Obama’s Economic Quagmire

While I’m writing this, I’m watching the President give a press conference on his budget this morning. You’ve already seen the high points of it, like the sky-high interest we’ll be paying on just the debt for many years, vacuuming up the needed capital for expansion of the private sector.

I am not encouraged by his words.

This budget is so bloated, so engorged as to risk a genuine explosion. The damage from the blast will obliterate the American economy that is already reeling from four years of progressive control of the purse strings in Congress. That orgy of spending, particularly in the two years since Obama was coronated, has done an unprecedented amount of damage to the economy.

Of course, this is viewed as a feature, not a bug, by this administration. All is proceeding according to plan.

Early on during the Reign of Obama the Terrible, we were patient. We knew he was new to the job and we were willing to cut him some slack while he became acclimated to his position as leader of the free world. Any gaffs or missteps were attributed to his freshness.

Wait, it’s time to drink a shot: Obama just blamed George Bush for the deficit.

It’s still morning, you say? OK, I’ll do two.

OK, where was I? Oh yeah, our forgiving nature. Those of us who actually did a bit of digging in order to educate ourselves knew that he was woefully unprepared for such a position of power. He even said so himself. His years spent as a community organizer and in the pew of Jeremiah Wright’s church prepared him well, just not for the presidency.

We were willing to wait and see if he was naive, or was purposely inflating the federal budget and the deficit along with it, kinda like the Cloward-Piven Strategy writ large. Well, thanks to the results, we can now say with a fair amount of certainty…

This is being done on purpose.

Need proof? It just so happens that I have some, courtesy of the good folks over at Innocent Bystanders. In a post entitled The Record, Mike has accumulated a handy list of economic indicators from the past two years.

Here are a few of the dismal figures:


January 2009                                                        TODAY          % chg
Avg. retail price/gallon gas in U.S.      $1.83            $3.104            69.6% 1

Crude oil, European Brent                  $43.48           $99.02           127.7%

Crude oil, West TX Inter.                   $38.74           $91.38           135.9%

Gold: London                                    $853.25         $1,369.50       60.5%

Corn, No.2 yellow                              $3.56             $6.33            78.1%

Soybeans, No. 1 yellow                       $9.66            $13.75          42.3%
Sugar, cane, raw                                 $13.37           $35.39          164.7%

Unemployment rate, overall                  7.6%             9.4%            23.7%

Unemployment rate, blacks                  12.6%            15.8%          25.4%

Number of unemployed                 11,616,000       14,485,000        24.7%
Number of fed. employees, ex. military 2,779,000   2,840,000          2.2%

Real median household income         $50,112           $49,777           -0.7%

Food stamp recipients                      31,983,716       43,200,878         35.1%

Unemployment benefit recipients    7,526,598        9,193,838           22.2%

Long-term unemployed                  2,600,000          6,400,000         146.2%

Poverty rate, (2008 v 2009)                 13.2%             14.3%               8.3%

People in poverty in U.S. (08 v 09) 39,800,000        43,600,000       9.5%

The footnotes are in the post and apologies for the bad cut/paste fu.


Ready for that shot yet?

After CPAC – A Short Survey of the Presidential Landscape

The Conservative Political Action Conference is over. The speeches were given, the straw poll was taken (Ron Paul won, again, yawn) and the 2012 Republican presidential field is still just as convoluted as when the conference began. Having to rely on reportage from afar all I have to go on is the same thing you do, namely YouTube vids of speeches, some of which were truly inspirational and stories like this one from Walter Shapiro.

I don’t know about you all, but given my distance from the event, the only thing I have to gauge these events by is my own internal List of Political Principles, and then see who comes the closest to speaking what I’m thinking. I’d like to attend the next Conference, but I’d need your support to do that. You can do that by hitting the tip jar.

Until then, my computer will have to suffice, as will yours. The Right Scoop has a nice collection of speeches. Click on over, as they say, and enjoy.

I was particularly struck by the positive tone of Herman Cain’s speech. As I’ve previously mentioned, we’re a center-right, capitalist country. Shouldn’t we elect a president who embodies those characteristics? At this point of the 2012 race, Herman Cain comes as close to mirroring the country’s overall political climate as anyone else I’ve heard so far.

His speech is here. Stupid People are Running America.

