Freedom Line Blog

Even for Barack Obama’s supporters, this has to be getting old.

Today, responding to a question about an American economy still struggling after almost three years of deficit-driven Obama “stimulation,” he went back to the “Bush Card” with radio host Tom Joyner:

George Bush left us with a $1 trillion deficit, so it’s a lot harder to climb out of this hole when we don’t have a lot of money in the federal coffers.”

There are several problems with President Alibi’s rationalization.  Among other things, (1) the recession officially ended all the way back in June 2009, (2) the money in those “federal coffers” to which he refers actually reached an all-time high under Bush in 2007 (several years after the Bush tax cuts and well into the Iraq and Afghan wars that Obama now scapegoats) and (3) nothing seems to have stopped him so far from spending trillions of dollars that we don’t have.

But forget about those realities for a moment.  On a more basic moral level, what does it say about Obama as a man that this is what he continues to offer the nation to justify his performance and his request for a job extension?

Republican control of the House of Representatives may have stifled the Obama Administration’s grand statist designs in Congress, but the White House continues to push costly, job-killing regulation through the rulemaking power of the administrative state. Because new regulations enjoy nowhere near the media scrutiny of new legislation, however, the public often remains unaware of their role as silent predators on America’s economy. That’s why credit is due to House Speaker John Boehner for calling Obama to account for this economic poison. From Politico:

In a letter that will be sent to President Barack Obama on Friday, House Speaker John Boehner charges that planned regulations have jumped nearly 15 percent over the past year and he calls on the administration to calculate and publicize their economic impact.

“This year, the administration’s current regulatory agenda identifies 219 planned new regulations that have estimated annual costs in excess of $100 million each. That’s almost a 15 percent increase over last year and appears to contradict public suggestions by the administration this week that the regulatory burden on American job creators is being scaled back,” Boehner wrote.

“I was startled to learn that the EPA estimates that at least one of its proposed rules will cost our economy as much as $90 billion per year. The administration has not disclosed how many of the other 218 planned rules will cost more than $1 billion, nor identified these rules,” he noted.

If Obama is serious about “pivoting to jobs” (a promise we seem to hear on a quarterly basis), there’s no way he can ignore the costs of federal regulations, which are de facto tax increases. According to the Small Business Administration, the annual cost of federal regulation alone amounts to $1.75 trillion dollars. That’s nearly 12 percent of America’s GDP gone every year because of the Washington bureaucracy.

A failure to repeal many of these draconian monstrosities is economic malpractice. But a failure to simply reveal their costs is a dereliction of duty.

You’ve heard of “flash mobs,” the growing phenomenon of thugs descending upon, assaulting and robbing convenience stores or vulnerable people on the street? Well, “flash elections” are Big Labor’s economic version of flash mobs.

Flash elections, or “ambush elections,” reference a proposed rule that would shorten the election window in union organizing campaigns to as little as 10 days.  Big Labor, which we noted this week elevates its own political power over American jobs and employee welfare, loves the ambush election proposal and is currently pushing it within Barack Obama’s  rogue National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).  Ambush elections are dangerous for many reasons, including the fact that they would drastically limit employers’ free speech window and ability to present both sides of the story to employees.  In contrast, union bosses would have many months to present their skewed arguments to employees without even allowing employers to become aware that a union organizing campaign was underway.  Moreover, ambush elections are a toxic “solution” in search of a problem, considering that the current median election time is 38 days, and 95% of elections already occur within two months, hardly an eternity.

Accordingly, CFIF is proud to announce that it has joined the Coalition for a Democratic Workplace and 275 other employers and associations in petitioning the NLRB to withdraw this destructive proposal.  Big Labor and the Obama NLRB have already killed enough jobs.  We simply cannot afford to lose even more due to their ideological shenanigans.

So almost three years after Barack Obama was elected President, he promises to unveil a “specific jobs plan” next month.  Very gracious of you, Mr. President.  Apparently, one of his brilliant ideas is to create an entirely new bureaucracy within the federal government, a “Department of Jobs.” Never mind that we already have a Labor Department, a Commerce Department, and so on.

