Showing posts with label Chrysler. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Chrysler. Show all posts

Wednesday, April 4, 2018

The Horrors and Destruction that Donald Trump Has Imposed On America...Just Kidding! Part 7

Before we start today’s discussion, let’s review my voting history: 
  • I have never voted for a Republican for President in my life. 
  • Thus, I did not vote for Trump. 
  • I have rarely voted for a Republican for national office in my life. 
A little over a year ago, many liberals, Democrats, and millennials were besides themselves with grief and fear because their pre-ordained queen, Hillary Clinton, was not elected President. Instead, Donald Trump was elected, an individual that these same people despised, hated, and feared, an individual they felt would endanger and possibly destroy the country and our democracy. For the past year they fretted, worried and lashed out at anything or anyone that even remotely smelled of Donald Trump.

Given that Trump has been in office for just over a year, I thought, that as someone who did not vote for him, it would be a good idea to review the horror, trauma, and terrible things that Trump has subjected the country to in just one short year. This obviously a very sarcastic comment when you take an unbiased look at what has happened during the Trump Presidency. The six previous posts we did on this topic identified over 100 good things that have happened to America and Americans since Trump became President:






But those six posts were not enough to cover the good things that have happened since the election. Already I found another set of ways why the country is better off since Trump came into office and thus, today we add to that list:
  1. National consumer confidence jumped up in February to the second highest level since 2004, 14 years ago, according to the most recent University of Michigan survey.
  2. In that same survey, Americans' perceptions of their own finances rose over 4% over the previous month.
  3. In that same survey, 35% of respondents gave favorable references to government policies (likely as a result of the Trump tax cuts and bonus payments), the highest level of favorability in half a century.
  4. Most automakers reported great sales in March with General Motors sales up 16% from the previous March, Chrysler saw a 14% year over year gain, the Jeep brand sales were up 45% and experienced their best sales month EVER, and most other car makers also saw year over year sales increases.
  5. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos recently and correctly announced that the Federal education failure known as Common Core was basically a relic from the past: “I agree — and have always agreed — with President Trump on this: ‘Common Core is a disaster. And at the U.S. Department of Education, Common Core is dead.”
Another five reasons to add to the previous 120 or so reasons why the first year and a few months of the Trump Presidency has not wrought disaster on the country.

Given your gross error in judgment relative to Trump, let me ask that you to do us all a favor by implementing the following changes in your behavior and attitude:
  • Chill out, tamp down your TDS affliction. No matter how much you hate Trump on a sexist, personal basis, get over it. He is the legally and duly elected President, he will be around for a while so refocus your hatred on more constructive issues and matters. You will live a lot longer if you take your hatred out of your heart and soul and devote it to something positive.
  • I would really appreciate it if some of you would apologize to the Trump voters you have disrespected in some of the grossest terms possible over the past year. You have called millions of voters racists, ignorant, stupid, Nazis, KKK members, and other horrible names simply because you disagreed with their voting choice. No American should be called such disgusting names simply because they exercised their Constitutional rights to the best of their abilities. Plus, slandering over 60 million Americans is no way to unite the country and get it focused on the real issues facing us all.
  • More personally, I would like, no I am demanding, an apology from some of you for your slanderous and disgusting name calling because in doing so, you insulted and disrespected my sister, my family members, my friends, and my co-workers who simply voted their conscience. I will defend their right to vote anyway they wanted and will no put up with your childish and vicious venom and bile directed at them, very important people in my life
  • And finally, I challenge you to read the following blog post, a post that shows quite clearly that it was hateful people like some of you and your silence during the Obama years that actually caused Trump to be elected. Thus, the people you hate for voting for Trump are actually looking back at you in the mirror:
https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2016/03/how-american-liberals-and-washington.html

If you were silent in the dozens of instances listed in this post then you were responsible for the very thing you hate: a Trump Presidency. Or put another way, a so far successful and productive Trump Presidency. Over 120 accomplishments in less than a year is not too shabby despite many of wanting both Trump and the country to fail.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:


www.loathemygovernment.com

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org

http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w








Thursday, August 13, 2015

The Obama Administration: The Type Of Presidency That Nixon Aspired To

Back in early 2014 we did a series of six posts that were very critical of the Obama administration up to that point. Our criticisms ranging from the inability to operate efficient and effective government services to promises that were never fulfilled to outright lies, especially in the area of Obama Care, to impeachable and treasonable activities. The first three posts looked at dozens of failures of this administration that were not impeachable offenses, just general incompetence and deceit. The first of those three posts can be accessed at:


The first twenty failures listed, just to give you an idea of how widespread the ineptness is, went as follows:

1) He promised to quickly shut down the oppressive detention center at Guantanamo Bay shortly after being elected but failed to do. This has resulted in the American taxpayer paying out almost half a billion dollars a year to keep the detention facility up and running.

Relevant Obama quote: "We will close the detention camp in Guantanamo Bay, the location of so many of the worst constitutional abuses in recent years." 

2) He promised to cut the annual deficit in half but instead ran up record setting TRILLION dollar deficits for four years in a row.

Relevant Obama quote: “What my budget does is…by the middle of this decade our annual spending will match our annual revenues. We will not be adding more to the national debt.”

Relevant Obama quote: “When George Bush came into office, our debt—national debt—was around $5 trillion. It’s now over $10 trillion. We’ve almost doubled it… But actually I’m cutting more than I’m spending, so it will be a net spending cut.” 

3) He promised that if his economic stimulus program was not implemented, unemployment could go as high as 8%. The program was implemented and unemployment skyrocketed well beyond 8% and stayed there for a record number of consecutive months.

4) He promised that economic programs such as Cash For Clunkers would stimulate the economy but subsequent analysis has shown that all those programs did was waste billions of dollars for no economic benefit. The latest analysis by the Brookings Institute shows conclusively that Cash For Clunkers involved about 380,000 vehicles, none of which were incremental, economic stimulating sales, they were sales that would have happened anyway but without taxpayer support.

