Great Speech this afternoon by Newt Gingrich at the 2012 CPAC Convention!CLICK HERE TO WATCH NEWT GINGRICH @ 2012 CPAC!
Friday, February 10, 2012
Newt Gingrich's Full Speech at CPAC 2012 - courtesy of ABC News
Great Speech this afternoon by Newt Gingrich at the 2012 CPAC Convention!CLICK HERE TO WATCH NEWT GINGRICH @ 2012 CPAC!
President Obama's Incredible Shrinking Labor Force By Newt Gingrich
Human EventsFebruary 8, 2012
Newt Gingrich
President Obama last week brandished new jobs numbers as proof that his policies were having an effect on the unemployment rate, which the report said declined to 8.3 percent in January.
The president is right about one thing: his big government agenda and class warfare tactics are having an effect -- but it's not the one he claims.
In truth, last month's drop in the unemployment statistic was due largely to the evaporation of 1.2 million people from the labor force number. When people become so discouraged they stop actively looking for work, they are no longer counted as unemployed and the rate goes down even though Americans are hardly better off than they were before.
The rate went down in January because (apparently) 1.2 million people decided in a single month not to pursue work. This is the number, in effect, that President Obama is touting.
The January report caps an extraordinary decline in the participation rate that the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) has been reporting under the Obama administration. Since January 2009, the BLS said more than five million people have dropped out of the labor force -- the greatest decline in American history and the lowest participation rate in more than three decades. Only about six in 10 adult American civilians are counted as part of the labor force.
A few more good jobs reports like this and we'll have a three percent unemployment rate with nobody working.
The president assures us, however, the lower unemployment rate is actually evidence that his policies are successful. Asked on Monday about the fact that unemployment had dropped in part because so many Americans left the labor force, unable to find jobs, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said the decline in the participation rate could be an "economic positive" because some of it is "due to younger people getting more education." Carney also tried to blame the massive exodus on Americans getting older—which they must have done at record levels in January to account for 1.2 million people retiring at once.
Those are pretty glib and grasping explanations for the single largest exit from the labor force on record—especially since it's more than four times the number who left the previous month.
In reality, almost half a million fewer Americans are employed today than when President Obama took office. The real unemployment rate, counting those who are unemployed, underemployed, or have looked for work in the past 12 months but since given up, is closer to 15 percent. More Americans are relying on food stamps than ever before. Teenage unemployment during the Obama administration is the highest since records began in 1948, with almost one in four teenagers who wants to work today unable to find a job. 8.2 million Americans have only part-time employment either because they can't find full-time work or because their hours have been cut back.
The president's unrelenting assault on job creators has made a bad economy much worse. In the middle of the worst economic conditions since the Great Depression, he rammed through Obamacare, spent almost a trillion dollars of "stimulus" indiscriminately, virtually took over the American auto industry, attempted to raise taxes on producers with carbon trading legislation, banned development of offshore oil and gas resources, passed the Dodd-Frank Act which crippled community banks, juiced up the regulatory powers of the EPA, FDA and other bureaucracies—and lately, has taken to demonizing job creators with class warfare rhetoric while offering policy platitudes that do nothing to solve our problems.
These are the things the president is trying to tell us are responsible for last month's drop in the unemployment rate? Having driven five million people out of the labor force, maybe on second thought he's right.
Your Friend,
Newt
Senators Mccain And Kyl Join Efforts To Protect Religious Freedom by Brian Rogers - Prescott News.com
McCain and Kyl have heard the public outcry and state their support for religious freedom, despite President Obama's health care law.
Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senators John McCain (R-AZ) and Jon Kyl (R-AZ) today announced that they have signed on as co-sponsors to the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 2012, introduced by Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL), and the Respect for Rights of Conscience Act of 2011, introduced by Senator Roy Blunt (R-MO), to protect religious freedom and restore rights of conscience under President Obama’s health care law. Senators McCain and Kyl issued the following statement:
“In conjunction with the anniversary of the Supreme Court ruling in Roe v. Wade, the Obama Administration announced that, beginning in August 2012, all U.S. employers would be required to offer
health plans that fully cover the cost of birth control, sterilizations, and abortifacients for all women they employ.
