Report by CBO Shows The Recovery Act Reduced the Deficit

I found the link to this report on BobCesca.com and had to share the report and some of the information with you.

This report was written by Economists Alan Blinder and Mark Zandi and published by the CBO. This chart shows what the deficit would be without the Recovery Act and how it is WITH the Recovery Act.

From the Wonk Room at Think Progress comes this:

Their conclusion is that had the combined financial and fiscal policies not been enacted, “GDP in 2010 would be about 6.5 percent lower, payroll employment would be less by some 8.5 million jobs, and the nation would be experiencing deflation.”

Blinder and Zandi break out their estimates separately for the financial policies and the fiscal policies. They estimate that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and other fiscal policies have saved or created 2.7 million jobs and without them, unemployment would stand at 11 percent and job losses would have totaled 10 million. On top of this, they estimate that if nothing had been done to address the financial crisis — no Troubled Asset Relief Program, no bailout of American International Group Inc, and no investment in the auto industry — our economy would have 5 million fewer jobs than we do today and unemployment would be sharply higher, at 12.5 percent.

However, one tidbit in the report that has received little notice is that by acting, Congress actually reduced our potential deficit problem. Given the policy steps taken, Blinder and Zandi estimate that by the end of the 2010 fiscal year, the federal budget deficit will be $1.4 trillion and it will fall to $1.15 trillion in fiscal year 2011 and $900 billion in fiscal year 2012.

The bolding is mine... because I wanted to make sure you saw it. For some reason all these so called Deficit Hawks are ignoring this in their reports and talking. Here is more:

However, had Congress done nothing, the deficit would have ballooned even higher, hitting over $2 trillion by the end of the 2010 fiscal year, $2.6 trillion in fiscal year 2011, and $2.25 trillion in fiscal year 2012. That’s right, doing nothing would have meant that the 2012 federal budget deficit would likely be over 2.5 times as large as taking the steps we took.

Once again bolding is mine. This is something we should be shouting from the rooftops and lording over the GOPers who are claiming now to want to reduce the deficit. A deficit that is largely due to their policies and the spending that went on during the years of 2001 and 2006 especially and to a smaller extent from 2006 to 2008.

Here is a nifty little chart that shows all the spending and how it is divided by category

As is shown by this chart the Bush Tax Cuts and the downturn of the economy added much more to the deficit than anything President Obama and the current Congress has done.

If you want to read the entire article from the Wonk Room, just give it a click.

We need to get this out and let people know the TRUTH about what is going on with the Finances of our Country. I have not seen this on any media outlet and I know it will never get much play if any on Faux Noise, because it tells the truth.

I hope you read the report and post these charts so everyone can see them... Please feel free to take anything you want... Linky love if you can, but is not necessary. I just want everyone, including some of the RWNJ's out there to see these and try to explain how the GOPers are going to fix this.
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Must Read for Today, Bob Cesca and John Cole

If you haven't or don't read Bob Cesca's Blog.. you are missing out. I quote him a lot and he is a great source for others.

First this week at Huffington Post he wrote this piece:

The Tea Party is All About Race

If you haven't read it.. you should.. He brings out some very valid points and makes some strong arguments I think everyone needs to see and read.

From the final lines of the piece:

In the final analysis, when you boil away all of the weirdness, it becomes clear that the teabaggers are pissed because there isn't yet another doddering old white guy in the White House -- like they're used to. That's what this is all about.

By way of a postscript, one of the many faceless radio talk show wingnuts, Jim Quinn, this week called President Obama a "Kenyan wuss" who should be "slapped silly." The Kenyan lie and the "slap silly" insult aside, this president is no wuss. You know how I know? He's a black man who ran for president and won despite the growing mob of gun-toting militant white bigots like Jim Quinn who are sucking air in America. President Obama achieving this despite the hatred and threats against him takes serious guts. Guts that Jim Quinn and the tea party movement will never understand.

Then last night, I went there and found this piece he had found from John Cole and highlighted on his blog. It is not only worthy of being read, it should be posted and found everywhere today... John is spot on and has his finger on the problem we are seeing.

So, thank you Bob, and thank you John for pointing this out and for having the bravery to say what needs to be said.

Here is a link to the John Cole column where he writes at Balloon Juice.

And here is a link again to the best blog ever.. BobCesca.com

Check him out, and check out John's article.. it is worth your time. Also check what Jane Hamsher is saying now...... Some of the commenter's are saying and I feel she is becoming the Liz Cheney of the Left. I hate to say that but she is. First she ties herself to Grover Norquist.... now she is doing this.

What she neglects to point out in her diatribe is that after Lynn Woolsey stated she would pass this bill, she would then come back and push for a Public Option in a separate bill. Because to use Reconciliation or majority vote we have to pass the bill as it is.. Read that... AS IT IS... no changes can be made to the Senate Bill.. The House and the Senate will then make changes after, just as they have done to all large legislation.

The Cost of Doing Nothing

Sometimes I wonder if people really realize the price of not doing Health Care Reform. the cost in money, premiums, costs to hospitals, not to mention families and individuals who don't have insurance and are faced with bankruptcy.

Not to mention the human cost in lives. We lose on average the equivalent of 9-11 every month to the lack of health care.Yes, you read that right.. 2,500 people a month die from the lack of quality health care in this country.

Yesterday, in the New York Times there was a great article about The Cost of Doing Nothing. written by Reed Ableson.

Some of the more important parts that I want to share are:

Suppose Congress and President Obama fail to overhaul the system now, or just tinker around the edges, or start over, as the Republicans propose — despite the Democrats’ latest and possibly last big push that began last week at a marathon televised forum in Washington.

Then “my health care” stays the same, right?

Far from it, health policy analysts and economists of nearly every ideological persuasion agree. The unrelenting rise in medical costs is likely to wreak havoc within the system and beyond it, and pretty much everyone will be affected, directly or indirectly.

“People think if we do nothing, we will have what we have now,” said Karen Davis, the president of the Commonwealth Fund, a nonprofit health care research group in New York. “In fact, what we will have is a substantial deterioration in what we have.”

Emphasis is mine because I wanted to make sure everyone saw what was said. The consequences of doing nothing is things will just get worse. Much worse.

Nearly every mainstream analysis calls for medical costs to continue to climb over the next decade, outpacing the growth in the overall economy and certainly increasing faster than the average paycheck. Those higher costs will translate into higher premiums, which will mean fewer individuals and businesses will be able to afford insurance coverage. More of everyone’s dollar will go to health care, and government programs like Medicare and Medicaid will struggle to find the money to operate.

“It will break all of our banks if we do nothing,” said Peter V. Lee, who oversees national health policy for the Pacific Business Group on Health, which represents employers that offer coverage to workers. “It is a course that is literally bankrupting the federal government and businesses and individuals across the country.”

Even those families that enjoy generous insurance now are likely to see the cost of those benefits escalate. The typical price of family coverage now runs about $13,000 a year, but premiums are expected to nearly double, to $24,000, by 2020, according to the Commonwealth Fund. That equals nearly a quarter of the median family income today.

All of this is just exactly what the President has been saying for months and months and what Democrats have been saying for years. However Republican's have been saying NO, NO, and NO, and last Thursday during the Health Care Summit at Blair House, all they could say was "Kill The Bill" and "Start Over".

Starting over and killing the bill is not an option at this time. We have invested too much time and too much sweat and tears into this to kill it and start over.

I asked my mother one day, about this obsession the Rethugs seem to have with the number of pages in the bills.. and she said she didn't remember them or anyone ever being this focused on the number of pages as they have been. They did the same thing with the Recovery Act and now with the Health Care Bill, constantly reminding people how many pages it is.. printing them out and piling them up.. What they fail to tell people is they only print on one side, and usually it is only about half or three-quarters of the page the rest is addendum's and footnotes. But, back to the article
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“It’s also cramping our economic growth,” said Frank McArdle, a consultant with Hewitt Associates, which advises large employers and reported on the need for change for the Business Roundtable, an association of C.E.O.’s at major companies. Spending so much on health care is “really a waste of people’s money,” Mr. McArdle said.

The higher premiums will also persuade more businesses, especially smaller ones, to decide not to offer insurance. More people who buy coverage on their own or are asked to pay a large share of premiums will find the price too high. It doesn’t take too many 39-percent increases, like the recent one proposed in California that has garnered so much attention, to put insurance out of reach.

“We have an affordability problem that is moving up through the middle class now,” said Paul B. Ginsburg, the president of the Center for Studying Health System Change, a nonprofit Washington research group.

Once again, this backs up what the President and the Democrats have been saying for months and years. Why do people continue to deny this is true? Why can't people see this is happening?

While estimates vary, the number of people without insurance is expected to increase by more than a million a year, said Ron Pollack, the executive director of Families USA, a Washington consumer advocacy group that favors the Democrats’ approach. The Urban Institute, for example, predicts that the number of uninsured individuals will increase from about 49 million today to between 57 million and 66 million by 2019. The Democrats’ plan is expected to cover as many as 30 million individuals who now are uninsured.

That is just unacceptable. How can we allow this to happen? We can't.... we have to make sure this gets fixed.

There will be a cost in lives, too. Mr. Pollack’s organization estimates that as many as 275,000 people will die prematurely over the next 10 years because they do not have insurance. Even people with insurance will find their coverage providing much less protection from financial catastrophe than it does now. Individuals will pay significantly more in deductibles and co-payments, for example. “More and more families will experience huge debts and bankruptcies,” Mr. Pollack said

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As I stated before.. 275,000 over 10 years... the numbers are sometimes a little different but that works out to 2,291 a month.... the equivalent of 9-11 every month dying because of a lack of health care. Think about that..

“If we fail this time, you’re not going to get this Congress to take this up on a big scale,” said Len Nichols, a health policy analyst at George Mason University who says he thinks the Democrats should go ahead and pass legislation.

But few policy analysts think Congress can afford to do absolutely nothing. Lawmakers are instead likely to try a series of smaller fixes, said Stuart Butler, a health policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation, a research group that favors market solutions over a larger government role.

After President Bill Clinton failed to get Congress to pass his health care bill in 1994, Republicans, who then had substantial victories in the House and Senate, worked with him to pass legislation like the health care privacy bill, a children’s health insurance program and the Balanced Budget Act, which contained significant changes to the Medicare program. Under President George W. Bush, the Republicans went on to pass a drug benefit under Medicare. “In the space of less than 10 years, you have several major bills,” Mr. Butler said.

Yet, still they didn't pay for anything and didn't cover anyone new. The Medicare D plan is good, but again, not paid for, and there is such a huge gap in coverage that we need new legislation to fix it. This is where part of the deficit comes from that everyone seems to be worried about. But of course that Rethug amnesia kicks in and they forget these facts.

If nothing passes now, Mr. Butler says he thinks Congress will tackle narrower areas, like insurance regulation, to make it easier for people with pre-existing medical conditions to find coverage, or maybe it will try another expansion of Medicaid or the children’s program.

But President Obama clearly prefers passage of a broader bill. In wrapping up Thursday’s session with lawmakers, he and other Democrats warned that an incremental approach was likely to provide too little relief to the people already feeling the effects of a broken system. “It turns out that baby steps don’t get you to the place that people need to go,” he said.

