Stocks have rallied, the $ is stronger, and government bond interest rates have gone up.  Signs that confidence and the economy continues on a growth path.

Sadly, but naturally, commodity prices also went up–from oil ( over $81 –yikes!) and gas (natural gas remains near an all-time low) to corn and copper.

Unemployment (click on the above chart for a better view) remains the #1 priority on President Obama’s desk (despite his continuing push for the democrats to force health care as defined by the dems) down American’s throats.  But, the question is will he act?

Obama and his minions just have to start taking tax uncertainty and health care cost uncertainty off the table.  They should waste no further time and simply announce that ALL the Bush tax cuts will remain in place (maybe expanded with business friendly cuts) and that health care (if not passed by the dems in the next two weeks) will be taken off the table for the rest of Obama’s term.

Then, I think we will see businesses’ opening their healthy coffers of cash (the big ones) or their entrepreneurial resources )the smaller ones)  to ‘full speed ahead.’

thanks to speaker pelosi for the chart

As to health care, congress should forget the massive restructuring they contemplate and start working on the important pieces one at a time.  Like a bill to open interstate competition.  Then a bill directed at tort reform to reduce costs.  Finally (this year anyway) a bill to regulate the insurance companies with the interests of the entire country in mind (no denials of benefits, insurance available to even the sick, and rate increases limited to inflation adjusted health care costs.

There is a lot to do and a lot to look forward to.  I am hopeful for the first time in months (see prior blog on the Obama ‘Home star’ program).

I would just love to see the March unemployment #’s drop but right here and now I will predict a slight increase to 9.8% in March (primarily because Obama and the dems will not likely do anything to mitigate the above mentioned uncertainty).

The next couple of weeks will really determine the rest of the year.  Act now Mr. President.  Help him Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi.  Pleeeeease!

It passed early this morning.  The vote?  60-39.  No republicans voted for the plan.  Every single Democrat voted for it.

Jeeze Louise!  When will the partisan politics end?  When will the mantra of ‘what is good for the country’ replace the partisan one of ‘what is good for my re-election?’

I wish I could tell you the details of the democrats plans (the one that passed the House and the one that passed the Senate).  But I can’t.  Because I don’t have the time to read four or five thousand pages.  And you know what?  That goes for most of our Senators and Congressmen either (they have only read the parts they drafted).

Are the two bills that must now be merged before final passage any good?  Who really knows.

But this much is clear.  There was no real effort on the part of democrats to engage republicans so that the bills would be widely acceptable.  Further, there was no real effort by the republicans to seek such engagement and get strategies important to them in the bills.

Consequently these bills (as drafted) do nothing to limit frivolous medical lawsuits, nothing to effectively lower the cost of medications (Americans pay twice as much as other countries in some cases), do little to stop the incredible growth of health care costs,  do little to extend coverage to all Americans (about 25 million people are left out in the cold), do little to limit the extravagant benefits Congress has, and leave many other questions unanswered as well.

These draft bills are NOT what President Obama promised.  They are partisan and offensive to most knowledgeable Americans.

Why does onlyNebraska get added medicare costs payed by the government (at the expense of citizens of all other states)?  As a bonus thrown in to get Nebraska’s vote, that’s why!

And there are other unfair and ‘porkified’ benefits thrown in as well simply to get votes that otherwise would not be there.

I don’t know what the final bill will look like and I am not really interested in the details yet.

It is enough to know that this bill was cobbled together by democrats so that democrats will get re-elected.  Another case of incumbent politics.  It is enough to know that this bill was cobbled together without any republican help so that those republicans could oppose, oppose and oppose — to help them get re-elected.

How does Congress work?  Whatever it takes to get re-elected and NOT what it takes to make America a better place for our 300 million citizens.

Harry Reid should be ashamed.  Nancy Pelosi should be ashamed.  President Obama should be ashamed.  The democrats should be ashamed and the republicans too!

It seems that costs of the final bill will be much higher than the benefits.  This bill alone (when finally written and passed) could add billions of $$ to our already impossibly high deficit.  It has no hope of being anything but an economic disaster.

The problem is that it will take years to prove itself one way or the other.  By then it will be forgotten by the voters and new issues will arise that force the majority party to act selfishly  to get re-elected.  The minority party will act just as selfishly to fight anything new . . . not because it is the right thing to do but because acting selfishly will help get them re-elected.

This partisan approach to running our government must end.

America is NOT the place for life long, professional politicians.   The only way to make this happen is with term limits.  America is no place for entitled political leaders.  America is no place for decisions to be made based on re-election probabilities. The only way to make this happen is with term limits.

America should be the country where normal citizens take four or eight years off of their regular life to serve the country as best they can and then return to earning a living the old fashioned way (and with no life-long benefits or retirement for their limited service).

Term limits!

But, incumbents will NEVER vote for term limits.  So we must.  Do NOT vote for any incumbents anymore.  No more than one term for anyone.  When politicians at EVERY level get the message and vote in laws regarding term limits then we can start voting our conscience again.

Until then?  No more ridiculous one party bills.

Good-bye incumbents!!

Ignore this message at your own peril.

thanks to flickr’s joe beone for the photo

President Obama is biting off way more than he can chew and I have stopped worrying and started becoming frightened.

Yep, BHO has begun to believe all the press releases (the ones he approved anyway) and he is starting to think that we need a whole lot more change than one President should reasonably expect (at least this quickly).

Turn the economy around?  Yes, we gotta see you do that.

Health care?  Of course, we need good health care that is affordable (or subsidized) for everyone!

Energy change?  Well, yeah, but not the kind you are pushing Mr. President.

Here is the bottom line.

We can afford to spend $3Trillion on turning the economy around because we have to.  This is the worst recession since the depression so we expect it and need this government intervention.

We ought to afford a trillion $ or so for decent healthcare.  This is America and if you can’t be healthy enough to vote then something is wrong and a bunch of us fit in that unfortunate and big bucket.

That’s not all there is to it though.  These ‘programs’ have to be financed.

Where does the money for all this stuff come from? They have got to be paid for somehow and there is only one way: taxes.   Come on, who ever heard of government cutting costs? So the ‘wealthy’ pay (as defined by the democrats this is anyone who already pays taxes–and the rest are those who ‘vote’ for democrats).

So, our taxes are going up because we have to pay for the bailouts.  Truth is they are going to be awful for the few that actually pay them.  They rest, well ya’all can just sit back and collect your entitlements because that is the way Pelosi and her pups want it and they are in the majority (at least today).

But this energy thing the House just passed is nuts!   It passed without anyone reading it –how could they it is nearly 1500 pages long!

The Prez and his lapdogs in Congress are over-reaching.  By a lot.  They have enough votes (they think–though even some intelligent democrats see this for what it is) to pass anything . . . to blow it right by the ‘mindless’ and ‘preoccupied’ general public.  Yikes!!

Worse, Obama is cruising along thinking he is superman (politically anyway).  He is feeling enobled (a lot more than enabled) by his submissive and agreeable cohorts in the legislative branch.

Dang, on top of that his lovely wife and wonderful kids have turned the Whitehouse into an ‘09 version of the famous Kennedy ‘Camelot.’  A PeterPan place where no wrong can be done or even attempted  . . . until it is too late.

Ahh, that dang energy bill, a disaster of epic proportions that Pelosi and Reid are trying to push through without listening to the loyal opposition (which really should be anyone who pays electric utility bills associated with any kind of coal generation).

This is bad legislation.  From the first word to the three millionth (remember 1500 pages).  It will increase the cost of electricity incredibly, it will decrease consumer spending by ‘taxing’ the hard earned $$ of all Americans (not just those that pay income taxes).  It could deepen and extend the recession.

All for climate change?  Climate change–heck yeah, our homes will have thermostats set to 85 in summer and 55 in winter — that’s really climate change!

I have been fully behind the President until now.  And I am ready to go fully against his ‘reign’ if this bill even comes close to passing as it now stands.

The American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009.

Yechh.  You can’t even read it–let alone understand it–let alone try and implement it!

Shoot.  There ought to be a law against any law that is more than two pages long!!

Yes, we need energy legislation but not this kind.  Anything ‘we’ do right now relative to energy needs to be couched in terms of energy independence.  In today’s economy anything that has the words ‘carbon capturing’ or ‘cap and trade’ is folly.

BHO needs to get his Democratic compatriots under control and ditch this bill as it now stands.  America and Americans are in NO position to pay increased taxes further than already necessary for economic recovery and probably universal healthcare.

I believe I stand with the majority of Americans on this:  ‘We’ will pay for just about anything to do with energy independence, but ‘we’ will NOT pay for forcing green energy down our throats . . . and that goes double in the middle of a deep recession.

Do what we must and can, not what a few knuckleheads in Washington, D.C. think is ‘cool.’

And, by the way, President Obama, stop trying to control the media and the polls by dictating who and what is going to be asked of you in press conferences.  Nixon was proof of how bad that can turn out.

Mr. President, stop thinking like a lawyer and start thinking like a school teacher or an economic blogger! Now, THAT would be ‘cool.’

thanks for the pic to teamstickergiant