Foolish big-government policies continue to impede economic recovery

Economic news continues to be slightly positive, with May's numbers a mixture of good and bad.

Unemployment ticked up one-tenth, from 7.5 percent to 7.6 percent and, oddly, that isn't as bad as it seems, because 420,000 people who had dropped out of the labor force thought that the environment had improved sufficiently to start looking for work again last month. Had those folks remained on the sidelines, the rate likely would have held at a too-high 7.5 percent. However, 101,000 of those new job-seekers didn't find work, pushing the unemployment rate up.

The influx of new job-seekers, however, moved the labor force participation rate from 63.3, a 34-year low, to 63.4.

New jobs totaled 175,000 last month, a little better than the 155,000 average of the last three months, but most were low-paying jobs that are not likely to increase consumer spending. And that number is well below the number needed monthly to make real progress in lowering the unemployment rate. The Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta's calculator shows that more than 400,000 new jobs per month will be needed to get the unemployment rate down to the full-employment level of 5.0 percent in a year, and nearly 261,000 new jobs a month to hit 5.0 percent in two years.

Four years after the $1 trillion stimulus package that was supposed to generate a 5.1 percent jobless rate, we are still a long way from that number with unemployment 50 percent higher than that. And as long as consumer confidence remains low and business uncertainty remains high, unemployment will not change much.

Businesses that scaled back workers during the recession continue operating with fewer employees, uncertain of how their costs may increase through higher taxes and costs related to health care reform, and won't hire more workers until those uncertainties are put to rest, or until there is a surge in consumer demand. However, consumers also are nervous about spending in the current economic environment, and are waiting for stability.

Last Thursday's Labor Department numbers showed that non-farm productivity, defined as output per hour of all workers, rose at a 0.7 percent annual rate in January through March, reversing the trend in the last quarter of 2012, as the economy sputtered.

One explanation for the recent pickup is that businesses saw higher demand for products and services over the winter, and that typically leads to higher wages for workers, ultimately improving living standards. However, it might also mean that employers are getting more out of their current workforce and thus have no urgent need to hire, which does not improve the unemployment picture.

On the topic of health care reform, the public has never embraced the Affordable Care Act known as Obamacare, and is even less enamored of it today, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.

Rasmussen found that only 41percent of the 1,000 likely voters that participated now hold at least a somewhat favorable opinion of the health care law, while 54 percent view it unfavorably. A tiny 15 percent view Obamacare very favorably, while 40 percent have a very unfavorable view of the law.

A slightly better rating appears in the new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, which shows that 49 percent of Americans say they believe the Affordable Care Act is a bad idea, while just 37 percent say it is a good idea. Like the Rasmussen poll, the NBC/WSJ poll had a substantial number of participants who strongly believe Obamacare is a very bad idea, at 43 percent.

These numbers reflect an increase in unpopularity since July 2012, when 44 percent of NBC/WSJ poll respondents called it a bad idea, while 40 percent called it a good one.

Some of the reasons for this unpopularity are that while the Affordable Care Act promised to lower premiums for families, regulators decided to impose a 3.5 percent surcharge on insurance plans sold through federally run exchanges. There also is a $63 fee for every person covered by employers, and a "premium tax" that will require insurers to pay more than $100 billion over the next decade. The Joint Committee on Taxation expects insurers to simply pass this tax onto individuals and small businesses, boosting premiums another 2.5 percent.

Earlier this year, the Congressional Budget Office said that 7 million people will likely lose their employer coverage thanks to Obamacare — nearly twice its previous estimate. The CBO said that number could be as high as 20 million.

And in December, state insurance commissioners warned Obama administration officials that the law's market regulations would likely cause "rate shocks," particularly for younger, healthier people forced by Obamacare to subsidize premiums for those who are older and sicker.

Combined with the other liberal policies that have caused the recovery to stall for four years, the unpopular federal takeover of health care deepens uncertainty for businesses and raises insurance and health costs for consumers. Then there is Obamacare's planned involvement of the IRS.

A stagnant recovery and pain and suffering are what happens when the narrow ideological dreams of the ruling elite take precedence over addressing the real needs of Americans.

The cost of Obamacare seriously threatens businesses and jobs

By James H. Shott

It is a simple concept: A business is an organization that provides products or services that it believes people need or want, and if it provides good quality at a fair price it should succeed. Some businesses are single-person entities, but most employ a few people or as many as thousands of people to perform tasks related to the production and sale of its products or services, and in return for their labor they receive agreed-upon compensation that enables them to buy things from other businesses like food, shelter, clothing and other needs and wants. It is what makes America run.