And even some people without a partisan point to make argue that the series of bills passed in the last 15 years have not made enough of a dent in slowing down medical costs. “We’ve had a lot of incremental reforms already,” said Mr. McArdle, the Hewitt consultant.

And many argue that putting off the inevitable has an additional cost. The Commonwealth Fund estimates that the nation would be spending hundreds of billions of dollars less than it does today if any of the health care legislation proposed by previous administrations had been enacted, assuming that they reduced costs by about 1.5 percentage points. If President Nixon’s plan had passed, the United States might be spending a trillion dollars a year less than it does now, and President Clinton’s plan would have reduced spending by some $500 billion a year.

“It makes a huge difference over a long period of time,” said Ms. Davis of the Commonwealth Fund.

This last section was the real money quote.. they have studied this and look what they have found... How much would the spending have been reduced if this had been done years ago when Teddy Rooseveldt tried it.. or Harry Truman?

We have to make sure this gets done. If you haven't called your Senator or your Representative, even if they are a Rethug, call them.. It is only a phone call and you will let them know how you feel. After what I heard Thursday, I think there are a lot of Rethugs getting phone calls now saying you don't really speak for me.. because I don't want you to kill this bill and I don't want you to start over.

Giving credit where it is due... Bob Cesca pointed me to this article.. He did a small write up on it at his place and I wanted to share it with all of you.

I hope you are as enlightened as I was and enjoyed the reading of it. I have posted most of it here, but you can read the entire article at the link above. Let's get this done folks.. Let's get the tweaks done by a simple majority and get this on the President's desk for his signature.

Pres. Obama Better than LBJ?

Once again I have to thank Bob @ BobCesca.com for pointing me in the direction of this story. I have been slack lately at checking out some of my favorite reading sites, such as CQ Politics and this is one story I missed. But Bob picked it up from another site and posted on it... so I thought I would elaborate on his post some.

I have been hearing from everyone how if Pres. Obama was "More like LBJ" he could get things done. In the comments just this week after his weekly address I think there were at least 2 or 3 references to that fact, mistaken though they are.

For one thing, as another commenter and I pointed out to them, LBJ had cooperative Republican's who actually voted for the legislation he was trying to get through, and for another, LBJ had been in Congress for a number of years and had been an arm twister and knew where the bodies were buried of a lot of members. No, I am not putting him down, I am just saying it was a different time and a different climate for LBJ.

Even so, it was still hard for him to get Medicare and Civil Rights legislation through Congress and the bills he got through, were not the bills we have now. They have been added to many times to make them what they are today.

That's the way all big Omnibus Legislation is done. That's the way this Health Care Bill is going to be. No, it isn't what we all wanted, no it isn't everything it maybe could be.. But the President, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi have to work with the members they have to pass what they can.

Yelling that they are sell outs and demanding that the bill be killed if it doesn't have this or that.. not supporting them and talking about how bad they are is not the answer.

Harry Reid can only work with what he has. Blaming him for Traitor Joe, Ben Nelson, Mary Landrieu, Blanche Lincoln and the others is not right. How would him trying to be more forceful with them have gained us anything? By him compromising his values, and in some cases ours, he has lost the support of his state, he has lost stature with progressives, BUT, he has gotten the Health Care Bill to a point it has never been before.

Not to mention, that Harry Reid has done some other things, maybe you aren't aware of.

This from CQPolitics:

President Obama set a new record last year for getting Congress to vote his way, clinching 96.7 percent of the votes on which he had clearly staked a position

That was a bit less than 4 percentage points higher than the previous record, set by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1965, according to an annual study by Congressional Quarterly.

Yes, you read that correctly. Pres. Obama has surpassed LBJ's accomplishments in his first year. With the help of the "sell out" Harry Reid.

Congressional Quarterly has compiled statistics on presidential support since 1953. Editors select the votes based on clear statements by the president or authorized spokesmen before the vote.

In all, Congress took 151 votes in which Obama had taken a position ahead of time.

His wins in his first year in office included votes for creating a massive economic stimulus package, bailing out the auto industry, allowing the Food and Drug Administration regulate tobacco and confirming Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

But they also included key moves toward overhauling the health care system, regulating financial services and reducing greenhouse gases which have not yet passed both chambers of Congress.

That unfinished work will be taken up in the second session, which begins Tuesday. Obama’s ultimate success will depend on how well his second year in office goes.

“If this Congress passes both health care reform and climate change legislation on top of the economic stuff, it will go down as a historic achievement,” says Rich Fleisher, a political science professor at Fordham University in New York City. “But unless they continue to manage the agenda in a way that is very, very careful, that could all fall apart.”

In the House, Obama won 68 votes and lost four.

Among the losses: a vote to disapprove further spending on a bank bailout and a July vote to pass a food safety overhaul. Both were temporary setbacks since Congress eventually ended up supporting the president’s position.

In the Senate, Obama won 78 votes and lost one.

The Republican win there came on an amendment which would have barred spending money to transfer detainees from the Guantanamo Bay prison camp to the United States. In the end, the bill allowed the transfer under certain conditions.

To build this record, Obama relied heavily on Democratic majorities with only occasional support from the GOP. As in the health care overhaul, he also had to keep the entire Democratic caucus in the Senate in line.

Yeah, see that last line... "keep the entire Democratic caucus in the Senate in line" Whose job is that? Why that ineffectual sell out himself, Harry Reid. The man who can't lead, the man who has let everyone down. The man who has helped Pres. Obama get more legislation through the Senate than LBJ.

So, there you have it..... Pres. Obama is better than LBJ and Harry Reid is doing his job as the Leader in the Senate.. No matter if you like it or not.. He may seem like he isn't doing a job like you think. But there is much more behind the scenes you don't see.