Relevant Obama quote: “Now, more American consumers will have the chance to purchase newer, more fuel efficient cars and the American economy will continue to get a much-needed boost."

5) He has abused and disrespected our armed forces’ veterans by allowing veterans’ benefits requests turnaround time to skyrocket to over a year, coldly and unnecessarily shutting down veteran memorials during the sequester, and legislation that reduces veterans’ benefits.

Relevant Obama quote: “When you take off the uniform, we will serve you as well as you've served us - because no one who fights for this country should have to fight for a job, or a roof over their head, or the care that they need when they come home.”

6) He has presided over economic policies that has seen about a 50% increase in the number of Americans that are receiving government food assistance, a total of about 47 million Americans.

7) He has presided over economic policies that have left well over 20 million Americans either unemployed or under employed.

Relevant Obama quote (Associated Press, July, 2013): "Four out of 5 U.S. adults struggle with joblessness, near poverty or reliance on welfare for at least parts of their lives, a sign of deteriorating economic security and an elusive American dream." 

8) He has presided over economic policies that have resulted in large numbers of college graduates unable to land a job in their preferred profession, assuming they can find a job at all.

9) He presided over economic policies that have kept minority unemployment levels substantially higher than the overall unemployment rates in America.

10) He has presided over an $833 billion economic stimulus program that was so inefficient that it conservatively cost over $300,000 per job created or saved, an unsustainable and failed economic policy.

Dozens and dozens of other failures can be followed up on by accessing the two blog posts listed after the linked post above.

We then spent three days worth of posts to discuss the actions of the Obama administration that were quite likely impeachable actions and offenses. The first of those more serious posts can be accessed at:


The first ten impeachable offenses listed in that post, to give you an idea of how widespread his impeachable actions are, along with the parts of the Constitution and Bill of Rights he violated and abused include:

1) He led the United States into a major military action against the country of Libya, spending well over a billion dollars of taxpayer wealth and placing our armed forces in danger without the approval of Congress, violating the War Powers Act and Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution.

2) He refused to fire James Clapper, a high ranking member of the President’s national security team after Clapper lied to Congress about how much electronic information the National Security Agency (NSA) was collecting on every American citizen, becoming an accessory after the fact in Clapper's lying to Congress.

3) He signed the latest NDAA legislation whose sections 1021 and 1022 allow for the indefinite detention of American citizens, without trial, who the government considers terrorist suspects until the vague “end of hostilities,” which violates the habeas corpus protection of American citizens under Article I Section 9 of the Constitution.

4) He personally signed off on the assassination of American citizens in foreign lands, e.g. the killing of American citizen Anwar al-Awlaki via a drone attack in Yemen, denying him and other citizens a fair trial by their peers, negating the rights, and lives, of al-Awlaki and at least three other American citizens, violating their right “to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” the Fourth Amendment, and the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution.

5) He has repeatedly and in varied ways denied members of our armed forces to their right to personally celebrate, follow, and take comfort in their personal Christian religion and faith, violating the First Amendment to the Constitution.

6) His administration’s development and deployment of the Fast and Furious gun running operation to supply weapons to violent Mexican drug cartels has violated any number of laws including:
  • The illegal shipment of weapons to criminal organizations.
  • Violations of international treaties regarding illegal gun smuggling.
  • Abetting the violence of those cartels who used Fast and Furious weapons to kill innocent Mexican civilians and a U.S. border agent, Brian Terry.
  • Denying Congress and Congressional investigators access to pertinent Fast and Furious executive branch documents needed to investigate the alleged transgressions by claiming executive privilege.
6) He unilaterally delayed the small business (SHOP) mandates from his own Obama Care legislation, without Congressional approval, violating Article II, Sections 3 and 4 of the Constitution.

7) He unilaterally delayed the employer mandates, without Congressional approval, from his own Obama Care legislation without Congressional, violating Article II, Sections 3 and 4 of the Constitution.

8) He unilaterally decided, without Congressional approval, that Obama Care enrollees in states using only the Federal health care exchange, i.e. those states that did not set up their own Obama Care exchange, would also be eligible for Obama Care subsidies, violating his own Obama Care legislation and violating Article II, Sections 3 and 4 of the Constitution.

9) He unilaterally decided, without Congressional approval, that those personal insurance policies that insurance companies had to legally terminate as a result of Obama Care could indeed stay in effect, violating Article II, Sections 3 and 4 of the Constitution.

10) He unilaterally decided, without Congressional approval, to change out many more tenets and deadlines of the Obama Care legislation (e.g. delaying the caps on out of pocket medical expenses, waiving the income proof requirement for subsidies, waiving the criminal background checks on Obama Care navigators, etc.), violating Article II, Sections 3 and 4 of the Constitution.

The dozens of other impeachable offenses he may have incurred can be accessed by going to the post that immediately followed the link cited above.

Now, before we go any further, let me again make clear that in know way can I be considered a Republican,conservative, neocon, etc. and that I am just out to do a hatchet job on this Presidency. I have never voted for a Republican for President and not until 2010 did I vote for a Republican for national office since I began voting back in the 1970s. The above accusations and observations are based strictly on reality and the words in the Constitution and Bill of Rights,not my political leanings.

Which gets us to the following 76 points. This list is a new, recent  list from Senator Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican Senator who is running for President. I include his list here for four reasons:
  • It is an update/refresher list of offenses and impeachable actions that update my posts from back in early 2014.
  • It includes impeachable offenses that I did not include.
  • However, it does include a lot of the same impeachable offenses that I researched and identified back in early 2014 that does lend credibility to his entire list.
  • Thus, just because he is a Republican it does not mean his listing of 76 impeachable offenses by a Democratic President are invalid, not true, and not reality.
Since back in early 2014 I have often may the claim that we are living through the most lawless and unConstitutional political class and Presidential administration of all time, the following list from Senator Cruz does nothing to contradict that observation and conclusion:

1. Disregarded 1996 welfare reform law in granting broad work waivers for work requirements of Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF).

