Apr 19 2009
Obama’s And The Congressional Democrats’ Achille’s Heel
Bumped To Top For The Weekend
There has been a slow moving train wreck in progress for months now, where the American people’s anger and frustration is on a collision course with Democrat policies enacted under President Obama. It is definitely not the poor picked on conservatives carping about government oppression from DHS – but more on that later. It’s the economy stupid!Â
This past week we have seen the stunning results of President Bush’s fast action on the banking crisis. Wells Fargo Bank surprised many with its hints it may record $3 billion in profits in the first quarter. JP Morgan is ready to pay back its $25 billion in TARP funds. All of these results, which do not reflect a complete salvation of our banking system by any means, are the results of actions taking late last year. Nothing Obama did in the last 3 months has had much of an effect on these positive events. But now all the rich bankers seemed to have been rescued (or are on their way to being rescued) from our economic tsunami.
So where is average America? GM is and Chrysler were not bailed out, they are facing bankruptcy. And the only thing the taxpayers can see is generations of debt being built up in time spans of months, when it used to be decades to see this much national debt created.
Average America is out of work or working a job well below their potential. Average America is hurting, and they are not liking what they are seeing. They could care less about the fat cats being rescued, they need to be bailed out too! They certainly don’t give a damn about the conservative drama queens acting like the paranoid liberals did on charges the NSA was monitoring Americans – see how well that worked for the left?.
Americans are concerned about their personal well being and the future of their families. The following graph was created by the Wall Street Journal to map the bad news on jobs across this country (click the image to use). It shows a stunning unemployment rate in Michigan (home of the auto makers) of nearly 13%! Oregon comes in at 12% and California at 11.2%.
![[map]](http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/OB-DM872_promo__D_20090417175451.jpg)
Here are a couple of state specific charts from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics website showing the stunning climb in unemployment since the economic meltdown last summer, first in California:
This is a record breaking year in California – worse than the Carter years:
The California figures contrasted with a national jobless rate of 8.5 percent in March. The new jobless figures are the highest since records first began to be released in 1976.
And we all know how the country changed after 4 years of Carter and Democrats in Congress. And it is expected to still get worse over the summer. Now look at Florida’s numbers:
 
Florida’s numbers are not as high, but that might be because that state is seeing a lot of people give up on finding a new career job – for now. This can be seen in the massive drop off in their labor market in the last 3 months:
The phenomena is called “under employment“, and it can mean the job problem in our economy is much worse than the unemployment numbers show:
April 6 (Bloomberg) — Joseph Ramelo gave up searching for work in January to return to school, two months after he was laid off as a San Francisco election clerk. Antonio Poe is struggling to get by doing part-time landscaping in Greensboro, North Carolina, after losing his job as an electrician.
While such workers are feeling real pain from the recession that began in December 2007, they’re not represented in the 8.5 percent unemployment rate the Labor Department reported last week. They are part of a broader group that includes those who want a job but have stopped looking for work and those who want full-time positions but have to settle for part-time employment.
A measure of underemployment that counts those people has almost doubled over the past two years, to 15.6 percent, providing a more complete gauge of the labor market’s deterioration.
Where is the bail out for America’s workers? Supposedly there was this thing called a Stimulus bill that was supposed to create (or save, as the Obama/Democrat spin always included) millions of new jobs. Well it hasn’t, and it won’t anytime soon (if ever). The following graph is the latest update on the recovery from the two departments that got a majority of the so called stimulus money (Energy and Transportation). It also shows 3 other departments (State, Interior and DoD) as well as NASA (click to enlarge).
 The key take away from the chart is the money is not moving out of DC- so there are no jobs coming. The previous graph from 3/27/09 can be found here, but it doesn’t look much different because not much is changing – except the contents of the reports from the government. These weekly status reports used to contain the first column (Appropriated) to show how much money was supposedly in the pipeline, but they have removed that column since my last chart. I will keep the column for comparison because it helps explain the continuing decline in the job market since the money supposedly going to create jobs is not there. So far, not much is moving.
As of 3/27/09 $105 billion dollars had been appropriated across these 6 parts of the federal government. At that time only 4.8% had been ‘obligated’ to specific projects, and an insignificant 0.0016% ($1.66 million) had actually been dispersed to begin work.
As of 4/14/09 only 9.3% of the money had been ‘obligated’ ($9.8 billion), and a still insignificant 0.0023% ($2.4 million) had actually been dispersed to begin work.
This is why Obama touts a 900 job program as progress when we are losing over 600,000 a month nationally – that’s all he’s got to show! It is pathetic.
What is really frustrating is there is no credible opposition to Obama and the Congressional Dems able to point out this situation to America. The conservatives (what’s left of them) are running around screaming they are being oppressed like that peasant character from Monty Python’s Holy Grail. It doesn’t matter how much sanity breaks through through occasionally now on the right, they are damaged goods.
