As we approach the mid-point of his term we, once again, hear President Obama with another scheme to create jobs.  This time he really, really means it.  For a mere $50 billion we can build roads, rails and runways and we can create an “infrastructure bank” to boot.  I guess the government wants to get into the banking business now that they have swallowed up two thirds of the domestic auto companies and passed a law to take over health care.  But, hey, who are you calling a socialist?

The infrastructure bank has supporters: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Ed Rendell the Democratic governor of Pennsylvania and Michal Bloomberg the Democratic, Republican, Independent mayor of New York, but they want it to support more projects such as water and clean energy projects.  But here’s the really good news, according to the New York Times “They say such a bank would spur innovation by allowing a panel of experts to approve projects on merit, rather than having lawmakers simply steer transportation money back home.” We get a brand new panel of experts to tell us morons what is good for us! 

How about this idea, get the Federal government out of the roads, rails and runways business.  Unless the road is part of the Interstate highway system, and that means interstate, the feds should stay away from it.  If a road within a city needs maintenance, that city and its citizens should pay for it, not taxpayers elsewhere in the country.  That’s how the whole process got screwed up.  You build my road, I’ll build your road and nobody will know who pays for what, until we find out we are $13 trillion in debt.

One of the good ideas Jimmy Carter had was to deregulate the airlines.  Airlines became competitive and prices came down.  The problem is that air travel consists of three components: the airlines, the airports and air traffic control.  Complete the process, deregulate the airports and air traffic control.  If you do that, airports can charge different prices for takeoff and landing slots.  No more will we see thirty-two flights all scheduled to take off at 7:30 AM from one airport.  Private investors would also have an incentive to build a state of the art air traffic control system. 

By the way, what happened to all those “shovel ready” projects from the first stimulus plan?  Did we actually finish building all the turtle crossings that this country needs?

On another front, Obama continues to tinker with the mortgage market rather than getting out of the way, letting housing prices find their bottom and then going from there.  George Mason economist Anthony B. Sanders said in the New York Times, ““Housing needs to go back to reasonable levels.  If we keep trying to stimulate the market, that’s the definition of insanity.”  Even Democrats are piling on:

“The administration made a bet that a rising economy would solve the housing problem and now they are out of chips,” said Howard Glaser, a former Clinton administration housing official with close ties to policy makers in the administration. “They are deeply worried and don’t really know what to do.”

Who would have thought that a president and vice president with no executive experience prior to taking office would not know what to do once they got there?  After all everyone knew that Obama was a really nice guy with an even temperament, what went wrong?  Now we hear that Fannie Mae wants to back mortgages with nothing down.  But not to worry, this time they are actually going to require the lenders to check to make sure the borrower has income. I feel better already.

Since this administration seems to like experts how about listening to these experts:

“We have had enough artificial support and need to let the free market do its thing,” said the housing analyst Ivy Zelman.

Michael L. Moskowitz, president of Equity Now, a direct mortgage lender that operates in New York and seven other states, also advocates letting the market fall. “Prices are still artificially high,” he said. “The government is discriminating against the renters who are able to buy at $200,000 but can’t at $250,000.”

It’s time for President Obama and his administration to get his boot off of the neck of the economy.  Ours is the strongest most resilient economy in the world, if you set it free.  All of the tinkering and the anti-business threats have pushed employers to the sidelines.  The uncertainty over the economy has led businesses to take a wait and see attitude.

The rhetoric the Democrats have been trying to muster to save their skins is that “eight years of failed policies,” yada, yada, yada.  The reality is that this recession started one year after Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid took over Congress.  This recession started in the last year of the Bush administration, not the first seven.  This recession has lasted nearly twice as long and counting under Obama than it did under Bush, and it shows no sign of changing anytime soon.  A recent poll in Ohio by Public Policy Polling asked respondents who they would prefer to see in the White House right now and the results were George W. Bush 50%, Barack Obama 42%; what does that tell you?

So, Mr. Obama, keeps your hands were we can see them and slowly step away from the economy.

