3 Disturbing Images of Obama

Once again, Karl Rove hits the nail on the head. obama's foreign policy or should I say, lack of foreign policy is lessening the United States in the eyes of the world. One would think that he would eventually keep his mouth shut on matters for which he has no head. Instead he continues to spout tough sounding rhetoric with very little substance and no follow up. It is our duty to assist those in Libya seeking freedom. In may not be in the form of troops or an invasion. But a simple no-fly zone would allow the rebels an opportunity to catch their breath and regroup. The airstrikes by the Libyan military keep the rebels on their heels and unable to gain ground.

obama's failure to lead on the budget, again, failure to lead is too light, his failure to participate in the process at all, has made him look foolish and immature. He criticizes, yet he adds nothing of substance to the conversation. The democrats, in return, try to get by with the bare minimum of participation, but thwart any progress by the Republicans. It has created an atmosphere similar to elementary school. The back and forth bickering with nothing being accomplished gives us in the real world very little to be hopeful about. We are not the idiots congress and obama take us for. We see the future of our Country and the financial ruin we are headed for.

obama claims to be uninvolved in the Wisconsin union battle. Yet he sent his pit bulls from organizing for America and makes snide little comments at every opportunity. His involvement runs much deeper than he would have us believe. He is very involved, but his refusal to admit it and show open support have angered many in his union base. He has revealed himself to be a coward on about every front. Just like his days in the Illinois senate voting present.

I'm still amazed that such a man has been able to ascend to such a level. He has no conviction, no strength and no spine. He is unwilling or unable to take a stand on any issue that opponents could use to pin him down. One would think that the president of the United States would do the right thing, always, and the critics be damned. I hope this experiment in socialism has reminded us why it has failed many times and in many places...

By Karl Rove - FoxNews

Last week was a bad week for America because it was a bad week for President Obama.

West Wing politicos may not share that opinion. They seem to think any week during which the president makes a speech or holds a news conference is a good week: Americans get to see the amazing, inspiring Mr. Obama. But three images of Mr. Obama from last week are hardly uplifting.

First, there was the president on Libya -- dithering, indecisive, unreliable, and weak. As Qaddafi’s mercenaries and bombers brutally grabbed back momentum from the democratic opposition, all Mr. Obama could say was, “My national security team has been working…to monitor the situation…to prepare the full range of options…”

If America’s failure to lead allows Qaddafi to snuff out the popular uprising against his dictatorship and regain power, the consequences for the U.S. will be severe. Dictators will know the U.S. president is a pushover. Our allies around the world will be dispirited and our adversaries emboldened.

Then there was the on-going budget battle. The failure of Mr. Obama, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to pass a budget before the start of the fiscal year last October 1 is an astonishing act of incompetence. They controlled the entire process with wide margins in both houses. Now we are reduced to funding the government of the world’s most powerful nation with continuing resolutions that cover two or three-week periods. And Congressional Democrats are whining it is impossible to cut $60 billion out of a budget that consists of $3.8 trillion dollars.

At a Friday morning press conference Mr. Obama called the failure to pass a budget “irresponsible” and said “the notion that we can’t get resolved last year’s budget in a sensible way…defies common sense.” But he was not passive observer. He’s the president who failed to get his own budget approved by his own party last year.

Then Mr. Obama went on to say of the budget that “it shouldn’t be that complicated…to get this completed.” This came after weeks during which Democratic Congressional leaders criticized the president for providing no leadership, then the appointment by Mr. Obama of Vice President Joe Biden as his personal negotiator on the budget, and Mr. Biden’s almost immediate departure for a weeklong foreign trip. Mr. Obama still refused to get his hands dirty by offering a possible solution.

Then there were the president’s remarks to members of the National Governors Association on Wisconsin, last month, where he cautioned, “I don’t think it does anybody any good when public employees are denigrated or vilified.”