“Religious freedom is sacred in our constitution and should be respected by public officials who swear to bear allegiance to it. Instead, the Obama Administration willfully developed a policy
that tramples the rights of faith-based organizations by requiring that their employee health insurance plans fully cover the cost of birth control, sterilizations and aborifacients. It is reprehensible that this Administration shows no respect for those whose conscience would be violated under the new mandate. Under this new mandate, beginning in 2013, religious institutions that sponsor employee health plans would have to begin offering plans that provide contraception, sterilizations, and abortifacients at no cost, to all employees.
As Archbishop Timothy Dolan aptly put it, ‘In effect, the president is saying we have a year to figure out how to violate our consciences.’ This is wrong.
“To restore conscience protections under President Obama’s health care law, we have cosponsored Senator Rubio’s bill, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 2012, and Senator Blunt’s bill,
the Respect for Rights of Conscience Act of 2011.”
Was that the Super Bowl or the Obama Bowl? By Bobby Eberle GOPUSA
February 8, 2012
What an interesting Super Bowl Sunday. The game went right down to the wire, but in addition to the Patriots and Giants being on center stage, Barack Obama was given his share of airtime as well. Come on! Can't we just keep the Super Bowl about football? First, there was an NBC interview with Obama in which he said he deserved a second term. Really? Then, there was the Clint Eastwood "Halftime in America" ad which basically was a plug for auto bailouts and Barack Obama.
The president said American manufacturing still needs a boost and "We have got to make sure we are pushing American energy, not just oil and gas, but clean energy."
During the NBC interview, Obama actually stated that he deserves a second term. Unreal. For what? For sky-high unemployment? For being the only president in history to run trillion dollar
deficits in every year of office?
Obama also said the country needed to return to "old-fashioned American values," so "everyone gets a fair shake."
Three years ago, Obama said if the economy hadn't turned around by this time, his presidency would be "a one-term proposition."
Wow, where to start? How about with "not just oil and gas?" Obama is so hostile to oil and gas that it's absolutely outrageous that he would even act like he supports American energy at all. Halting the Keystone Pipeline is just one bit of evidence that Obama does not care about American energy independence.
Then, we have "old-fashioned American values." Ugh! Is it old-fashioned values to make Catholic hospitals and universities go against their faith in order to provide Obama-mandated health insurance coverage? Is it old-fashioned American values to accuse the people who fund the government of not paying their fair share? Is it old-fashioned American values to divide Americans based on race and economic status?
So... that was our lead-in to the Super Bowl... an NBC fluff piece that was essentially a Barack Obama ad. Now, we have the real commercial thanks to Clint Eastwood:
CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE VIDEO!
Nice spot, right? Great music... good emotions. Except... the message. The message is all wrong. I guess the line that really rubs me the wrong way is when Eastwood says that Americans "rallied around what was right." What in the world does that mean? Does it mean that whenever an industry gets in trouble, only government can bail them out? Nonsense!
Keep in mind that the problems in Detroit were not simply due to the downturn in the economy. Years of demographic studies, sales reports, and projections were ignored. The automakers kept making SUVs when people were thinking more about fuel economy... and so on.
The whole premise that unless the tax payers bailed out the auto industry under Obama's leadership that there would be no more American cars is crazy. Corporations get in trouble... they get in the red... they file for bankruptcy protection, and they reorganize. Some make it. Some don't. That's how business should work.
As noted in the Wall Street Journal report, liberals were loving the commercial:
"Saving the America Auto Industry: Something Eminem and Clint Eastwood can agree on," tweeted Dan Pfeiffer, the White House spokesman. Added David Axelrod, Obama's chief strategist: "Powerful spot." Filmmaker Michael Moore was a bit more direct (and apologies for the Twitterese): "Your sermon seemed 2 b a call 2 give O his 'second half.'"
There are all sorts of messages being promoted at the Super Bowl, but saying that the only way for America to come back is through big government is about as un-American as it gets. Wake up, people! See what is going on around you... even during the Super Bowl.