So where does a country go to get some answers? Why is it that the bankers and fat cats are healed, yet average American men, women and families are still deep in the throws of economic crisis? The answer is because government doesn’t create jobs – the private sector does.
If this nation was going to go into debt to get out of this mess, it should have cut taxes to spur economic growth, like Kennedy, Reagan and George W Bush did successfully. The government should have primed the small business job creation pump and let it rip. But no, we had to try the same failed socialistic policies that have failed innumerable times across the globe. Now we are going massively into debt and getting NOTHING in return.
This picture is going to change as slowly as the federal bureaucracy crawls even at its fastest speed. Outside of the military, the Feds do not move fast at all, and tend to slow things way down. And this is the slow moving train wreck that is heading right at the Dems and Obama.
Actually the Republicans did suggest twice, that lowering taxes would help spur economical development. And one suggestion, that I liked, was to fix the military gear coming back from Iraq which is necessary and would help unemployment. But it was criticized by the Obama shills and Obama himself that anything the Republicans suggested were the same old failed policies that got us into this mess in the first place. It seems that logic is no longer in vogue, any straw man will do and any correlation, no matter how absurd, will be bought by the masses because it is a means to an end, someone’s pet project.
Cap and trade during a recession couldn’t be a worse policy for employment and those of us who are living on the financial edge, let alone local, state and federal budgets. There will not be one product, one building, one mode of transportation that will not be more expensive by hundreds of thousands of dollars. The worst part of it all is that there is no alternative energy available. If there were the government would not have to be involved, the people would do it themselves. Of course it is very good for special interests of our now government, like the Sierra Club.
Socialized medicine is a very expensive government program. It has been tried and universally it’s costs continue to skyrocket and over time the medical treatment declines. But never mind that taxes will also go up to cover those who need coverage. How socialized medicine helps us get out of this recession is beyond reason, but if Obama says it, it must be change we can believe in.
I agree that educating our children is an imperative. I think most people do too, that is why most legislators voted for no child left behind. The first step was to find out which schools were failing no matter how much money was being spent to educate each child. Now we know, so the new answer is to spend more money for each child. Because politics is more important then our children, the obvious answer will never be put to use.
It seems every day Obama comes up with another way to spend billions of the tax payers dollars, why just yesterday he thought billions on high speed rail would be a great idea. Every time he visits a different government department he thinks of another way to spend billions. I can’t keep up with all the new ideas. Gosh when I spend I need an over all plan so that I don’t forget the food bill when I get excited about the new spring collection. Ya know I thought it was kind of interesting when Michelle was telling us about Obama’s personal habits. Like when he takes off his cloths he doesn’t hang them up or put them in the dirty cloths basket, but leaves them on the floor for someone else to pick up. Or when he butters his toast he doesn’t put the butter away. Could it be that he is a man full of great ideas who someone else picks up after. In this case the picker-uppers are we the people, not Michelle. Every time we the people pick up after Obama it will cost money that we would have spend to support our families. Now the government gets to decide how we want to live, what is good for us, and what is most moral and good for our families. Listen to the words of our elected officials. Never a statement is made that doesn’t include the words “moral” and “family”. Those words must have polled well.
In the next few years Obama’s great ideas will “come home to roost” as his friend and mentor said. Unemployment will still be in double didgets, government will have grown to unsustainable levels draining the public sector of needed money to build new businesses, and the cost of everything will skyrocket. Our new friends, Iran, Venezuela, Cuba, the Palestinians will think we are pushovers, and we have change we can all believe in. Let’s just hope it doesn’t come with killing consequences.
I really like you, Kathie. Ditto to all.
If all this wasn’t bad enough ….. Now Obama’s EPA plans to cut off the oxygen, which in this case is actually carbon, to a potentially recovering patient, which in this case is actually the economy:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8004975.stm
Not to worry, green jobs are on the way:
Who knew it was this easy?
Green Jobs fizzle faster – not going to be very many gold watch ceremonies after 40 years …
We will probably still be dealing with the mess this administration creates as we are still dealing with the messes the Carter administration created.
Carter walked away from Iran which left a regional power vacuum which Russia filled when they invaded Afghanistan. That eventually led to the creation of al-Qaida and 9/11. Iran then created Hezbollah in Lebanon which resulted in the death of US and French troops and two wars with Israel and a civil war in Lebanon.
Nothing really came of Carter’s peace initiatives except to validate terrorism as a means to an end, raised a terrorist to the level of head of state, but solved nothing. Carter’s policies in the Middle East have killed thousands of people and continue to kill today.
This administration could well make decisions that will be causing us trouble for decades and can’t be undone by a mid-term election.
