On the Road to Socialism? We've Arrived!

[Skarp]

http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticle ... 7608242634

On The Road To Socialism? We've Arrived!
By PATRICK J. BUCHANAN | Posted Tuesday, March 03, 2009 4:20 PM PT

In his campaign and inaugural address, Barack Obama cast himself as a moderate man seeking common ground with conservatives.

Yet his budget calls for the radical restructuring of the U.S. economy, a sweeping redistribution of power and wealth to government and Democratic constituencies. It is a declaration of war on the right.

The real Obama has stood up and lived up to his ranking as the most left-wing member of the Senate.

Barack has no mandate for this. He was even behind John McCain when the decisive event that gave him the presidency occurred — the September collapse of Lehman Bros. and the market crash.

Republicans are under no obligation to render bipartisan support to this statist coup d'etat. For what is going down is a leftist power grab that is anathema to their principles and philosophy.

Where the U.S. government usually consumes 21% of gross domestic product, this Obama budget spends 28% in 2009 and runs a deficit of $1.75 trillion, or 12.7% of GDP. That is four times the largest deficit of George W. Bush and twice as large a share of the economy as any deficit run since World War II.

Add that 28% of GDP spent by the U.S. government to the 12% spent by states, counties and cities, and government will consume 40% of the economy in 2009.

We are not "headed down the road to socialism." We are there.

Since the budget was released, word has come that the U.S. economy did not shrink by 3.8% in the fourth quarter, but 6.2%. All the assumptions in Obama's budget about growth in 2009 and 2010 need to be revised downward, and the deficits revised upward. Look for the deficit for 2009 to cross $2 trillion.

Who abroad is going to lend us the trillions to finance our deficits without demanding higher interest rates on the U.S. bonds they are being asked to hold? And if we must revert to the printing press to create the money, what happens to the dollar?

As Americans save only a pittance and have lost — in the value of homes, stocks, bonds and other assets — $15 trillion to $20 trillion since 2007, how can the people provide the feds with the needed money?

In his speech to Congress, Obama promised new investments in energy, education and health care. Every kid is going to get a college degree. We're going to find a cure for cancer.

Who is going to pay for all this? The top 2%, the filthy rich who got all those Bush tax breaks, say Democrats. But the top 5% of income earners already pay 60% of income taxes, while the bottom 40% pay nothing.

Those paying a federal tax rate of 35% will see it rise to near 40% and will lose a fifth of the value of their deductions for taxes, mortgage interest and charitable contributions.

Two-thirds of small businesses are taxed at the same rate as individuals. Consider what this means to the owner of a restaurant and bar in Los Angeles open from noon to midnight, where a husband and wife each put in 80 hours a week.

At year's end, the couple find they have actually made a profit of $500,000 that they can take home in salary. What is the Obama-Schwarzenegger tax take on that salary? Their U.S. tax rate will have hit 39.6%. Their California income tax will have hit 9.55%.

Medicare payroll taxes on the proprietor as both employer and salaried employee will be $14,500. Social Security payroll taxes for the proprietor as both employer and employee will be $13,243.

In short, U.S. and state income and payroll taxes will consume half of all the pair earned for some 8,000 hours of work.

From that ravaged salary they must pay a state sales tax of 8.25%, gas taxes for the 50-mile commute, and tens of thousands in property taxes on both their restaurant and home.

And, after being pilloried by politicians for having feasted in the Bush era, they are now told the tax deduction they get for contributing to the church is to be cut 20%, while millions of Obama voters, who paid no U.S. income tax at all, will be getting a tax cut — i.e., a fat little check — in April.

Any wonder native-born Californians are fleeing the Golden Land?

Markets are not infallible. But the stock market has long been a "lead indicator" of where the economy will be six months from now. What are the markets, the collective decisions of millions of investors, saying?

Having fallen every month since Obama's election, with January and February the worst two months in history, they are telling us the stimulus package will not work, that Tim Geithner is clueless about how to save the banks, that the Obama budget portends disaster for the republic.

The president says he is gearing up for a fight on his budget.

Good. Let's give him one.

[hotwheels]

We are in big trouble with this man running the show......TOOOOOOOO LEFT!!

[blackwidow]

I guess this country is ready for some socialism.