Thursday, February 09, 2012
Let’s take a look at the representation in the new CD 6 vs the new CD 9.
Instead of believing the 'propoganda' being put out by "Pro-Schweikert Blogs" we thought you would like some ACTUAL numbers in the Arizona CD-6/CD-9 new Congressional Districts:
We think that paints a rather clear picture. CD9 would consist of a new constituency for Congressman Quayle. On the contrary, a large majority of CD 9 is already familiar with Congressman Schweikert. The argument that Congressman Quayle abandoned his district is not accurate. Nearly 70% of the district that voted him into office resides in CD 6.
The Schweikert campaign has conveniently withheld a good deal of relevant information...while immediately opting to go negative in their messaging.
It also helps to see just how egregious the AIRC was when they drew the lines in regards to Congressman Quayle. Ben stood up to Obama and in doing so he has now become Obama's target. Below is a snippet of Congressman Quayle’s neighborhood with a red dot displaying his residence. The Democrats were able to succeed in drawing the lines down a residential street and cutting up into the Congressman’s neighborhood to cut him out of his district literally by feet.
Obama's Next Bailout By Anthony Randazzo
February 8, 2012Take yourself back to the good old days of 2006, when the Azzurri rightly ruled the football world and Lana Del Rey had not yet taken icicle form. With a good paying job, and only two more years of the Bush administration in sight, you decide to buy a summer home on Miami Beach. It is a good investment, you reason, until the real estate market collapse and leaves you several hundred thousand dollars underwater. And even though you’ve rented out the home since 2006 and kept your well-paid job, with about 20 percent of homes in America worth less than their mortgage it has been almost impossible to get a modification or refinance the mortgage to buy something more affordable.
Until now.
Under a revised White House program, second homes—whether owned as a rental property investment, as a vacation home, or just as an extra mortgage from a house-flipping project gone array—are now eligible for taxpayer subsidies to reduce the principal on the underlying mortgage. This means that even though you made a poor investment decision with that home in Miami, taxpayers will now help foot the bill to reduce your mortgage by several hundred thousand dollars at little cost to you.
The program is called the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP), and it was started by the Department of Housing and Urban Development since 2009. You might have heard about it, as it is one of the Obama Administration's most widely panned programs.
Second (and third) homes had been “excluded” from federal programs to subsidize housing. But in the wake of changes to the federal refinance program announced in the State of the Union address last week, the Obama administration is now seeking to relax the rules on its loan modification program to increase its impact.
HAMP got started in early 2009 by using $29.9 billion from the Troubled Asset Relief Program (the bank bailout fund). It was supposed to work by offering payments to mortgage servicers in exchange for modifying the principal due on mortgages. However, nearly half of the trial modifications that were started ended in failure. And according to a monthly HAMP report in January, only 909,953 mortgages had permanent modifications through the program—costing the taxpayers an average of about $2,000 each so far. (See page 57 of the Inspector General report on TARP from last week.)
Since the goal from the start has been to modify as many as five million mortgages, the White House is moving to increase the pool of eligible mortgages by reducing the standards necessary to qualify. After all, it is not like reducing mortgage standards in order to accommodate more homeowners has ever been a policy leading to disaster before, right?
Mortgages on rental properties are now eligible for modification—meaning the total amount owed, not just the interest rate, may be reduced to avoid foreclosure. If the home you live in cost you
$300,000 (plus interest on the mortgage) when you bought it, but now is worth just $225,000, HAMP could pay a lender to summarily knock $75,000 off the mortgage. If you own a second home and rent it out (even if that was not the original purpose of the home) you could get the same deal for a mortgage that started out at $700,000 but today is worth substantially less.
Remember when companies that bought insurance from AIG got paid 100 cents on the dollar from the September 2008 bailout? This is the same thing, except the recipients are people who flipped homes and were caught holding the hot potato.
