RWNJ » Spending

30% of Personal Income Comes from Government

admin — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 12:50:39 +0000

The Wall Street Journal reports good news as personal income rises .5% in August, the best improvement of the year. Well, not so fast… The Capital Hill blog is reporting that the reason is not private sector growth, but in fact 60% of the increase was due to government transfer programs. Yes, that’s just another term for wealth transfer.

It’s frightening that nearly one-third of personal income comes from the Government. Even worse is that more than half of that is through wealth transfer programs. The number has risen around 5% since Obama has taken office. He really does believe in “spreading the wealth around“!

The Government Can

admin — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 21:26:18 +0000

Another thing that speaks for itself. Enjoy!

Obama’s Budget Tightening Farce

admin — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 21:50:37 +0000

It’s official, Obama is asking his Cabinet to cut spending. Has he finally realized the importance of not putting the country into a tailspin of debt? Let’s evaluate…

Obama has asked for a reduction of $100 million. When we are talking about deficits in the Trillions, a few million is a simple drop in the bucket. AP puts this into perspective:

Less than one-quarter of the budget increase that Congress awarded to itself.

4 percent of the military aid the United States sends to Israel.

Less than half the cost of one F-22 fighter plane.

7 percent of the federal subsidy for the money-losing Amtrak passenger rail system.

1/10,000th of the government’s operating budgets for Cabinet agencies, excluding the Iraq and Afghan wars and the stimulus bill.

When you consider that the costs of borrowing the money for the latest “Stimulus” package is $100 million a day, does this effort amount to anything?

Republicans to Offer Budget Alternative

admin — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 19:14:21 +0000

The House Republicans gave an outline of proposals for an alternative budget plan today. Specifics on how much the budget would cost and what affect it would have on the deficit are due to be released next week. Among the proposals are spending cuts on everything except defense and lowering the top tax rate from 36% to 25%. A tax cut of that magnitude would free up money used by those in a position to hire workers and would likely be a huge shot in the arm to the economy.

Senate Republicans will be introducing a series of amendments to the budget next week in an attempt to cut spending from the budget. House Democrats are able to restrict the number of amendments that can be offered, so House Republicans are opting to present their complete budget alternative when it is finished.

The big question at this point is if the Democrats will be willing to listen to alternatives or if they will continue to press their agendas forward in a unilateral fashion.

A Perspective on Debt

admin — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 12:47:31 +0000

I came across this debt ticker over at Marvelous Medley:

Just look at that number… $11 Trillion dollars and growing fast! A trillion is a large number, and a bit hard to wrap my head around, so I looked around for some comparisons. I came across this over at tysknews:

Trillion = 1,000,000,000,000.
The country has not existed for a trillion seconds.
Western civilization has not been around a trillion seconds.
One trillion seconds ago – 31,688 years – Neanderthals stalked the plains of Europe.

NPR gave this for comparison:

$1 Trillion would be enough money to buy about a 1,000 boxes of Girl Scout cookies for every person in the United States.

And here is a youtube video to give a bit more explaination:

It is hard to wrap one’s head around this number. Take the above, multiply it by 11. Now you have our current debt. Next year, we’ll be adding around $2 Trillion to that number. And we will continue to add Trillions to the debt every year until we get this out of control spending in check.

The United States GDP was just over $14 Trillion in 2008. Yes, our debt is nearly as much as our entire GDP! The interest payments on this debt is the third largest item on our budget at over $412 Billion. Now, throw in that the Federal Government alone is slated to spend over 27% of our GDP this year. Certainly someone other than me has to see the obsurdity in this.

CBO: Deficit is $1.8 Trillion Dollars

admin — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 19:11:28 +0000

The CBO has reported that Obama’s budget would put the United States into a deficit of $1.8 Trillion this year. Even more worrying is that under Obama’s policies the debt would grow to 82 percent of the entire US economy by 2019. This will certainly pose problems for Obama’s proposed $3.6 Trillion budget.

The massive spending needs to stop before we get swallowed up by a black hole of debt. This is not the time to be pushing things like governmental health care, not that there would ever be a good time to institute it anyhow.

