ACT BLUE_How They Get Their "Donations" And The Kinds Of People Who Give To Them

This is how Kamala Harris raised all that money in one day.

Silver Throat’s donors mostly had no idea they even donated.

Watch every second of this: pic.twitter.com/vidc0D9uu7

— Joey Mannarino (@JoeyMannarinoUS) July 24, 2024

Former Soviet Citizen Confronts Socialists at Occupy Wall Street

THE REWARDS OF BEING A SOCIALIST: Pelosi's Wealth Grows By 62 Percent

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) saw her net worth rise 62 percent last year, cementing her status as one of the wealthiest members of Congress.

Pelosi was worth at least $35.2 million in the 2010 calendar year, according to a financial disclosure report released Wednesday. She reported a minimum of $43.4 million in assets and about $8.2 milion in liabilities.

For 2009, Pelosi reported a minimum net worth of $21.7 million.

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) also remained a multimillionaire. He reported that his minimum net worth in 2010 was close to $2.1 million, with zero liabilities. His 2009 minimum net worth was more than $1.8 million.

Forms disclosing the assets and liabilities of lawmakers for the 2010 calendar year were released Wednesday. The forms give a good estimate of lawmaker wealth, though they show ranges and not precise values for stocks, pension plans, vacation homes and other assets of lawmakers.

Pelosi saw her wealth rise due to some stock gains and real estate investments made by her husband, Paul.

Apple stock owned by Pelosi's spouse rose from at least $500,000 in 2009 to $1 million in 2010. The minority leader's husband also took a bigger stake in Matthews International Capital Management — worth at least $5 million last year, compared to $1 million in 2009 — and his investment in some undeveloped residential real estate in Sacramento, Calif., jumped to at least $5 million in value.

Paul Pelosi also has sizable assets in the United Football League, including $1 million in a partnership interest in a Jacksonville, Fla., franchise and $5 million in a partnership interest for the Sacramento Lions. (source)

UNION TRUTH REVEALED: Crashing A Special Olympics Ceremony To Show Their Hate

111th Congress Added More Debt Than First 100 Congresses Combined: $10,429 Per Person in U.S.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi holds one of the pens used by President Barack Obama to sign the health care bill, Tuesday, March 23, 2010, in the East Room of the White House in Washington.

The federal government has accumulated more new debt--$3.22 trillion ($3,220,103,625,307.29)—during the tenure of the 111th Congress than it did during the first 100 Congresses combined, according to official debt figures published by the U.S. Treasury.

That equals $10,429.64 in new debt for each and every one of the 308,745,538 people counted in the United States by the 2010 Census.

The total national debt of $13,858,529,371,601.09 (or $13.859 trillion), as recorded by the U.S. Treasury at the close of business on Dec. 22, now equals $44,886.57 for every man, woman and child in the United States.

In fact, the 111th Congress not only has set the record as the most debt-accumulating Congress in U.S. history, but also has out-stripped its nearest competitor, the 110th, by an astounding $1.262 trillion in new debt.

During the 110th Congress—which, according to the Clerk of the House, officially convened on Jan. 4, 2007 and adjourned on Jan. 4, 2009--the national debt increased $1.957 trillion. When that Congress adjourned less than two years ago, it claimed the record as the most debt-accumulating Congress in U.S. history. As it turned out, however, its record did not last long.

The $3.22 trillion in new federal debt run up during the 111th Congress exceeds by 64 percent the $1.957 trillion in new debt run up during the 110th.

Although the 111th Congress cast its last vote on Dec. 22, it will not officially adjourn until next week.

Democrats controlled both the House and Senate in the 110th and 111th Congresses.

The 108th Congress ($1.159 trillion in new debt) and 109th ($1.054 trillion in new debt) take third and fourth place among all U.S. Congresses for accumulating debt. In both these Congresses, Republicans controlled both the House and Senate.

Still, the $3.22 trillion in new debt accumulated during the record-setting 111th Congress is more than three times the $1.054 trillion in new debt accumulated by the last Republican-majority Congress (the 109th) which adjourned on Dec. 8, 2006.

Historically, according to the U.S. Treasury, the federal debt did not reach $3.22 trillion until September 1990, during the 101st Congress. Between the first Congress, which adjourned in 1791 leaving behind approximately $75 million in debt, and the convening of the 101st Congress, which occurred on Jan. 3, 1989, the national debt grew to $2.684 trillion.

During the Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) tenure as speaker, which commenced on Jan. 4, 2007, the federal government has run up $5.177 trillion in new debt. That is about equal to the total debt the federal government accumulated in the first 220 years of the nation's existence, with the federal debt rising from $5.173 trillion on July 23, 1996 to $5.181 trillion on July 24, 1996.

In her inaugural address as speaker, Pelosi vowed that Congress would engage in no new deficit spending.

"After years of historic deficits, this 110th Congress will commit itself to a higher standard: Pay as you go, no new deficit spending,” she said in an address from the speaker’s podium. “Our new America will provide unlimited opportunity for future generations, not burden them with mountains of debt."