Think about that, the next time you criticize the President for not being strong enough, and think about it the next time you say Harry Reid isn't doing a good job as Leader. I think they are both doing good. At least better than LBJ.

Recovery Act Protecting Millions From Poverty

The other day Bob from BobCesca.com posted part of a report from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and it had some very interesting information.

First, let me remind everyone that the CBPP is a Non-partisan research and policy institute working on federal and state fiscal policies and public programs that affect low- and moderate-income Americans. So, like the Congressional Budget Office, (CBO) they do not have an agenda and it matters not which political party is in office.

There are charts and graphs at the site and the entire report can be accessed at their site.. I am just going to point out some highlights.. There are some very good things that need to be seen and read in this report. They need to be pointed out and I think should be shared with some of the wingnuts out there so they will shut up about the Recovery Act not doing anything good.

While the recession is expected to drive states’ poverty rates up for 2009, new analysis based on Census data shows that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) is keeping large numbers of Americans out of poverty in states across the country. In addition to boosting economic activity and preserving or creating jobs, the recovery act is softening the recession’s impact on poverty by directly lifting family incomes.

The Center’s analysis, which covers 36 states and the District of Columbia, examines the effect on poverty of seven ARRA provisions: the expansion of three tax credits for working families, two provisions that strengthen unemployment insurance assistance, a provision that boosts food stamp benefits, and a one-time payment for retirees, veterans, and people with disabilities.[1] Nationally, these provisions are keeping more than 6 million Americans out of poverty and reducing the severity of poverty for 33 million more. (These figures include both people whom ARRA has lifted out of poverty and people whom ARRA has kept from falling into poverty.)

These estimates are conservative. The seven provisions examined cover only about one-fourth of the recovery act’s total spending. The remainder of the act contains an array of provisions that also have an effect on poverty either through direct job creation or through increased spending (on areas such as education, health care, and housing) that leads to more consumer demand in the economy, which in turn preserves or creates jobs. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the legislation as a whole had increased employment by 600,000 to 1.6 million jobs as of September 2009 and is expected to boost employment by 900,000 to 2.3 million jobs by the fourth quarter of this year.[2]

Moreover, this analysis does not capture the full anti-poverty impact of the seven provisions it examines. It considers the provisions’ direct effects on the incomes of the families that receive added income or benefits as a result of these provisions, but not the provisions’ additional effects on the economy and private-sector employment. For example, increased jobless benefits or food stamps preserve private-sector jobs in a recession by enabling consumers to continue purchasing goods and services they otherwise could not have afforded. That additional spending, in turn, ripples through the economy, helping stores and companies to stay in business and avoid steeper layoffs and reductions in work hours, and thereby averts larger increases in poverty.

That is my emphasis.. I felt it needed to be seen and so I put it in bold.. I think that is the biggest part of this that needs to be told over and over. There is more..

Congress designed the recovery act to reach a wide spectrum of low-, moderate-, and middle-income Americans. Policymakers took care to include provisions that provide assistance to low-income families, not only because they stand the greatest risk of hardship during downturns but also because of evidence that they are the most likely to spend quickly whatever money they receive, thereby pumping more money back into the economy in a timely manner.

Our analysis considers seven of the act’s temporary provisions, totaling $205 billion over five years:

* a new Making Work Pay tax credit of up to $400 for workers ($800 for a couple) earning up to $95,000 ($190,000 for a couple);
* an expanded Child Tax Credit for lower-income working families with children;
* an expanded Earned Income Tax Credit, including increased tax-credit benefits for a working family with three or more children and for married families to lessen the marriage penalty the EITC can otherwise impose;
* additional weeks of emergency unemployment compensation benefits (paid after a worker’s 26 weeks of regular state unemployment benefits expire);
* an additional $25 per week for unemployed workers to supplement their unemployment benefits;
* a $250 one-time payment to elderly people and people with disabilities who receive Social Security, SSI, or veterans’ benefits; and
* an increase in food stamp benefit levels.

The state-by-state findings presented here build on a Center analysis released in September 2009, which focused on figures for the nation as a whole as well as five large states. Details of the methods used here are described in the appendices of that report. [3]

In brief, the analysis uses Census data to examine how these policy changes will affect family income and poverty status by state. The estimates start with data collected in March 2004, March 2005, and March 2006 through the Census Bureau's Current Population Survey. Data for three years are combined to increase the reliability of the state-by-state estimates.

We make three adjustments to these Census data. First, we correct the tendency of Census and other surveys to undercount receipt of certain public benefits, using the data and methods for making such adjustments that are reflected in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ TRIM model. [4] Next, we adjust the data to approximate recent economic and demographic conditions in each state, including labor-market conditions and state population levels in April through June of 2009. Finally, we adjust the food stamp participation data to approximate actual food stamp participation levels by state in May 2009. For each family in the resulting data, we estimate the family’s 2009 income with and without the seven recovery act provisions.

The analysis considers a family to be kept out of poverty if its estimated income is below the poverty line without the recovery act provisions but above the poverty line with the provisions. We use a measure of poverty that adheres to National Academy of Sciences poverty measurement recommendations by including after-tax cash and non-cash income, while subtracting child care and work expenses and out-of-pocket medical expenditures.

We provide estimates for 36 states and the District of Columbia. For the remaining 14 states, our data are insufficient to show reliable results. [5] Given the uncertainty associated with using a sample of the population, we show a range of estimates for each state. This range can be substantial, particularly for states with the smallest survey samples. For example, estimates for Iowa range from 25,000 to 55,000 residents kept out of poverty, with our best estimate falling in the middle (40,000).

