WSJ: By the Numbers ... Obama's Historic Record of Failure

By Michael Boskin, WSJ

...an $825 billion stimulus package; the Public-Private Investment Partnership to buy toxic assets from the banks; "cash for clunkers"; the home-buyers credit; record spending and budget deficits and exploding debt; the auto bailouts; five versions of foreclosure relief; numerous lifelines to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac; financial regulation and health-care reform; energy subsidies, mandates and moratoria; and constant demands for higher tax rates on "the rich" and businesses.

Consider the direct results of the Obama programs. A few have performed better than expected—e.g., the auto bailouts, although a rapid private bankruptcy was preferable and GM and Chrysler are not yet denationalized successes. But the failed stimulus bill cost an astounding $280,000 per job—over five times median pay—by the administration's inflated estimates of jobs "created or saved," and much more using more realistic estimates.

Cash for clunkers cost $3 billion, just to shift car sales forward a few months. The Public-Private Investment Partnership, despite cheap federal loans, generated 3% of the $1 trillion claimed, and toxic assets still hobble some financial institutions. The Dodd-Frank financial reform law institutionalized "too big to fail" amid greater concentration of banking assets and mortgages in Fannie and Freddie. The foreclosure relief program permanently modified only a small percentage of the four million mortgages the president promised. And even Mr. Obama now admits that the shovels weren't ready in all those "shovel-ready" stimulus projects.

Perpetually overpromising and underdelivering is not remotely good enough, not even for government work. No corporate CEO could survive such a clear history of failure. The economic records set on Mr. Obama's watch really are historic (see nearby table). These include the first downgrade of sovereign U.S. debt in American history, and, relative to GDP, the highest federal spending in U.S. history save the peak years of World War II, plus the highest federal debt since just after World War II.

The employment picture doesn't look any better. The fraction of the population working is the lowest since 1983. Long-term unemployment is by far the highest since the Great Depression. Job growth during the first two years of recovery after a severe recession is the slowest in postwar history.

Moreover, the home-ownership rate is the lowest since 1965 and foreclosures are at a post-Depression high. And perhaps most ominously, the share of Americans paying income taxes is the lowest in the modern era, while dependency on government is the highest in U.S. history.

That's quite a record, although not what Mr. Obama and his supporters had in mind when they pronounced this presidency historic.

The world's largest army!!

True story and most people will never know it.

Here’s an interesting side bar. After the Japanese
decimated our fleet in Pearl Harbor Dec 7, 1941, they could have
sent their troop ships and carriers directly to California to
finish what they started.

The prediction from our Chief of Staff
was we would not be able to stop a massive invasion until they
reached the Mississippi River . Remember, we had a 2 million man
army and war ships…...all fighting the Germans. So, why did they
not invade?
   After the war, the remaining Japanese generals and
admirals were asked that question. Their answer…...they know that
almost every home had guns and the Americans knew how to use them.
   The world's largest army... America 's hunters! I had never
thought about this....
   A blogger added up the deer license sales in just a handful of
states and arrived at a striking conclusion:

There were over 600,000 hunters this season in the state of
Wisconsin. Allow me to restate that number.
   Over the last several months, Wisconsin 's hunters became the
eighth largest army in the world.
More men under arms than in Iran .
More than in France and Germany combined.
   These men deployed to the woods of a single American state
to hunt with firearms, and no one was killed.
That number pales in comparison to the 750,000 who hunted the
woods of Pennsylvania and Michigan 's 700,000 hunters,
All of whom have now returned home.
   Toss in a quarter million hunters in West Virginia and it
literally establishes the fact that the hunters of those four
states alone would comprise the largest army in the world.
The point?
   America will forever be safe from foreign invasion with that
kind of home-grown firepower.

Hunting -- it's not just a way to fill the freezer. It's a
matter of national security.That's why all enemies, foreign and domestic, want to see us disarmed.
Food for thought when next we consider gun control.

Arizona governor vs. Phoenix Suns owner

I'd say she makes a pretty good case with her analogy!!

The owner of the Phoenix Suns basketball team, Robert Sarver,came out strongly opposing AZ's new immigration laws.

Arizona's Governor, Jan Brewer, released the following statement in response to Sarver's criticism of the new law:

"What if the owners of the Suns discovered that hordes of people
were sneaking into games without paying? What if they had a
good idea who the gate-crashers are, but the ushers and
security personnel were not allowed to ask these folks to
produce their ticket stubs, thus non-paying attendees couldn't
be ejected.
Furthermore, what if Suns' ownership was expected to provide
those who sneaked in with complimentary eats and drink? And
what if, on those days when a gate-crasher became ill or injured,
the Suns had to provide free medical care and shelter?"
- Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer