Just Do The Math

Posted on July 26, 2012 by Darth Chipmunk

Ending the Bush tax cuts for incomes over $250K will bring in an estimated $850 billion over 10 years. That’s a lot of money. There’s just one little problem. $85B a year doesn’t mean much when paying on a trillion dollar annual deficit. Even the whole $850 billion doesn’t bridge a single year’s budget gap. Here’s a graph of the deficit:

But deficit is not debt. The deficit is the annual shortfall between income and expenditure. The debt is the accumulated deficits combined. Currently, the US debt is a staggering $15.8 trillion dollars. That’s 15,800 billion. In that light, you can eliminate ALL of the Bush tax cuts and the result is utterly insignificant, a worthless gesture and a waste of time and energy.

The entire discussion of Bush tax cuts is distraction. The real battle is cutting spending to match with reasonable taxation rates and finding a sustainable middle-ground. But spending cuts are not even a part of the discussion. I must be feverish… did I say “reasonable taxation rates”? Ack!

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This Is Why We’re Doomed (Updated)

Posted on July 26, 2012 by Darth Chipmunk

Since Chick-fil-A ownership made the politically incorrect statement regarding support of traditional marriage they’ve been under fire. But there’s a serious problem.

It’s one thing to stop patronizing an establishment because you, as an individual, don’t like their politics. Vote with your dollars. But it is a completely different matter for the Government to step in and approve or deny business permit applications based on agreement with current political correctness.

If you were a business owner, would you dare step out and voice your support for traditional marriage, knowing that the Government will not approve your permit(s) as a result?

As our own Government destroys Freedom through intimidation, half the population cheers because they agree. What could go wrong?

[Added:] The Anchoress has a post relating to the Boy Scouts and Homosexuality over at Patheos that makes the point better than I ever could with my sophomoric squirrel brain (H/T Ace of Spades HQ):

It’s more difficult to extend a hand to someone else and say, “I see you; you see me; we are not bad people, we just disagree.”

That takes grace.

The brilliance of our constitution is that, in explicitely naming a freedom of association, it says no one can become the prisoner of someone else’s insistence. No one needs to be (as Big Gay Al says) “extorted” into thinking “correctly.” If a group chooses to limit its membership, well, the excluded members are still completely free to create their own associations and assemblies. Thus, the founders provided for the nation to find a way for people to be both together as a nation, and apart as individuals; together to one degree, but still “alone” to another.

It’s sort of the right to choose your friends, or — if you prefer — the shared right to discriminate.

If Chik-fil-A fails because of its owners core belief in Traditional Marriage, it should fail because customers eat elsewhere and their sales plummet, not because Government wiped them out. But there’s the rub, yes? What if sales actually go up as more Americans vote with their dollars? And what if Chik-fil-A has a record month?

[Added II:] Maybe it’s just me. But the Government using the tactic of intimidation, of disallowing the opposition the right to register their own opinion via permitting and other bureaucratic processes seems awfully similar to the lawfare tactics employed by Kimberlin, Rauhauser and crew.

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Thursday Morning News and Links

Posted on July 26, 2012 by Darth Chipmunk
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Quote of the Day

Posted on July 25, 2012 by Darth Chipmunk

Speaking before the VFW, where he received a standing ovation:

“In dealing with other nations, [Obama] has given trust where it is not earned, insult where it was not deserved and apology where it was not due.” -Mitt Romney

This will come as a shock, but the media isn’t covering it.

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Liberal Tolerance – Part 2,496

Posted on July 25, 2012 by Darth Chipmunk

Via Breitbart, State Sen. Louise Lucas, part of President Obama’s “Truth Team” and an official member of the campaign was on the John Fredericks Morning Show and said:

What I am saying to you is Mitt Romney, he’s speaking to a segment of the population, who does not like to see people other than a White man in a White House or any other elected position.

Let’s be real clear about it… let’s be real clear Mitt Romney is speaking to a group of people out there who don’t like folks like Barack Obama in any elected or leadership position. We know what’s going on here and some people may be afraid to say it but I am not. I am not afraid to say it.