But here’s something for Obama to ponder.  As noted today in The Wall Street Journal, “Over the past five years, Texas has added more net new jobs than all other states combined.”  Naturally, Team Obama and the desperate political left are already attempting to discredit Texas’s economic success.  But the facts, unsurprisingly, refute their claims.  For instance, for all of the attempts to mislabel those new jobs as low-wage, the Bureau of Labor Statistics “pegs the median hourly wage in Texas at $15.14, 93% of the national average, and wages have increased at a good clip:  in fact, the 10th fastest state in 2010 at 3.4%.”  Keep in mind the lower cost of living in Texas, where those wages therefore go further.

So as Obama ponders a “Department of Jobs” during his extended Martha’s Vineyard vacation while the economy stumbles, perhaps he will experience an epiphany.  Namely, that he should do at the federal level what Texas has done at the state level – bring legal reform, reduce taxes and allow the private sector to flourish.

In a rare moment of candor yesterday, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney admitted, “the White House doesn’t create jobs.”  That’s a refreshing contrast from Obama’s previous “jobs saved or created” nonsense, but he can certainly say that again.

Today, the Labor Department reported that unemployment remained essentially unchanged last month at 9.1%, with only 117,000 new jobs created.  Keep in mind that the economy needs approximately 125,000 new jobs per month just to keep the unemployment rate steady, and 200,000 per month to reduce the rate by a single percentage point over an entire year.  In other words, the economy continues to create far too few jobs to significantly reduce the unemployment rate.

Also keep in mind that Obama promised in February 2009 that if we passed his “stimulus,” unemployment would top out at 8% back in the fall of 2009, and be down to around 6% by now.  Instead, we have witnessed a post-war record number of consecutive months at or above 9% unemployment.  Over the same 30-month period that have passed since Obama’s “stimulus” promise, Ronald Reagan’s policies reduced unemployment from 10.4% to 7.1%.

The White House may not create jobs, Mr. Carney, but history shows that its policies can foster growth or, in your case, wreak havoc.

Below is one of the latest cartoons from two-time Pulitzer Prize-winner Michael Ramirez.

View more of Michael Ramirez’s cartoons on CFIF’s website here.

City Journal’s Nicole Gelinas describes the Bush-era “TARP” bailout as a massive case of moral hazard.  With the financial sector able to fob off its bad debts to the American taxpayer while suffering almost no consequences, it’s no wonder the jobless rate is not recovering.

The politicians we elect have three choices—the same choices they had four years ago. They can admit that this debt isn’t worth much and allow the financial sector to bear the consequences. They can hope that the Fed tries to use inflation to raise the price of everything else, making the debt seem a lighter burden in comparison. Or they can maintain their silence, letting the financial sector take another half-decade or more to make enough money on new ventures so that it can finally admit what it should have admitted back in the fall of 2007: bad debt is never good. At least the Fed acknowledges this strategy: it says that it’s using “time” to manage toxic securities and “minimize disruption to the financial markets.” But prolonging government control of financial markets just prolongs investors’ uncertainty.

If Congress and President Obama, as well as the candidates who would like to succeed the president in 2013, maintain their silence, people should at least understand that the lousy jobs numbers are no mystery. They are the result of a policy that Washington has willfully chosen. As the Fed notes, the cost of this policy isn’t measured in dollars but in something more precious: time. Washington’s refusal to confront the debt problem is costing millions the most productive years of their lives.

Responding to this morning’s terrible unemployment report, President Obama mused, “We still have a long way to go and a lot of work to do.”

No, Mr. President.  That’s precisely what the nation fears.  We’ve already allowed you to go too far and do too much, but you’re apparently not getting the clue.

