E!!

Clever.  And sobering.

the French start sounding more sensible than the Americans on economic policy.

Read about President Sarkozy’s comments on capitalism here.  The Newsmax piece starts with this:

French President Nicolas Sarkozy says that the economic maelstrom that has captivated the world’s attention for the last 17 months is “not a crisis of capitalism” but, in actuality, a breakdown of a system that has “drifted away from capitalism’s most fundamental values.”

For a re-cap of how the U.S. drifted, here’s a pretty good (short) op-ed from the WaPo (August).  Title:  Is Capitalism Dead?  The market that failed was not exactly free.

Harry Reid said the following in a newsletter to his constituents yesterday:

“In his budget request for 2010, President Obama will announce plans to devise a new strategy to find another solution to deal with the nation’s nuclear waste that does not include storing it in Nevada.”

This is a shame if so.  The Yucca Mountain project currently employs hundreds of people and stands to employ thousands more, not to mention the nearly $100 billion it would bring into the hurting state economy.

The operation of nuclear energy plants and the transportation, recycling, and storage of spent nuclear fuel can be done quite safely these days - in fact is done safely all over Europe - but apparently Harry Reid is not going to let the facts get in the way of politics-per-usual and a Wednesday press release.  (More on the latest with Yucca here.)

This is the second time in less than three weeks an Obama agenda item has dealt a heavy blow to Nevada’s economy.  What was the first, you ask?  This offhand comment recently made at a townhall meeting:

“You are not going to be able to give out these big bonuses until you’ve paid taxpayers back, you can’t get corporate jets, you can’t go take a trip to Las Vegas or go down to the Super Bowl on the taxpayers dime.”

Rich Becker wrote an excellent piece on the fallout of that comment, which summed up is this:

Companies are now scrambling to avoid the “stigma” of holding company functions in Las Vegas and millions of dollars have been lost due to cancelled rooms and convention events.  (These organizations aren’t really cancelling the events; they’re just relocating them.  To sunny California, mostly.)  And the tremendous loss of room revenue, convention business, enertainment dollars, and gaming revenue is going to lead to even more layoffs than Nevada’s already seen.

So where are Harry Reid (and Dina Titus) with their outrage and big press releases when Nevada’s economy really needs them?  Busy rubbing elbows with a president who clearly doesn’t give a damn about the what’s best for the Silver State.

I guess Nevada is now “blue” in more ways than one.

But don’t just stand there and cry, good citizens.  You can do something:

http://dumpreid.com/

Leslie Carbone, on tomorrow’s Stimulus anti-Stimulus vote in the House, that is.

Like many Americans last week, I tuned in for the 30-minute Barack-o-mercial. 

In between the anecdotal close-ups of struggling American families – a widow working two jobs and raising two kids; a husband and father worried about his job at the Ford plant – I noted that Obama’s megacommercial failed to present hard data on the cost of his proposed programs and said nothing about our huge federal deficit and the corresponding budget pressures he will face once in office. 

Obam’s description of his health care plan – which “includes improving information technology, requires coverage for preventive care and pre-existing conditions, and lowers health care costs for the typical family by $2,500 a year” – sounds very nice, but there has been no independent economic analysis confirming that costs will really be reduced by that (or any) amount.

Obama simply Hopes that spending $50 billion on his proposed Changes over the next five years will save the system money.  But even if his optimistic estimates prove out, Obama’s plan does not stipulate that the net savings by insurance and health care providers will result in lower premiums for consumers.

And then we have Obama’s promises to “cut taxes for every working family making less than $200,000 a year…  Give businesses a tax credit for every new employee they hire…  Eliminate tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas…  Help homeowners by freezing foreclosures for 90 days… Provide low-cost loans to help small businesses pay their workers and keep their doors open…”

Independent analysts have estimated that combined with our current budget shortfalls, these and other of Obama’s proposals will likely result in a $1 trillion deficit next year.  That being unthinkable, some purging will be necessary.  But which of his programs will Obama cut, and why has he been promising all of them if he knows at least some must go?