Since the field is wide open, as it always is this far out from the next national election, there are lots of candidates to listen to, to pick through their records, read their books and get up to speed on their political philosophies and their vision for the country.

I would also offer a piece of advice. Don’t allow the Make-Believe Media to form your opinion for you. As you’ve no doubt noticed over the past few years, the alphabet media has jumped into bed with the political left, and will do everything in their dwindling power to prop up the weakest candidate they can find to oppose Obama.

You’ll hear names that you didn’t know, or only have a passing familiarity with in an effort to get you to support their candidate instead of the best one for the country. You’ll see polls favoring folks like Huckabee, or Pawlenty, or Romney early and often. Both Chris Christie and Colonel Alan West have announced they won’t be running, so we can count them out, at least in this go-‘round.

Who are my personal favorites? I thought you’d never ask. Here, in no particular order, are the candidates I’d like to see emerge at the front of the pack:

Herman Cain, John Bolton’s Mustache, and Mitch Daniels (as soon as I can hear his speech. Early reports on it are favorable).

However, should we fail to generate a true conservative Obama beater in this election cycle, all is not lost. Part of the success the Tea Party has had in its short life span is to motivate a truly grassroots-level passion about politics. Nowhere is this more evident than in the Republican victories in many state legislatures and governorships.

The Senate can and should be the focus of the next election, as many Democrats are up for reelection.

Let’s daydream for a moment. Let’s say we can’t field a strong enough candidate to beat Obama, that the left and the Mainstream Media (but I repeat myself) unite again in another smear campaign against whomever the GOP find to run. Then what?

If we win the Senate and manage to get a 2/3 majority, we could turn Obama into a lame-duck president overnight. The prospects are almost too good to think about.

Such a scenario would be the best we could do, that is, until the mainstream media breathes its last decrepit breath, as it appears it will soon do. After pulling out all the stops to elect Obama to a second term, they would have spent all of their energy in the last great hurrah of progressivism, the second coming of the Chosen Won.

If the last four years of progressive dominance in Washington hasn’t soured the country by then, we are in deep trouble. One wonders what it would take for the populace to finally awaken to the damage inflicted upon the nation by the likes of Pelosi, Reid, Waxman, Boxer, Frank, Geithner, Bernanke, Napolitano and the rest of the calcified ‘60’s retreads clutching their dog-eared copy of “Rules for Radicals.”

The political mind reels at the thought of a radical leftist president held in check by a conservative Congress. That would provide hours of fun at almost any gathering, providing, of course, that there were no firearms readily available. Both sides would claim success, naturally, but the country would have a fighting chance to reverse the very dangerous course that the left in Washington would pursue. With the majority to override a presidential veto, Congress could start to dismantle the progressive agenda through repealing ObamaCare and other government takeovers of private industries while our President hits the golf course.

A win-win outcome if there ever was one.

Now, I need a cigarette…

Friday Bits of Tid, Riot Like an Egyptian Edition

Another Friday, another revolution. Anyone who thinks this uprising sprang fully formed from the head of Zeus has yet to discover the wonders of the radical left and their ability to make things appear as something completely different. Magicians, they are. And the cluelessness of this administration is, um, how to put it, unprecedented. Yeah, that's it. Nobody in the intelligence community or the State Department had any idea this would happen.

The country's in the very best of hands...

So, how about a soundtrack for the revolution, eh?



Romania cracks down on witches. So, are we to assume that they have managed to solve all the big, important problems?

A time capsule with wheels. Well, not really. It's a barn, but what was found inside will warm the heart of car lovers everywhere.

What? You don't want a government center named after the great Harry Baals? Where is your civic pride?

Busting drinking monks.

Skating rink signs, doing the jobs the police won't do.

More of this, please. Oregon lawmaker tells European animal rights activist to butt out.

In case you've misplaced your real one, a digital conscience.

BackwardsGirl sent me this link since she knows how much I enjoy a cold Guinness: beer marshmallows. Beer, the cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems. I'm of course paraphrasing Homer.

And finally, a tribute to our cat overlords...



Y'all have a good weekend.

Dems on Jobs – “What Will We Do?”

This is a nugget you already know if you follow politics. The Democrats in Washington don’t have a clue about how to create jobs. Gateway Pundit has this headline that says it all, “Democrats Admit They Are Completely Baffled on How to Create Jobs.”

Well, duh.

Ever since the Dems took over Congress following the election of 2006, nearly every economic indicator has shown the destructiveness of their agenda to our economy. You see them every day on the news and I’ve cited them so often even I’m tired of repeating them. Absolutely nothing is improving.

There can only be one conclusion – Progressive Democrat policies are killing our economy.

To their credit, they are slowly starting to recognize their role as the job-killers they are. Dick Durbin (D-Illinois) said this when asked about a Democrat legislative agenda to create jobs, “I don’t know what we’ll do next.”

If that doesn’t fill your heart with hope and change for winning the future, I don’t know what will. I find it hard to contain my enthusiasm. How about you?

Aren’t you thrilled to know that those we send to Washington, clearly the best and brightest we have to offer to act in our place, to chart the course of our great nation, don’t understand our basic, free-market economic system?

We are well and truly screwed until we either educate our fully-grown representatives (who should already know these things), or we replace them with someone who at least has some experience in the business world or a passing knowledge of economics.

I’m for replacing them.

I’ve mentioned before, the unwritten assumptions that I believe our Founders held regarding government  today are not recognized by those in the Democrat Party. They proved one of them by proudly proclaiming that this most recent Congress was the most productive in history thanks to the number of new laws passed. This boast proved to me that they clearly don’t understand the idea of a people being free unless there is a law preventing an action, and subsequently, that each new law removes a bit of our freedom. Understanding this principle, we should demand that Congress convene no more often than the Texas state legislature, which meets only every two years.

But that’s just me.

Clearly, passing laws at a breakneck pace (and being proud about it) rapidly reduces our freedom. The idea that they may have gone too far in their legislative zeal never seems to occur to them.

Here’s another rule that Dems can’t fathom: government cannot create wealth. The only way government can obtain its funds is through taxation. Taxation of the private sector, or if you prefer a stronger term, confiscation of other peoples’ money. This is common knowledge outside the Beltway, but the current crop of progressive Democrats appear to be ignorant of this basic economic fact.

Government funds that are used to "create" jobs don't really do that in the long run. We've seen it in action, most notably in the form of subsidies for "green companies" that eventually fold up because they cannot compete in the open market. A one-time injection of cash won't help any business that hasn't already proven to work. A viable idea maintains itself without the need for federal funds. It grows as a matter of course. Yet we hear many on the left maintain that government needs to keep spending money it doesn't have in order to "create jobs". How many times must we read of the failure of these efforts before we finally conclude that it just doesn't work, it never has, and it never will?

The public is so far ahead of what passes for progressive "thought" that it's becoming scary. We hold simple truths to be self-evident today. How have we managed to elect leaders who don't know what we know?

Think of it this way: government is a leech on the economic body, draining it of nutrients and energy. While it’s small, the damage can be compensated for through the body’s natural defenses. But what if that leech begins to grow to the size of the human body itself? Then what happens?

At the risk of repeating myself again, you don’t need an economic degree to figure this out. If you have ever balanced your monthly checkbook, you already know how it works. It’s simple, too simple it seems, for Democrats to understand.

There are still quite a few of them who think the application of more leeches will help cure the patient.

Lost in the Noise – How Well Capitalism Can Work

In the past two years, ever since the election of Barack Obama, we’ve been on a crash lesson in Marxist economics. The results haven’t been pretty, as just about everyone can see. At the risk of flagellating a deceased equine, here a few of the highlights (which are actually lowlights) of this curious witch’s brew of big government and crony capitalism: record numbers of Americans on food stamps for the first time, record numbers living in poverty, the slowest recovery from a recession in history, record high federal deficits, low tax revenue, the list goes on.

To borrow a term, unprecedented.

What’s worse is that we’re being bombarded with the negative results of Obamanomics, so much so that we’re in danger of forgetting that there is a way out of this. The constant drumbeat of more government intervention in an effort to reverse course (a noble aspiration that is failing, as the stats show) is drowning out what we need to do, which is to effect a drastic reduction of government and its leech-like effect on the creation of wealth.

Yes Virginia, there really is such a thing as wealth creation. But you’d never know it from listening and reading the Make Believe Media.

Case in point: this article in the New York Times by one Bob Herbert entitled A Terrible Divide. In what I’m sure he and the Times editorial staff think is a well-reasoned missive on the results of Obamanomics, he manages to criticize conservative solutions to the problems that plague us, as though capitalism is at fault for them. Here’s a taste:

Standards of living for the people on the wrong side of the economic divide are being ratcheted lower and will remain that way for many years to come. Forget the fairy tales being spun by politicians in both parties — that somehow they can impose service cuts that are drastic enough to bring federal and local budgets into balance while at the same time developing economic growth strong enough to support a robust middle class. It would take a Bernie Madoff to do that.

“Service cuts?” Would Mr. Herbert be referring to the funding for Planned Parenthood? That same vital service organization currently struggling to fill the gap left by ACORN by assisting in the sex slavery of under-aged girls? The ones fulfilling the vital service of depriving the country of citizens?

Perhaps he’s referring to the National Endowment for the Arts. Or the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Heaven forbid these necessary services have their budgets cut by one penny. The horror of it all…

But I digress. In this one article lays many of the false assumptions that the left wants the unwashed masses to believe. That conservative thought is dragging the country down by daring to take a realistic look at where our tax money is going. Example after vague example spouted by Mr. Herbert and others form the drum circle, providing a soundtrack to the bad acid trip the country is currently having.

What we have here is a failure to communicate, again. By relying on personal opinion instead of actual journalism by the MBM, you know, where a reporter actually reports the facts with a critical eye seeking the truth, we have instead blame placed in the wrong places, and upon the wrong people.

With all the noise, we’re almost losing sight of the virtues of capitalism and all the positive things it can do. Remember the Twentieth Century? That serves as the best example I can make regarding the power of capitalism to fundamentally transform a nation, but in the good way. Never before has any society done more to advance itself and in the process raise the standard of living for the whole world.

We need to remind ourselves that government was much smaller back then. In fact, I believe a case can be made that the larger any government becomes, the less productive the economy becomes as a direct result. The lesson we should be getting from our current sad state of economic affairs is that our own government has finally reached the point that it’s intervention into the free market is seriously preventing the very growth that a large government depends on for its survival.

How strange that the proponents of massive government programs are seemingly unable to see where the money to fund their utopian dream comes from, and as a result, their efforts inevitably starve the government of the funds it needs.

The lesson we should be learning is this: capitalism works best when left alone. By interfering with the free market, government has the real power to twist and distort capitalism until it actually fails. We’re seeing this in action, but I’ve yet to see any concrete action by this administration to stop their anti-capitalist crusade. They are mysteriously unable to see that it is their meddling in the free market that's causing the downturn.

To draw upon President Obama’s favorite metaphor, he has pushed the accelerator pedal of big government to the floor and is now saying he will back off the throttle just a little bit.

But by all appearances, he has turned on the cruise control. We are headed for a tragic wreck that we may not survive if we, the terrified passengers, don’t reach over and turn the ignition off, pull over and say, “You can’t drive anymore.”

Ronald Reagan Reminds Us We’ve Yet to Tame Big Government

While over at Ace of Spades yesterday, I watched Ronald Reagan’s stirring speech from 1964 entitled “A Time for Choosing.” I hadn’t heard it in several years. I was struck by the number of issues he addressed that we have yet to resolve. In case you haven’t heard it lately, here it is,



Nearly all of the problems he mentioned are still with us today. Problems such as deficit spending and high federal debt, inflation, war, apathy, a ruling elite who believe they can control our personal lives better that we can, and the fragility of freedom (under attack from all sides, but mostly from inside Washington), serve to remind us that we have fallen far from the political ideals of our Founders.

At the same time, Mr. Reagan also reminded us of our exceptionalism. The concepts of self-rule, individual responsibility and freedom prick our senses to reawaken us to our destiny and our purpose, to the greatness that we are today in real danger of losing.

Free-market capitalism was under attack then, as now. Well-meaning but misguided social scientists seek to impose their vision of a mankind perfected upon our society, as if we were somehow incapable of correcting our mistakes, as if the average American was some sort of animal, growling and pawing in search of prey when all we really want is to provide for ourselves and our families a comfortable living in peace with our neighbors. He points out the still popular but grossly inaccurate opinion held by leftists that capitalism is a zero-sum game where the one who benefits robs the less fortunate of their money. Or as he put it, “We have so many people who can’t see a fat man standing beside a thin one without coming to the conclusion the fat man got that way by taking advantage of the thin one.”