Here is an accounting of the new debt accumulated during the tenure of each Congress since the 101st. The convening and adjourning dates are reported by the Clerk of the House and the debt levels are recorded by the U.S. Treasury:

Congress Convening/Adjourning Debt Levels

111th Congress

Jan. 6, 2009 $10,638,425,746,293.80

Dec. 22, 2010 $13,858,529,371,601.09

New Debt: $3,220,103,625,307.29

110th Congress

Jan. 4, 2007 8,670,596,242,973.04

Jan. 3, 2009 10,627,961,295,930.67

New Debt: 1,957,365,052,957.63

109th Congress

Jan. 4, 2005 7,601,016,892,663.19

Dec. 8, 2006 8,655,403,967,590.98

New Debt: 1,054,387,074,927.79

108th Congress

Jan. 7, 2003 6,387,381,983,103.35

Dec. 9, 2004 7,546,778,677,941.37

New Debt: 1,159,396,694,838.02

107th Congress

Jan. 3, 2001 5,723,237,439,563.59

Nov. 22, 2002 6,332,715,758,032.33

New Debt: 609,478,318,468.74

106th Congress

Jan. 6, 1999 5,615,428,551,461.33

Dec. 15, 2000 5,706,990,981,165.37

New Debt: 91,562,429,704.04

105th Congress

Jan. 7, 1997 5,312,781,237,956.91

Dec. 19, 1998 5,583,950,306,972.53

New Debt: 271,169,069,015.62

104th Congress

Jan. 4, 1995 4,801,793,426,032.89

Oct. 4, 1996 5,222,049,625,819.53

New Debt: 420,256,199,786.64

103rd Congress

Jan.5, 1993 4,169,232,407,244.75

Dec. 1, 1994 4,774,851,353,596.54

New Debt: 605,618,946,351.79

102nd Congress

Jan. 3, 1991 (Dec. 31, 1990) 3,364,820,000,000.00

Oct. 9, 1992 (Sept. 30, 1992) 4,064,621,000,000.00

New Debt: 699,801,000,000.00

101st Congress

Jan. 3, 1989 (Dec. 31, 1988) 2,684,392,000,000.00

Oct. 28, 1990 (Oct. 31, 1990) 3,274,950,000.000.00

New Debt: 590,558,000,000.00 (source)

Obama's Health-Care Law Ruled Unconstitutional Over Insurance Requirement

The Obama administration’s health- care overhaul unconstitutionally requires Americans to maintain a minimum level of health insurance, a federal judge ruled, striking down the linchpin of the plan.

U.S. District Judge Henry Hudson in Richmond, Virginia, said yesterday that the mandate on individuals in President Barack Obama’s health-care legislation goes beyond Congress’s powers to regulate interstate commerce. Hudson severed the issue of the mandate, which is set to become effective in 2014, and didn’t address other provisions such as expanding Medicaid.

“At its core, this dispute is not simply about regulating the business of insurance -- or crafting a scheme of universal health insurance coverage -- it’s about an individual’s right to choose to participate,” wrote Hudson, who was appointed by President George W. Bush in 2002.

The ruling is the government’s first loss in a series of challenges to the law mounted in federal courts in Virginia, Michigan and Florida, where 20 states have joined an effort to have the statute thrown out. Constitutional scholars said unless Congress changes the law, its fate on appeal will probably be determined by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, who brought the suit, said his office has spoken with lawyers from the Justice Department about asking the U.S. Supreme Court to take the case without a review by the federal appeals court in Richmond. Tracy Schmaler, a Justice Department spokeswoman, said she had no comment on Cuccinelli’s statement.

Appeal Likely

A senior Obama administration official said that an appeal of Hudson’s ruling was likely and also expressed confidence that the legislation would be upheld.

“This is only round one,” Cuccinelli said, during a news conference at his office in Richmond. “This lawsuit is not about health-care, it’s about liberty.”

In his 42-page opinion, Hudson said the “unchecked expansion” of congressional power represented by the insurance requirement “would invite unbridled exercise of federal police powers.” No Supreme Court decision has authorized Congress to “compel an individual to involuntarily enter the stream of commerce by purchasing a commodity in the private market,” he wrote.

To overcome that conclusion, the Obama administration ultimately may have to persuade at least one of the five Republican-appointed justices on a Supreme Court that in recent years has limited Congress’s power to regulate interstate commerce.

Commerce Clause Cases

The court hasn’t directly considered a challenge to Congress’ power under the Constitution’s commerce clause since John Roberts became chief justice in 2005.

“There’s a lot of activity focused now on alternatives to the mandate,” said Dan Mendelson, chief executive officer of Avalere Health, a Washington-based consulting firm.

Hudson, who didn’t order the government to stop work on implementing the law during an appeal, limited his ruling to the mandatory insurance provision.

Peter Urbanowicz, a managing director at Alvarez & Marsal Healthcare Industry Group in Washington, said he read the decision to leave in place all of the law’s obligations on insurers for expanded coverage. If Hudson’s decision is upheld, insurance companies would be required to provide new benefits without expanding the pool of insureds, he said in an e-mail.

That would cause “skyrocketing costs” for insurers, said Robert Zirkelbach, a spokesman for the Washington lobby group, America’s Health Insurance Plans.

Health-Insurance Stocks

Health plans rose as much as 2.7 percent after the ruling was announced, and then fell back. The Standard & Poor’s Managed Health Index of six insurers climbed 0.3 percent in New York trading, led by a 1 percent increase for Aetna Inc. of Hartford, Connecticut. UnitedHealth Group Inc. of Minnetonka, Minnesota, the largest medical plan by sales, rose 0.6 percent.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said at a press briefing yesterday said that the administration still believes the legislation is constitutional.