2. Implemented portions of the DREAM Act, which Congress rejected, by executive action.

3. Ended some terror asylum restrictions, by allowing asylum for people who provided only “insignificant” or “limited” material support of terrorists.

4. Allowed immigrants in the U.S. illegally, who are relatives of military troops and veterans, to stay in the country and get legal status.

5. Extended federal marriage benefits by recognizing, under federal law, same-sex marriages created in a state that allows same-sex marriage even if the couple is living in a state that doesn’t recognize same-sex marriage.

6. Recognized same-sex marriage in Utah, even though the Supreme Court stayed the court order recognizing same-sex marriage in Utah and Utah said it would not recognize same-sex marriages performed before the stay.

7. Refused to prosecute violation of drug laws with certain mandatory minimums.

8. Issued signing statements, refusing to enforce parts of Congressional-enacted statutes.

9. Illegally refused to act on Yucca Mountain’s application to become a nuclear waste repository.

10. Falsely portrayed the Benghazi terrorist attack as a spontaneous protest against an anti-Muslim YouTube video, and then lied about the White House’s involvement.

11. Illegally revealed the existence of sealed indictments in the Benghazi investigation.

12. Failed to enforce the Magnitsky Act as required by law, by not adding Russian human rights abusers to a list of people not permitted to travel to or do business in the U.S.

13. Killed four Americans overseas in counterterrorism operations without judicial process.

14. Continued to give Egypt aid after the military took over its government, even though federal law prohibits aid to Egypt in the event of a coup.

15. Granted a “hardship” exemption from the individual mandate for people whose health plans were canceled because their plans weren’t Obamacare compliant.

16. Delayed the individual mandate for two years.

17. Allowed individuals to buy health insurance plans in 2014 that did not comply with Obamacare. Extended this delay until 2016—past the mid-term elections.

18. Extended the deadline to enroll in Obamacare.

19. Illegally granted businesses a waiver from Obamacare’s employer mandate. Twice.

20. Illegally continued the Obamacare employer contribution for congressional staffs.

21. Illegally delayed the Obamacare caps on out-of-pocket healthcare payments.

22. Illegally delayed Obamacare verification of eligibility for healthcare subsidies.

23. Illegally required people to violate their faith via the Obamacare contraception mandate.

24. As of May 2011, over 50% of Obamacare waiver beneficiaries were union members (who account for less than 12% of the American work force).

25. Ordered Boeing to fire 1,000 employees in South Carolina and shut down a new factory because it was non-union.

26. Implemented a moratorium on offshore drilling after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill without statutory authority, and continued to enact new versions after federal courts repeatedly invalidated the moratorium.

27. Treated secured creditors worse than unsecured creditors in the Chrysler bankruptcy.

28. Terminated the pensions of 20,000 non-union Delphi employees in the GM bankruptcy.

29. Had SWAT teams raid a Gibson guitar factory and seize property, on the purported basis that Gibson had broken India’s environmental laws—but no charges were filed.

30. Government agencies are engaging in “Operation Choke Point,” where the government asks banks to “choke off” access to financial services for customers engaging in conduct the Administration does not like—such as “ammunition sales.”

31. Made illegal “recess” appointments to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the National Labor Relations Board when Congress wasn’t in recess. Ignored the rulings of three federal courts of appeals that held those nominations unconstitutional. 2.

32. Appointed czars to oversee federal policy specifically because czars do not require Senate confirmation, earning criticism from stalwart Democrats such as West Virginia Sen. Robert Byrd and Wisconsin Sen. Russ Feingold.

33. As of January 2012, 36 of the President’s executive office staff owed $833,970 in back taxes.

34. As of 2011, 311,566 federal employees or retirees owed $3.5 billion in taxes.

35. Illegally targeted conservative groups for heightened IRS scrutiny.

36. Circumvented the Freedom of Information Act, by requiring White House Counsel review of all documents to be released under the Freedom of Information Act that the Administration believed pertained to “White House equities”—and then delayed in producing many of these documents by FOIA’s statutory deadline, or didn’t produce them at all.

37. Got secret permission from the FISA Court to reverse restrictions on the National Security Agency’s use of intercepted phone calls and emails, permitting the NSA to search American’s communications in its databases.

38. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is seeking to monitor about 80% of U.S. credit card transactions.

39. Targeted Fox News reporter James Rosen by falsely labeling him a possible “co-conspirator” in a criminal investigation of a new leak.

40. Secretly obtained phone records from staff at the Associated Press.

41. Had meetings with lobbyists in coffee shops near White House to avoid disclosure requirements.

42. Aided drug cartels instead of enforcing immigration laws—as found by a federal judge. Border Patrol agents, multiple times, knowingly helped smuggle illegal immigrant children into the U.S.; “the DHS is encouraging parents to seriously jeopardize the safety of their children.”

43. Illegally sold thousands of guns to criminals, in the operation known as Fast and Furious and then refused to comply with congressional subpoenas about the operation.

44. Dismissed charges filed by Bush Administration against New Black Panther Party members who were videotaped intimidating voters at a Philadelphia polling station during the 2008 election.

45. Argued for expansive federal powers in the Supreme Court, which has rejected the Administration’s arguments unanimously 9 times since January 2012.