The end notes are important too..

End Notes:

[1] As explained below, data were insufficient to estimate the antipoverty impact in the remaining 14 states.

[2] Congressional Budget Office, "Estimated Impact of the American Economic Recovery and Reinvestment Act on Employment and Economic Output as of September 2009," November 2009; and letter from CBO Director Douglas W. Elmendorf to Senator Charles E. Grassley, March 2, 2009.

[3] See Arloc Sherman, “Stimulus Keeping 6 Million Americans Out of Poverty in 2009, Estimates Show,” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, September 9, 2009 (appendices).

[4] Specifically, we correct the Census data for underreporting of food stamps, TANF, and SSI benefits using the data and methodologies to correct for underreporting that are used in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' TRIM model.

[5] For seven of these 14 states, we do not show results because of very small sample size. In addition, we checked to ensure that our predicted state-to-state distribution of ARRA benefits is generally consistent for each state with the actual distribution of benefits paid through October 30, 2009, as reported on the government website, www.recovery.gov. We do not show results for another seven states because we determined that the state's share of benefits in our model differed by more than 10 percent from the state’s actual share of the benefits (due to random sampling error, the inability of our model to fully capture some complex program interactions, or other reasons).

There are charts on the web site and other facts you can read, I didn't want to post the charts, some times they are hard to see when we post them.. so thought the link would be best..

Please take the time to look at this and feel free to link to it, post it, share it or whatever you would like to do.. This needs to be shared and told.. the media is not covering this.. they would rather talk about how bad it is.. not the good things.

I hope you see that while not all the news is good, there are at least some things in the ARRA that did benefit a lot of people. We have heard so many times, it wasn't big enough, it wasn't targeted enough, it was all pork.. so on and so on.. This shows it was good for the ones who needed it most. That's the bottom line.

Treason and Sedition

This is from my friend Matt and was posted at the Huffington Post. Now I normally don't read much there.. but I do have a few bloggers from there I read.. Matt, Bob Cesca and a few others.

This is a great piece and if you don't read Matt's writings.. well shame on you...lol Matt also writes at his own little spot called Osborne Ink.

In his post at Huff Post yesterday he is talking about several times that things have been said by members of Congress and by others which are undermining to the United States Government. But my words do it no justice..Here is Matt:

Article III of the Constitution defines treason against the United States in three ways: levying war against the country, adhering to the country's enemies, or giving aid or comfort to enemies. The punishment for treason is death, but the article requires a high burden of proof. It is the only crime defined in the Constitution.

Sedition, on the other hand, is defined by statute and has a lower burden of proof. Sedition is an attempt to disrupt or overthrow the constitutional government of the United States or incite resistance to lawful authority.

Jumps right into it doesn't he...lol

He then cites the relevant passage from the US Code.

After that he has a video from the "National Association of Rural Landowners -- one of the sponsors of the 9/12 "tea parties." That's how far this kind of un-American rhetoric has penetrated the mainstream conservative movement." That's directly from the article by Matt.

Once again, these videos are chilling, yet funny in a way.. As I pointed out yesterday, NO ONE in the mainstream of the republican party, is willing to stand up to these fringe groups and tell them to cool it. William Buckley did that to the Birch Society and it stopped. But no one has that kind of guts or that kind of authority now.

Rushbo has gotten so large.. not in size either, I am talking his voice and his authority that no one seems to be able to shut him up. He is pumping the rhetoric. Just as is Glen Beck and several other talk show entertainers. They don't care if something happens.. to them it is all about the money and the ratings.

After that video, Matt goes on to remind us of the Robert Perry story at NewsMax.Com that TomCat did such a wonderful write up about. Matt wrote it up too and thanks to all the publicity it got NewsMax did have the sense to pull the article. But the damage was done.

Sorry, I won't link to NewsMax.. if you want to read a Right Wing site, you can search for it...you won't get there from my site.

That story or article, whatever you want to call what Perry wrote.. it was at the least SEDITION. That's why they took the story down. If the truth was known they may have gotten a little phone call or a visit from someone..lol which is a good thing if you ask me. I hope Mr. Perry got a visit too.

The entire article is great, as are all of Matt's articles. Please go here to check it out and read and watch the videos, and if you haven't gone to Matt's place at Osborne Ink, please go by there too.

Pictures From the Wingnuts March, 9-12-09 Failed UPDATE, Picture Added!

Yesterday Glenn Beck had his infamous 9-12-09 rally in Washington,DC. He has been talking about this for months now.

He cried, he boohooed and he whined, that he wanted to bring back the feelings we all had from 9-12-01.

Well, excuse me Mr. Crazy man Beck, but I don't remember feeling like the idiots were on parade on 9-12-01, like they were yesterday. I don't remember feeling like there were going to be killings and lynchings on the Capitol steps like I did yesterday.

I also don't remember feeling like someone opened up the door of the local asylum and let the people off their meds for the last 2 weeks and turned them loose on the streets of Washington, DC to take over.

But, that's what it was like in DC yesterday. The crazies were in charge and they had the signs to prove it.

Here are a couple of real winners here... one even on a child.. who didn't even have a clue I am sure who he was talking about.



And this one, which shows exactly where these people get their ideas and their brainwashing from. Please note the SPELLING...sorry I should have pointed that out earlier.. Thanks Sue for bringing it to my attention again.



For more pictures, go check out Sue's blog at Helloooo...Mr. President, are you listening? She has a great bunch of the Wingnuttery there. She's been watching it for a couple of days and writing about it.. She also has some of the perpetrators coming to her blog that are fun to debate with... lol

Bob Cesca has been posting quite a bit on the wingnuts and the pictures at his place and as always is on top of most of the asshattery. So you can check out Bob Cesca's Awesome Blog! Go! and find all kinds of wonderful stuff.