“One hundred and fifteen miles away, a different judge in a different district rendered a different decision,” Gibbs said, referring to a Nov. 30 ruling by U.S. District Judge Norman Moon, in Lynchburg, Virginia, named by President Bill Clinton. That decision upheld the act in a lawsuit brought by the evangelical Liberty University and five individuals. U.S. District Judge George Caram Steeh in Michigan, another Clinton appointee, also sided with the government.

‘Will Be Upheld’

“Our belief is that when all the legal wrangling is done, this is something that will be upheld,” Gibbs said.

Justice Department lawyers in court papers called the mandatory insurance measure the cornerstone of the overhaul as it pushes younger and healthier people into the insurance pool. Through the individual mandate and expansions of Medicaid and employer-based coverage, the law is estimated to provide 32 million more people with coverage by 2019, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

The law bars insurers from denying coverage to people who are sick or imposing lifetime limits on costs. Without payments generated from the required policies, the health-insurance market would face extinction, the government argued. The mandate falls under Congress’s power to regulate interstate commerce as $43 billion in unpaid medical bills are absorbed by the market each year, U.S. lawyers said.

‘Simply Wait’

“If people aren’t compelled to buy insurance and the insurance carriers are compelled to offer it, then many will simply wait until they are sick,” said John Sullivan, an analyst at Leerink Swann & Co. in Boston. “You can’t just pull this part out of it.”

Virginia’s suit claimed Congress has only the power to tax, not to force participation in a market. Its case defended the Virginia Health Care Freedom Act, a state law barring compulsory purchase of health insurance by its citizens.

Florida, joined by 19 other states, filed a separate lawsuit challenging the law’s constitutionality and arguing it puts too big a burden on its budget by expanding state-run Medicaid programs. U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson in Pensacola, Florida, is slated to hear arguments Dec. 16 on motions by each side to decide the case in their favor.

In the Florida case, the states are backed by 63 members of the U.S. House of Representatives, mostly Republicans, in a court brief. Incoming House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner, an Ohio Republican, and 32 Republican U.S. senators separately submitted papers arguing the legislation represents an unconstitutional expansion of congressional legislative powers.

Expansion of Medicaid

Florida’s Attorney General Bill McCollum said he is hopeful Vinson will strike down the individual mandate and halt the expansion of Medicaid.

“The implementation of this law could add more than 1.9 million Floridians to the Medicaid program, a tremendous financial burden on our state at a time when our budget has no room for extra expenses,” he said in a statement.

A group of about 40 economics scholars, including Nobel laureates Eric Maskin, George Akerlof and Kenneth Arrow, filed their own brief, arguing in favor of the legislative package.

The Virginia and Florida cases are the most likely to reach the Supreme Court, according to health-care and constitutional lawyers.

Both have been “well briefed and well drafted,” Urbanowicz said.

The case is Commonwealth of Virginia v. Sebelius, 10-cv-00188, U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Virginia (Richmond).(source)

DOOMSDAY FOR BARRY: A Decision May Be Necessary (The Bush Tax Breaks Nightmare And How To Deal With It)

A massive bipartisan tax package preventing a big New Year's Day tax hike for millions of Americans is on its way to President Barack Obama for his signature.

The measure would extend tax cuts for families at every income level, renew jobless benefits for the long-term unemployed and enact a new one-year cut in Social Security taxes that would benefit nearly every worker who earns a wage.

The president is expected to sign the bill this afternoon.

In a remarkable show of bipartisanship, the House gave final approval to the measure just before midnight Thursday, overcoming an attempt by rebellious Democrats who wanted to impose a higher estate tax than the one Obama agreed to. The vote was 277-148, with each party contributing an almost identical number of votes in favor (the Democrats, 139 and the Republicans, 138).

In a rare reach across party lines, Obama negotiated the $858 billion package with Senate Republicans. The White House then spent the past 10 days persuading congressional Democrats to go along, providing a possible blueprint for the next two years, when Republicans will control the House and hold more seats in the Senate.

"There probably is nobody on this floor who likes this bill," said House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md. "The judgment is, is it better than doing nothing? Some of the business groups believe it will help. I hope they're right."

Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich., said that with unemployment hovering just under 10 percent and the deadline for avoiding a big tax hike fast approaching, lawmakers had little choice but to support the bill.

"This is just no time to be playing games with our economy," said Camp, who will become chairman of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee in January. "The failure to block these tax increases would be a direct hit to families and small businesses."

Sweeping tax cuts enacted when George W. Bush was president are scheduled to expire Jan. 1 - a little more than two weeks away. The bill extends them for two years, placing the issue squarely in the middle of the next presidential election, in 2012.

The extended tax cuts include lower rates for the rich, the middle class and the working poor, a $1,000-per-child tax credit, tax breaks for college students and lower taxes on capital gains and dividends. The bill also extends through 2011, a series of business tax breaks designed to encourage investment that expired at the end of 2009.

Workers' Social Security taxes would be cut by nearly a third, going from 6.2 percent to 4.2 percent, for 2011. A worker making $50,000 in wages would save $1,000; one making $100,000 would save $2,000.