Today, as in 1964, there are those that feel our Constitution is outmoded, an anachronism due to its age and language, indecipherable, limiting, nothing more than a relic to be viewed in a museum much like the bones of a prehistoric beast.

Like a wild beast, Mr. Reagan cited government programs that grow far beyond their original intentions to spring from their confinements and wreak havoc where there was none, outliving their usefulness (if there ever was any) to devour the private sector’s initiative and energy. “The more the plans fail, the more the planners plan.”

In a rare dose of reality coming from a campaign speech, Mr. Reagan asks if, since government seeks to solve all the ills of society, shouldn’t they be reading us the score showing how well they’re doing? Indeed, after all the billions spent to cure poverty and the grand promises made by those who propose program after program, how is it that record numbers of Americans are now forced to live in poverty today? “Shouldn’t they be telling us about the decline each year in the number of people needing help?”

Fraud, waste and abuse of government systems were addressed in his speech, along with the demonization of those who seek to clean it up. He summed up what passes for liberal thought today, even as it was back then. “They say we’re always against things, never for anything. The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they’re ignorant, it’s that they know so much that isn’t so.”

Social Security was in financial trouble then as now. Imagine the scorn heaped upon someone who would dare suggest that there was a private sector way to provide for retirement years, or that the system itself was insolvent and in need of reform.

Reagan excoriated planned inflation, the same type that we’re seeing today couched in the benign title of the “quantitative easing” of our monetary supply. Whatever it’s called, the results are the same: a carefully planned reduction in our standard of living through the printing of more money in order to try to balance Washington’s books in the absence of getting the economy going again.

The failure of a corrupt United Nations that seeks to blunt American interests at every turn, the exploding numbers of public sector employees, the erosion of once-sacrosanct individual property rights by an overreaching and out-of-control court that focuses on Constitutional case law instead of what it actually says, it's all there.

Nothing has changed. We’re still in a struggle to maintain our freedom against government.

We miss you, Mr. Reagan, and pray that your words will persevere, to renew the spirit of freedom we so desperately need today to liberate us from our own special tyranny, that of progressivism.

Friday Bits of Tid, Super Bowl XLV Edition

Got your chips, dip, and favorite adult beverages? Are you ready for some football?

I sure am. I hope the game isn't a blowout this year. But watching Green Bay's and Pittsburgh's easy advance through the playoffs doesn't encourage me. The hardest part of this will be introducing the five-year-old granddaughter to the wonder, the marvel that is football.

I already taught her about Nascar. When she sees Kyle Busch, she says "Eighteen, BOO!" The kid's got potential...

Anyway, despite the absence of cheerleaders, it should a good game. Two good quarterbacks with high-powered offenses and defenses should make for a memorable game. I don't have a dog in this hunt, as my Crimson Tide won last years' national championship, so I'm still glowing from that.

If the game turns out to be dull, there's always the commercials. Here's one you won't be seeing. Please, I beg of you, if you have children present, please send them out of the room, as this commercial has been banned by Fox for its content...



(h/t Breitbart's Big Hollywood.)

Busting smoking monks.

Hunter sues after failing to find elephant. "From what I know, (the hunter) should have seen elephant excrement there," it quoted the company owner as saying. But I thought he was after the elephant itself.

Walk like a gorilla, not an Egyptian.

Mystery of the Miami sand bar piano solved.

Alcohol may be good for you. I agree with Benjamin Franklin who said, "Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy." Hmm, that would make a good toast.

These two links are for after the Super Bowl:

When gas is outlawed, only outlaws will have gas.

and

Decades of dieting delusions.

And finally, ESP, where the P stands for Penguin.



(shamelessly filched from the Sandcrawler over at The Jawa Report)

Enjoy the game, y'all.

Obama Supports Anti-American Group Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt

I support freedom.

It is, after all, the natural yearning of the soul. No one wants to be told what to do, or how to live their life.

It is why America was founded. We threw off the shackles of King George III and became the world’s most productive society. A quick look at our accomplishments shows that no other nation has done so much to elevate the situation of mankind than us. We have a proven track record of success.

Freedom works.