46. Sued Louisiana to stop school vouchers and keep low-income minorities trapped in failing schools.

47. Threatened to arrest military priests for practicing their faith during the partial government shutdown.

48. Muzzled the speech of military chaplains.

49. Sued fire departments saying their multiple-choice, open-book written employment tests were racially discriminatory.

50. Gave 23,994 tax refunds worth more than $46 million to aliens here illegally using the same address in Atlanta, GA.

51. Released a mentally ill Guantanamo detainee… who had been a high-risk al Qaeda fighter in jihad combat since the 1980s.

52. Backed release of the Lockerbie bomber, Abdel Baset al-Megrahi.

53. President Obama told NASA administrator to “find a way to reach out to the Muslim world.”

54. Claimed the Fort Hood shooting was “workplace violence” rather than terrorism.

55. Signed a stimulus bill that spent money on bonuses for AIG executives, and then acted shocked and outraged at the bonuses.

56. Gave $535 million to Solyndra, which went bankrupt; Solyndra shareholders and officials made substantial donations to Obama’s campaign.

57. Reneged on a campaign promise to cut the deficit in half by the end of his first term in office.

58. Increased the national debt more in one term than President Bush did in two terms.

59. Extended mortgage assistance to people who bought multiple homes during the housing bubble.

60. Proposed rules that would have decimated family farms, by prohibiting children under 18 from doing many forms of farm work.

61. Former “safe schools czar” has written about his past drug abuse and advocated promoting homosexuality in schools.

62. Nominated Timothy Geithner—who had significant tax issues —to head the Treasury Department, which enforces tax laws.

63. Reneged on campaign promise to broadcast healthcare reform negotiations on C-SPAN.

64. Reneged on a campaign promise to wait five days before signing any non-emergency bill (at least 10 times during first 3 months in office).

65. Unilaterally, increased the minimum wage for federal contract workers from $7.25 to $10.10, via executive order.

66. Cancelled all White House tours after sequestration—purportedly saving $18,000 per week—even though President Obama had spent more than $1 million in tax money to golf with Tiger Woods one weekend a few weeks before.

67. Adopted pro-union “ambush election” rules.

68. Pressured Ford to pull an anti-auto-bailout TV ad.

69. Actively, aided in George Zimmerman protests.

70. Tried to seize a privately owned motel when guests used illegal drugs at the motel.

71. Shut down the Amber Alert website, while keeping up Let’s Move website, during the partial government shutdown.

72. Gave supervised release to a convicted criminal (an alien here illegally) who later killed a nun in a DUI.

73. Shut down an Amish farm for selling fresh unpasteurized milk across state lines.

74. Spent $7 million per household in “stimulus funds” to connect a few Montana households to the Internet.

75. Spent $205,075 in “stimulus” funds to relocate a shrub that sells for $16.

76. Fired an inspector general after investigating an $850,000 AmeriCorps grant received by a nonprofit run by former NBA star and Obama supporter Kevin Johnson (now mayor of Sacramento).

Now, granted, many of these are not impeachable offenses. They are signs of incompetence, hubris, and general arrogance. But dozens of Cruz’s statements are impeachable offenses for which nothing has been done. Which gets us to the title of today’s post: The Obama administration is the type of Presidency that Nixon aspired to. Lawless, un-Constitutional, ruthless, uncaring, and petty, everything Nixon was and more.



Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:


www.loathemygovernment.com

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org

http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w


Tuesday, December 10, 2013

December, 2013 Political Class Insanity, Bonus Post: ATF Loses Millions Of Cigarettes, FBI and NSA Go Wild, Detroit Goes Poof, and More

Okay, one last set of insanity for this month, courtesy of the American political class, As I feared, no sooner had we stopped writing about the lunacy and wasteful spending of the American political class, another wave of insanity hits us, requiring one last bonus post for this month.

The basis of this last insanity post is the current issue of Reason magazine. Reason is a great source of news and analysis when it comes to freedom and liberties. They provide deeper insights to the ways the political class is continually stripping us of our rights as government’s tentacles reach deeper and deeper into our wallets.

One of their monthly features is a section called ‘Citings” where they give quick hits on what we call political class insanity. The first four hits below are from their January, 2014 issue and the remaining hit is just another broken promise and boast from our current President.

1) It is no secret that the Obama administration, using the National Security Agency, has shredded the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution and the protection against unreasonable and unwarranted searches of our lives. This issue of Reason gives a little perspective on just one aspect of this intrusion into our private lives, for no reason:
  • According to a report and analysis from the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Security Agency, every 90 days for the past seven years, has obtained secret warrants and orders from the ultra secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court that compelled telecommunications carriers to give the Federal government the total telephone calling records, international and domestic, on EVERY American from EVERY day.
  • Since 2008, the FBI was given free rein to investigate American citizens that were not even suspected of any crime or wrongdoing. Imagine the potential for abuse from that activity.
  • The ACLU found that from 2009 to 2011, the FBI opened over 82,000 of these types of intrusive investigations and found less than 3,500 (only about 4%) justified any further investigation.
  • It was not reported how many of those meager 3,500 actually led to any criminal or terrorist arrests or cases. 
  • Thus, about 80,000 Americans secretly had their private lives violated without cause and without their knowledge.
The Fourth Amendment ceases to exist when government agents can capriciously get into your private communications for absolutely no reason or justification and not even have to tell you they did so. That is insanity in a free society.

2) Political class insanity does exist solely at the Federal government level. We have often covered the insanity at the local and state government levels. Consider a law and court case from the state of Texas. 

Let’s assume you found that you were really good at braiding hair. You figure you have a skill with minimal overhead that could make some money and possibly a career out of. Great, braiding someone’s hair does not require the use of harsh chemicals, noxious gases, dangerous and sharp instruments, or any other dangerous process. You are just creatively twisting someone else’s hair at their request. 

However, the assumption that this type of business has low overhead would be false. According to Texas state law, in order to simply braid hair in Texas, you have to maintain an official “barber college.” This entails having a facility with at least 2,000 square feet of space, you have to have multiple mannequins and associated wash stations, and you have to have 2,250 hours of training, hours that must cost a lot of money. All to braid someone’s hair. Lunacy.