Since Leftists don’t understand the way businesses work, they view them with suspicion and not infrequently seek to punish them for doing things they must do to stay in business. They sometimes even seek to punish businesses when they don’t do things the Left thinks they should do, but which have no business-related function.

When you combine the Left’s abysmal understanding of business operations with its compulsion for government solutions to every perceived problem, and add in the habit of implementing solutions without fully considering the repercussions, the stage is set for mass chaos.

Case in point: The ominous effects of Obamacare on employers, particularly small businesses, have been discussed since healthcare reform was just a poisonous glimmer in the Leftist mind. But despite the ample economic reasons for why this healthcare reform was a bad idea, the Left still doesn’t get it: Obamacare raises operating costs for businesses that implement the plan, and when costs rise, businesses must raise prices and/or cut expenses to offset the increase. Higher prices discourage customers, who either find a better price from a competitor or just buy less of that product or service. Both put businesses at risk.

But the Left freaks out when companies opt to protect their customers and themselves from the harmful effects of higher prices when they focus on the biggest expense most businesses have: employee costs.

Because the Left’s solutions are poorly thought out, they fail the common sense test and therefore fail to persuade people to accept them on their merits. The Left then resorts to forcing its ideas on us. Barack Obama’s manic effort to replace traditional energy with “green” energy is a prime example of an idea that people rejected because they saw that it couldn’t work. Nevertheless, the Obama administration declared war on coal and oil production to force us to use inadequate wind and solar energy because they arrogantly believe they know what is best for the rest of us.

Since Obamacare increases health insurance costs, often doubling them, businesses have to decide how to offset those costs. They can cut expenses, raise prices, or some combination of the two. Those who can’t justify increasing prices and can’t cut enough other expenses must look at employment expense, and reduce full-time staff below the threshold level through staff reductions and/or reduce full-time employees to part-time hours. Even companies that decide not to implement Obamacare must pay a $2,000 per employee penalty.

But despite the fact that rising employee costs are the problem, the Leftists reject staff and hour reductions as unfair; believing the money to cover the enormous costs of Obamacare will simply appear out of thin air. Thus, when the Papa John’s pizza chain said it must raise prices or reduce employee hours to get expenses under control, the Left suggested boycotting Papa John’s: To convince the company to do nothing about increased employee expenses, the Lefties propose that people buy their pizza from a competitor. Only the Left would react to an employer trying to stay in business by boycotting it.

Other chains also are boycott targets for the same reason: Burger King, Domino’s Pizza, McDonald’s, and Applebee’s.

Obamacare’s anti-business and job-killing requirements are not the only reason the Left proposes a boycott; a business that doesn’t spend its money according to Leftist dogma also may be attacked.

A self-identified liberal website urges liberals to “bring these people down,” referring to a list of “fast food joints” that the website owner dislikes because of how they use their own money: Chick-fil-A, Cinnabon, White Castle, Waffle House, A&W, KFC, Long John Silver's, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, IHOP, Arby's, Chili's, Cracker Barrel Old Country Store, Hardee's, Olive Garden, Red Lobster, LongHorn Steakhouse, Wendy's, and Outback Steakhouse.

All of these businesses deserve our support, and at least one organization supports businesses targeted by the Left’s loony idea. Rebooting America organized a Papa John’s Appreciation Day last week.

One employer who owns about 100 restaurants nationwide decided to pass on the costs to his customers along with reducing employee hours. He plans to put a 5 percent surcharge into effect to help offset the increased cost of health insurance and also to help customers see the harmful unintended or unadvertised effects of foolish, ill-considered policies like Obamacare.

In order to fix a healthcare problem that required only a little tweaking, our intrepid Leftist government instead tried to revamp an entire economic system and created a myriad of other serious problems. What’s really scary is that the worst is likely yet to come.

Cross-posted from Observations

Guests of Vlad the Impaler

Dear Reader:

This is the kind of writing that makes Alan Caruba stand out from the multitude of Conservative commentators in the press and on the Internet today. Alan is insightful. He probes deeper than most. Plus, his wit is as sharp as a double-edged sword.

Alan’s abilities as a wordsmith are unsurpassed. Once you read his article below, I’ll bet you will agree with me – and -- be ready to add a few superlatives, describing Mr. Caruba’s writings, yourself.

