"There are good reasons that your car insurance company doesn’t add $100 per year to your premium and then cover oil changes, and that your health insurance doesn’t charge $50 more per year and cover toothpaste. You’d have to fill out mountains of paperwork, the oil-change and toothpaste markets would become much less competitive, and you’d end up spending more." - John H. Cochrane
The Daily Caller Investigates Media Matters: Their Tax Exempt Status and Links to the White House Click here...
Did CNN Misreport Obama Budget by at Least $2.5 Trillion? February 13, 2012
On CNN’s Monday broadcast of President Barack Obama’s speech about his budget proposal in Annadale, Va., the network’s chyron said that the president would cut $4 trillion in spending and raise $1.5 trillion in taxes over 10 years, suggesting $5.5 trillion in deficit reduction. However, the White House doesn’t even make that claim. Read more...
This is hard to watch!!!
Get a Load of All These Programs the Feds Are Unofficially Funding This Year
January 27, 2012
The Congressional Budget Office has released a report on all unauthorized appropriations and expiring authorizationsfor fiscal year 2012. The report has been sent to both the House and the Senate. Read more...
Stimulus-Backed ‘Green’ Bankruptcy of the Week: Ener1 January 26, 2012
The problem? Something the government often fails to take into account when spending tons of other people’s money because they think it can be artificially created later on: Product Demand. Read more...
The soaring national debt has reached a symbolic tipping point: It's now as big as the entire U.S. economy.
The amount of money the federal government owes to its creditors, combined with IOUs to government retirement and other programs, now tops $15.23 trillion.
That's roughly equal to the value of all goods and services the U.S. economy produces in one year: $15.17 trillion as of September, the latest estimate. Private projections show the economy likely grew to about $15.3 trillion by December -- a level the debt should surpass this month.
"The 100% mark means that your entire debt is as big as everything you're producing in your country," says Steve Bell of the Bipartisan Policy Center, which has proposed cutting nearly $6 trillion in red ink over 10 years. "Clearly, that can't continue." Read more...
Downsizing the Federal Government by the CATO Institute
The Department of Education operates a range of subsidy programs for elementary and secondary schools. That aid is matched by rising federal regulatory control over the schools, but federal intervention has not generally lifted academic achievement. The department also provides subsidies to higher education through student loans and grants. Unfortunately, that aid has fueled inflation in college tuition and is subject to widespread abuse.
The department will spend $79 billion in 2011, or about $670 for every U.S. household. It employs 4,400 workers and operates 171 different subsidy programs. Read more...
Boehner: Problem in Washington Is ‘Too Much Spending’—But Since March, There’s No Spending Without GOP Approval January 23, 2012
House Speaker John Boehner says no one in Washington has tried harder than he has to reach an agreement with Obama on solving the nation's long-term deficit problems. In an interview on Fox News Sunday, Boehner said President Obama is the stumbling block:
"The president would never say yes to fundamental reform for our tax code. He asked for more revenue. I told the president, I'll put revenues on table, but only if we're going to have fundamental reform of our entitlement programs. The president never said yes, and then he wanted $1 trillion worth of new taxes. Read more...
Budget and Spending Issues for 2012
The Issue
Federal spending in fiscal year (FY) 2011 reached $3.6 trillion, an all-time record. When adjusted for inflation, spending is more than three times its peak level in World War II ($1.17 trillion in constant 2011 dollars), and it now consumes nearly 25 percent of total economic output (as measured by gross domestic product, or GDP), a post–World War II record. This spending drains away resources that could otherwise contribute to economic growth and is the principal cause of today’s unprecedented budget deficits. But the problem is not only the excess of spending over revenue. Equally important is the trajectory of spending: It is on an unsustainable path that risks disaster for America. While some of this spending is a temporary result of the recession and financial crisis, the current Administration has seized every opportunity to rationalize permanently higher spending, new programs, and an expanded role for government.Read more....