My newest friend in the blog world is TomCat.. MauiGirl pointed me at him and I have quickly come to love his blog and him.. He is wonderful and has been around for a while, but due to tragic circumstances had to be off the net for a while. Now he is back and better than ever. So go check him out at Politics Plus.

Then there are just all the others on the rolls.. you can check them out but those 3 are the most important. So check out Sue, Bob and Tom.. You won't regret the time you spend at any of them.

There have been some comments and some arguments by certain people about the size of the crowds, so here is a comparison shot of the crowd yesterday and the crowd at Pres. Obama's Inauguration. The picture on the right was taken we know on Jan. 20th and the crowd was estimated at about 1.5 million people. Today, the DC Fire department has estimated the size of the crowd at around 60,000. Nowhere near the 2 million Michelle Malkin tried to claim and what she said ABC News stated, however ABC has refuted that claim and said they NEVER said that in any way shape or form.

Take a look at this shot and tell me what the crowd looks like to you.

My Comments on the Comments

A commenter told me he was disappointed in Pres. Obama and his list is included. I wanted a chance to refute his claims as to why he was disappointed and see what it was and if I could make him happier. Here is his list.. I will try to answer them after.. Please leave anything you would like to add in the comments.. Thanks all.


• Obama was anti-Iraq war when Bush started it, but he has been way too slow shutting it down.

He is still Anti-Iraq war and is following his time line and the time line he was given by the commanders and by the SOFA. Actually I believe they are going to be out sooner than they planned even so. It does take time to move men and equipment out of battle. It would be nice to be able to just say "Come Home" and they all magically appear.. but it doesn't work that way...

• Obama has expanded the foolish Afghanistan war. What are we accomplishing there?

This was something he said he was going to do.. There is nothing here that is new or not stated all along. Why are you surprised over this. He ALWAYS said he would do this. It was his intent all along to escalate the war in Afghanistan. He never hinted, stated or implied anything to the contrary.

• Obama has not shut down Gitmo, and has continued Bush rendition policies. A detainee has recounted recent torture under the Obama administration. Obama has continued Bush detention and torture policies.

No, he hasn't continued the torture policies. That is just not true. He is shutting down Gitmo and if he had been allowed to do it it would have been done. Congress is the one who blocked him, by refusing to grant him the money needed to get it closed. To lay all this on the President is just wrong. As for renditions, yes, but they weren't just Bush policies, those have been in place since Eisenhower.. They are policy going back years and years. Nothing is going to change them, I am afraid. Now they are just more in the open.

• Obama has been way too wimpy in this health care reform fight. He ought to tell the Blue Dogs to get on board or else, the way Bush or LBJ would have done. There's one instance where he should have followed Bush's example. I'm afraid his bipartisan stance is going to allow the Republicans to win.

Did you read my earlier post at all?.. He is doing much better than LBJ did when he passed Medicare. To say he is doing better is trying to rewrite History and is just plain wrong. LBJ got a mediocre bill passed and then with add ons later we got a decent bill that made Medicare what it is today. To say he has been way too wimpy is just being silly and rather obtuse.

• His economic recovery gave billions -- trillions to the banks without helping the little guy at all. The banks responded by tightening the screws on their credit card customers and giving huge tax paid bonuses to their top execs.

His economic recovery?? That started under BUSH... here we go rewriting history again. Remember that was in September of 2008, and there was nothing that Barack Obama could do except vote for or against it, he was still candidate Obama at that time. Since then yes, after the election he has had a little hand in some of this, and most of his policies have been geared toward Main Street.

Where's the Change We Can Believe In? Obama is even distancing himself now from Eric Holder's prosecution of Bush's War Criminals. He opposed publication of more torture photos. Bush's people did things we executed Nazis and Japanese for. Obama would rather let it slide. I am puzzled by Obama. He is a Constitutional scholar. I just don't get it.

This last one, I answered at your blog but will do it again here, Yes, Pres. Obama has distanced himself from AG Holder and the prosecution of any and all war crimes. That is considered Separation of Powers and is defined in the Constitution. He should do that. To do anything less than that would be to become more like Bush and that's not what we want. That's what Bush did.. was to circumvent the Constitution and politicize the Attorney General's Office, yet you are asking him to do just exactly that. Sorry, but that's not what I voted for and that's not what I would want him to do.

I hope I answered your questions and helped you some. I am not the only one who feels this President has done well so far and is getting a bum rap. There are several others who feel the same way.

I think there are a lot of people who are jumping on the Obama has failed bandwagon very early in this presidency. And for some reason they are on the left side of politics. Frank Schaeffer sees the same thing. Here is his take on it:

The Left Is Also Obama's Problem
Can the left learn to keep its mouth shut once in a while? Does the American left know how to win wars or just skirmishes? Does the left want change or does it demand perfection? You can't have both in this life.

No one has been a tougher critic of the Republican Party, the Religious Right and various wing nuts out to destroy the Obama presidency than me. Few ordinary Americans (that I know of) have taken more heat (and hate) for their support of the President than me either. Former right wing religious right leaders like me are never forgiven for joining the reality-based community!

Believe me, with my old "friends" on the right I don't need more enemies! (Just check out Fox News smearing of me last week with insanely out-of-context clips on the O'Reilly Factor lifted and edited from Maddow interviewing me.) So I'm hesitant to knock the left. I guess I don't like the idea of all sides pissed off with me at once. But in the light of how and why the debate over health care is being dominated by the loony right maybe the left is partly to blame for the stalemate on health care reform.

