Rahm's Next Big Crisis

We have been treated to a litany of fake crises over the years by our Demofascist Leadership. Who can forget the images of Jimmy Carter in his argyle sweater ushering us through the 72-degree thermostat crisis, or the more recent bullying crisis, or whatever crisis it was to which Rahm Emanuel responded with this laugher: "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. What I mean is it's an opportunity to do things you could not do before."

And who can argue with DemoRats' exceedingly fine responses to the various crises our nation has faced? From midnight basketball to the present administration's how-can-I-be-out-of-money-when-I-still-have-checks-left? concept of "fiscal responsibility," Democrats have shown themselves models of courage and competency for at least 30 years (coughcoughcough).

Of course, all of this posing over, and conjuring up of, fake crises seems to have desensitized Modern Progressives to real crises that may be looming on the horizon. Like, oh, say terrorism or Social Security.

In a recent blog entry on the Congressional Budget Director's official blog, the nonpartisan director informed the country that cost of living adjustments for 2010 seem unlikely for Social Security recipients (that will go over well at AARP, don't you think?) and that, based on current economic forecasts, the Social Security surplus will decline to a mere $3 billion in FY 2010.

Now, admittedly, $3 billion sounds like an adequate cushion if you are worried about your 16-year old's prom dress, car insurance, and summer camp.

But there are a couple of factoids that you ought to keep in mind about these projections.

1) The Social Security surplus dipped into the red in February of FY 2009.

2) The current projection of a $3 billion surplus assumes a moderate recovery consequent to Obama's "stimulizing" (I made that up - don't use it!) the economy.

3) That the Social Security Administration's coffers have already experienced an unexpected decline of $1.2 trillion, this figure is quoted by the CBO director himself, based on the recession that arguably started in mid-2008.

It doesn't take much to see that if you do not accept the Obamazombies' Rosy Scenario about the effect of the stimulus package, a similar dip of inflows into Social Security - in the trillions, not billions - is likely, just as happened in February.

Even under the Rosiest of Scenarios, the CBO director is forecasting a Social Security deficit in 2017 - potentially an Obama presidential year. And if The One continues to spend through his administration has he has done in the first 100 days, there will certainly be no hope of spending through that almost assured 2017 deficit in Social Security.

Of course, we hear nothing of this impending wreckage. After all, we have real crises of cyberbullying, sexting, global warming, and Obama Care to worry about.

Newsweek Nails It!: Obama is a Marxist!

Out of the mouth of babes and the mainstream media, every once in a while you get profundity.

My uncle reads Newsweek, I don't. So he saved the February 16, 2009 copy for me, and it had THIS on the cover:




Note the self-conscious mockery of actual socialist symbolism:






Now of course, if a Conservative makes this same observation, he is a "right-wing extremist." Everyone from Mike Savage to Sean Hannity to Joe the Plumber to John McCain have been criticized for utilizing the word in connection with The One.

And yes, the story on the inside, written by Jon Meacham and Evan Thomas, ties this "socialism" that "we all are" now to the policy of Barack Hussein Muhammad bin Obama. The story specifically states that Obama is going much further than even the free-spending Bush while "reversing Bill Clinton's end of big government" [sic]. And the article casts its own lot with Obama's spending-like-water goals, asserting (without proof) that "an aging population and global warming and higher energy costs will demand more taxing and spending."

Of course, the story is strangely silent about the fact that the retirement savings of the aging population was wiped out by Democratic social engineering in the housing market, that high energy costs will be caused by Socialist global warming nonsense, and that, well, that global warming is so much Socialist nonsense designed specifically not to respond to a real threat, but rather to put the brakes on the free market and transfer power to national governments and international non-governmental organizations. But all that is beside the point! The good news is, we're all Socialists with the advent of The One.

A moment of honesty (unintended, I am sure) was induldged in by our Newsweek heroes, when they note "The catch [of all this expanding Socialist governance] is that more government intrusion in the economy will almost surely limit growth (as it has in Europe, where a big welfare state has caused chronic high unemployment)." Emphasis added.

The article concludes: "Growth has always been America's birthright and saving grace." But look for that growth to stop, Komrade!

In an adjacent story by Michael Freedman (who seems to barely be able to restrain his orgasmic delight long enough to type his story), the claim is made that the long-term effects of Obama's policies "will be a steady drift toward what could be called a European model of governance, regulation, and paternalism. Already, big government is on the rise - projected public spending figures show the United States will move ever closer to European averages over the next two years." The U.S. government will begin regulating "with big brother vigilance," turning entire industries into "virtual wards of the state." Of course, restraint is not always a good thing, as we learn when Freedman indulges in some journalistic cheerleading, "This is all likely to prove very popular if the conventional wisdom [read: the hopes of the mainstream media elites] is right."

How is that whole hopey-changey thing working out for ya? Oddly enough, all these ideas have been tried before. But rather than being "tried and true," it seems they are "tried and tattered."