Which is why I support freedom for the Egyptian people. Even though things could be better here in the good old US of A, we’ve still got it pretty good. We have our problems, which we are currently in the process of resolving as we always have. I’d be a real hypocrite if I didn’t think everyone should live the way we live here.

If the Egyptian people choose to have open elections, they have the potential to secure the blessings of freedom. However, with this potential comes a danger. There’s a group poised to take a leadership role in their government that is troubling, the Muslim Brotherhood, which has as its stated goal the implementation of Sharia law and the destruction of Western civilization.

“The Ikhwan must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in
eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and “sabotaging” its
miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and
God’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.”

Even more troubling is the Obama administration’s support for this group.

We have a voice in the choice of the Egyptian people. We’ve seen revolutions in the Mideast before, most notably in Iran in 1979. The violence against the US resulted in the imprisonment and torture of Americans for 444 days. It’s been reported that one of those instrumental in that barbaric act is now the president of Iran. Years of oppression under that regime led to violent protests in 2009.

So it seems that Islamic republics are not the answer either. One simple truth remains: no one is free under Sharia law. In this case, the word “law” is very descriptive of the type of control that Sharia imposes. The penalty for the slightest violation, such as criticism of sharia itself, is death. For more shocking facts about sharia and Islam and how it is the antithesis of freedom, click here.

If Obama were truly sincere in his wish for freedom, he would say that we would not support any government that has any faction of the Muslim Brotherhood in it. That would be a gesture that would place the US squarely on the side of freedom, as we should be, at all times and in all places.

The fact that he’s even considering talking to this virulent anti-American group half a world away should concern each and every one of us for one simple reason – this group supports, and is actively engaged in, the destruction of Western civilization and is active here in the US.

So, the question arises, why? Why, Mr. President, do you appear to support an openly hostile group, organized with the expressed purpose of overthrowing our own government and destroying our way of life?

Good News and Bad News

First, the good news. As you may have heard, a Florida federal judge has voided ObamaCare for now. On Monday, Judge Roger Vinson, US District Court for the Northern District of Florida. (Insert cheers for a Reagan appointee here). It seems in their haste to pass an unpopular, unnecessary bill against the will of the people, progressives in congress last year removed a tiny bit of language known as “severability.” In finding one part of the bill unconstitutional, because of the absent severability clause, the entire law was deemed void. Ken Klukowski over at FoxNews.com has the skinny on why this is important.

This law is terrible, but you knew that already. Which is why Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and the rest of the progs like it so much. The concept itself is flawed. It doesn’t solve anything other than their insane quest for ever-increasing power over our daily lives, which is never enough. When they could’ve merely refined our existing system, the best one in the world, they sought instead to dismantle it in favor of a massive new arm of government to oversee the most intimate aspect of our life: our health.

And, in an effort point out all the wonderfulness of unconstitionality of the individual mandate, South Dakota has introduced legislation to require everyone in that state to own a firearm (h/t Jawa Report). Hey, if the feds can require you to buy something, why not a gun? Or a Bible?

We can’t allow this camel anywhere close to the tent, much less allow it to stick its nose underneath it. Camel poo, and all that.

And now for the bad news. There will be no cheerleaders in this years’ Super Bowl for the first time. In a rare convergence of the stars, we somehow have two of the only six NFL teams who don’t have cheerleaders in the game. Now, if someone wants to open a federal investigation into this most egregious oversight, I’m all for it. Is it too much to ask for emergency replacement cheerleaders?

You won’t be seeing this,

or this,

or this,

on the sidelines on Sunday. I’m crushed, as I’m sure you are. Oh well, there's always the commercials.

Is It Time for America to Close Ranks?

If you keep up with the news, you may have noticed that the rest of world is on fire.

Literally.

Yesterday, Glenn Beck scratched the surface of the turmoil in the Middle East in an attempt to warn us of the dangers we face from events on the other side of the globe. It wasn’t pretty, to say the least. The failures of the US to embrace freedom and self-determination of our allies there have led to the riots we’re now seeing. By propping up dictators, we’ve proven that we don’t really mean what we say when it comes to freedom. We want it for us, but seemingly for no one else, judging by our actions on the global stage for the past few decades.

In addition, many of the factors that have fueled unrest in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, Ireland, Greece, Spain, and elsewhere are now present here. Wayne Allyn Root over at Breitbart’s Big Government has this article that outlines these factors. If you aren’t quite ready for a drink this morning, you will be after you read his post. Here is an excerpt:

• The U.S. budget deficit is far more than even economic experts imagined.