This is what happens when government and the bureaucracy it spawns gets too large. Either unnecessary government agents and employees come up with ludicrous regulations like this to justify their jobs or excessive regulations are used to erect high barriers of entry into an industry, reducing competition and protecting special interests already in that industry. This protection is usually erected in cahoots with the associated politicians who usually get some type of financial reward for erecting the barriers.

Fortunately, a brave citizen in Texas, Isis Brantley is fighting this insanity in court. Best wishes to her as she looks to protect her freedom to earn a living at something she likes to do and is good at it without the political class and bureaucratic government it operates getting in the way. We wish her luck.

3) Let’s combine the previous two affronts to freedom, government snooping without just cause and overreaching and intrusive state government, and see what we come up with. According to Reason, we might come up with the snooping fiasco in the state of Ohio. According to Reason, the political class in that state quietly integrated facial recognition software into a state government website that includes driver’s license photos. Scary development.

Even scarier is the fact that a whopping 30,000 law enforcement officers in the state of Ohio are authorized to access driver license images without audits, warrants, or any oversight. Again, imagine the potential for abuse with such a wide open access to private lives for no reason. 

A police officer trying to find the identify of his ex-wife’s new boyfriend. A potential stalker police officer seeing a pretty woman on the street and using her photo to track down her name and address. The scenarios for abuse are large, dangerous, and downright creepy. That is what people in Ohio are facing from a political class that has very little respect for privacy and security of its citizens. And since the FBI research has found that facial recognitions is often wrong at the rate of about 20% of the time, is the risk worth the less than perfect results?

The article points out that Kentucky has a similar system but allows only 34 government employees to access the photos, software, and information. Twelve states do not have such software, the state of Maine forbids its use by any state agency, and several states that have the software absolutely forbid its use by law enforcement authorities.

4) One of the jobs of the Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms Federal agency is to clamp down on black market cigarettes sales. They are probably not doing a great job since recent news reports indicate that about 60% of the cigarettes sold in the state of New York are sold illegally on the black market but that is a topic for another day.

This latest issue of Reason magazine reported on major screw-up’s by ATF when it comes to undercover stings and operations by ATF agents:
  • A recent study by the Justice Department found that the ATF may actually contribute to the supply of illegal cigarettes sold on the black market rather than stopping such sales.
  • The study looked at “churning” investigations where ATF agents are actually allowed to engage in illegal cigarette sales, I am assuming as undercover sting operations, as long as the money made selling cigarettes in the operations is used to fund the ATF operations.
  • Sounds like a nifty idea, let the criminals pay the government money during the stings and the government does not have to turn back the cash paid during the sting. They “theoretically” can use it to fund their operations, reducing the burden on the taxpayers.
  • However, the Justice Department found that such operations had lousy oversight and auditing controls in place.
  • In one case, the ATF allowed an informer to keep $4.9 million out of $5.2 million in profit that was made by one operation. 
  • The study could also not account for the location of 2.1 million cartons of cigarettes that churning investigations were supposed to use to catch the smugglers.
  • The missing cigarettes are worth more than a whopping $127 million on the retail market. 
Think about that last statement: the government cannot account for $127 million worth of assets. Unbelievable. Also, where do I sign up to become an ATF informant? At $4.9 million, that is a sweet gig.

5) In other insanity, recall this week that we have discussed the fact that General Motors still owes the American taxpayer about $10 billion from their government bailout. They are unlikely to ever repay that loan even though they are sitting on over $26 billion in cash reserves and are investing large amounts of money in China where they will be hiring Chinese workers, not American workers, to build cars.

But now recall the words from President Obama in October, 2012 when he was bragging about what he had done to “save Detroit” and bolster his reelection chances:

“Just a few years ago, the auto industry wasn’t just struggling – it was flatlining. GM and Chrysler were on the verge of collapse. Suppliers and distributors were at risk of going under. More than a million jobs across the country were on the line – and not just auto jobs, but the jobs of teachers, small business owners, and everyone in communities that depend on this great American industry… [we] refused to throw in the towel and do nothing. We refused to let Detroit go bankrupt.”

Well, he cannot make the promise or boast anymore. A judge has ruled that yes, Detroit can go into bankruptcy and will able do so after all of the appeals are heard and the ruling likely upheld. Detroit never had a chance, Obama’s claim last year was fortunate for him that it came a year or so before the eventual reality took place.

In just fifty years, the American political class took the fourth largest city in America, a city with the most prosperous middle class, and turned it into a Third World cesspool that had no other financial options except to seek bankruptcy protection from the courts. That is true insanity and another Obama failed promise, despite shoving tens of billions of dollars into the area, wasting billions and billions of taxpayer dollars in a futile attempt to fix an unfixable mess. Insane.

There you finally have all the insanity for this month. Broken political promises, losing millions and millions of dollars through botched ATF operations, unwarranted invasions of privacy, and erecting barriers to market entry for no good reason. Yep, sounds about right when talking about America’s current political class. Pathetic.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

www.loathemygovernment.com

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w


Sunday, November 18, 2012

Fighting The Invisible Empire, The Political Class and The Banksters - Was Woodrow Wilson Right?