For the month of June, unemployment unexpectedly rose to 9.2% and added a negligible 18,000 jobs, far below the 150,000 that economists had expected.  That means the unemployment rate has risen from 7.8% when Obama signed his massive government spending “stimulus” to 9.2% over two years later.  Keep in mind that his administration promised at the time that the “stimulus” would cap unemployment at 8% in the fall of 2009, and be down to around 6.5% by now.  Instead, it rose all the way to 10.2% and has remained above 8% for a post-war record 29 consecutive months.

Ignoring that, Obama and liberal pundits like Ezra Klein appearing on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” claimed that what we need is even more of the same.  At what point do they finally get the signal?

If you’ve ever had the misfortune of drifting off the highway, chances are you’ve been instantly reminded by the deep grooves on the other side of the white line.  When your car crosses over them a deep, sickening rattle shakes your vehicle.  It’s a warning that you’re about to leave the road and enter a crash zone.

Most people have to fight to urge to overcorrect.  Austan Goolsbee, President Barack Obama’s chief economist, would probably reclassify the loud death tones as just “bumps along the road” and keep driving.

That’s effectively what Goolsbee is doing by claiming that the nearly 80 percent drop in jobs created from April to May are just 200,000 or so “bumps” in the White House’s empirically indefensible road to recovery.

Like an absent-minded professor ignoring the warning signs of an impending car wreck, Goolsbee and Co. are driving the American economy off the road and into a ditch.  Unemployment is anchored at 9.1 percent.  The stock market is falling with every new round of bad economic news.  Rating agencies are downgrading America’s economic outlook because of its lack of fiscal responsibility.

There are two ways to stop bumping over the warning grades.  Either get back on the highway or leave the pavement entirely.  By sticking to his present course, President Obama is steering the nation’s economy into a serious wreck.

This morning, the Labor Department announced that the U.S. unemployment rate climbed again to 9.1% this month, up from 9.0% in April.  Just as alarmingly, the net number of jobs created was only 54,000, down from 232,000 in April.  In addition to deteriorating from the previous month, both numbers fell well below the expectations of economists, who had anticipated a decline in the unemployment rate to 8.9%, and 160,000 net new jobs.  This also means that in the 27 months since Obama signed his unprecedented government spending “stimulus,” unemployment has only climbed from 8.2% to 9.1%, even though the Administration projected that he would have it down to 6.5% by now.  By way of comparison, in the same 27 months following the effective date of President Reagan’s tax cuts in January 1983, unemployment plummeted from 10.4% to 7.3%.  The facts speak volumes.

This morning, the Labor Department announced that first-time unemployment claims rose again, from 414,000 last week to 424,000 this week.

As demonstrated by this Labor Department graph, weekly unemployment claims average approximately 300,000 during periods of economic normalcy.  One year ago, the number stood at 463,000 when the Obama Administration proclaimed the arrival of the “Recovery Summer,” yet it never dipped below 400,000 for the remainder of 2010.  We finally dipped into the high 300,000 range in February of this year – still an elevated level – but the number climbed back to 478,000 last month.

This is the Obama “stimulus,” over two years and $1 trillion of government spending later.

This week provides a stark contrast between a leader actually willing to risk political capital, versus a man who now seeks four more years of politics-as-usual.

On the one hand, we have House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R – Wisconsin).  Tomorrow, Congressman Ryan will unveil a federal budget proposal that reduces spending by $4 trillion over the coming ten years, provides pro-growth tax reform and caps runaway federal spending.  All without reducing Social Security benefits by a single penny for anyone already receiving them or over 55 years of age, along with Medicare reform that will save it from its catastrophic fate if nothing is done.  Congressman Ryan knows full well that by offering budget leadership, Democrats will possess a “political weapon” to use against him, even if it means that “they will have to lie and demagogue” to do so.  But instead of shrinking, he has chosen leadership.

On the other hand, we have the President of the United States.  The purported leader of the Free World.  The most powerful man on Earth.  The man who formed a blue-ribbon deficit commission, then proceeded to ignore it.  Instead of making sure that a Congress dominated by his own party could even manage to pass a 2011 budget, instead of offering decisive world statesmanship amid worldwide crises and instead of providing leadership in averting a national debt catastrophe, Obama instead focused on unveiling his 2012 reelection campaign this week.  Instead of offering a plan, the AWOL Obama will apparently just sit back and attack Paul Ryan’s.