But AJ, the disbursement of the “stimulus” funds isn’t due until next year according to what was said at the time they were approved. It is basically meant to flood the country with money just before mid-term elections. It is vote-buying.
Obama says he is going to go program by program and cut the budget just like Americans have had to do at home. Maybe he needs a quickie on how government got so big. If it was so easy for the President to cut the budget there isn’t a President that would not have done it. After all as Obama has been say Bush grew the budget by billions. I was thinking the line idiom veto didn’t pass muster. Maybe he needs to confer with Nancy and Harry , congress might help slash all their favorite programs. Just ask the governors, they have had real success.
Maybe the CIA will self cut, thinking that it was really a big lie that “the government” will never disclose AGENTS AND METHODS. I’m wondering just who will the congressional committees call to talk to about the newly disclosed torture memos. We now know the methods…………let’s hear from the agents! This government has gotten into the bad habit of changing the rules after an agreement. No wonder people are hanging onto their money. Who knows what might happen next?
What is really frustrating is there is no credible opposition to Obama and the Congressional Dems able to point out this situation to America.
Actually that doesn’t matter.
There was never and still isn’t any credible opposition to Bush and the Republicans but apparently enough people being fed up got them voted out and that is what will happen again.
Many people have been elected over the years just to get rid of the incumbents. If the country got fed up with a man that was doing a good job and elected someone with absolutely no qualifications just because he had a different name it will certainly happen to someone that is doing an absolutely horrible job and is selling out the country every chance he gets.
WOW, you don’t say……..”Obama disappointed by reporter’s Iran sentencing”, gosh, I wonder how her parents feel about the 8 years their 31 year old daughter got. Probably,”disappointed” would come to mind!
Bet she will emerge 20 years older in dog years…
One family friend is laid off. Their house is paid for but they still have taxes and utilities. Another acquaintance of mine shot himself yesterday. Things aren’t good out here these days.
Notice how generally quiet the democrats have been in the last few weeks.
The Democrats are going to try and take the credit for the profits of these banks.
PS thank you Lace.
“The Democrats are going to try and take the credit for the profits of these banks.”
No, they will just take the profits and claim that it could not have happened without the “people’s money”
We have a Fed that has basically dumped the Treasury into the economy and nothing has happened. The money is apparently simply sitting in the bank reserves of the banks. Their reserves have gone up considerably but the amount of cash in circulation hasn’t.
On top of that, the fed funds rate is at 0 to 0.25% … in other words, banks are getting overnight loans from the fed for FREE.
So lots of free money SHOULD mean an economic explosion. But it isn’t happening.
Come on guys, doesn’t intentions count?
He’s trying to get us to socialism, give him credit.
Geez.
If you look at the unemployment charts they all have one thing in common. look at when the big upturn occurred. just after the November election when the bad news sank in that the socialists were gonna be running things.
“look at when the big upturn occurred. just after the November election when the bad news sank in that the socialists were gonna be running things.”
The minimum wage went up (in some cases considerably) in many states on January 1.
I wonder how Obama will handle this? Find at FREEREPUBLIC
U.N. Official: Obama’s Decision Not to Prosecute Torture Violates International Law
The United Nations’ top torture investigator criticizes Obama’s decision not to prosecute CIA agents for detainee treatment that has deemed torture.
I wonder if Obama even read the memos before they released them. So is this an I’m sorry I didn’t realize the consequences. Or maybe this a way of Obama getting Bush punished and keeping his hands clean.
Minimum wage increases:
The Federal minimum wage goes to $7.25/hr on July 24.
You are going to see a LOT of minimum wage jobs eliminated.
Everyone is assuming that Obama and the Dems passed the Stimulus Bill to help the economy that was about to fall of a cliff if the bill did not get passed. The rush to pass the biggest spending bill in the history of the world was not to start spending it now when it won’t help them, but to spend it when they need it most which is reelection.
Since when have we ever seen the Dems have access to Billions already voted and approved just sit on it and not go wild? Can anyone tell me when this has ever been the case?
It’s too early to spend the money, the people need to know what it means to suffer and they need a lot more of them to be part of that group that is suffering before they will come riding in on their white horse.
For 8 years they could blame everything they thought was wrong with this country on the evil Bush, even natural disasters were his fault.
But now their Messiah is in charge so now everything that goes wrong will be the evil conservatives fault. You heard that reporter from CNN yell at that guy with the kid that the City of Lincoln was gong to get Billions from the Stimulus package so he should shut up and be grateful to the Federal Government.
The Federal Government is now to be our saving grace so just go with the flow. Who cares if your kids are going to have that burden on their shoulders, the Federal Government will by then be taking care of them too.
AJ already has pointed out that the money has not even gone out of Washington yet. That too will be blamed on the Republicans regardless if it isn’t true because truth is no longer what we think it is, it is what they tell us it is!!
SBD