In a capitalist country, poorly run businesses need to be allowed to fail. Obsolete businesses need to be allowed to fail. It's not the government's job to prop up failing companies and preserve jobs.
Even if thousands of jobs will be lost in the process. Adversity is what creates ingenuity; not hand outs.
Unfortunately our American people are constantly being told by politicians, the media, and schools that it IS the governments job to solve all of our problems and we are becoming complacent about it. Someday all the jobs in this country will be government jobs and it seems that the American people are fine with it. We can all work for Big Brother, get socialized health care, go to government run schools to prepare us for our government job in the big bureaucratic machine.

Someone made a post earlier about how to catch a wild pig. It was a great post that I passed on to many of my friends because of the truth in it.

We are ready for socialism and that is exactly what we're going to get.

[Stubs]

I guess this country is ready for some socialism.

In a capitalist country, poorly run businesses need to be allowed to fail. Obsolete businesses need to be allowed to fail. It's not the government's job to prop up failing companies and preserve jobs.
Even if thousands of jobs will be lost in the process. Adversity is what creates ingenuity; not hand outs.
Unfortunately our American people are constantly being told by politicians, the media, and schools that it IS the governments job to solve all of our problems and we are becoming complacent about it. Someday all the jobs in this country will be government jobs and it seems that the American people are fine with it. We can all work for Big Brother, get socialized health care, go to government run schools to prepare us for our government job in the big bureaucratic machine.
Someone made a post earlier about how to catch a wild pig. It was a great post that I passed on to many of my friends because of the truth in it.

We are ready for socialism and that is exactly what we're going to get.

Maybe that is why our government is getting worse and worse, products of the public school system. And then when they get to Washington they send THEIR kids to the best private schools.

[softballaddict]

This may help to reverse that trend. I'm not holding my breath, but we have to do something. This would solve most if not all of the taxation, favoritism, politics of the tax system. They may still give it away to those who are looking for handouts...but at least the tax side of the equation would be fair.

http://www.fairtax.org/site/PageServer

[Skarp]

Keep dreaming.

[weekend4trvl]

I watch the news everynight...I'm not hearing this. MSNBC

[Skarp]

I watch the news everynight...I'm not hearing this. MSNBC

You're kidding right? You think the MSM is going to start critically analyzing Obama's policies? He is THEIR man, and his policies are the very policies that the MSM has been cheering on for the past 50+ years.

So now they are going to start comparing relative budgets vs gdp's and such? No frickin' way.

[anonlooker]

I watch the news everynight...I'm not hearing this. MSNBC

You're kidding right? You think the MSM is going to start critically analyzing Obama's policies? He is THEIR man, and his policies are the very policies that the MSM has been cheering on for the past 50+ years.

So now they are going to start comparing relative budgets vs gdp's and such? No frickin' way.

Actually, now that they got Obama elected, they are lining up cushy government jobs:

Linda Douglass, who left her post as congressional correspondent for ABC News last year to work for then presidential candidate Barack Obama and now is in line to serve as an assistant secretary of Health and Human Services.

Or Jay Carney, once Washington bureau chief at Time magazine, now press secretary to Vice President Biden.

Or Peter Gosselin, an award-winning economic writer for the L.A. Times, now chief speechwriter for Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.

Or the Tribune’s Jill Zuckman, now press secretary to Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.

Perhaps even more startling, watch “Countdown With Keith Olbermann” or “The Rachel Maddow Show” almost any day, and you’ll see working reporters like NBC News' Chief Foreign Correspondent Richard Engel taking anything but an objective journalistic stance.


So no, you won't get objective analysis on MSNBC, or pretty much anywhere in MSM. And you're naive if you think you will.

[anonlooker]

For a somewhat reasoned analysis of how things are starting out for Obama's Era of Hope and Change, there's this from yesterday's Wall Street Journal:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123604419092515347.html

And if I had nothing to do today, I'd point you toward some other areas of concern, like foreign relations, where Obama's team is headed by the cuckolded wife of America's Blow-Job President. Nice pick!

I bet she'll get a ton of respect from the male dominated governments posing the greatest threat to our well-being. (Funny how she's portrayed as being "on her knees" begging China to keep buying our debt. But not really funny at all, when you consider what's a stake.)

Already the Russians are laughing at him, the Iranians blew off his "initiative", and even the Brits are royally pissed off!

And Geithner, OMG, is monumentally incompetent. He says things everyday that are anathema to any real hope of jump starting the economy. Alas.