So there you have it.  One man seeks to cut spending by $4 trillion, and the other man seeks to spend $1 billion getting himself reelected.

Apparently, whatever jobs labor unions don’t drive overseas or eliminate entirely are made worse by them.

According to a just-released Gallup survey, “U.S. Union Workers Score Lower on Work Enforcement Index.”  On a variety of measures, from the sense of employee/supervisor partnership to overall trust, unionized workplaces simply maintain substantially lower levels of workplace wellbeing.  Ultimately, as the Gallup report states, unionized workplaces impact the factors that “in turn have well-documented associations to various desirable business outcomes, including customer engagement, turnover, absenteeism, and productivity.”

As critical standoffs between taxpayers and intransigent labor bosses in Wisconsin and across the nation continue, this new Gallup survey sheds some important information on the matter.

According to a Wall Street Journal survey of economists, unemployment for the November 2012 election will remain elevated at 7.7%.  That would make it the highest for a presidential election since the Carter/Ford nailbiter in 1976, when it was 7.8%.

Ominously, the report adds, “Economists in the survey slightly raised the likelihood of recession over the next 12 months to 14%, largely due to rising oil prices.”  The article endeavors to highlight the caveat that, “analysts point out that it is often the overall trend – rather than the level of joblessness – that determines an incumbent’s fate.”  The 7.8% rate of November 1976 (in which the incumbent Ford lost), however, had declined from 9.0% in May of 1975, 8.3% one year earlier and 7.9% at the beginning of 1976.

Liberal pundits appear eager to claim that no Republican wants to take on the supposedly strong Obama, but this survey and storm clouds in the form of higher gas prices, overall inflation and worldwide chaos may suggest otherwise.

Last month, we noted with alarm that the Congressional Budget Office forecast a record $1.5 trillion federal budget deficit for fiscal 2011.

It’s apparently even worse than that.  Today, the Obama Administration unveils its proposed budget, projecting that this year’s deficit will actually reach $1.6 trillion.  So after telling Americans during his 2008 campaign that he was going to go through the budget “line-by-line” and reduce the deficit, Obama has given us deficits of $1.4 trillion, $1.3 trillion and now a record $1.6 trillion.  And what to show for it?  Unemployment remains at or above 9% for a post-World War II record 21st consecutive month, despite Obama’s promises that it would top out at 8% in October 2009 and decline to between 6% and 7% today.

As for those who continue their mindless “Blame Bush” rationalization crusade, they must explain how three years into the Age of Obama, the deficit is increasing, not decreasing, from $1.3 trillion to $1.6 trillion (an almost 25% increase).

In its monthly report this morning, the Labor Department announced that unemployment has now remained at or above 9% for a post-World War II record 21st consecutive month.  Additionally, it reported just 36,000 new jobs, well short of the expected 140,000 number.

On the eve of the 100th anniversary of Ronald Reagan’s birth, these numbers contrast the results of a big government agenda versus a free market agenda.  In the 23 months since Obama’s massive $1 trillion “stimulus” passage, unemployment has increased from 8.2% to 9%.  One would expect better results in exchange for deficits of $1.4 trillion in 2009, $1.3 trillion in 2010 and an expected record $1.5 trillion this year.  Keep in mind that Obama projected that if we followed his big government agenda, unemployment would be down between 6% – 7% by now.  In contrast, the 23 months following the effective date of Reagan’s tax cuts in January 1983 saw unemployment plummet from 10.4% to 7.2%.

The facts speak for themselves.  Inexplicably, Obama nevertheless called for even more federal “stimulus” in his State of the Union address.  As we celebrate the Gipper’s 100th birthday, we should remember the timeless lesson taught by his freedom agenda’s success.

