Category Archives: budget
Government Train Wreck
A reporter blamed the tragic Amtrak train wreck in Philadelphia on not enough government spending on infrastructure. House Speaker John Boehner said the train wrecked because it was going 106 mph in a 50 mph zone. This may be just the sort of thinking President Obama wants Boehner to change.
Men in Green
I Googled Obama-Robin Hood and got 10,400,000 links . Obama-Peter Pan brought 1,800,000. Obama-Fantasy was good for 51,600,000.
I’m guessing he’s one of the men in green.
The popular Robin Hood story is that he steals from the rich and gives to the poor. Except the real Robin Hood – the legend anyway- stole from the Sheriff of Nottingham who taxed the poor.
In that story President Obama wouldn’t be Robin Hood. He’d be the Sheriff of Nottingham, except he taxes the rich. Well, the poor too if you want to get into the Obama Care weeds.
He’s obsessed with fairness. In 2008 Charlie Gibson pointed out that when Clinton and Bush cut the capital gains tax, revenues increased. He asked Obama if he would increase the capital gains tax even if it meant less revenue to the government. The future president said he would – in the interest of fairness.
Dan Henninger in Thursday’s WSJ Wonder Land column wondered about fairness:
Other than the president, the one other slice of the American population that obsesses over fairness everywhere is children. Every parent knows that about the age of four, kids in groups start saying, “That’s not fair.”
If you have a birthday party and cut pieces of the cake for all, one of them will say, “Her piece is bigger than mine. Why is she getting a bigger piece? That’s not fair.”
And parents, ever since Adam and Eve left the Garden of Eden, have felt obliged to instruct their children on the reality. Life isn’t going to be “fair.” And the path into the future requires more than envy, tantrums and grabbing what belongs to others.
Cradle-to-grave fairness may be infantile, but the idea lives on, especially in politics and most of all in Mr. Obama’s mind.
Even Jimmy Carter knows life’s not fair.
Anyway, in President Obama’s mind it doesn’t matter if he’s Robin Hood or Peter Pan. We’ll always be the serfs.
Ebola in Akron
Democrats have learned the true source of the ebola virus – Republicans. Or more specifically sequestration, the scheme to hold federal spending in place. Sequestration was actually proposed by President Obama and later implemented by Congress as a way to climb down from the fiscal cliff.
The head of NIH says if not for sequestration we’d have an ebola vaccine by now. He didn’t say if it would cause autism.
IBD says CDC and NIH are doing just fine..
The CDC’s budget today is 25% bigger than it was in 2008 and 188% bigger than in 2000. The NIH budget has been flat for the past few years, but at a level that’s more than double what it was 14 years ago.
Plus, spending at both of these agencies has actually been higher than President Obama himself proposed (see chart). The 2014 NIH budget, in fact, is almost $1 billion bigger than Obama sought in his budget plan, released in early 2010.
Akron
AAAAAAAAAAiiiieeeee This just in: Ebola comes to Akron. I live in Akron! The victim traveled through Cleveland Hopkins airport this past weekend. I traveled through Cleveland Hopkins airport this past weekend! Damn Republicans.
The White House Front Door
Last Friday a knife carrying nut climbed the White House fence and walked through the front door without knocking. Ron Fournier blamed the VA. Dana Milbank blamed budget cuts.
Mark Steyn has pointed out that the first family’s presidential perks run over a billion dollars a year. The entire British royal family only sets their subjects back $57 million.
The American royal family travels in aircraft outfitted with a gym, theatre, and heat seeking missile protection. The president’s limo “The Beast” also makes the trip along with 45 or so other vehicles and 200 secret service agents.
I blame the guy who forgot to lock the door.
Retractable Debt Ceiling
The House voted to retract the debt ceiling with no restrictions and the Senate approved about 5 minutes later.