"This legislation is good for growth, good for jobs, good for working and middle class families, and good for businesses looking to invest and expand their work force," said Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.

Some Democrats complained that the package is too generous to the wealthy; Republicans complained that it doesn't make all the tax cuts permanent.

Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite, R-Fla., called it "a bipartisan moment of clarity."

The bill's cost, $858 billion, would be added to the deficit, a sore spot among budget hawks in both parties.

"I know that we are going to borrow every nickel in this bill," Hoyer lamented.

At the insistence of Republicans, the plan includes an estate tax that would allow the first $10 million of a couple's estate to pass to heirs without taxation. The balance would be subject to a 35 percent tax rate.

Many House Democrats wanted a higher estate tax, one that would allow couples to pass only $7 million tax-free, taxing anything above that amount at a 45 percent rate. They argued that the higher estate tax would affect only 6,600 of the wealthiest estates in 2011 and would save $23 billion over two years.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., called the estate tax the "most egregious provision" in the bill and held a vote that would have imposed the higher estate tax. It failed, 194-233.

Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., said he thought the White House could have gotten a better deal.

"When I talk to the Republicans they are giddy about this bill," he said. (source)

Last-Ditch Effort To Ram Through Omnibus Bill By Barry, Pelosi Et Al Fails

After wrestling with - and finally abandoning - a 1,900-page catch-all spending bill stuffed with more than $8 billion in home-state projects known as earmarks in Washington and pork in the rest of the country, Senate leaders need to come up with a measure to keep the federal government running into early next year.

Nearly $1.3 trillion in unfinished budget work was packed into the spending measure, including $158 billion for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. But Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid gave up on the bill Thursday after several Republicans who had been thinking of voting for it pulled back their support.

Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky had thrown his weight against the bill in recent days, saying it was "unbelievable" that Democrats would try to muscle through in the days before Christmas legislation that usually takes months to debate.

"Just a few weeks after the voters told us they don't want us rushing major pieces of complicated, costly, far-reaching legislation through Congress, we get this," McConnell said. "This is no way to legislate."

The turn of events was a major victory for earmark opponents like Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Tom Coburn, R-Okla., who for years have been steamrolled by the old-school members of the powerful Appropriations Committee.

The spending barons saw their power ebb in the wake of midterm elections that delivered major gains for Republicans - with considerable help from anti-spending tea party activists.

"We just saw something extraordinary on the floor of the United States Senate," a grinning McCain said.

The $1.27 trillion catchall bill wrapped together 12 bills - blending $1.1 trillion for the operating budgets of every federal agency with an infusion of funding to carry the war in Afghanistan into its 10th year - into a single foot-tall piece of legislation that Democrats had hoped to pass with just a couple of days' worth of debate.

It was designed to bankroll the day-to-day operations of the government for the budget year that started Oct. 1, funding the almost one-third of the federal budget that Congress has to pass each year.

The House and Senate typically spend months on the 12 annual spending bills, but Democrats didn't bring even a single one to the Senate floor this year, an unprecedented collapse of an appropriations process. The House only passed two of the 12 bills and didn't make any of the other 10 public.

The sinking of the bill was a setback for President Barack Obama, who supported it despite provisions to block the Pentagon from transferring Guantanamo Bay prisoners to the United States and fund a program to develop a second engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, which the administration says is a waste of money. Obama came under fire from Republicans for supporting the bill after promising after the election to take a harder line on earmarks.

Just Thursday, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates made a public push for the omnibus measure at an appearance at the White House, saying that operating under a stopgap measure frozen at current levels would be a major hardship for the Pentagon.

McConnell had earlier quietly backed the effort to produce the legislation, which had significant input from Republicans on the Appropriations panel.

But release of the bill on Tuesday sparked an outcry among the GOP's conservative political base. Senate Republicans held two combative closed-door meetings in which the rank-and-file turned up the heat on those few Republicans who were considering voting for the bill.

Republicans were also irate that the measure contained money to begin implementation of Obama's controversial health care law and a financial overhaul measure that all but a handful of Republicans opposed.

On the merits, most of the rest of the bill had bipartisan support. It stuck to a spending cap sought by Republicans while boosting spending for Head Start, veterans programs and Pell Grants for disadvantaged college students. But that message didn't get out amid the firestorm over earmarks and the measure's remarkable size.

McConnell proposed Thursday to keep the government running at current funding levels through Feb. 18. By then, Republicans will have taken over the House and bolstered their strength in the Senate, giving them greater leverage to force spending cuts.

The House last week passed a yearlong funding bill that's mostly frozen at current levels. (source)

The Net Neutrality Coup (How's That Hope And Change Thing Working For Ya' Now?)

The campaign to regulate the Internet was funded by a who's who of left-liberal foundations.

The Federal Communications Commission's new "net neutrality" rules, passed on a partisan 3-2 vote yesterday, represent a huge win for a slick lobbying campaign run by liberal activist groups and foundations. The losers are likely to be consumers who will see innovation and investment chilled by regulations that treat the Internet like a public utility.

There's little evidence the public is demanding these rules, which purport to stop the non-problem of phone and cable companies blocking access to websites and interfering with Internet traffic. Over 300 House and Senate members have signed a letter opposing FCC Internet regulation, and there will undoubtedly be even less support in the next Congress.