Alan has studied Mr. Obama and his administration and with the accuracy of a laser is able to cut through the layers upon layers of propaganda to offer his readers an analysis of the Obama Administration unmatched anywhere else on the web.

We are proud to offer the piece below to our readers, especially during this time of tribulation in America.

Please scroll down and read Mr. Caruba’s comments below.

Thanks.

J. D. Longstreet
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Guests of Vlad the Impaler
By Alan Caruba
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Lately I have been reading and hearing a lot of psychoanalysis of Barack Hussein Obama and it reflects a growing need by pundits and regular folks to figure him out.

The reason is obvious. We are all now the guests of Vlad the Impaler, version 2.0.

As several million unemployed already know, he doesn’t give a rat’s patoot about what it’s like to not have a salary, not have health care coverage, and not be able to make the mortgage or car payment.

Having been abandoned by his birth father, his step-father, and finally by his mother, Barack figured out how to bottle up all that anger, put on a happy face, and pay back America for failing him.

Obama has lived a virtually invisible life whereby no one who ever attended college with him recalls him. He taught at the University of Chicago and not one student has ever come forward to acknowledge having been in one of his classes. Among the friends he did choose, all shared a common theme of hatred for America. If there is a paper trail, it has been carefully sequestered, out of reach, sealed.

Less than a year and a half into his first and, hopefully, last term, all the polls including those of the mainstream media show that people don’t merely “disapprove” of his performance in office, they are seriously worried whether he should even be in office.

If you don’t like America, Barack Hussein Obama knows exactly how you feel and why.

All this was on display throughout the campaign, up to and including delusions of grandeur and omnipotence that in any other setting would have instantly identified him as a mental case. “Yes, we can” shouted the crowd.

What they got, however, was the biggest collection of left-wing nut-jobs one could gather in one spot; most of them designated “czars” and exempt from any investigation by Congress.

Communists, dedicated socialists, weird “scientists” who think reducing the population is the only way to save the Earth; others who think we should abandon all the traditional and known energy sources that keep the lights on and the cars rolling in favor of windmills, solar panels; and bicycles. You know, crazy people!

We got a kind of machine politics that hasn’t been seen in Washington, D.C. since the early days and years of the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration when the Great Depression so frightened people they were willing to watch the federal government expand in ways that were never intended. From time to time, the Supreme Court would staunch the flood of horrid legislation. FDR’s answer was to try to “pack” the court by expanding it.

Today, we have witnessed a Democrat-controlled Congress that just passed a huge “reform” of the nation’s healthcare industries, effectively destroying the relative handful of insurance companies that provided coverage.

With healthcare now under government control and virtually every other commercial and financial activity to suffer the same fate, it is only time before everyone will be issued an ID card to control everything one does.

Where in the Constitution is the federal government authorized to literally own an automobile manufacturer destroyed by its own unions? An insurance company that was so big it was not allowed to fail despite billions in bad transactions? Why, in fact, is the federal government in the business of buying and selling housing mortgages?

For most of the beginning of his first year in office, Obama was everywhere on television, granting interviews to reporters who listened in amazement at his detachment from the reality of the economy. “Are you punch drunk?” asked Steve Kroft of Sixty Minutes. Bret Beir of Fox News fought to keep him focused on the questions being asked.

People swiftly noticed he could not speak extemporaneously. Without the Tele-Prompters, he lost the aura of being all knowing and all seeing. It became a joke. A response to a simple question about taxes recently elicited a rambling 17-minute “answer” that made everyone listening wonder why he could not deliver a simple answer.

And then there are the critical, unanswered questions that will not go away.

Where was he born? Hawaii? Okay, but his father was a British subject, a citizen of Kenya, so rule out his eligibility to be president. Why won’t he produce a real birth certificate? Why are his university records unavailable? What nation’s passport did he travel on when he visited, of all places, Pakistan? Questions, questions, questions.

There is the growing fear that he is not eligible to hold the office, but he has already named one Supreme Court judge and will soon appoint another. He is issuing executive orders. He is signing laws.

In my life, I saw Richard M. Nixon driven from office for official misconduct resulting from the Watergate scandal. I saw Bill Clinton survive impeachment despite having broken several laws that would have put most people in jail.

It is hard to get rid of a really bad president. It may prove harder to get rid of an imposter, a provocateur, a revenge-filled destroyer of the economy and the nation.