Something We Can All Look Forward To

President Obama announces His Budget Plan and the Stock Market Craters

President Obama got his $800 billion stimulus package off the launching pad and now we eagerly await the massive stimulus to come when people start seeing their taxes reduced in April by $8-$16 per week.  Stand back, the crowds could be euphoric and out of control.

With the ink barely dry on that package, President Obama rolls out the next attack on future generations of Americans.  His plan calls for the addition of debt so staggering that it may destroy the U.S. economy.  How long before the additional interest on the national debt starts growing so fast that we cannot pay it, let alone the principal?  In his budget he plans to add half a trillion to the national debt every year, and all of this is with some very rosy forecasts of 5% and 6% GDP growth.  Will someone please tell the rookie, that when you slam the most productive earners with more taxes, they tend to react by producing less.

“The budget that President Obama proposed on Thursday is nothing less than an attempt to end a three-decade era of economic policy dominated by the ideas of Ronald Reagan and his supporters.”

The Reagan policies produced 25 years of unprecedented growth.  So the inexperienced President Obama is going to undo this because…?  The Democrats love to point to the economy during the Clinton years, but you have to look a bit more closely.  During the first two years of the Clinton’s time in office the economy was basically flat.  The economy didn’t really start moving until 1995.  What coincided with that?  Oh, yeah, the Republicans took control of Congress.  Taxes were cut and the economy took off like a rocket.

If you look at the term of George W. Bush, after 9/11 and the recession he inherited, he again cut taxes and the economy took off.  The stock market didn’t start it’s downward spiral until about six months into 2007.  What coincided with that?  Oh, yeah, the Democrats took control of Congress.  Coincidence?  You decide.

So now we have the new president deciding to trash the policies that have successfully grown the economy under Reagan, Clinton, and Bush.  At the same time he is going to saddle future generations with massive debt on top of a looming Social Security and Medicare bill coming due.

I consider myself an optimist, but for the first time in my life I am actually fearful that one man could destroy the U.S. economy in his first 100 days and rush this in under the guise of an emergency, where there is no debate, no time to read what is getting put into law, just slam it in and trust the the most inexperienced president in the last century that it will be all right.  Do you feel better now?

Can We Dump this Canard Over the Side?

More than anything else, the proposals seek to reverse the rapid increase in economic inequality over the last 30 years.

This economic inequality hogwash is dishonesty at it’s peak.  The so-called economic inequality is a sign of the success of the economy.  Think about it, the economy has a floor but not a ceiling.  That is, your income cannot go below zero, but there is no limit to how high it can grow.  So as incomes rise higher and higher, yes, they are going to move further from zero.  This is like saying that air travel is worse today than when the Wright Brothers flew because planes fly higher now than they did in 1903!  So let’s pass a law that says airplanes can’t fly higher than 2,000 feet so we don’t have a great inequality in altitudes.

There is nothing stopping anyone from having that high income if they work hard, use their talents, and succeed.  America is not about punishing the successful.  Many who start out at the bottom move up.  Many who came here as immigrants start at the bottom.  If the Democrats want to improve the numbers, let them control the illegal immigration that is probably inflating the numbers on the bottom.  Let’s stop turning success into failure.  How many people would like to be like Bill Gates?  How many people think America would be better off if we were all like Willy Loman?

The Big Flameout

The Productive Ones Set Sail to More Favorable Tax Climates

Let’s suppose for a moment that the stimulus works and the economy takes off.  With what President Obama has in the works, and the massive taxes that he plans to impose on the top earners, and the carbon taxes he plans to levy on businesses that weill be passed along to the consumers in higher prices (there goes your $8 tax break), and the masive debt he is loading on future generations, the stimulus will soon flameout, and a bigger recession will follow.  This time we won’t able to borrow and spend our way out of it.  Tax cuts won’t matter because there will be no one earning anything to tax.  The wealthy will have packed up and moved to more favorable tax climates and Barack Obama’s historic presidency will have flamed out as well.