boehner, called his “so-called” economic plan nothing but a list of what Republicans are against and devoid of innovative new ideas that can help move the country forward.

[View Complete Article →]

Tags: ··········

No Comments

With consumers slow to spend, businesses are slow to hire

August 23rd, 2010 · Deception, Government, Government Control, Greed, Money Lost, Obama's Scheme, Selling Out the US, Tax Dollars, Taxes, Treasury

By Neil Irwin Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, August 21, 2010

CHICAGO — Corporate profits are soaring. Companies are sitting on billions of dollars of cash. And still, they’ve yet to amp up hiring or make major investments — the missing ingredients for a strong economic recovery.

Many Democrats say the economy needs more stimulus. Business lobbyists and their Republican allies say it needs less regulation and lower taxes.

But here in the heartland of America, senior executives say neither side’s assessment fits.

They blame their profound caution on their view that U.S. consumers are destined to disappoint for many years. As a result, they say, the economy is unlikely to see the kind of almost unbroken prosperity of the quarter-century that preceded the financial crisis.

Across the industrial parks and office towers of the Chicago region, in a more than a dozen interviews, senior executives said they see Americans for years ahead paying down debts incurred during the now-ended credit boom and adjusting spending to match their often-reduced incomes.

“It’s a different era,” said Daryl Dulaney, chief executive of Siemens Industry, which has 30,000 U.S. employees who make lighting systems for buildings and a wide range of other products. “Our hiring and investment decisions have to be prudent and reflect that.”

[View Complete Article →]

Tags: ············

No Comments

Budget analysts see 2010 deficit at $1.3 trillion

August 19th, 2010 · Auto Industry, Banking Industry, Deception, Democrats, Federal Spending, Government, Greed, Money Lost, Non-Transparency, Obama's Scheme, Reform, Selling Out the US, Tax Dollars, Taxes, Terrorism from Within, Treason, Unemployment

The Associated Press
Thursday, August 19, 2010; 12:22 PM

WASHINGTON — This year’s federal deficit will exceed $1.3 trillion, Congress’ official budget analysts projected Thursday in a report underscoring election year perils both parties face as they struggle to balance conflicting demands to trim budget shortfalls, spark the economy and cut taxes.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said this year’s budget gap would be $71 billion less than last year’s red ink, thanks to a reversal of recent trends that have seen years of steadily rising government spending and falling federal revenues.

Even so, that would leave this year’s deficit as the second largest ever in dollars, trailing only last year’s $1.4 trillion. To put those numbers in perspective, the shortfalls for 2009 and 2010 are each three times as big as the government’s annual deficit had ever been previously.

The report immediately became fodder for partisan finger-pointing over the deficit, a concern of voters in the shadow of this fall’s elections, which will determine control of Congress.

Sen. Judd Gregg of New Hampshire, top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, said the report highlighted that a “spending spree” by Congress, including enactment of President Barack Obama‘s health care overhaul, was driving annual deficits and the cumulative federal debt skyward.

“Today’s CBO outlook only underscores what we already know – the current pace of U.S. spending is unaffordable and unsustainable, and without a change in direction, this country is headed for fiscal calamity,” Gregg said.

Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, D-N.D., said helping the economy recover must be the top priority. But he said to address long-term budget pressures like the retirement of baby boomers, “we must start now to enact deficit reduction policies that will kick in after the economy has more fully recovered.”

[View Complete Article →]

Tags: ··············

No Comments

Judge decries lenient treatment of banks but approves Barclays deal

August 19th, 2010 · Accountability, Banking Industry, Corruption, Deception, Democrats, Ethics, Greed, Non-Transparency, Obama's Scheme, Selling Out the US

 By Spencer S. HsuWashington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, August 19, 2010

A federal judge Wednesday denounced the Obama administration’s treatment of major global banks accused of violating U.S. laws, saying the government lets them off easy by declining criminal prosecution in exchange for payments of hundreds of millions of dollars.

“The public looks at this and says: ‘They get a free ride here. They are paying for their justice. . . . They don’t have to plead guilty,’ ” said U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan of the District, who nevertheless approved a $298 million forfeiture by Barclays Bank to settle criminal charges of violating U.S. financial sanctions against Cuba, Iran, Libya, Sudan and Burma. “Shareholders pay. The bank doesn’t suffer.”

In questioning the Barclays deal, Sullivan became the latest federal judge to criticize the Obama administration for being too lenient with giant banks. In recent months U.S. District Judges Ellen S. Huvelle of the District and Jed S. Rakoff of New York have balked at initial plans by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to settle charges that Citigroup and Bank of America misled investors leading up to the 2008 financial crisis.

[View Complete Article →]

Tags: ···········

No Comments

With mosque remarks, Obama purposefully walks against the traffic: Obama’s Promise to 57 States

August 17th, 2010 · Corruption, Deception, Defense, Dissention, Ethics, Federal Spending, Homeland Security, National Security, Obama's Scheme, Selling Out the US, Terrorist Attack, Treason

By Michael D. Shear – Tuesday, August 17, 2010; 9:37 AM

As Washington and the nation continued this week to process President Obama‘s remarks on the Islamic cultural center planned near Ground Zero, one fact remained indisputable: This was a controversy of the president’s choosing.

True, some folks had been publicly pushing Obama to join the fray. But having chosen to stay silent for weeks, and with Washington virtually empty for August break, there seemed to be little pressure on him to do so.

And yet, with little warning, Obama decided that his voice — the president’s voice — was an important one to add to the debate.

One Republican consultant said flatly right after the remarks, “He is right on principle, but he will get slaughtered on the politics.”

“It’s almost like they’ve decided to throw in the towel” on the midterm elections, said the consultant, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “If the power to decide this was his alone, I could understand this, but it is not. He chose to walk into this from the sidelines, which seems to me a foolish waste of political capital on a local issue. A curious mix of ego and self-aggrandizement, albeit for the right cause.”

The president’s advisers often describe Obama’s early months in office as largely dictated by the crises unfolding around him. They say the economic collapse, the bank and auto failures, the H1N1 pandemic and the oil spill crisis all forced him to act.

But at other times, the president has seemed almost to welcome the danger that comes with wading into a difficult political situation. The more fraught, the better, it seems.

[View Complete Article →]

Tags: ·········

No Comments

Democrats uncertain about approach to midterms: Honorably would be Novel!

August 16th, 2010 · Corruption, Deception, Democrats, Ethics, Greed, Selling Out the US, Tax Dollars, Taxes, Terrorism from Within, Unemployment

Reference:  Just some ideas that come to mind

 

By Paul Kane – Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, August 16, 2010

The Democrats passed the stimulus package. They passed health-care and Wall Street overhauls and revamped the financing system for higher education. Their other main priorities, on immigration and energy, appear to be headed nowhere.

So, what will they do next?

It’s a question that has left congressional Democrats, who have spent the past two years mocking Republicans for lacking an agenda, without a clear plan of their own to promote in the final 80 days of the 2010 campaign.

House Democratic leaders issued lawmakers three sets of talking points that included one package of new legislation, a collection of modest bills designed to revive the manufacturing sector. Senate Democrats have not exactly jumped to embrace those proposals, instead suggesting that between now and Election Day a more detailed agenda might be forthcoming.

[View Complete Article →]

Tags: ···············

No Comments