This was a classic Obama straw man. Who exactly is “vilifying” or “denigrating” whom? The president’s intimation was that it was Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, but Mr. Walker’s tone has been mild, even-tempered, restrained and entirely appropriate.

If there are people who needed a presidential admonishment about civility and respect, they are the protestors who broke into the Wisconsin capital building in a vain attempt to keep the legislature from voting, the protestors who compared Mr. Walker to Adolf Hitler, and the Democratic legislators who fled the state rather than do their duty. But those would be the president’s allies and admonition are only required of his opponents.

When Mr. Obama was in the Illinois State Senate, he had the annoying habit of voting “present” on controversial issues he felt might damage his future political ambitions. -- But at least Mr. Obama showed up then. The president’s refusal now to provide leadership on Libya or the budget and his readiness to score cheap political points with straw man attacks makes his days in the State Senate look like an era of true statesmanship.

Layoffs coming in Wisconsin...

Governor Walker notified the unions in Wisconsin that layoffs are coming. With the refusal of the scumbag democrats to do their job, he has no choice but take a different approach.

I tink his approach is wrong though. I wouldn't lay off anyone, I would outright fire their asses and replace them with people who want a job. I would have fired the teachers on the morning of the third day they missed class. There are lots of unemployed teachers who would love to have the jobs that the teachers in Wisconsin seem to care so little for.

As far as the awol democrats, I would assist the people of the State in beginning recall proceedings. In my opinion, these people have abandoned their jobs and should be treated as such. These democrats are denying the people of their State representation...

Dems Galvanized By Union Issue at DNC Meeting

Let's look at this piece by piece...

by Trish Turner - FoxNews

Labor Secretary Hilda Solis fired up Democrats at the party's national winter meeting in Washington on Saturday, as the feisty former California congresswoman chastised Republican governors in Wisconsin, Ohio, and across the country for not sitting down with union workers to negotiate a compromise on state budget crises.

Unions are always willing to negotiate themselves better benefits and wages, if you can call it a negotiation. Usually it is give in or we will go on strike. It's almost impossible to get unions to negotiate a DECREASE in their salary or benefits, even it means driving their employer out of business.

"We know many states are facing tough budget decisions. We know there is room for shared sacrifice. Shared," Solis stressed, adding, "We've seen our brothers and sisters in public employee unions willing, willing to give up their fair share...The governors in Wisconsin and Ohio aren't just asking workers to tighten their belts, they're demanding they give up their uniquely American rights as workers."

Once again, unions aren't usually, hardly ever in fact, willing to share a sacrifice. Any claims otherwise is a lie. In this case, the unions saw that Governor Walker had the votes to pass laws that will help him in his quest to fix the budget of his State, forcing a sacrifice. "Uniquely American rights as workers", they left out a word, UNION. Most of us in the real world don't have the backing of a bunch of union thugs who will hold our employer prisoner unless we get raises and benefits that make our companies unprofitable or worse.

It was the issue that moved attendees most at their annual gathering, with many sporting bright red "Stand Up for Worker's Rights" badges and toting supportive signs. As members cheered and shouted their support, it was clear this issue could be one that galvanizes the party base in the future should the state budget wars continue deeper into the 2012 election season.

It will only help the Republicans further if the democrats decide to make a bigger issue out of this. The vast majority of Americans are non-union and from the polls lately, most people don't have much sympathy for union workers in general and government union workers specifically. It's hard to sympathize with people who make almost twice as much as you for less work and at your expense.

One senior Democratic official told Fox, "Regardless of how Wisconsin plays out, what's clear from the display today is that (Wisconsin Governor) Scott Walker has handed us a gift. He took a deflated, fractured party coming out of 2010 and as evidenced by what we saw in this room, given us a unified, energized and motivated base."

"The fight is on!" Solis cheered, as the formal speeches wrapped and the low-key gathering devolved into something more closely resembling a pep rally, and the microphones were opened up to audience members. First up, Gerald McEntee, head of the American Federation of State, Country, and Municipal Employees union, the third largest union in the country.