Last week the New York Times noted a lack of enthusiasm on the part of Obama's former foot soldiers when it comes to rising to the occasion and pouring on the support for health care reform. ("Health Debate Fails to Ignite Obama's Grass Roots," August 15.) Why the lack of enthusiasm?

It's because the left has made the classic mistake of going for a whole loaf and therefore risking getting nothing. The left has proved itself as impatient as the right and just as shortsighted, given that the lefty sniping at the Obama administration started almost from day one. And now after barely six months in office the people who worked so hard to get him elected have seemingly lost their enthusiasm for another fight on behalf of Obama.

What sapped the yes-we-can optimistic, hope-filled bedrock supporters' will? Who sapped it?

There is a connection between sniping from the left -- the drip, drip, drip of criticism, the demand for instant perfection, be it from those taking shots Obama's economic policy and claiming that the President is in the hip pocket of Wall Street -- and those saying he cut some sort of evil deal with pharmaceutical companies, and the lop-sided "debate" on health care. The right didn't sap anyone's will who voted for Obama. The left shot itself in the foot.

It seems to me that Obama's critics on the left just don't understand governing. If Franklin Roosevelt had had this quality of "support" from his bedrock constituency there would have been no New Deal and we would have never entered the war to defeat fascism. In fact today's left seems to have a death wish of exercising the "right" to snarky frivolity when it's time to get serious.

The American left has a choice: follow our moderately progressive Democrat president and support him when he most needs it most, or allow our whole project to be derailed by the far (increasingly fascist) right. If it is derailed, sure -- the Republicans played a part. But so did the know-it-all left, all because the left's pontificators -- including those right here in the Huffington Post -- would rather be heard than humbly offer their support to our President (or anyone else) and see change actually happen.

Why?

It strikes me that the left suffers from a sort of crazy First Amendment knee-jerk twitch comparable the the right's sick Second Amendment twitch! The right thinks it must collect guns, the left thinks it must express opinions, and damn the real world consequences. Hey, so Obama fails! Well at least I got my say!

The right is irredeemably sick. The left is just silly. Together the silly and the sick may just do us in. If Limbaugh gets his Obama-must-fail wish, look in the mirror.

On the right the election literally broke their racist brains. This is now the day of the old angry white men once again. And how has the left responded? Did we circle the wagons and hang tough with our young black president? No everyone waded in.

The open question is this: Is the left going to be dominated by its talkers or get on with governance that can only happen with near infinite patience and loyal support? Does the left know how to follow a leader and get something done?

Q: "You mean I have to behave like a regular citizen once in a while and let the people I elect do their job?!"

A: If our self-styled free thinkers decide loyalty is beneath them and have forgotten how to compromise and live in the real world, a few election cycles from now the left is going to find itself reduced to screaming down their far right opposition at town hall meetings.

We have a great president. We have a chance for real change and we'd better use it. Sarah Palin and company are waiting in the wings.

My old friends on the far right are counting on the stupidity of right wing white America to believe their lies. They are also counting on the left being so in love with the sound of its own voice that the left can't govern.

How different things would be right now had everyone who voted for President Obama stuck by him and his administration with total determination, and waited until he had a chance to implement -- and test -- his programs, before wading in with the nit-picking.

The left faces the implacable and loony right. The chips are down. Support the President.

And once again, from one of my favorite bloggers, Bob Cesca, and if you don't read him you really should.. he says this.. and this was a couple of weeks ago:

The Republicans, talk radio and Fox News are fabricating off-the-wall lies practically on a daily basis. The Healther crazies are mobilized by corporate lobbyists. Blue Dogs are holding up progress. The corporate press is all but signing the death sentence for Healthcare Reform 2009. And the public option? Jesus H, I long for the days when we were just fighting for that -- now it looks like we'll be lucky to get any sort of healthcare reform in general.

So what do we do when these enemies are so well defined and screaming out for razor-sharp counterattacks?

Why, we're liberals and progressives. We attack each other, of course!

For example, four of the eight Recommended Diaries on Daily Kos are screeds attacking the administration. I don't know quite what to make of this dynamic, but the overall narrative seems skewed and misguided right now. I can say for certain that, whether justified or not, there's a time and a place for everything, and, right now, there are a clear set of opposition targets and they're ripe for the picking.

Adding... To clarify, I don't have any problem with being critical of the Obama administration or holding him accountable. I've gone down that road many times. And I will probably flip my shit if he signs a healthcare reform bill without the public option. However, what drives me insane is this exaggerated whiny "he's betraying us!" or "he's just like Bush!" horseshit.

Bob goes on in that post to site this list, which comes from a commenter at DailyKos called jonnie rae..

He stabilized the markets, so 401Ks are starting to slowly come back and we are not about to meltdown anymore.

Unemployment numbers are coming down dramatically from when he took over.

GDP went from 6.5 shrinkage to 1 shrinkage since he has been in office.

Tens of thousands of state employees still have jobs, and services are maintained because of his stimulus.

He ended torture.

He IS closing Gitmo.

95% of Americans are receiving a tax DECREASE.

He provided unemployment, food stamps and a 65% reduction in Cobra for those who lost their jobs.

He set new emissions standards.

He protected wilderness land set for oil leases.

He got Pakistan to agree to fight the Taliban, which Bush never could. The top leader was taken out this week.

He nominated and got confirmed the first latina Supreme Court Justice in history.

He signed Equal Pay for Equal Work, Children's Health Bill and Credit Card Reform.

He has a first time home owner's credit, a modification of mortgage plan in place. (This needs work, but it is in place)

He has made it easier for students to get college loans. (UMass just gave a 1500 rebate to all students because of the stimulus money.)

He has improved America's image around the world, especially with Muslim countries.

He got the 2 NK journalists out.