Yet President Obama, long an ardent backer of net neutrality, is ignoring both Congress and adverse court rulings, especially by a federal appeals court in April that the agency doesn't have the power to enforce net neutrality. He is seeking to impose his will on the Internet through the executive branch. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, a former law school friend of Mr. Obama, has worked closely with the White House on the issue. Official visitor logs show he's had at least 11 personal meetings with the president.

The net neutrality vision for government regulation of the Internet began with the work of Robert McChesney, a University of Illinois communications professor who founded the liberal lobby Free Press in 2002. Mr. McChesney's agenda? "At the moment, the battle over network neutrality is not to completely eliminate the telephone and cable companies," he told the website SocialistProject in 2009. "But the ultimate goal is to get rid of the media capitalists in the phone and cable companies and to divest them from control."

A year earlier, Mr. McChesney wrote in the Marxist journal Monthly Review that "any serious effort to reform the media system would have to necessarily be part of a revolutionary program to overthrow the capitalist system itself." Mr. McChesney told me in an interview that some of his comments have been "taken out of context." He acknowledged that he is a socialist and said he was "hesitant to say I'm not a Marxist."

For a man with such radical views, Mr. McChesney and his Free Press group have had astonishing influence. Mr. Genachowski's press secretary at the FCC, Jen Howard, used to handle media relations at Free Press. The FCC's chief diversity officer, Mark Lloyd, co-authored a Free Press report calling for regulation of political talk radio.

Free Press has been funded by a network of liberal foundations that helped the lobby invent the purported problem that net neutrality is supposed to solve. They then fashioned a political strategy similar to the one employed by activists behind the political speech restrictions of the 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign-finance reform bill. The methods of that earlier campaign were discussed in 2004 by Sean Treglia, a former program officer for the Pew Charitable Trusts, during a talk at the University of Southern California. Far from being the efforts of genuine grass-roots activists, Mr. Treglia noted, the campaign-finance reform lobby was controlled and funded by foundations like Pew.

"The idea was to create an impression that a mass movement was afoot," he told his audience. He noted that "If Congress thought this was a Pew effort, it'd be worthless." A study by the Political Money Line, a nonpartisan website dealing with issues of campaign funding, found that of the $140 million spent to directly promote campaign-finance reform in the last decade, $123 million came from eight liberal foundations.

After McCain-Feingold passed, several of the foundations involved in the effort began shifting their attention to "media reform"—a movement to impose government controls on Internet companies somewhat related to the long-defunct "Fairness Doctrine" that used to regulate TV and radio companies. In a 2005 interview with the progressive website Buzzflash, Mr. McChesney said that campaign-finance reform advocate Josh Silver approached him and "said let's get to work on getting popular involvement in media policy making." Together the two founded Free Press.

Free Press and allied groups such as MoveOn.org quickly got funding. Of the eight major foundations that provided the vast bulk of money for campaign-finance reform, six became major funders of the media-reform movement. (They are the Pew Charitable Trusts, Bill Moyers's Schumann Center for Media and Democracy, the Joyce Foundation, George Soros's Open Society Institute, the Ford Foundation, and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.) Free Press today has 40 staffers and an annual budget of $4 million.

These wealthy funders pay for more than publicity and conferences. In 2009, Free Press commissioned a poll, released by the Harmony Institute, on net neutrality. Harmony reported that "more than 50% of the public argued that, as a private resource, the Internet should not be regulated by the federal government." The poll went on to say that since "currently the public likes the way the Internet works . . . messaging should target supporters by asking them to act vigilantly" to prevent a "centrally controlled Internet."

To that end, Free Press and other groups helped manufacture "research" on net neutrality. In 2009, for example, the FCC commissioned Harvard University's Berkman Center for Internet and Society to conduct an "independent review of existing information" for the agency in order to "lay the foundation for enlightened, data-driven decision making."

Considering how openly activist the Berkman Center has been on these issues, it was an odd decision for the FCC to delegate its broadband research to this outfit. Unless, of course, the FCC already knew the answer it wanted to get.

The Berkman Center's FCC- commissioned report, "Next Generation Connectivity," wound up being funded in large part by the Ford and MacArthur foundations. So some of the same foundations that have spent years funding net neutrality advocacy research ended up funding the FCC-commissioned study that evaluated net neutrality research.

The FCC's "National Broadband Plan," released last spring, included only five citations of respected think tanks such as the International Technology and Innovation Foundation or the Brookings Institution. But the report cited research from liberal groups such as Free Press, Public Knowledge, Pew and the New America Foundation more than 50 times.

So the "media reform" movement paid for research that backed its views, paid activists to promote the research, saw its allies installed in the FCC and other key agencies, and paid for the FCC research that evaluated the research they had already paid for. Now they have their policy. That's quite a coup. (source)

More Federal Workers' Pay Tops $150,000

The number of federal workers earning $150,000 or more a year has soared tenfold in the past five years and doubled since President Obama took office, a USA TODAY analysis finds.
The fast-growing pay of federal employees has captured the attention of fiscally conservative Republicans who won control of the U.S. House of Representatives in last week's elections. Already, some lawmakers are planning to use the lame-duck session that starts Monday to challenge the president's plan to give a 1.4% across-the-board pay raise to 2.1 million federal workers.