"This battle in Wisconsin is not just for public sector workers," McEntee cried, "It's really a battle for human rights!" The longtime union president chided Wisconsin's governor, as he invited a willing audience's "boo's" and asked for support picketing the Republican during an appearance he is scheduled to make on a Sunday morning political talk show.

This is just stupid. It is a battle about unions and the fact that they are driving States into bankruptcy. It's not the fault of the unions though. democrats are so dependant on the union vote that they are willing to sacrifice the very budgets of their States to keep that vote. The unions have taken full advantage of the relationship. It has nothing to do with human rights...

"This is where we go when we elect Republicans to these powerful offices," McEntee warned a rapt crowd, as a parade of union officials, as well as, current and retired union workers from Michigan to Florida to New Mexico followed him at the mics, all with one focus: protect the right to collectively bargain. Some even compared the current union fight to the democratic struggles in the Middle East. The crowd cheered for each, as they approved a resolution of solidarity with union workers in Wisconsin and beyond.

This IS what you get when Republicans are in charge, a reality check. State budgets are based on real dollars, revenue that the State takes in. When you exceed that income, there is a problem. Some States are spending their entire budgets on union salaries, union pensions and entitlement programs. When you are a democrat in charge that is easy to get around, you just run a deficit and wait for the next Republican to come in and clean up your mess.

For these pompous, spoiled democrats and union thugs to compare what they are doing to what is going on in the middle east is just crazy. It's playing politics with the lives of real people. There are citizens of Libya laying dead in the street. They have been murdered by mercenaries and thugs. These democrats and union people have absolutely NO CLUE what the people of the Middle East are facing. When these smug assholes are experiencing a hardship other than sleeping on the hard floor in the Wisconsin Capitol building maybe they can talk, when they face being mowed down by machine gun fire they can compare themselves to unarmed civilians in Cairo or Tripoli. Until that time comes, it is an insult for them to compare themselves to people who face life and death every day.

Walker and a number of other GOP governors across the U.S. are moving to end this long-time union mainstay, as these officials contend that the practice shoots up the cost of doing business in their cash-strapped states. Walker, who was elected in 2010 in the GOP wave that swept the country, has refused to negotiate, saying the state is broke and that the voters chose him and other governors like him to get their states' fiscal houses back in order.

Back at the winter meeting, Democratic National Committee Chairman Tim Kaine, himself a former governor, praised the union workers, but it was Solis, the first Latina Cabinet secretary in U.S. history who hails from "a union household," who really marshaled the rank and file.

"These are our neighbors, our friends and family. They teach our kids...risk their lives to protect our friends and families, and all they're asking for is to be treated with dignity. All they're really asking for is an opportunity to sit down at the table. And that's what collective bargaining is all about." Through a standing ovation, Solis shouted again, "The fight is on!"

In the State of Wisconsin, the Department of Education says that two thirds of children read at a below average level. Hmmm, maybe "They teach or kids..." is a stretch...

Wisconsin battle gets ugly...

It's funny really, it's always liberals trying to paint conservatives as violent and hateful, but it always turns out to be the opposite.

In Wisconsin, the protestors against the Governor Scott Walker are comparing him to adolph hitler and the recently deposed dictator of Egypt, hosni mubarack.

I haven't seen Scott Walker order millions of government employees into a gas chamber for execution. I'm 100% positive that we never will. So the comparison to hitler is, well, stupid. Obviously these protestors either have no knowledge of history or they are going for some kind of shock factor. Since many of these people are teachers, I hope they have some idea of the history of hitler and World War II. So that leaves only their attempt at shock. It is deplorable and shameful to try to compare the murder of millions of people with the current events in Wisconsin. These protestor should be ashamed of themselves.