Another part of the revamped HAMP is to triple payments (from between 6 and 21 cents on the dollar to between 18 and 63 cents on the dollar) for lenders and servicers who reduce the amounts owed on mortgages. This deal is open to both private lenders and to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (who essentially would be getting a subsidy from HUD to modify a mortgage before asking the Treasury Department to subsidize the rest of the losses). The program will also stay in effect until the end of 2013, instead of its original 2012 conclusion date.
The reality is that we simply have no need for this program. Even for those individuals who favor principal modifications as the solution to the housing crisis, there were still 2.6 million private modifications that occurred during the same timeframe as HAMP, without any subsidy needed.
At best, HAMP wastes resources for something that is being done better without the government’s heavy hand. At worst, HAMP is dragging out the housing crisis by delaying necessary foreclosures. Either way, there is no good reason why investors who bought homes to rent or flip should be bailed out by the taxpayer.
Anthony Randazzo is director of economic research at the Reason Foundation.
Tempe Chamber of Commerce Endorses Michael Monti for Mayor of Tempe
Endorsement Follows Key Debate
(Tempe, Arizona) Businessman and candidate for Tempe Mayor Michael Monti has received a key endorsement. The Tempe Chamber of Commerce endorsed Monti following his impressive performance at a January 30th debate co-sponsored by the Tempe Chamber of Commerce and the Arizona Republic.
Monti not only discussed his background as owner of Monti’s La Casa Vieja, he also laid out his innovative plans to help Tempe go from good to great.
Monti stated, “It takes an endorsement just like this to overcome a self acknowledged career politician. I respect Councilman Mitchell’s service but Tempe can do better to fill Mayor Hallman’s big shoes. I appreciate the Tempe Chamber of Commerce recognizing this and encouraging someone from the business sector to move Tempe forward.”
Michael Monti, owner of Tempe’s historic Monti’s La Casa Vieja, co-founded Local First, Arizona. He is also active in the Tempe Diablos Charities, and is the youngest inductee in the Arizona Restaurant Association’s Hall of Fame.
His campaign is based on bringing private sector ideas to government, fiscal responsibility, civic involvement, economic opportunity, and innovation. His proposals include:
- Financial incentives for city workers who save tax dollars
- The creation of the Tempe Community Corps to increase volunteerism, and aid Tempe neighborhoods
- Partnerships with ASU and the business community to bring more jobs to Tempe
- The creation of a public swimming beach at Tempe Town Lake, paid for by the private sector
- Partnerships with the ASU College of Nursing to aid Tempe seniors
Encouraging businesses to embrace eco-friendly projects such as the Blink Car Charging Stations at Monti’s La Casa Vieja
A ban on texting while driving in Tempe
Arizona leaders and organizations that have endorsed Michael Monti include:
Tempe Mayor Hugh Hallman
Tempe Council Member Onnie Shekerjian
Tempe’s first elected Mayor, Rudy Campbell
The Tempe Chamber of Commerce
Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne
Congressman David Schweikert
Former Tempe City Council Member ‘Hut’ Hutson
Former State Rep. Laura Knaperek
Tempe Democrat Carl Hayden
To visit the Monti4 Mayor Website click here or log on to www.monti4mayor.com (@monti4mayor).
###
Paid for by Monti4Mayor
ObamaCare's Great Awakening - The Wall Street Journal
HHS tells religious believers to go to hell. The public notices.February 8, 2012
The political furor over President Obama's birth-control mandate continues to grow, even among those for whom contraception poses no moral qualms, and one needn't be a theologian to understand why. The country is being exposed to the raw political control that is the core of the Obama health-care plan, and Americans are seeing clearly for the first time how this will violate pluralism and liberty.
***
In late January the Health and Human Services Department required almost all insurance plans to cover contraceptive and sterilization methods, including the morning-after pill. The decision came after passionate lobbying by religious groups and liberals from the likes of Planned Parenthood, amid government promises of compromise.
In the end, Planned Parenthood won. HHS chose to draw the rule's conscience exceptions for "religious employers" so narrowly that they will not be extended to religious charities, universities, schools, hospitals, soup kitchens, homeless shelters and other institutions that oppose contraception as a matter of religious belief.
CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