FEDERAL WORKERS: Earning double their private counterparts

Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, who will head the panel overseeing federal pay, says he wants a pay freeze and prefers a 10% pay cut. "It's stunning when you see what's happened to federal compensation," he says. "Every metric shows we're heading in the wrong direction."

National Treasury Employees Union President Colleen Kelley counters that the proposed raise "is a modest amount and should be implemented" to help make salaries more comparable with those in the private sector.

Federal salaries have grown robustly in recent years, according to a USA TODAY analysis of Office of Personnel Management data. Key findings:

•Government-wide raises. Top-paid staff have increased in every department and agency. The Defense Department had nine civilians earning $170,000 or more in 2005, 214 when Obama took office and 994 in June.

•Long-time workers thrive. The biggest pay hikes have gone to employees who have been with the government for 15 to 24 years. Since 2005, average salaries for this group climbed 25% compared with a 9% inflation rate.

•Physicians rewarded. Medical doctors at veterans hospitals, prisons and elsewhere earn an average of $179,500, up from $111,000 in 2005.

Federal workers earning $150,000 or more make up 3.9% of the workforce, up from 0.4% in 2005.

Since 2000, federal pay and benefits have increased 3% annually above inflation compared with 0.8% for private workers, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Members of Congress earn $174,000, up from $141,300 in 2000, an increase below the rate of inflation.

Jessica Klement, government affairs director at the Federal Managers Association, says the government's official pay analysis shows that federal workers earn less than private workers for comparable jobs. Still, she says, managers are willing to give up next year's raise: "If it will help the country bounce back, they're willing to make the sacrifice." (source)

Barry As President: Forgiving GM From Paying 45 Billion Dollars In Taxes (Is That Patriotic According To Biden?)

General Motors Co. will drive away from its U.S.-government-financed restructuring with a final gift in its trunk: a tax break that could be worth as much as $45 billion.

GM, which plans to begin promoting its relisting on the stock exchange to investors this week, wiped out billions of dollars in debt, laid off thousands of employees and jettisoned money-losing brands during its U.S.-funded reorganization last year.

Now it turns out, according to documents filed with federal regulators, the revamping left the car maker with another boost as it prepares to return to the stock market. It won't have to pay $45.4 billion in taxes on future profits.

The tax benefit stems from so-called tax-loss carry-forwards and other provisions, which allow companies to use losses in prior years and costs related to pensions and other expenses to shield profits from U.S. taxes for up to 20 years. In GM's case, the losses stem from years prior to when GM entered bankruptcy.

Usually, companies that undergo a significant change in ownership risk having major restrictions put on their tax benefits. The U.S. bailout of GM, in which the Treasury took a 61% stake in the company, ordinarily would have resulted in GM having such limits put on its tax benefits, according to tax experts.

But the government, in a little-noticed ruling last year, decided companies that received bailout money under the Troubled Asset Relief Program won't fall under that rule.

"The Internal Revenue Service has decided that the government's involvement with these companies, both its acquisitions plus its disposals of their stock, means they should be exempt" from the rule, said Robert Willens, a New York tax consultant who advises investment banks and hedge funds.

The government's rationale, said people familiar with the situation, is that the profit-shielding tax credit makes the bailed-out companies more attractive to investors, and that the value of the benefit is greater than the lost tax payments, especially since the tax payments would not exist if the companies fail.

GM declined to comment.

The $45.4 billion in future tax savings consist of $18.9 billion in carry-forwards based on past losses, according to GM's pre-IPO public disclosure. The other tax savings are related to costs such as pensions and other post-retirement benefits, and property, plants and equipment.

The losses were incurred by "Old GM," the company that remained in bankruptcy after the current "New GM" resulted from the reorganization last June.

Investors typically view tax-loss carry-forwards losses as important assets in bolstering a company's balance sheet.

GM's chief domestic rival, Ford Motor Co., last year adopted a plan to preserve deferred "tax assets" which stood at $17 billion at the end of 2009. Ford declined to comment on the GM tax ruling.

Death By 1,000 Cuts: Cap And Trade Passes In Congress

Roll Call Vote On This Bill

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has put cap-and-trade legislation on a forced march through the House, and the bill may get a full vote as early as Friday. It looks as if the Democrats will have to destroy the discipline of economics to get it done.

Despite House Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman's many payoffs to Members, rural and Blue Dog Democrats remain wary of voting for a bill that will impose crushing costs on their home-district businesses and consumers. The leadership's solution to this problem is to simply claim the bill defies the laws of economics.

Their gambit got a boost this week, when the Congressional Budget Office did an analysis of what has come to be known as the Waxman-Markey bill. According to the CBO, the climate legislation would cost the average household only $175 a year by 2020. Edward Markey, Mr. Waxman's co-author, instantly set to crowing that the cost of upending the entire energy economy would be no more than a postage stamp a day for the average household. Amazing. A closer look at the CBO analysis finds that it contains so many caveats as to render it useless.

For starters, the CBO estimate is a one-year snapshot of taxes that will extend to infinity. Under a cap-and-trade system, government sets a cap on the total amount of carbon that can be emitted nationally; companies then buy or sell permits to emit CO2. The cap gets cranked down over time to reduce total carbon emissions.

