Negative Railroad A Collection of Breaks in the Line

The Failed Obama Administration™ has raised its own forecast deficit from seven trillion to nine trillion dollars.

Keep in mind, deficit is the annual shortfall. Debt is the total of accumulated deficits. GDP, the total value of everything the US makes in a year, is fourteen trillion. The accumulated total amount owed, as of passage of the spendulous bill, was “only” twelve trillion.

Another righty waits for God to give a political sign:

Talk-show host Sean Hannity, a vocal opponent of Barack Obama's policies, said today he would not rule out a bid for the presidency in 2012.

Egged on by radio colleague Bill Cunningham, Hannity said he would consider entering the front lines of the political fray if God directs him.

"I've never made a decision in my life without – whatever destiny God has you've got to fulfill it," he said. "I'm not sure that's my destiny."

The slippery slope argument is common. We are warned against (A) because it will lead through (B) and (C) to something really crappy at (K) or (L).

“Don’t go near cannabis, because after one whiff, you’ll eventually end up dead in some toilet stall from a heroin overdose”

“If you listen to heavy metal music, you’ll end up a murderer and burn in hell for eternity.”

By more strict logic, each point in the progression must be weighed on its own merits. (A) stands alone. (B) stands alone. It’s not reasonable to reject (A) or (B) because of (K) or (L).

Compassion is: sympathetic consciousness of others' distress together with a desire to alleviate it

Justice is: the maintenance or administration of what is just especially by…the assignment of merited rewards or punishments

Neoneocon on the Scottish judge who authorized compassionate release of the Lockerbie terrorist:

The Associated Press reports gives this headline to today’s release of State employment statistics:

July unemployment dips in 17 states, rises in 26

Unemployment is up in over half the States, but AP puts that after the comma, in a position of reduced importance. The ordinary reader will walk away with a notion that unemployment has dipped.

Dr. Sanity considers the term “Death Panel”:

In fact, as a physician, I think that the descriptive "Death Panels" terminology effectively summarizes what is an entirely logical progression of Obama's health policies. This progression is derived directly from Obama's own words and those of his health-reform minions/czars.

Read her whole post to see the logical progression laid out.

[Paraphrasing] a defiant commenter on Vox Day’s post about invidious discrimination:

I’m already 71. I’ll die before they can pull the plug on me!

Nice.

“Death Panel” was rhetorical genius. Theorists and legislators use complex and nuanced language that usually flies over the heads of the public. “No,” they say, “there will not be death panels, just procedural review boards and end-of-life counseling.” In the ivory tower there is a difference. But in practical effect and in common terms, it’s the same thing.

Public opinion is not a courtroom. So we see politicians on all sides debating the translation of nuance into common terms. “You can keep your doctor.” Only if he isn’t driven out of his practice by the nuance and detail of the actual legislation.

In February, when the current President was bashing the economy to sell the spendulous bill, I observed there were still 142 million Americans going to work. Last week we were told unemployment dropped .1%, but even Big Media reported the drop was due to people falling out of the labor force, not because more people were back to work. Total employment was slightly over 140 million.

Captain Capitalism rants about Prius drivers with vanity plates:

"Skyler McFairtradecoffeedrinker was a great man. He only bought organic, fairtrade coffee from small, locally owned coffee stores that gave back to the community 30% of their pre-tax profits. He volunteered his time at the local minimalist-crapo-art museum where he lobbied the government for more taxpayer money for art nobody wanted. He wasn't a rich man, but he was rich in that his footprint was minimal on this planet. He lived in a small house with environmentally friendly insultation and spent only 79% of the US average on heating and air conditioning. He drove a moped and a Prius and emitted 56% less than the average American in carbon emissions."

Those with a taste for venom should keep an eye on the lefty blogosphere. There will be spittled spewed over this:

Finally, WND asked [Michelle] Bachmann if she could see a day when the candidate who began her political career in jeans and a holey sweatshirt would one day run for the presidency.