• Unemployment is up yet again — far more than the experts projected.


• Social Security shortfalls are bigger and have happened sooner than any expert predicted — a decade sooner.


• Fourth Quarter GDP was lower than projected — and even the figure released was merely the result of the Fed printing fake money 24 hours a day, to create false consumer confidence, to prop up a U.S. economy that is falling off a cliff.


• The foreclosure crisis is deepening beyond what any expert imagined. As a result, real estate prices are falling even further, thereby threatening not only consumer spending, but the very survival of major banks.


• Inflation is skyrocketing on the two things that matter most — food and energy prices. One more disaster — perhaps the fall of Egypt, leading to an oil crisis — could lead to a hyperinflation that could turn America into a combination of Zimbabwe and the Weimar Republic.


• We already face economic Armageddon on a state and local level. U.S. cities, counties and states are teetering on the verge of bankruptcy. Their grave financial condition is the result of massive unsustainable spending and debt, caused in large part by irresponsible public employee salaries, pensions and health benefits. The worst part of this crisis is that the stimulus money is gone and the federal government is bankrupt, unable to bail itself out, let alone the cities, counties and states.


• There are early signs of revolt and anarchy here in America — with a record number of policemen shot and killed during a two-week period in January.


• The Middle East threatens to turn into a powder keg that could lead not to democracy, but to radical Islamic control of many Arab countries. This grave new threat to America, American interests, and the survival of our ally Israel, would lead to more military spending and a potential oil crisis that could engulf and overwhelm the U.S. economy. In our current vulnerable economic state this tragedy could set off a worldwide economic panic.


• Japan’s credit rating was downgraded on what most economists agree is a disastrous slide toward oblivion. Japan’s debt is so huge it can never be repaid. As one famous economist describes the crisis they are facing: “Japan is a bug in search of a windshield.” Japan’s impending implosion could also trigger a worldwide economic panic.


• Spain just announced unemployment of over 20%. Not only does this news threaten the survival of the EU, it also drives a stake through Obama’s strategy for saving the U.S. economy by creating green jobs. Spain proves there is no market for green jobs. The whole idea is a mirage created by leftist progressive politicians desperately grasping for straws.

Note that the common denominator in all this is money (pardon the pun). All of the countries caught in this quagmire are all to the left of us, politically. And by being to our political left, these countries leaders are also less capitalistic than we are.

Did you notice how our economy began its decline when the progressives Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid took control of Congress in January of 2007? Here’s a little reminder of what economic conditions were when they took office – our unemployment rate in October of 2006 was 4.4%. Compare that to the 9.4% (down from 9.8%) we’re currently enjoying and it becomes plain that the first thing leftists do when they attain power is to destroy the economy, creating problems where there were none, so that they can provide the “solution”. In this case, a massive expansion in government control of the economy, which is smothering all of us in unprecedented debt.

How’s that hope and change working out for ya?

Needless to say, this doesn’t have to happen. We’ve done it to ourselves by our indifference to politics, by thinking that whomever we elect to office will automatically act in our best interests. If you think this is still the case today, then it’s time for you to burn your voter registration card and exit the political system because you are a big part of the problem.

The solution to our problems is a greater interest in politics. The Tea Party has been instrumental in getting Americans interested in politics like never before. By outlining a national agenda that puts us first, we can avoid the unrest that threatens to envelop the rest of the world.

We need to become self-sufficient as a nation. By every measure, this move towards a global economy is a grand failure. We are blessed with rich natural resources like oil that we can’t harvest because we our own government is preventing us from doing so. By ridding ourselves of anti-American posers in Washington we can build our own products for ourselves, mine and refine our own metals, grow our own food and thereby insulate ourselves from those on the world stage who have repeatedly announced their hatred of us.

But we need to get busy. Time is against us. We need to led our leaders know that we don’t want riots in American streets due to sloppy monetary policies. We are still the world’s largest economy. And we’re about to lose it.

We need to take the reins back and control our own destiny. We need to remove the self-described Socialists (Bernie Sanders) and Progressives (Pelosi, Reid, Frank, Durbin, and too many others) from Washington and replace them with folks who will act in the best interest of America.

Let's get cracking.