WSJ: Public Confidence in Obama Dropping

admin — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 14:46:51 +0000

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that confidence in Obama is rapidly dropping. Obama’s numbers have now dropped to the point that they are lower than President Bush in this point in 2001. His net approval rating was as low as +6% this week according to Rasmussen. The article points out multiple signs of trouble in the polling data:

A third strongly disapprove of Obama’s performance.
Obama has lost nearly all Republican support and a large portion of Independant support.
Support is dropping more rapidly than other Presidents of the 20th and 21st centuries.
83% are concerned Obama’s policies will not improve the economy.
82% are worried about the growing deficit.
78% are concerned about inflation.
69% are worried about Government’s increasing role in the economy.
Less should have been spent on the stimulus according to a 3-to-1 margin.
Obama’s budget is opposed by a 46% to 41% margin.
Voters reject Pelosi’s idea of a second stimulus by a 2-to-1 margin.
The feeling is that the mortgage bailout will unfairly benefit the irresponsible by 48% to 36%.
45% do not have confidence in the direction Obama is taking.
Less than half suport increasing taxes for expanded health-insurance (17% less support than 1993).
Only 20% support the most recent bank bailout.

Obama’s Earmark Test

admin — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 12:44:59 +0000

It looks like President Obama is about to face a big test with the omnibus spending bill on its way to his desk. Obama made it clear that he was against earmarks in both the campaign and in his rhetoric during his presidency. The package has nearly 8000 earmarks in it (both Republican and Democrat), worth $5.5 Billion.

The question is, will Obama stand true to his anti-earmark principle and veto this bill? It isn’t difficult to take this bill and send it back to be reconstructed without earmarks. Unfortunately, the administration to this point has become expert at taking action contrary to what was promised and deflect the blame back on the previous administration.

According to an AP story, it appears that is exactly what Obama is preparing to do. White House spokesman Gibbs has already said “It represents last year’s business.” This has set the stage for Obama to not stand to his principles and use yet another instance of the blame game. At some point, the new administration is going to have to make a stand that they aren’t afraid to take responsibility for.

Bayh Not Supporting Omnibus

admin — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 14:34:02 +0000

Being a former resident of Indiana, I still follow Indiana politicians fairly closely. Evan Bayh has been one of those that I can admire for sticking to his principles, even if I don’t always agree with him. This is an example where he is sticking to his guns and is not supporting the earmark-laden $410 billion spending bill.

If I had more faith that Obama was a man of his word, I’d expect he would veto this bill… unfortunately, the President has backed out of several of his campaign promises and I cannot expect the earmark promise to be maintained either. Bayh apparently agrees.

Jim Cramer: “Greatest Wealth Destruction By a President”

admin — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 14:01:17 +0000

In an interview with Matt Lauer on NBC, CNBC Analyst Jim Cramer (who, I should point out, is not a Conservative) regarded Obama’s policies as an advancement of a “radical agenda” and pointed out that this was the “greatest wealth destruction by a President” that he’s seen.

Obama has shrugged off the steep decline in the stock market. He said, “What I am looking for is not the day-to-day gyrations of the stock market … but the long-term.” Apparently, he has missed the continued stock market slide (25% reduction since he was elected). He also stated, “The stock market is sort of like a tracking poll.” The Wall Street “poll” is speaking volumes on its opinion of the way the economy is heading. Given that the economy usually lags the market by 6 months, our economic future does look grim.

Perhaps we should move away from the agenda of restributing wealth, hiking taxes, and burying ourselves in even more debt. We need to do what is right for the economy. That includes business-friendly policies, lower taxes for all economic classes, and long-term job promotion. This new administration has had the opportunity to implement these types of policies, but instead has moved from one set of bad policies to another. In the end, it is the country that pays for this mistake.

The Next Spending Bill On Horizon

admin — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 14:44:59 +0000

AP has released an article describing the Democrat’s proposed $410 Billion appropriations package. The bill includes thousands of earmarks totalling at least $3.8 Billion. It is also 8% larger than the bill from last year, well in excess of inflation.

Democrats are claiming the excess is necessary to counteract cuts the Bush administration put in place. Republicans are claiming that the raises are well in excess of the cuts when combined with the recently passed stimulus package.

In addition to the financial considerations, the bill includes loosening restrictions on travel and trade to Cuba.