Though much of his infomercial focused on the “hard realities” of life for select American families, Obama seems unwilling or unable to face reality himself.  It seems he could stand to learn something from that widowed mother of two who has to settle for half instead of whole gallons of milk when the money runs short – and doesn’t promise her family otherwise on the way to the store.

According to Yahoo! Finance, Nevada is behind only California, Arizona, and Florida in terms of total state budget shortfall.

Nevada’s budget gap is 16% of the total state budget or $1.2 billion.

Nevada has the worst foreclosure rate in the nation, and falling tourism and gambling revenues has slowed the economy dramatically.

A special legislative session in June resulted in budget caps and cuts, but it’s quite likely another special session will have to be called – after the elections in November.

Adapted by Elizabeth Crum - E!! - from “A kingdom for a stage” by William Shakespeare [from Henry V]

O for a Muse of moderation, that would ascend
The brightest netwave of invention,
A kingdom for a Sage, senators to act
And bloggers to behold the swelling scene!

Then should the warlike pol, like Reagan,
Assume the port of Mars; and at his heels,
Leash’d in like hounds, should dollar and dividend
Crouch for employment. And pardon not, O Blogivists,
The doltish congressmen who dare

On their unworthy stage to recommend forth
Their idiotic plans:  can that intellectual vacuum hold
The vasty notions of fiscal responsibility?  Or will we cram
Within this week the very blunders
That did affright the kings of Wall Street?

O, pardon! since a crooked politician may
Protest while pocketing a million;
So let us, Bloggers in this great sphere,
Type, click and upload on screens galore.

 Today within the corridors of Congress
We see confined two indistinguishible parties,
Whose egos are exceeded only by their greed
And perilous corruption splits all asunder:
Piece out their imperfections with your posts;
Into a thousand parts divide their rhetoric,
And make it clear to all who rules this realm:

The Blogosphere, in all its glory rides

Printing our apt remarks i’ the receiving Web;
For ’tis our thoughts that now shall thump our kings,
Chase them here and there; Twittering and
Turning the empty accomplishment of many years
Into pithy posts:  for the further supply of which
Welcome us Bloggers to this great Webstory;
We pundit-like your online reading pray,

Bookmark our blogs, and kindly judge our daily Play.

-

I like Jim Henley’s one-liner: “Wouldn’t it save administrative costs if I just started giving my money to random rich people?”

(H/T:  Outside the Beltway)

I had the honor of meeting and assisting Pat Toomey last week at the Conservative Leadership Conference here in Las Vegas.  This morning, Club for Growth says/releases the following (excerpted):

Eighteen months into the credit crunch, many largely capitalized financial services firms are experiencing serious difficulties but the overall economy continues to grow.  GDP growth over the past 12 months was 2.25 percent and 3.5 percent when excluding the drag imposed by the housing sector.  Even within the financial sector, many banks are doing well.  Regional bank indices had risen significantly since the lows of last July—prior to the bailout announcement—and thousands of community banks are thriving.  It is extraordinary that a massive government intervention in the economy is considered inevitable when the economy is not even in a recession.

Indeed it is.  On what is the panic of Wall Street types based?  Could it be fear that lack of liquidity and credit in the market will affect their own bank accounts?

At the same time, socializing economic risks come at a great cost to the American economy by misallocating capital, inviting political manipulation, and putting taxpayers on the hook for possibly a trillion dollars.  Such a large takeover by the government will surely be accompanied by adverse, unintended consequences.  Already, other companies and industries are lining up at government’s door asking for their own bailout.  And if the government incurs $700 billion in debt to finance the purchase of bad bank assets, the danger that it will eventually monetize that debt and trigger dramatic inflation is very worrisome.

“Unintended consequences.”  This concept is one of the great underlying tenets of conservative thought.  The idea is that when one makes broad, sweeping changes there are always unplanned effects, and they are often worse than the problem with which you began.

Our Do Nothing Congress should, in this case, do nothing (other than what Newt said yesterday).  We ought to free things up where we can, allow the market to self-correct, and let those who must (and should) take their proverbial Lumps. 