I saw this all before he won the office, wrote about it then and wrote about it since. If I did, others did. Indeed, some wrote entire books about it.

So why has no court in America demanded that Barack Hussein Obama produce a birth certificate or any other proof of eligibility?

If a cover-up got Nixon booted and both a real estate deal and a sexual dalliance with a White House intern merited a special prosecutor for Clinton, when doesn’t this question rise to a point of critical concern for the nation?

Alan Caruba
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Alan Caruba writes a daily post at http://factsnotfantasy.blogspot.com/. An author, business and science writer, he is the founder of The National Anxiety Center.
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© Alan Caruba, 2010

The health care reform bill has passed; now we know what’s in it

Commentary by James H. Shott


House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said a short while before the House of Representatives voted on the health care reform bill that “we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it,” that arrogant statement indicating that there were some surprises tucked neatly away.

During the 14 months the fight over this bill raged, Americans were opposed to most of what they knew about it, every House Republican opposed it, and 34 Democrats voted against it. Clearly, there was more to dislike than to like. Now, the bill has passed and we know what’s in it.

The attacks on the elderly and the seriously troubled Medicare program are truly breathtaking. Medicare now pays providers substantially less than their services cost, and more cuts begin this year.

In 2011: cuts begin for Medicare Advantage; the elderly are no longer allowed to use Health Care Account (FSA, HSA, HRA, Archer MSA) distributions for over‐the-counter medicine; Medicare cuts to home health begin; wealthier seniors begin paying higher Part D premiums (not indexed for inflation in Parts B/D); new Medicare cuts to long‐term care hospitals begin in July; Medicare reimbursement will be cut when seniors use diagnostic imaging like MRIs, CT scans, etc., and cuts begin for ambulance services, ASCs, diagnostic labs, and durable medical equipment.

And, additional Medicare cuts to hospitals and to nursing homes and inpatient
rehab facilities begin after October, along with cuts for dialysis treatment; Medicare will reduce spending by using an HMO‐like coordinated care model; new Medicare cuts to inpatient psych hospitals begin in July; Medicare cuts to hospice begin in fiscal 2013, accompanied by cuts to hospitals that treat low‐income seniors. In 2014 more Medicare cuts to home health begin.

Who said there won’t be rationing? And with even lower reimbursements, more providers likely will decline to treat Medicare patients.

President Obama said he wanted a bill to help people; apparently he wants to help them at the expense of the elderly.

“But those changes only affect old people,” you say? Everyone will be old someday, but at the rate Medicare cuts are being implemented, that program may not exist in 20 years.

Next year your government will impose a new annual tax on brand name pharmaceutical companies. Do you think that might cause drug prices to rise? Well, it will. And Americans must also begin paying premiums for federal long‐term care insurance.

Employers are required to report the value of health benefits on W‐2s starting in 2011, meaning folks will then have to pay income tax on the value of their health benefits.

In 2013: there will be a new tax on all private health insurance policies;, an increased Medicare wage tax of 0.9 percent; a general increase from 7.5 percent to 10 percent in the threshold at which medical expenses, as a percent of income, can be deducted; and your government will impose a 2.3 percent excise tax on medical devices, all of which will make medical care more expensive, not less expensive.

And then in 2014 individuals without government‐approved coverage are subject to what the government calls a “tax” of the greater of $695 or 2.5 percent of income. This is not a tax, however, it is a fine: How can you be taxed on something you didn’t buy and don’t own?

If you make $30,000 a year and don’t have insurance, you’ll be fined $750. Earn $50,000 and you get a $1,250 fine, just for not following your government’s demand to buy something you don’t want and may not need.

Employers who fail to offer "affordable" coverage (whatever that means) would pay a $3,000 fine for every employee that receives a subsidy through the Health Care Exchange, and employers who do not offer insurance must pay a fine of $2,000 for every fulltime employee.

What do you suppose will happen to small businesses that are marginally profitable, but can’t afford either to buy health insurance for their employees or to pay a $2,000 fine per employee for not doing what they cannot afford to do? How many people will lose their job as a result of this mandate?

Larger companies are not immune from these punishing effects. AT&T, John Deere, and Caterpillar, among others, have said effects of the reform bill will be millions of dollars each, with AT&T’s hit to be $1 billion. These additional costs will have a negative impact on how all businesses operate. Will they create new jobs or lay people off? Will they raise prices on their products?