Barack Obama assured Americans throughout his campaign that if we hired him, he’d reduce the deficit.  Here is Obama in his own words from his closing infomercial of October 29, 2008:

I believe we need to usher in a new era of responsibility.  Across the country, families are tightening their belts, and so should Washington.  That’s why, for my energy plan, my economic plan and the other proposals you’ll hear tonight, I’ve offered spending cuts above and beyond their cost.  I’ll also go through the federal budget, line by line, eliminating programs that don’t work … and making the ones we do need work better and cost less.”

Here’s the ugly reality, over two years later:  The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) announced this week that the 2011 budget deficit will reach a record $1.5 trillion.  That follows $1.4 trillion and $1.3 trillion deficits in his first two years.  The 2008 deficit, for purposes of comparison, was $455 billion.

Something to consider when assessing Obama’s latest State of the Union address, and his upcoming promises over the next two years.

Love him or hate him, there is no denying that Newt Gingrich is the conservative movement’s best policy entrepreneur / political consultant / motivational speaker.  At today’s House Republican retreat, the former speaker laid down the gauntlet for restoring America’s greatness.

His speech before the new House majority framed the multiple crises facing the country in positive terms; calling for every full and sub-committee to designate 1/3 of their hearings to the theme of “Hope and Opportunity.”  The idea is to focus on solutions to America’s problems, such as inviting job creators to speak before committees on what they need government to do – or not do – to get America working again.

Most interesting to this writer is Gingrich’s call to redirect the 99 weeks of unemployment payments into a human capital program.  It would require recipients to enroll and complete job training programs, effectively turning welfare into workfare.  Moreover, the explosion of online education makes finding the right program easy to find and flexible to complete.  In today’s tech-heavy, certification-obsessed economy, tying the $133 billion spent on unemployment payments to job training is a great way to get out-of-work Americans on and off the welfare rolls as quickly as possible.

As a former radio spot writer for Gingrich Communications, I’ll admit I’m partial to Newt’s way of thinking.  The former speaker’s speech to the House GOP shows why.  With conservatives unlikely to move any major legislation due to Democratic control of the White House and Senate, Gingrich is proposing – I believe – the next best thing: changing the discussion from “the party of no” to “the party that restores American Exceptionalism.”

Let’s get to it.

This morning, the Labor Department announced a national unemployment rate of 9.4%.  Unfortunately, this means that the unemployment rate has surpassed 9% for a post-World War II record 20 consecutive months.  Moreover, the announcement of just 103,000 new jobs fell well short of the anticipated gain of 150,000 new jobs.

The Obama Administration will trumpet the misleading 0.4% decline from last month’s 9.8% rate as evidence that its agenda is somehow succeeding.  That claim, however, conceals the fact that the rate had already dropped from January 2010’s 9.7% rate to 9.5% in June, only to climb back to 9.8% to finish the year.  Further, this is the same Obama Administration that promised unemployment would peak at 8% in October 2009 – fourteen months ago – and be down to 7% by now if we just passed his so-called “stimulus” bill back in February 2009.  Almost $1 trillion in deficit spending and two years later, the verdict is clear.  It has failed miserably.

It’s something to remember as the Obama Administration attempts to “triangulate” and claim successful governance as we steam toward the 2012 reelection campaign.

After the public death of the omnibus spending bill and a retreat on opposition to tax cuts, why in the world won’t the Democrats running the U. S. Senate simply go home for the holidays?  It’s obvious that a majority of Americans are just plain tired of them, and want to move on.  Yet, here we are on the precipice of another bitter policy fight as Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) readys two more contentious bills for floor votes.

The DREAM Act promises to give backdoor amnesty to tens of thousands of illegal immigrants in exchange for getting a college degree.  The other bill would repeal the military’s ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy regarding homosexual service members.

Really?  With nearly double-digit unemployment and a trillion dollar budget deficit, these are the kinds of evergreen, polarizing issues the Senate needs to pass judgment on before it takes a three week vacation?

Forget the shenanigans.  The Senate should extend the continuing resolution to fund the government and get out of town.  We could all use a break.

H/T: The Daily Caller