Government Incompetence

Tax Cuts, Less-Intrusive Gov’t Help Canada Soar

Canada flag low taxes economic success by IBD Editorials –

Success: Away from the low growth and high regulation of an America under Washington’s thumb, our northern neighbor is economically strong. As 2011 ends, Canada has announced yet another tax cut — and will soar even more.

The Obama administration and its economic czars have flailed about for years, baffled about how to get the U.S. economy growing.

In reality, the president need look no further than our neighbor, Canada, whose solid growth is the product of tax cuts, fiscal discipline, free trade, and energy development. That’s made Canada a roaring puma nation, while its supposedly more powerful southern neighbor stands on the outside looking in. [Read more…]

Throw ‘Em All Out…And Good Riddance!

Throw Them All Out Government Corruption by J.R. Dunn –
Crony capitalism is the most serious current danger to the American community, a threat not simply to government or the economy, but to our very way of life. It is the worst such threat since the trusts and monopolies of the early 20th century, and in much the same way. Cronyism is one of the major forces behind the establishment of the corrupt pseudo-aristocracy that has been taking shape in this country over the past two decades, a synthetic privileged class made up in large part of politicians, hustlers, and hangers-on who have become expert in exploiting the rest of us.

The legacy media, for some obscure reason, tends to bury discussions about this group. While the reportage on discrete incidents is there — see the parade of stories on Solyndra, Goldman Sachs, and MF Global for examples — we find little effort to pull it all together. Academics, with the single exception of Angelo Codevilla, who sounded the alarm two years ago in The Ruling Class, appear oblivious, as if they had no idea what’s going on, which may well be the case. [Read more…]

Job Creation Is No Mystery

Job Creation Business Economy Not Government by Tom McClintock –
The government’s continuing failure to address our nation’s gut-wrenching unemployment stems from a fundamental disagreement over how jobs are created in the first place.

We are now in the third year of policies predicated on the assumption that government spending creates jobs.

We have squandered three years and trillions of dollars of the nation’s wealth on such policies, and they have not worked because they cannot work.

Government cannot inject a single dollar into the economy until it has first taken that same dollar out of the economy. [Read more…]

Fatal Flaws of Keynesian Economics

Keynesian Economics Failureby Ron Ross –
It’s now clear that the federal government’s massive stimulus spending has not achieved its objectives. Why hasn’t it? It’s important that we have answers to that question.

The stimulus was premised on the economic model known as Keynesianism: the intellectual legacy of the late English economist John Maynard Keynes. Keynesianism doesn’t work, never has worked, and never will work. Without a clear understanding of why Keynesianism cannot work we will be forever doomed to pursuing the impossible.

There’s no real mystery about why Keynesianism fails. There are numerous reasons why and they’ve been known for decades. Keynesians have an unrealistic and unsupportable view of how the economy works and how people make decisions. [Read more…]

America Slouching Towards Fiscal Armageddon

America Slouching Towards Fiscal ArmageddonAmerica is in grave danger. Our government’s out-of-control spending and our politicians’ refusal to implement meaningful budget reforms are leading us towards a fiscal crisis that can undermine our very way of life. We are spending ourselves into oblivion. With each passing day, we are $5 billion in deficit spending closer to the edge of an abyss that can cripple our economy, destroy America’s wealth, and lead to catastrophic social consequences for all current and future generations. Yet our leaders in Washington refuse to face reality and continue to play political games while the country’s budget crisis deepens and the threat grows exponentially.

In February of this year the US federal budget deficit grew by a record $224 billion; the biggest one-month increase in history. Worse still, the 2011 US budget deficit is forecast to reach $1.5 Trillion.  According to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) this annual deficit represents the largest budget gap in our country’s history, equivalent to approximately 10% of America’s total economic output.  This follows the enormous $1.3 Trillion deficit racked up for 2010 and will be superseded by an equally disturbing $1.65 Trillion deficit forecast for 2012. [Read more…]

Inflation, Back to the ’70s We Go!

Inflation in AmericaConservatives warned about it, economists predicted it, and now it’s here. Inflation has arrived and it’s taking off like a rocket. IBD reports that wholesale prices, often a precursor to consumer prices, rose at an yearly rate of 8% in February. The story warns: “Food prices today are the highest on record, rising at double-digit rates (see chart). Meanwhile, gasoline tests the $4-a-gallon level, the dollar is weakening and gold is near its all-time high.”

This ominous surge is attributable to very high energy and food prices driven mostly by our government’s reckless spending that’s accelerating rather than abating. Combined with Obama’s suicidal energy policies, continuing political instability across the Middle East, the government’s stifling regulatory hold on our economy, the EPA’s assault on manufacturers and energy producers, and the recent catastrophe and devastation in Japan, a dangerous perfect storm of inflationary and destabilizing factors are emerging which will spell disaster for our economy and negatively affect all American consumers’ purchasing power and wealth. [Read more…]

Budget Cuts Lingo, Stranger Than Fiction

Budget Cuts Sanity vs InsanityYesterday, the Senate Democrats soundly defeated the attempts by the Republicans in the House to implement a very minute cut for the 2012 federal budget. Referring to the approximately $61 billion that the GOP was recommending (a mere 1.6% when compared to the $3,700 billion budget being proposed) the Democrats “emphatically rejected a budget-slashing House spending bill as too draconian.”

Yes, you read that right, a 1.6% cut is deemed “draconian.” The party of “it depends on what the definition of “is” is”, is once again re-defining the meaning of language and distorting reality to promote its scorched earth political agenda. [Read more…]