No Bailout, No Handouts, No Copouts and Nothing New

Riding into the 2012 campaign season on his trusty teleprompter; Obama gave his fourth State of the Union Address.  This address sounded very much like a similar State of the Union Address he gave in 2011 and another he gave in 2010.  However, this time he means business.  

I don’t like to call his political style that of class warfare; rather, it is more the dumbing down of the less prosperous and dependent.  Since the main reason for this speech was to set the stage for his 2012 run at a second term, he needs to start today to ensure the public is too stupid to understand the facts.  As a magician fools his audience, Obama waves his golden pocket watch in the face of the government dependent.  He tells them that a prosperous life can be had by all if we contain the wealth of those that prosper.  This, in other words, means that when you wake up every time you hear the word ‘fair’ you will believe that your wealth has been taken by a rich person.  Obama impresses upon us that his economy would be one that is ‘built to last, where hard work pays off, and responsibility is rewarded.’  

His favorite example is the secretary of Warren Buffett.  This poor little old woman was dragged across the coals by our IRS while her boss was given a lawn chair and a mojito.  In fact, between sips of his mojito, Buffett was able to call Obama and make him aware of this travesty of justice.  It turns out that Buffett in 2009 skated through with a 17.7% tax rate and his secretary had a tax rate of over 32%. 

Gazing wide eyed at the golden presidential pocket watch, we fail to see that some of the details are left out.  First, in order for the secretary to be paying over 32% in income tax, she would be pulling in over $1 million without deductions (not bad for a secretary).  Second, the majority of Buffett’s money was made on capital gains.  This is charged at a straight 15%.  The trick behind capital gains is that this money has already been taxed.  The money you invested had already been taxed as income and the gains (or profits of the company you invested in) have been taxed as business income.  Barrack and Warren want you to believe that these numbers are some how related.  This way, Obama can propose that the rich need to pay a larger chunk (their fair share) in higher income tax.  All the while, Warren’s tax rate won’t change, because he is not collecting a significant share of income.  ‘Tax reform should follow the Buffett rule: If you make more than $1 million a year, you should not pay less than 30 percent in taxes.’ 

After the President has successfully warped your sense of taxation, he needs to make you sure you don’t comprehend how the US budget works.  Let’s start with the fact that the last yearly budget Obama signed was in May of 2009.  When that fiscal year expired (while the Democrats controlled the presidency and both houses of congress), he and his Democrat leaders, Pelosi and Reed, were unable to bring forth a new budget.  Why?  It was an election year and the country would have balked at his proposed spending.  Right now Obama can spend without restriction. 

We need to believe that Obama has cured our spending problems with $2 trillion in spending reduction.  Which is a great idea, accept a couple of weeks ago he asked for $1.2 trillion in debt ceiling increase.  If you add that together with his other request for debt ceiling increase in August of $2.1 trillion, he is out spending his own reduction.  Not to mention that $2 trillion in cuts are spread out over 10 years.  Don’t get me wrong, I love spending cuts; however, this is like sticking a pin hole in the bottom of 55 gallon drum to empty it while a fire hose floods the top. 

Still swinging our heads in the motion of Obama’s watch, he continues to re-write the ideals of America.  According to Obama there two great evils killing the job market: 1) jobs and manufacturing began leaving our shores 2) technology has made businesses more efficient, but also made some jobs obsolete.   He never really explains what he means by the second, but there is much misinformation about the first. 

For decades we have heard about the evil outsourcing of jobs.  Companies trying to make a buck by finding cheap labor abroad.  Yet, Obama tells the story of Jackie Bray.  Jackie is a single mother laid off from her job.  However, lucky for her, Siemens was paying to educate people to work in their facility.  I personally think that is a great idea.  However, Siemens is a multinational company headquartered in Germany.  Wouldn’t we call that insourcing?  In essence he is willing condemn US corporations for being multinational, while praising the actions foreign companies hiring within the US.  Maybe it’s a hatred for US business he wants us to believe? 

We are getting s-l-e-e-p-y and he says he will, ‘Take the money we're no longer spending at war, use half of it to pay down our debt, and use the rest to do some nation-building right here at home.’  That is an interesting proposal since I thought that money was all borrowed.  Not to mention that number should be going down to zero, especially in Iraq now that the soldiers are home.   Therefore, he wants to borrow an undetermined amount of money to pay off borrowed money, seems prudent. 

After we tax the rich and borrow money in undetermined amounts; then we will improve our education system.  With our minds numb and impressionable, Obama explains, ‘let's offer schools a deal. Give them the resources to keep good teachers on the job, and reward the best ones. In return, grant schools flexibility: To teach with creativity and passion; to stop teaching to the test; and to replace teachers who just aren't helping kids learn.’  While Obama is vague on how that should happen, it sounds familiar.  Sounds like something you could get recalled for. 

As his parting thought, he gives us an enemy.  We must punish the banks.  They have brought great ills on our society and they must pay for what they have done.  Obama will attack the banks from two directions.  He will ask Darth Holder he gather the state attorney generals and begin digging into their bank records before the financial crisis of 2009.  They are to be relentless and, ‘hold accountable those who broke the law.’  While Holder is pressuring banks Obama will send to ‘Congress a plan that gives every responsible homeowner the chance to save about $3,000 a year on their mortgage, by refinancing at historically low interest rates.’  We will pay for this with ‘a small fee on the largest financial institutions’, because we all know those fees will never get passed onto the consumer and Americans can keep their ‘values of fair play.’ 

As we the watch stops swinging 90 minutes later and the fog of Obama attempting to dumb down those less prosperous and dependent lifts, we must always remember the way of our military.  They work together as a team.  They take strength from the strong and give it weak.  They never make the weak responsible for their inadequacies and neither should the country.  We will take prosperity from the prosperous and give it to those unable or unwilling to prosper and with that ‘the state of our Union will always be strong.’