“The government, which was designed for the people, has got into the hands of the bosses and their employers, the special interests. An invisible empire has been set up above the forms of democracy.” Woodrow Wilson

We have talked about this quote a few times in prior posts. These days it seems as if ordinary American citizens have very little control of their own wealth as the Washington political class has confiscated and handed out our personal wealth to large and small businesses for a variety or reasons:
  • General Motors still owes the American taxpayer at least $24 billion, according to government sources, with little chance of ever repaying that debt in the near future.
  • Chrysler, now owned by a foreign company, has cost the American taxpayer about $1 billion that will never be paid back.
  • Hundreds of billions of dollars were dished out to small and large banks alike via the TARP program to cover for their inept and irresponsible banking practices, much of which has not been paid back.
  • The Federal Reserve Board has printed well over $2.3 TRILLION and used it to buy back bad assets from major banks in the vain and unfulfilled hope that these banks would lend their newly acquired cash to businesses and Americans to jumpstart the economy.
  • An article by Bloomberg on June 18, 2012 outlined how the American taxpayer, and taxpayers around the world, subsidize their countries' major banks, encouraging risky banker behavior that always seem to lead to bank bailouts. The details of the article can be read at:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-06-18/dear-mr-dimon-is-your-bank-getting-corporate-welfare-.html
  • The major point made by the analysis and article was that about $76 billion of taxpayer wealth is money laundered through Washington and flowed through to the major banks every year.
  • An Associated Press news report from August 9, 2012 covered the news that the Justice Department will not investigate or prosecute criminal charges against either Goldman Sachs the company nor Goldman Sachs employees related to trades they made during the financial crisis/Great Recession. These charges were developed and highlighted in a detailed 2011 U.S. Senate investigative report. Despite the Senate findings of potential criminal activity, no legal action happened.
  • In a December 2, 2011 post we did on Goldman Sachs' relationship to the highest levels of the Federal government, we came to the following conclusion: “There is an obviously cozy Goldman Sachs connection between the highest levels of government and the highest levels of Goldman Sachs and those that used to work for Goldman Sachs." 
http://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2011/12/government-favors-and-politicians-for_02.html

These are just some of the bigger money laundering examples of recent memory, there have been so many more including the tens of billions of flushed down dozens of bad alternative energy companies, that we do not have time today to review them all.

This is not a Republican or Democrat condition, it is a politician affliction. We get very little say in how our wealth is redistributed to special political cronies and interests, often in exchange for campaign cash for politicians’ reelection efforts.

While Bush may have funneled taxpayer wealth to Haliburton, Obama funneled it to Solyndra et al. Both were intimately involved in funneling wealth to the big banks over the years. Individual taxpayers were helpless in stopping the redistribution. Seems Wilson was right, an invisible, or not so invisible, empire has been set up above the forms of democracy.

But what if we could get control of this invisible empire? Not only would it make good financial sense to control our taxpayer wealth, it would help us get additional liberty pumped into our faltering democracy, and frankly, revenge is sweet. Somebody outside of the invisible empire is actually taking on the task of breaking up this cartel:
  • A Federal lawsuit seeking the return of $43 trillion and an audit of all the TARP programs by an independent receiver has been filed against senior members of the Obama administration and the New York group known as the “Banksters”.
  • From what I understand about the law suit, “Banksters” is a collective term meant to include all of the big banks and those that operate them in that invisible empire.
  • The Wall Street Journal has reported the Spire Law Group, LLP has moved its massive law suit/tort action into the Federal court in Brooklyn, New York.
  • In this District Court lawsuit (Case No. 12-cv-04269-JBW-RML), Spire is acting on the behalf of homeowners across the country seeking to halt all foreclosures nationwide until the return of the $43 trillion.
  • Note: I have not found out how they arrived at the $43 trillion number but it certainly gets attention and is probably a good opening bid.
  • The lawsuit is seeking an audit of the TARP Program based on a report by the former Inspector General of the bailout program, Neil Barofsky. Barofsky has countered the claims made by President Obama, both publicly and privately to Congress, that the TARP money has been paid back.
  • Mr. Barofsky asserts that none of the money advanced by the Treasury has ever been paid back by the recipients of the program.
  • The lawsuit contends it has established the location of the $43 trillion of laundered money in a criminal racketeering enterprise participated in by the following individuals: Eric Holder, Tony West, Kamala Harris, Jon Corzine, Robert Rubin, Timothy Geithner, Vikram Pandit, Valerie Jarrett, Anita Dunn, and Robert Baueras
  • The lawsuit alleges that the Obama administration “actively borrowed money from these “Banksters” to fund his political campaign in this 2012 election and has not pursued any criminal charges against them.” (sound familiar, see the above point about Goldman Sachs.
  • The lawsuit also claims multiple violations of the United States Patriot Act have occurred, along with the Policy of Embargo Against Iran and Countries Hostile to the Foreign Policy of the United States, and the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) and other State and Federal laws by the Obama Administration. Seems like they have got all of the potential bases covered.
Interesting, somebody outside of the cozy Washington club is trying to break through the invisible empire. Obviously, the $43 trillion figure is for attention and public relations. The Federal government’s annual budget is only about a tenth or so of this figure so I doubt that even the largest bank have anything close to $43 trillion in assets. In fact, $43 TRILLION is about three times the size of the nation’s GDP so it is indeed a large number.

I wish them luck in both recovering ill gotten gains from both politicians and the Banksters and more importantly, uncovering the invisible empire that Wilson warned us about. Given that we have allowed the political class to take over and abuse our political processes in so many ways:
  • Gerrymandering of Congressional districts
  • Earmark funding for political cronies in exchange for campaign funding and support
  • The obscene amount of organizational (corporations, PACs, unions) money that drowns out citizens’ voices, needs, and priorities
  • The absence of term limits that produces non-productive, self satisfied, and self enriched members of the political establishment,
  • Insider trading by politicians for their own financial good,
this avenue of approaching the misuse of political power is a unique, welcome respite from the continual degradation of our political processes and democracy.

Many of these political abuses were discussed in “Love My Country, Loathe My Government” along with some suggested ways to fix the situation. I did not think of going the legal route like Spire is doing, but good luck to them in their quest to squash the undue influence of “The Invisible Empire.”