So, while President Obama, and Congressional Democrats are popping corks on the champagne celebrating a bill that will cost $940 billion over ten years and wreak havoc on the elderly, the rest of us are wondering how we are going to handle the cost increases and health care service restrictions this bill will produce.

Opponents of this approach to health care reform said all along that a lot of improvement could have been achieved by addressing health care problems individually, instead of this massive, costly, and horribly flawed approach.

We should have listened to them.

Cross-posted from Observations

What Obama could have said to bring bipartisan effort to health reform

Commentary by James H. Shott

Those anticipating leadership and clarity from President Obama in last week’s address to Congress on health care reform were disappointed.

He could have shown us that he had at last started listening to what most Americans were telling him and the Congress to do, and outlined proposals to address the weaknesses of the current health care system, the one that provides the highest level of care in the world.

He could have endorsed several needed reforms, ones that Republicans support, which would change this Democrat crusade into a bi-partisan effort, changes like tort reform to lower malpractice and health insurance rates and the tendency of providers to prescribe procedures and tests that are needed only to protect them from predatory lawyers and their clients.

He could have said he would work with states to remove the barriers preventing insurers from offering their policies in all states, thereby increasing competition, improving policies, bringing premiums down and increasing the number of Americans with coverage. He could have committed to reducing expensive and unnecessary regulation.

And as someone who keeps telling us how wonderful government healthcare is and will be, he could have promised to get Medicare and Medicaid to pay their fair share to doctors and hospitals, eliminating shifting costs to insured patients.

He might have renounced the half-truths and outright distortions of fact he and fellow liberals have been using to scare people into accepting the idea of a single payer, government-run health care system that ultimately will result from his idea of reform.

He could have cited the actual number of people without health insurance, the number that omits the 12 million illegal aliens, as well as the millions with enough money to buy insurance but who voluntarily decline to, and those who are without coverage for three months or less; a number that is a mere fraction of the 46 million so frequently cited.

But he didn’t.

What we heard instead was more of the same tired rhetoric Mr. Obama has relied on to create the greatest divide in the American people we have seen in the last 40 or more years, on a subject that has frightened and angered those that oppose any additional government influence in how health care is provided in the country.

This time his speech threatening those who have the temerity to oppose him and his ideas was angrier and more petulant, accusing his critics of spreading "lies" and saying opponents want "to do nothing.”

It was the “All about Barack Hour,” “I” this, and “me” that – 68 times he said “I,” “my,” or “me.” “I will protect Medicare,” and “I am directing my Secretary of Health and Human Services … ,” and “I have no interest in putting insurance companies out of business ... I just want to hold them accountable.”

Mr. Obama continually said things that simply weren’t true, and that got the better of many in the House Chamber, who groaned and emitted other sounds of disapproval, including an unfortunate interjection by South Carolina Republican Congressman Joe Wilson, who screamed out “You lie!” after one of the president’s misstatements of fact. (Isn’t it curious that the House has had a rule in existence for a hundred years prohibiting members from calling any president a liar? Mr. Wilson is apparently not the first to have done so.)

However, crude as Mr. Wilson’s comment was, he wasn’t wrong on the facts. So how do we accurately characterize the president’s factual misstatements?

A lie is when someone deliberately passes on information known to be false. But sometimes people say things they don’t realize are false. They haven’t lied; they were just wrong. Therefore, if the president made statements he didn’t know were untrue, he is poorly informed; but if he made statements he knew were untrue, he lied. Neither is acceptable.

There is an element of fantasy in Mr. Obama's statements on health care, including that we are going to save money by spending money; that we will solve our fiscal problems with a program that will increase the national debt by $1 trillion over a decade; and, that we will guarantee you can keep your current insurance by passing a bill that encourages your employer to stop offering it.

As the details of Mr. Obama’s Fantasyland ideas meet the light of day, he is losing support among his own party in Congress and among voters. His logical inconsistencies, implausible scenarios and the unacceptable possibility of another government takeover have generated protests by hundreds of thousands of unhappy Americans voluntarily participating in tea party rallies and a march in Washington last weekend.

Barack Obama is a smart man. He has an Ivy League education and he was a constitutional law professor. So isn’t it curious that so much of what he wants to do isn’t permitted by the Constitution? Things like circumventing the advice and consent of the U.S. Senate and appointing “czars” to manage billions of taxpayer dollars, taking over banks and auto companies and reforming the health care system are not permitted by the Constitution.

Perhaps Mr. Obama needs a refresher course on how the United States actually works.