To get support for his bill, Mr. Waxman was forced to water down the cap in early years to please rural Democrats, and then severely ratchet it up in later years to please liberal Democrats. The CBO's analysis looks solely at the year 2020, before most of the tough restrictions kick in. As the cap is tightened and companies are stripped of initial opportunities to "offset" their emissions, the price of permits will skyrocket beyond the CBO estimate of $28 per ton of carbon. The corporate costs of buying these expensive permits will be passed to consumers.

The biggest doozy in the CBO analysis was its extraordinary decision to look only at the day-to-day costs of operating a trading program, rather than the wider consequences energy restriction would have on the economy. The CBO acknowledges this in a footnote: "The resource cost does not indicate the potential decrease in gross domestic product (GDP) that could result from the cap."

The hit to GDP is the real threat in this bill. The whole point of cap and trade is to hike the price of electricity and gas so that Americans will use less. These higher prices will show up not just in electricity bills or at the gas station but in every manufactured good, from food to cars. Consumers will cut back on spending, which in turn will cut back on production, which results in fewer jobs created or higher unemployment. Some companies will instead move their operations overseas, with the same result.

When the Heritage Foundation did its analysis of Waxman-Markey, it broadly compared the economy with and without the carbon tax. Under this more comprehensive scenario, it found Waxman-Markey would cost the economy $161 billion in 2020, which is $1,870 for a family of four. As the bill's restrictions kick in, that number rises to $6,800 for a family of four by 2035.

Note also that the CBO analysis is an average for the country as a whole. It doesn't take into account the fact that certain regions and populations will be more severely hit than others -- manufacturing states more than service states; coal producing states more than states that rely on hydro or natural gas. Low-income Americans, who devote more of their disposable income to energy, have more to lose than high-income families.

Even as Democrats have promised that this cap-and-trade legislation won't pinch wallets, behind the scenes they've acknowledged the energy price tsunami that is coming. During the brief few days in which the bill was debated in the House Energy Committee, Republicans offered three amendments: one to suspend the program if gas hit $5 a gallon; one to suspend the program if electricity prices rose 10% over 2009; and one to suspend the program if unemployment rates hit 15%. Democrats defeated all of them.

The reality is that cost estimates for climate legislation are as unreliable as the models predicting climate change. What comes out of the computer is a function of what politicians type in. A better indicator might be what other countries are already experiencing. Britain's Taxpayer Alliance estimates the average family there is paying nearly $1,300 a year in green taxes for carbon-cutting programs in effect only a few years.

Americans should know that those Members who vote for this climate bill are voting for what is likely to be the biggest tax in American history. Even Democrats can't repeal that reality.(source)

Barry In Charge: Pravda Says It Best: Obama Is Our Gorbacev

History may repeat itself two or three times or even reach the point, which Francis Fukuyama described as the end of history. The US historian of Japanese origin introduced the notion during the time when there were two dominating superpowers in the world – the United States and the Soviet Union.

When the USSR collapsed and Russia lost much of its international influence, the USA became the world’s number one gendarme. That was the time, when US presidents started making one mistake after another. Their mistakes eventually led to the phenomenon, which is currently known as the clash of civilizations. America needed an enemy. America needed oil. Both were found in one country – Iraq.

US President George W. Bush declared the date of September 11, 2001 as the beginning of new history in the world and announced the crusade against the international terrorism, which took roots in radical countries of the Muslim world.

Pakistan found itself involved in the US-led war in Afghanistan. The relations between the United States and Iran were finally ruined and were balancing on the brink of war during the last year of Bush’s presidency.

The new president of the United States of America, the first Afro-American of the Muslim origin, Barack Hussein Obama, had to face the severe reality of Bush’s legacy.

As soon as the United States found itself in the middle of the economic crisis, the administration of the country decided that it was the best time to launch the struggle for peace in the whole world. This is exactly what Mikhail Gorbachev was doing during the agony of the Soviet Union.

Barack Obama did not say anything when Israeli troops were destroying residential quarters in the Gaza Strip during the Cast Lead operation in Palestine. Obama was as silent as a sphinx.

The sphinx started talking.

Obama said during his landmark speech at the Cairo University that the state of affairs in Palestine was unbearable. He also emphasized that the USA’s ties with Israel were indestructible. Obama quoted the Holy Book of all Muslims, the Qur’an and urged the people of all religions to live in peace with each other. However, good words do not leave a sweet taste in the mouth.

Obama says that it would be good to give a new incentive to the dialogue with the Muslim world. Will the US administration be able to recognize the rights of the Palestinian Authority to create an independent state? Will the US administration ever realize that the Muslim world is not a pack of cards which the USA can play to win the geopolitical leadership?

History repeats itself. The Mideastern tour of the Afro-American head of the White House was promoted as a new page in the relations between America and the Muslim world. As a matter of fact, Mr. Obama simply did what his predecessors had done before him.

Ivan Tulyakov (source)

Lawmakers Want Obama To Slow Down On GM, Chrysler

WASHINGTON (AP) - Lawmakers appealed to the Obama administration on Friday to slow down the restructuring of General Motors and Chrysler, wary of shuttered car dealerships, job losses and the big unknown of a GM bankruptcy.
"We are asking President Obama to call 'time-out' on his automobile task force," said Rep. Steve LaTourette, R-Ohio.