Note: We will take Spire's approach a step further over the few posts so stayed tuned.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at www.loathemygovernment.com. It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

http://www.reason.com/
http://www.cato.org/
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://realpolichick.blogspot.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Bailout Review - TARP, Too Big To Fail, Fannie, Freddie, Chrysler, and The General Motors Con Job

CNNMoney recently published some analysis that they had completed using the latest U.S. Treasury information. They went through the history and payback, or lack of payback, behavior of those entities that had been fortunate enough to receive taxpayer bailout money, courtesy of the Washington political class.

The results of their investigation are not pretty and include the following conclusions:

  • The government has already written off some of its losses on the Chrysler bailout. Chrysler, which is now owned and  controlled by Italian automaker Fiat, left behind an unpaid tab of $1.3 billion for U.S. taxpayers to pay off from its total infusion of $12.4 billion.
  • The former financing arm of General Motors, GMAC, which is now known as Ally Financial, received $16.3 billion of taxpayer wealth but has only paid $5.7 billion so far. The CNNMoney analysis concluded that Ally may never be able to pay the remaining $10.6 billion without a successful IPO.
  • Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the Federal government's housing subsidy disasters received about $187.5 billion of bailout money but have only paid back $70.7 billion. Independent analyses have proven that the difference, $116.8 billion, is unlikely to ever be repaid and will probably continue to get worse over time.
  • While the biggest banks in the country have paid back their TARP funds, about 400 smaller banks still owe the American taxpayer $35 billion from various TARP programs.
  • General Motors received $51 billion in bailout funds from the American taxpayer and has repaid about $24 billion so far. However, the GM stock price would have to increase about 150%, from the current price of about $23 to $57, highly unlikely, for the taxpayers to just breakeven.
  • Thus, the article's analysis leads to the conclusion that each American household, on average, is still owed about $1,750 each for the unpaid balance of the bailout funds.

Disgraceful waste of taxpayer wealth. Chrysler is no longer an American company and the American taxpayer paid over a $1 billion to make it so. Poorly performing banks are still around, not due to the great leadership of their management, but the $35 billion American taxpayers gave them to cover their mistakes and mismanagement. Fannie and Freddie are still eating up taxpayer wealth with no reformation or termination plans underway.

But the greatest sham pulled on the American taxpayer is General Motors. The Obama political campaign continues to boast that "Bin Laden is dead but General Motors is alive" but considering the GM facts above and the following facts, you consider if this is really "living:"

  • As mentioned above, General Motors and its former financing arm, GMAC, are alive today and in  their present format only because of the unpaid $35 billion or so they owe the American taxpayer.
  • Delphi was once a subsidiary of GM. News reports, based on actual released government email communications, show that Obama's Treasury Department was instrumental in deciding that thousands of non-union Delphi employees would have their pensions terminated while union employees at Delphi would have their full pension rights maintained in the auto bailout plans. How sad that Ameircans' futures are determined not on fairness but on political favors and potential votes.
  • The CNNMoney website reported in February, 2011 that The U.S. Treasury forgave $14 billion in tax revenue because of unconventional deal it granted to General Motors. Although GM has had profitable periods since the bailout, it will not have to pay taxes since the Obama administration allowed GM to maintain past financial losses on its book to offset future profits for years to come. According to CNNMoney, this tax break is completely against standard bankruptcy proceedings and laws and will reduce GM's U.S. tax bill by an estimated $14 billion in the coming years, and its global taxes by close to $19 billion, according to a company filing. Another favor to Obama's political supporters at the expense of Ford and other honest carmakers and other American companies.
  • In June of this year the current GM, Dan Akerson, gave a speech where he bragged how now seven out of ten GM cars are now made by factories outside of the United States, mostly China, and that GM was also moving research and development resources overseas.
Thus, who still thinks that this bailout was a good idea to pay tens of billions of dollars of taxpayer wealth so that the recipient of that wealth could build up its business overseas? Insanity.

No matter how you cut it, none of these bailouts were good ideas. The government should never have gotten involved. It should have allowed normal bankruptcy laws/procedures and market forces shape the events  that have unfolded over the past few years. It would have resulted in fairer treatment of investors, employers, and taxpayers and not rewarded incompetent business managers and political cronies.

When government gets involved, it gathers control over the nation and its people. And government control not only wastes taxpayer wealth it also destroys freedom when petty politicians get to choose winners and losers in life.


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The following words are something I have never done before. My blog posts are always based on as unbiased mews sources as possible. These almost always include actual government reports and statistics, Associated Press reports, Bloomberg news reports, Reuters news reports,Wall Street Journal reports, USA Today reports, New York Times reports, and other main stream media reports.  

I do not include Fox News reports or conservative blog reports since I find liberal leaning friends and family will automatically reject those reports, not because they are wrong,  but solely because of their source. This sometimes makes verifying government misconduct difficult since many of the main stream news sources do not always follow up, investigate, and report on Obama administration shenanigans.

Given today's topic, government mishandling and biases in bailout decisions, I have included a report that came through my email about how badly the Chrylser bailout and process was handled from a political and cronyism perspective. I never use emails that come floating in but this one looks interesting from a sourcing perspective, it names names, and certainly has a ring of truth to it, given what we discussed above. 

I present it below and ask any readers if they can come up with reliable sources to prove or disprove that this disgraceful behavior actually happened relative to the Chrysler. If we can find some sources, I will put it into a regular blog post in the near future. If true, than we have fallen down the corruption rat hole further, deeper, and faster than even I imagined.

Chrysler's Railroad

This could be a scandal of epic proportions and one that makes Nixon's Watergate or Clinton's Monica Lewinsky affair pale by comparison. Why was there neither rhyme nor reason as to which dealerships of the Chrysler Corporation were to be closed?