As for the comparison to mubarack, again, a situation where innocent people lost their lives. These protestors have no idea what it is like to have true violence aimed at them. In Egypt the military fired on unarmed civilians and the civilians held their ground. I have a hard time believing that the Wisconsin protestors are made of the same stuff as the people of Egypt. They are lucky enough to live in a Country where they never have to find out. This comparison is also stupid.

There have also been calls for the assassination of Governor Walker. Who is it again that are the violent ones?

michael moore decided to put his two cents worth in, and you can guess which side of the issue this idiot is on.

It seems that the liberal/democrat/union whackos are the violent ones. Maybe I'm wrong, but the evidence seem to support me on this...

Wisconsin's 'Phony' Budget Crisis

Give this a read, and when you hear some dumbass liberals talking about the debate in Wisconsin being a political stunt by the Governor, you can call them on it. The budget problems in Wisconsin are very real, they are not made up. What is made up is the liberal/union talking points.

Unless the public sector unions are willing to or are forced to make these concessions they are headed for massive layoffs. Up to this point, government workers have been spared what those of us in the real world have been facing. While there have been furloughs in some parts of the Country for government workers, I haven't heard of many, if any, government workers being laid off.

What the Governor is asking is for the union employees to pay a portion of their retirement and healthcare. What he is asking on the retirement is about the national average for private sector workers and the healthcare contribution is below what private sector workers contribute. How is this unfair? These union employees will still retain the right to negotiate their salaries. How many of us not working for the government have an opportunity to do that? I'm sure we can all ask, but what are your chances, really? I know what mine are, slim and none. And you know what? That's fine with me. I'm damn proud to have a decent job, many people aren't so lucky these days.

With each passing day, my lack of concern for these spoiled government workers turns to anger. They have no idea how those of us that pay their salary, benefits and retirement live. They don't have a clue how good they have it. They bitch and complain because they are being asked to pay a small portion of what it costs to keep them living large.

Each and every one of them are lucky I'm not the Governor of their State. I would have fired their asses on Friday.

And the "doctors" that are passing out the fake sick notes... oh damn, you can't even imagine the trouble they would be facing if I were in charge. I promise you, most of them would do a little prison time over this stunt. They have broken all kinds of laws and probably violated the oath they took to become a doctor in the first place.

By Elizabeth MacDonald - FoxBusiness

Opponents of Wisconsin Republican Governor Scott Walker say that the governor is ginning up a phony deficit crisis. Opponents say Wisconsin is in surplus, not in deficit. They also say corporate tax cuts caused the deficit. Wrong on all counts.

The state's deficit is very real. Fox Business has Wisconsin's nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau report. There is a section that, read in isolation, does show a $121.4 million general fund gross balance as of June 30, 2011, and a net balance of $56.4 million. These are the figures used by the governor's opponents to say the state is in surplus.

But the fine print of the rest of the memo spells out at least $315.7 million in unpaid bills or expected shortfalls in programs such as Medicaid services for the needy ($153.2 million alone), the public defender’s office and for corrections. (EMac note: The figure rises to $437 million if you factor in all of the costs submarined in the footnotes).

The state owes Minnesota $58.7 million under a discontinued state income tax reciprocity deal. The deal covered individuals who live in Wisconsin and earn income in Minnesota. More individuals live in Wisconsin and earn income in Minnesota than live in Minnesota and earn income in Wisconsin.

Also, like most states Wisconsin has succumbed to budget gimmickry, which happened under the prior Democratic governor. The $121.4 million figure doesn't include $200 million Wisconsin raided out of its state’s “Injured Patients and Families Compensation Fund,” representing a debt that the Wisconsin state supreme court declared resulted from an illegal raid on the fund under former Democrat governor Jim Doyle, which was done to balance the budget. Finally, the $121.4 million figure doesn’t include the $25.2 owed to the public defender’s office ($3.5 million) and the state’s department of corrections ($21.7 million).

And Governor Walker’s opponents’ claim that his corporate tax-cut bills approved in January is responsible for the deficit is wrong, too, because the cuts have not taken effect yet, so they cannot be part of the current problem.

These cuts do not take effect until the next two-year budget, from July 2011 to June 2013.

Set aside for now that many economists argue that corporate tax cuts actually keep businesses and jobs in the state, and create revenue. Look at companies fleeing Illinois and California due to tax hikes. Witness Indiana’s Republican Governor Mitch Daniels giving a shout out to Illinois businesses to pull stakes and relocate to Indiana, given Illinois dramatic tax hikes to cut its deficit.

The Legislative Fiscal Bureau’s report shows that corporate income and franchise taxes “are estimated to increase from $834.5 million in 2009-10 to $935.0 million in 2010-11.” That’s right, increase.

The report notes: “The estimates also have been adjusted to reflect the impact of corporate income/franchise tax law changes enacted during the 2009-11 biennium.”

The report also says: “Collections are forecast to decrease to $900.0 million in 2011-12, and then increase to $925 million in 2012-13.”

However, the bureau’s “analysis indicates that for the three-year period, aggregate, general fund tax collections will be $202.8 million lower than those reflected in the November/December reports.”

Why? Not just because of corporate tax cuts, analysis which seems to rely on the static modeling technique, rather than dynamic scoring.

The bureau’s report says: “More than half of the lower estimate ($117.2 million) is due to the impact of Special Session Senate Bill 2 (health savings accounts), Assembly Bill 3 (tax deductions/credits for relocated businesses), and Assembly Bill 7 (tax exclusion for new employees).”

So individual cuts and business incentives to create jobs are behind the estimated shortfall here.

Like other states, Wisconsin has relied on federal aid. Wisconsin’s state pension has projected rosy stock market returns, which led it to in turn set aside less money in those funds, because heck the market will take care of it. Many states did likewise, betting on average 8% to 10% annual returns. That budget hole, among others, has led to the states to act like the tin can on the just married car always clamoring after federal money. When will the U.S. do what the International Monetary Fund does when it gives aid money out to reckless governments? The IMF ties federal aid to specific covenants like pension reform.

Taxpayers increasingly pay for rising government union compensation. Just as in Wisconsin, taxpayer funded government worker paychecks are dunned 1% to pay for union dues, which unions then use to lobby for tax and spend increases. Tax Foundation has data that shows that last year, 25 states saw unions lobbying for tax and spending hikes. Tax Foundation says 29 states raised taxes by $24 billion last year, the largest sum since 1979.

The real fight in Wisconsin is the governor’s push to end not just collective bargaining for benefits, but also for automatic payroll deduction of union dues.

State battles like the one in Wisconsin will get worse as the Administration’s stimulus money runs out this June.

obama continues to show his true colors...

obama will never be anything more than a community organizer. The definition of community organizer should be "professional shit starter.

obama has decided to take the side of the unions in Wisconsin and Ohio. This is a fight he should have at least stayed neutral on if he couldn't get behind the Republican efforts to get State budgets under control. But that would go completely against his nature. He has shown that on a National level he has no concern for curbing spending so why would he care that unions are helping drive many States to bankruptcy.

Ohio alone is 8 BILLION dollars in the hole. Governor Kasich isn't even asking union members to pay as much of their health care costs as private sector employees have to pay.

In Wisconsin, Governor Walker is asking public sector (government employees) union members to pay 12% of their healthcare premiums, up from 6%. He is also asking them to pay 5.6% of their pension costs. They don't currently pay anything, that bill is picked up by the taxpayers.

I think the part of this that bothers me the most is there are times that  I come in contact with government employees and they are either rude or incompetent. Not always, but enough to make me remember it clearly. If anything they should be extremely nice to their customers since those really are the people paying their salary, and their insurance and their pension. The least they could do is say "Thank You".