Access to unlimited cash and credit is not a “human right,” and we should stop behaving as if it is.

Seems the All-Powerful and All-Knowing Wizard Harry Reid got all of 4,000 signatures on an Anti-Yucca petition urging the Nuclear Regulatory Commission not to approve the application for the Department of Energy to begin construction.  If there is as much opposition to Yucca as Reid claims, why so few Johnny Hancocks?

The whole Yucca “controversy” continues to amaze me.  What I’ve found from talking to regular folks is that Yucca really isn’t all that controversial except in the minds of Reid and others who are rabidly against it.  Most people seem to realize that Nevada would draw a HUGE paycheck in exchange for supporting the infrastructure of Yucca.  They are also appreciative of the potential cash boost to our construction industry and the creation of thousands of permanent jobs.

Here’s a little history lesson:

The U.S. Dept. of Energy had its first public meeting in Nevada on Yucca Mountain in 1983.  Don Veith, the Yucca Mountain project manager, presented an overview of the legislation.  The meeting was then opened to public comment.  Governor Richard Bryan stood and announced that he was “unalterably opposed” to the storage of “nuclear waste” in Nevada.  A surrogate for then-Congressman Harry Reid echoed the congressman’s “strong opposition.”  According to those present, most other attendees expressed an opinion along the lines of, “Interesting – maybe there’s something in it for us.”

But via the governor’s office and the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects (created in ‘85), the state officially adopted a negative view of Yucca.  And under Director Bob Loux, Yucca has faced two decades of unrelenting criticism and obstruction.

Along the way, several multi-billion dollar offers have been informally made to Nevada by the DOE and/or nuclear industry in exchange for the state’s acceptance of the repository.  At one point, the Reagan administration offered Nevada a multi-billion-dollar nuclear medicine and nuclear science research facility to be associated with UNLV and situated on the Nevada Test Site.  The offer was flatly rejected.

Ladies and gents, spent nuclear fuel is presently stored at temporary sites around the nation.  It is stored safely and without incident.  The nuclear reactors that render efficient electricity are also operated safely and without incident.  For the good of our economy and our nation, we should all take a second look at Yucca.  Please contact me if you would like to get on a Yucca Mountain mailing list and participate in future discussions, forums, panels, and meet-ups.

From the American Enterprise Institute:

The nation’s GDP grew at a surprising 3.3 percent rate in the second quarter, up from 0.9 in the first quarter. That is welcome news for the nation’s 154 million strong labor force on this Labor Day holiday. The Census Bureau reported that, in 2007, real median household income rose for the third straight year, a point Douglas J. Besharov made at an AEI conference on August 25.

Although most Americans are uneasy about the nation’s economy, they remain optimistic about their personal prospects. In a recent HarrisInteractive poll, only 18 percent said the country was on the right track; 76 percent felt that way about their personal lives.

Here’s the opener to Jonah’s column today.  It’s a Must Read.  As usual.

The US economy — yes, that economy — grew at a 3.3 percent annual rate last quarter. This no doubt caused consternation at the highest levels of the Democratic Party, perhaps forcing some to consider a new convention film at the last minute: “Dude, Where’s My Recession?”

To hear the Democrats at their convention this week, you’d get the sense that a recession is merely a technical term for the worst human misery ever visited upon a once-great people. You’d think Americans were listening to the Democratic speeches as they huddled around their kitchen tables (if they hadn’t already been used for firewood), deciding which of their children to pack off to the orphanage and how much tree bark they can afford to eat next week. 

Last night, Barack Obama proclaimed: “Our economy is in turmoil, and the American promise has been threatened once more.” He went on to describe an America reminiscent of the Grapes of Wrath (if not Mad Max).

But this was a week-long theme. Over and over again, Democrats insisted that the “American dream” is being snuffed out, crushed, beaten, stabbed and quite possibly dismembered in President Bush’s West Wing bathtub, where Bush and Dick “The Cleaner” Cheney can dissolve the remains in sulfuric acid.  …