Cross-posted from Observations

The September 12th March on Washington

The September 12th March on Washington

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On Saturday, September 12th, 2009, thousands of grassroots patriotic Americans will march on Washington, D.C. for the largest "tea party" in history -- the 09.12.09 March on Washington.

What’s happening in America? Well, it looks to this scribe as if Americans are fed-up with the worse government we have had in the history of this nation and they’re going to Washington to tell them so!

The folks over at www.gather.com/ say the following: “The politicians in Washington, D.C. take our hard-earned money with taxes and inflation. Then they bail out their buddies in the banks with $700 Billion of our money. Then they bail out their buddies in the auto industry... before taking over the biggest ones. Then they pass a so-called "stimulus bill" that is nothing more than a HUGE piece of pork. Then they try to pass the largest tax increase in history with their fake-environmental "cap and tax" bill.

THEN... they try to take over the American healthcare system, and try to ram socialized medicine down our throats. We've had enough, and we're NOT taking it any more. The "sleeping giant" is waking up. Read the article HERE.

Let’s take a look at a press release from FreedomWorks:

FreedomWorks Taxpayer March on Washington Scheduled for September 12, 2009

“WASHINGTON - (Business Wire) Over the last six months the national debt skyrocketed by nearly $3 trillion. According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, our national debt will more than double by 2019. Americans will have to pay for this stratospheric spending spree first by begging foreign nations to buy our bonds, and later through higher taxes and inflation.

Grassroots anger at the inability of Washington to live within a budget has been building for some time, and began to boil over in late 2007 as the Bush Administration and Treasury Secretary Paulson abandoned their claimed free market principles to bail out automakers and Wall Street banks through TARP.

When newly elected President Obama and his allies in Congress passed the $780 billion debt stimulus plan in February 2009, activists took to the streets.

On tax day, the tea party movement began in earnest. Until now the movement has remained at the local levels. No longer will that be the case. The movement is coming to Washington on September 12, 2009 for a march and rally at the US Capitol.

From autos to banking, the government is crowding out the private sector of our economy. Where Bush bailed out the private sector, Obama is making hostile government takeovers. Ignoring our multi trillion-dollar deficit, Washington is considering a massive new energy tax and a takeover of health care.

On Saturday, September 12th FreedomWorks will be joined by over ten thousands of liberty-loving activists to take a stand against politicians who are bankrupting our future. National co-sponsors include Tea Party Patriots, ResistNet, National Taxpayers Union, Americans For Tax Reform, Young Americans for Liberty, Ayn Rand Center, Campaign for Liberty, Free Republic, Young America’s Foundation, Smart Girl Politics, and The Club for Growth.

The event will kick-off on September 10th and 11th with various events throughout Washington including grassroots leadership training and Capitol Hill visits. The three-day event culminates on September 12th as taxpayers march on the Capitol building.

For more information, including media inquiries, registration, contacting event coordinators, and the schedule of events, please visit our event website at http://www.912dc.org/.”

Over at http://www.912dc.org/ the folks say this: “It’s time to take the tea party movement directly to Washington, D.C. Please join thousands of local organizers and grassroots Americans from across the country as we gather in our nation’s capital to deliver a message to the politicians: Enough!

We’ve had enough of the out of control spending, the bailouts, the growth of big government, and the soaring deficits. And we reject the future tax increases to pay for all of this spending and debt down the road. We are gathering on 9-12-2009 to deliver our message in person that we’ve had enough!”

Sounds as if these folks are determined to be heard - and to get their point across by taking their protest directly to the nation’s front yard. It is about time! When Moses won’t come to the mountain, then the mountain must go to Moses!

I have been on this earth a long time and I don’t recall ever experiencing a US government as disconnected from the people of the nation as is this government.

Now the fun begins! By the “fun” I mean watching the Mainstream Media trying their very best to ignore this building crescendo of citizen protest. Oh, make no mistake about it. The MsM will make every effort to ignore or “play down” this March on Washington. For if people turn up in vast numbers it will make the media look extremely bad!

It was a Tea Party in Boston that helped get this experiment we call America off and running. Now it is a Tea Party in the capitol of the nation the original tea party helped spawn that may, very well, play a part in saving that experiment!

I have only a couple, or three, questions: Whose got the tar? And whose got the feathers? And, oh yeah, the rails! Whose got the rails? Huh?

J. D. Longstreet
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Conservative+Democrats+Healthcare-reform+MsM+Obama