Members of Congress urged the White House to re-examine its work to stabilize the U.S. auto industry, prompted by sweeping plans outlined last week by Chrysler LLC and General Motors Corp. to shutter hundreds of car dealerships.

They said a pending June 1 deadline for a GM bankruptcy created more uncertainty for the industry, and could lead to a rash of more job losses and dealership closings.

Thirty-six members of Congress, mostly Republican, told the White House they were troubled by the work of the auto industry task force appointed by the president earlier this year. The panel has worked with GM and Chrysler to try to restructure the companies.

"They represent various Wall Street interests who have long looked at exporting jobs out of this country," said Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, who accused the task force of facilitating plans by GM to import Chinese-made vehicles to the U.S.

Five House members, including Kucinich, LaTourette and House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., met with a representative of the Obama task force on Friday. "They're anxious to have additional meetings," said LaTourette spokeswoman Deborah Setliff.

The White House said it was focused on helping the companies become viable to preserve jobs and strengthen the auto industry.

"Saving the auto industry is an urgent priority for our nation and our workers. The task force has worked diligently and deliberatively throughout this process and we will continue to work with all stakeholders," said White House spokeswoman Amy Brundage.

Chrysler LLC, which has received $5.8 billion in federal aid, disclosed in bankruptcy court last week its plans to close about a quarter of its 3,200 U.S. dealerships by June 9.

General Motors, which has received $19.4 billion in aid and could be forced into bankruptcy, has told about 1,100 of its dealers—about 20 percent—that their franchise agreements will not be renewed by late next year. GM said Friday it had borrowed an additional $4 billion from the government, bringing its total to $19.4 billion.

Chrysler plans to close eight manufacturing plants, part of its work to shed assets, debt and contracts and shift its good assets to Italian automaker Fiat Group SpA.

GM and the United Auto Workers union reached a tentative agreement Thursday on labor and health care concessions. Details have not yet emerged but GM had previously said it would close 16 factories, laying off 21,000 hourly workers.

While many auto plants are confined to Rust Belt states, the loss of car dealership jobs affect communities throughout the country. With an upcoming Memorial Day recess looming, members of Congress are expected to field questions about the job losses.

While GM has not made its list public, Chrysler has identified 789 dealerships in 49 states that are scheduled to be closed. Only Alaska was spared.

"These dealers deserve a little more than a pink slip in the mail," wrote Missouri Sens. Claire McCaskill, a Democrat, and Kit Bond, a Republican.

The job losses have also brought vows of congressional oversight. Sens. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., and Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, the ranking members on the Senate Commerce Committee, said they would hold hearings on the dealerships in early June.

Rockefeller's home state could lose 17 of its 24 Chrysler dealerships while 50 Chrysler dealerships in Texas are expected to go out of business.

"These companies cannot be allowed to take taxpayer funds for a bailout and then leave local dealers and their customers to fend for themselves with no real notice and no real help," Rockefeller said.(source)

Barry In Charge: From One Socialist To Another, "I Think We Can Work Together" (The Chavez flirt)

Venezulan socialist dictator Hugo Chavez has found someone with whom he is a fellow traveler. Having clung to power long enough for America's democratic process to rid him of the odor of "Diablo", we see his flirtatious glee over meeting Barry.

How long will it be before Barry apologizes for everything we've done to South America, like over 200 years of protection for them through the Monroe Doctrine?

Sweetness & Light: Another Learning Moment

I frequent the excellent blog, Sweetness-Light.com The people there are some of the most (self or formally) educated people I've ever come across in nearly 20 years of combing the internet.

The explosive news about Barry's Bolshevik tactic of eliminating a sitting CEO of a private company was covered extensively today. Here's just some of the comments from faithful readers of this blog today:

Enthalpy
March 30, 2009 at 4:06 pm

This is the harbinger of President Obama’s Health Care Plan. He or his representative has rejected your request for any heart surgery because you have not prepared properly for the operation by keeping fit as you were instructed and you have failed to reduce your weigh by the required amount. You will then be advised as to what options are remaining for you in your last days. How fortunate you are to have someone watching you and watching out for you. May His Name Be Praised.


jobeth
March 30, 2009 at 5:48 pm

I know you are only half kidding but you are so right. This medical thing really gets me going.

My father-in-law (a Brit) in 2006 was denied all nourishment (just plain saline…no nutrients) for 6 weeks…yep, not kidding…6 weeks because he had the audacity to have a massive stroke at the age of 85. Of course he died. He was legally euthenized (sp?) He was declared too old and unimportant to the state. Before that he was a strong active old guy with a great sense of humor. Not to mention a war vet…who took shrapnel for the ingrates that killed him.

Not to mention that for weeks prior he was denied care when he was having TIAs (mini-strokes). They refused to take him into the hospital when he was having the TIAs and of course ultimately he had the big one. The just kept giving him appointments weeks away, probably hoping he wouldn’t be around to keep it.

Once in the hospital, they said “he said he doesn’t want to live”
We asked him…his mind was quick, and he managed to say “yes, you silly booger”

I about had a cow when I was told that the patient and family had NO SAY in how one is treated medically.

I’ve gone over this before here, but this is our future if/when Obalmy gets is Nationalized health plan in.

Sooo…Too old?….Too handicapped?….Inconvenient expensive treatment?

“Too bad for you….Bye,Bye… Hope the afterlife is nice….”.”

Grrrr…..