He got the non-proliferation treaties going again, and he will chair the next meeting. Already an agreement exists to reduce Russia's and US's arms.

A significant amount of the bailout money is being paid back. This is a good thing.

He has taken on healthcare, the most difficult thing to pass in the US. I am not completely happy with how he is doing it, but he is doing it.*

He ended the abstinence only thing. And the law that said a pharmacist could refuse to give birth control pills to women if they so chose.

He is sticking to the timetable to withdraw troops from Iraq.

He got funding for the useless bomber cut.And those heliocoptors. He plans to make more weapons' cuts.

He has cut 2 trillion from the budget over the next ten years.

He has taken on energy, the second most difficult thing to pass in the US and it has already passed the House.

He saved the American auto industry. (Cash for clunkers is doing great too, both for the industry and jobs, and for the environment.)

He is building a green economy for the US. First steps in the stimulus, others in the energy bill.

More jobs will be created in transportation when rest of stimulus kicks in in 2010.

He is facing complete disrespect and vilification from the media and the wingnuts,getting more than 30 death threats per day,and still goes on, calmly and with determination and intelligence.

* He has no champions in the Senate, only a small group of obstructionists who seem to have been given all the power by Harry Reid. The insurance industry has convinced people that he is Hitler; and this is only the beginning. If Pharma gets into it, what do you think will happen to healthcare? They have way more money than the insurance companies. You want him to fight all the corporate interests which actually OWN this country, including the Senate and Congress,and you want him to do that virtually alone? The left has attacked him almost from day one. The right is throwing the kitchen sink right now.

Now, if this isn't enough there is also this article from the Washington Monthly and Steve Benen who quotes E.J. Dionne and they are talking about how Pres. Obama is not getting the credit he deserves for the financial crisis and how he handled it.

It is a great read and you should check it out. They lay it out that Bush got credit for how he handled 9-11 even though he mis-handled it before hand.

He also quotes Ezra Klein who states that because Pres. Obama didn't let the crisis get out of hand and stopped it before it went out of control people don't realize exactly what he did.

Those are my thoughts and some thoughts of others around the web.. let me know what you think. Tell me and we can fix this together..

Where is the Outrage Now? Is this Disrespecting Our Flag?

You have to see this from ShowMeProgress, They have decided to take on the Governor from the north, no I mean way north.

It seems she is using the flag as a prop in a photo shoot she did. And it is not very respectful. According to a blurb on MSNBC, and I didn't catch exactly what was said, this is illegal, but it is questionable as to whether it is the photographer or Palin who would be in trouble. Looks like both to me, she should know better, as a government official, but I am not sure. I will update if I hear more later.

The picture in question is one of a series used in the feature article in Runner's World and can be found here.

As you can see from the picture, she is standing next to a bar stool and leaning on a flag. The flag is draped over the stool and not hung like it should be.

Remember during the campaign, all the flack over the flag pin or lack thereof..or the hand over the heart during the playing of the National Anthem, and how that was being less than patriotic..

Now, we have Palin trying to show off her runners physique, all the while demanding everyone take her serious draped over the top of the flag, disrespecting it. Then trying to challenge the President to a race..

Then, after we see this picture of her on the flag, comes this video released by someone in Sarah PAC, then later denied by them.



You tell me.. what are they up to here.. of course this version isn't quite as bad as the first one they came out with. The first version of this video was even more disgusting and demeaning to the President.

This woman who seems to think she is already in a run for higher office, when she can't even take care of the people in her state is failing big time.

She is now potentially facing charges for violating the flag and if she keeps up, she is going to have more than the 18 ethics charges in Alaska against her.

Stay classy Sarah.

h/t Bob Cesca & Andrew Sullivan

Newest Ad For MoveOn from Lee Stranahan

Here is MoveOn.org's newest ad from Lee Stranahan. It features our favorite FORMER VP Dick Cheney, and uses his famous words to put him right back in his place. (How I wish it would put him back in that Undisclosed location, never to be heard from again.)

Watch and let me know what you think, and if you really like you can go to Bob Cesca's and let Lee know what you think.

Santelli is a Fraud and a Rethuglican Cheat

I think we all have seen the rant from the floor of the Board of Trade by Rick Santelli the other day. How he called on Pres. Obama to stop with the Mortgage Fix he proposed and yelling about how it was forcing him to pay his neighbors mortgage.

Well, even though he was totally wrong about all his facts, he says he has a following. Maybe he does. As long as he is surrounded by people on the trading floor and they have to answer to him, and support what he is saying.

But, if he had really read the plan as it was proposed, and realized that it was not a reward for bad behaviour and not going to bail out the speculators and the ones who were flipping houses and lieing on their applications as he said, maybe he might have a leg to stand on.

This morning, I was reading over at Bob Cesca's GDAB and noticed a link to PoliticalCarnival. So I clicked over and was reading some of the posts there. Well, guess what I found. I found where someone had discovered that Santelli's rant was scripted and he had been outed.

It was posted to twitter by someone and here it is:

@Meryl333 the Santelli rant was totally scripted Meryl and the reaction on Internet press and twitter exactly what CNBC wanted. Cramer 2
about 11 hours ago from Tweetie in reply to Meryl333

I have hammered Chris Matthews lately about his treatment of Pres. Obama but at least he did point out that Santelli was off in his rant on this matter. He questioned his motives and then questioned his politics. Santelli admitted that he was a Republican and voted for McCain.

There was also an interview of Santelli by Brian Williams, Matt Lauer and Steve Liesman talked to him about his rant.. watch it below:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

He shows his ignorance and his selfishness. It's all about him and no one else.. typical rethuglican ignorance and it's ok if it is us doing it not you.