Roll the clock back to the weeks just before Chrysler declared bankruptcy. Chrysler, like GM, was in dire financial straits and federal government "graciously" offered to "buy the company" and keep them out of bankruptcy and "save jobs." Chrysler was, in the words of Obama and his administration, "Too big to fail," same story with GM.

The feds organized their "Automotive Task Force" to fix Chrysler and GM. Obama, in an act that is 100% unconstitutional, appointed a guy named Steve Rattner to be the White House's official Car Czar - literally, that's what his title is. Rattner is the liaison among Obama, Chrysler, and GM.

Initially, the national media reported that Chrysler 'had made this list of dealerships. Not true! The Washington Examiner, Newsmax, Fox News and a host of other news agencies discovered that the list of dealerships was put together by the "Automotive Task Force" headed by no one other than Mr. Steve Rattner.

Now the plot thickens. Remember earlier we said that there was neither rhyme nor reason why certain dealerships were closed?

Actually there's a very interesting pattern as to who was closed down. Again, on May 27, 2009, The Washington Examiner and Newsmax exposed the connection. Amazingly, of the 789 dealerships closed by the federal government, 788 had donated money, exclusively to Republican political causes, while contributing nothing to Democratic political causes. The only "Democratic" dealership on the list was found to have donated $7,700 to Hillary's campaign, and a bit over $2,000 to John Edwards. This same dealership, reportedly, also gave $200.00 to Obama's campaign. Does that seem a little odd to you?

Steve Rattner is the guy who put the list together. Well, he happens to be married to a Maureen White.

Maureen happens to be the former national finance chairman of the Democratic National Committee. As such, she has access to campaign donation records from everyone in the nation- Republican or Democrat. But of course, this is just a wacky "coincidence," we're certain.

Then comes another really wacky "coincidence." On that list of dealerships being closed down, a weird thing happened in Arkansas, North Louisiana and Southern Missouri. It seems that Bill Clinton's former White House Chief of Staff, Mack McClarty, owns a chain of dealerships in that region, partnered with a fellow by the name of Robert Johnson. Johnson happens to be founder of Black Entertainment Television and was a huge Obama supporter and financier.

These guys own a half dozen Chrysler stores under the company title of RLJ-McClarty-Landers. Interestingly, none of their dealerships were ordered closed - not one!

While all of their competing Chrysler/Dodge and Jeep dealership were! Eight dealerships located near the dealerships owned by McClarty and Johnson were ordered shut down.

Thus by pure luck, these two major Obama supporters now have virtual monopoly on Chrysler sales in their zone. Isn't that amazing?

Go look in The Washington Examiner, the story's there, and it's in a dozen or so other web-based news organizations; this isn't being made up.

Now if you thought Chrysler was owned by Fiat, you are mistaken. Under the federal court ruling, 65% of Chrysler is now owned by the federal government and the United Auto Workers union! Fiat owns 20%. The other 15% is still privately owned and presumably will be traded on the stock market. Obama smiles and says he doesn't want to run the auto industry. 

As horrifying as this is to comprehend, and being as how this used to be the United States of America , it would appear that the president has the power to destroy private businesses and eliminate upwards of 100,000 jobs just because they don't agree with his political agenda.

This is Nazi Germany stuff, and it's happening right here, right now, in our back yard. There are voices in Washington demanding an explanation, but the "Automotive Task Force" has released no information to the public or to any of the senators demanding answers for what has been done.

Keep your ear to the ground for more on this story. If you've ever wanted to make a difference about anything in your life, get on the phone to your national senator or representative in the House and demand an investigation into this.

Benjamin Franklin had it right when he said, "All that's necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing."

An amazing thing happened as this story was going to press. Obama's Car Czar, Steve Rattner, resigned on July 13 and was promptly replaced by former steel workers union boss Ron Bloom.

According to CBS News, Rattner left "to return to private life and spend time with his family."

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said, "I hope that he takes another opportunity to bring his unique skills to government service in the future."

By the way, Rattner is under investigation for a multi-million dollar pay-to-play investment bank scandal in New York ....

Uh-oh! But, we're certain that had nothing to do with his resignation. And, according to several news sources out there, there are rumors he's being investigated for what could be pay-to-play scandal involving the closing of Chrysler and GM dealerships. Really? Again, that couldn't have anything to with his resignation -- that's ridiculous! Like CBS said, this guy just wants to "spend more quality time with his family."

Obama has 32 personally appointed "czars" who answer to no one but him, all of whom are acting without any Constitutional authority.

But hey, we're sure they all have "unique skills"......as Tim Geithner likes to say!

SOOOOO. HOW'S THE HOPE/CHANGE WORKING FOR YOU?..

This goes beyond corruption in high places - to gross criminal actions on the part of our government!

I hope you will spread this far and wide, and hopefully the taxpaying public will demand some of that transparency we were promised ... followed by criminal prosecution of the perpetrators!

What a crooked government we have!!!!! Vote 'em all out ... November, 2012
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Despicable if true? Anyone find any sources that liberal friends and family could not reject outright?

We invite all readers of this blog to visit our new website, "The United States Of Purple," at:

http://www.unitedstatesofpurple.com/

The United States of Purple is a new grass roots approach to filling the office of President of The United States by focusing on the restoration of freedom in the United States, focusing on problem solving skills and results vs. personal political enrichment, and imposing term limits on all future Federal politicians. No more red states, no more blue states, just one United States Of America under the banner of Purple.

The United States Of Purple's website also provides you the formal opportunity to sign a petition to begin the process of implementing a Constitutional amendment to impose fixed term limits on all Federally elected politicians. Only by turning out the existing political class can we have a chance of addressing and finally resolving the major issues of our times.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at www.loathemygovernment.com. It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

http://www.cato.org/
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://realpolichick.blogspot.com/
http://www.flipcongress2010.com/
http://www.reason.com/
http://www.repealamendment