He’s speaking to that fringe out there who do not want to see anybody other than a white person in a leadership position. Senator Miller said it before she died and I agreed with her. They don’t want President Barack Obama in office as President and for all the reasons that you and I and a lot of other people understand.

There comes a point where you don’t even know what to say anymore. I’ve written 85 pieces under the “Obama” tag. Virtually all are critical, and most are angry. But they are all reasoned, even if only to a squirrel. At no time have I suggested that skin color has anything to do with my acknowledgement that the President is a miserable failure at uniting Americans, supporting business, igniting the economy, crafting helpful foreign policy, and a lot more. According to these good folks my reasoning is irrelevant, as I am seething with unconscious racist rage and hatred.

  • Unemployment rate? Racist!
  • Deficit and debt? Racist!
  • Arab world in flames? Racist!
  • No budget? Racist!
  • Spending cuts? Racist!

Are you sensing a theme?

And when I point out that I like Herman Cain and Allen West just fine? “White guilt!” they explain.

Meanwhile, this:

“Kill these racist honkeys, these crackers, these pigs, these pink people, It has been long overdue!” #NBPPTAMPA

And just in case that didn’t wake you up:

“Now Is The Time To Stand Up And Fight Back There Are No Good Crackers, And If You Find one, Kill Him Before He Changes” #KhalidAbdulMuhammad

That looks like a literal call to kill white people, including innocents. But I’m told not to believe my lying eyes, that this is a mistaken honkey/cracker interpretation, and that my seething unconscious racism taints my narrow white brain without me even knowing it. That, in fact, there’s no reason for concern. The innocent tweets above are simply enthusiastic appeals to all African-Americans to gather together and become more involved in their communities. If I weren’t so pink, I’d understand how simple that is to comprehend, but racism. And racist. So sit down and shut up, cracker.

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Wednesday Morning News and Links

Posted on July 25, 2012 by Darth Chipmunk
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The President’s “Enemies” List

Posted on July 24, 2012 by Darth Chipmunk

What happens when you donate to the President’s opposition? The usual answer would be, “Nothing.” But in the new era of Hope and Change, supporters of the President’s opposition should keep a wary eye. Frank VanderSloot can tell you all about it.

VanderSloot gave a pro-Romney super PAC “Restore the Future” a million dollars last year.  Then in April, he was identified along with seven other donors on an Obama campaign website as “wealthy individuals with less-than-reputable records.” Then, the inevitable: He received the initial audit notice from the IRS last month. Two weeks later, he got one from the Labor Department. His reaction?

“It seems coincidental, but who knows? The problem is the president made the list, and 61 days later I get the first letter. One has to ask: Is the fact I’m being shot at the result of having a target on my back? … Was the list made with that intent?”

Of course the President’s campaign will say they made the list to provide transparency. And that they can’t be held responsible for what others did with the information. And surely it’s a coincidence. And give Obama the benefit of the doubt.

So given this reality,  if you had a million dollars that you considered giving to Romney, wouldn’t you think twice? I mean, I gave him a measly hundred bucks and I’m wondering when the mailer will go to my neighbors. Seriously. How long will it take for them to make me regret it?

And so intimidation becomes a hallmark of Presidential elections. How Progressive.

Simultaneously, Jacob Weisberg lectures:

If I hear one more person accuse the Obama campaign of practicing “Chicago-style politics,” I’m gonna kick all his nephews off the park-district payroll. I’m gonna send some precinct captains over to straighten him out.

Mitt Romney and his surrogates don’t understand what Chicago-style politics means. No one seems to have told them that it’s been gone for 25 years. And they don’t get that Barack Obama, in his Chicago days, never had anything to do with it.

Gone for 25 years? I think Weisberg confused the difference between “Chicago style politics” and “The American Dream.” I confuse those two, also. They’re so similar…

Tongue in cheek aside, I’d venture a guess that today’s IRS Agents are just as real and scary as Daly’s precinct Captains of yesteryear, given the serious damage they can inflict on your future with audits, investigations, penalties and liens. And with the IRS becoming the de facto enforcement arm for ObamaCare, they’re more powerful than ever, akin to a new National Police Force.

meh. America, Amerika… What’s the difference, right?

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