"If I felt that's what the Lord was calling me to do, I would do it," she answered. "When I have sensed that the Lord is calling me to do something, I've said yes to it. But I will not seek a higher office if God is not calling me to do it. That's really my standard.

Late last night CNN interrupted its regular drone with a breaking story: Japan Emerges from Recession. They played it up a like an airplane crash or celebrity arrest. They even had to rouse a financial correspondent from sleep to get up-to-the-minute commentary over the phone. Faintly optimistic-sounding news about a government statistic from a foreign economy has become sensational.

Although credit was given to the Japanese government’s stimulus spending, the reporter failed to grasp the (in)significance of figures showing Japan’s domestic demand had continued shrinking. The reported growth was entirely from exports. If anybody’s stimulus is responsible, it must be the Chinese. They’re the only big player still growing demand.

Despite persistent efforts of politicians and pseudo-news organizations like CNN to proclaim the economy has “turned a corner” and is “getting back on track” (someday I’ll have to rant about vapid economic metaphors), the US stock market reacted to this phenomenal news by dropping 186 points (2%).

I’ve seen plenty of righty speculation that part of the reason Sarah Palin drives lefties crazy is her staunch display of the value of human life. She didn’t abort Trig. Instead, she is proud of him and full of love.

She has been ridiculed as an intellectual lightweight. Yet, she is the one who put the label “Death Panel” on Federal health legislation:

This picture, via Maggie’s Farm, is trump on the Failed Obama Administration’s™ prevaricating about the government deciding who is fit to live:

Yes, it is “over the top”. But it makes the point plain, while staying true to the reasoning behind it.

I fully expected some kind of Federal health legislation to pass, supported by rhetoric about honoring Ted Kennedy and his cancer. Now it seems the people might stop such nonsense from becoming law.

Should some Kennedy rhetoric be deployed in some effort to resuscitate the legislation, keep this in mind:

So the elder patriarch of the Kennedy Clan shipped his daughter off to a convent, and when she started sneaking out at night and embarrassing the family, he somehow authorized physicians to saw into her brain until she lost the ability to speak.

I think the most horrible thing I’ve read in the last few months is

Cost of Government Day (COGD) is the date of the calendar year on which the average American worker has earned enough gross income to pay off his or her share of the spending and regulatory burden imposed by government at the federal, state and local levels.

Cost of Government Day for 2009 is August 12. On average, working people must toil 224 days out of the year just to meet all costs imposed by government. In other words, the cost of government consumes 61.34 percent of national income.

If you had given the government everything you earned from January 1st through today, you could keep every nickel until the end of the year.

To forbid me from saying that one culture is better than another necessarily forbids me from having opinions about human behavior, and the meaning of life.

Quoted from: TJIC

A half-assed prediction:

We’ll be seeing a wave of reports about the dangers of petroleum-based fertilizer.

With global warming running afoul of the evidence, and since peak oil paranoia never caught the mainstream, the do-gooders who seek control need a fresh angle.

Even if we switch to a “new economy” of wind and rubber-band power for harvest and transport, the evil oil interests can starve us to death as long as we depend on industrial farming and fertilizer. We must mandate an organic/sustainable agriculture policy IMMEDIATELY.

Barry, adding his voice to a choir, has called a bottom:

President Obama says the country has "stepped back from the brink" where the economy is concerned.

The president says the U.S. economy has turned the corner. He made the positive remarks on the day his $787 billion stimulus plan turned one hundred days old at a meeting with major donors in Beverly Hills, California.

"When you look at the economy right now, I think it's safe to say that we have stepped back from the brink, that there is some calm that didn't exist before," Obama said.

Last year we saw what happened when government enticed farmers to turn corn into motor fuel. The price of food went up.

The same is happening now with sugar:

The price of raw sugar has increased to its highest level since 1981, as supply concerns grow.
…
Growing demand in Brazil for sugar to be turned into ethanol, coupled with a sharp fall in Indian production, have both prompted worries, he explained.

The mandated “alternative energy economy” will make us prisoners of geography by raising the cost of travel. Or, we’ll just starve to death.