Unintentional Comedy at 70 mph

by Jon Caldara | 1:29 pm, March 31, 2010

As Yogi Berra once said, “it’s deja vu all over again.”  Remember those FasTracks lies we’ve been told for 30 years?  Well, a new report from the Rocky Mountain Rail Authority makes RTD’s distortions look like child’s play.  The report claims that “high speed” rail lines between Fort Collins and Pueblo, and Denver International Airport [...]

The Denver Metro Young Republicans 4th Annual Legislative Reception

by Brett Moore | 1:18 pm, March 31, 2010

[ April 6, 2010; 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm. ] You are cordially invited to The Denver Metro Young Republicans 4th Annual Legislative Reception! Meet and Mingle with your elected Republican Leaders and the DMYR Membership!
-Cocktails and heavy appetizers will be provided-
Tuesday, April 6, 2010, 6:30-9:30 pm
Reserve your spot now by emailing rsvp.dmyr@gmail.com

-DMYR Members $10.00
-Joining Members $30.00 (includes admission + 1 year DMYR membership)
-All others [...]

If Obama is looking to up his poll numbers among regular Americans..here is a good way

by Mr. Bob | 12:40 pm, March 31, 2010

#instapundit #oil #bigoil #teaparty
From the NYT…I hope he follows through with this. This is good news for the economy…the first right thing he’s done for the economy since getting into office.

OBAMA to open up Offshore Drilling Many Areas for the First Time!

Dirty Tricks

by Al Maurer | 12:30 pm, March 31, 2010

Richard Nixon would blush at the dirty tricks the left is pulling these days. Like members of the Congressional Black Caucus claiming Tea Party protesters spat on them and called them names when video shows none of this to be true. That didn’t stop CNN from reporting it as fact, however.
Or the Harry Reid supporters [...]

For the Taxpayers and For the Children: Ben DeGrow on Colorado Springs TV

by Eddie | 10:09 am, March 31, 2010

I’ve been doing a really good job cutting back on using “It’s For the Kids” in my blog logic, right? Well, that doesn’t stop certain groups from wanting to undermine Colorado voters’ rights to decide on taxes by insisting it’s “for the children.”
Hats off to Colorado Springs News 5 reporter Andy Koen for seeking out [...]

Tea Party Express Rolls into Colorado

by Ben DeGrow | 8:46 am, March 31, 2010

If you’re in Colorado, the place to be today is at one of the Tea Party Express rallies rolling through our state:

Grand Junction —
Date/Time:
Wednesday, March 31st at 10:00 am
Rally Location:
1301 East Sherwood Drive
Grand Junction, CO
Denver —
Date/Time:
Wednesday, March 31st at 4:00 pm
Rally Location:
West steps of the State Capitol
200 E Colfax Ave
Denver, CO 80203

It will be interesting [...]

Petition Supporting Colorado AG Suthers’ Actions to Defend Constitution

by Lu Busse | 7:21 am, March 31, 2010

We learned yesterday afternoon that liberals/progressives had started a petition against AG John Suthers and they had 5,000 signatures.  So in way of the Colorado conservative response, Americans for Prosperity started an online petition FOR his actions.   Here are the text for petition and link: Support Attorney General Suthers Attorney General Suthers is under attack for defending Colorado against the over-reaching powers of the Obama [...]

Dan Maes will report he raised about $50,000 from about 500 contributors in first quarter

by Donald E. L. Johnson | 7:21 am, March 31, 2010

Dan Maes will report that in the first quarter he raised about $50,000 from 500 new contributors, he told me in a brief interview at this morning’s Arapahoe County Republican Men’s Club luncheon. He raised $10,000 in the fourth quarter of 2009.

Leave Our State Alone: A Constitutional Path to Prosperity

by Jon Caldara | 6:06 am, March 31, 2010

It’s no secret that University of Colorado economics professor and senior fellow Barry Poulson is a prolific writer.  The man cranks out a consistent bevy of works that are both substantive and interesting (the latter being something you almost never get from an economist).  His latest piece is no exception.
In “Restoring Federalism and State Sovereignty: [...]

Alan Reynolds explains why soaking the rich is doomed to fail

by Rossputin | 5:09 am, March 31, 2010

The Cato Institute’s Alan Reynolds has written a must-read (and must-share) piece for the Wall Street Journal explaining why the Democrats’ plans to fund their government takeover of health care on the backs of the “rich” is doomed to failure.  It gets a little technical, such as with discussions of multipliers, but it’s extremely important to understand this information and get others to understand it as well.

See “The Rich Can’t Pay for ObamaCare“, Alan Reynolds, WSJ, 3/30/10
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304370304575151682845921038.html

——————————————

The president intends to squeeze an extra $1.2 trillion over 10 years from a tiny sliver of taxpayers who already pay more than half of all individual taxes. It won’t work.

By ALAN REYNOLDS

President Barack Obama’s new health-care legislation aims to raise $210 billion over 10 years to pay for the extensive new entitlements. How? By slapping a 3.8% “Medicare tax” on interest and rental income, dividends and capital gains of couples earning more than $250,000, or singles with more than $200,000.

The president also hopes to raise $364 billion over 10 years from the same taxpayers by raising the top two tax rates to 36%-39.6% from 33%-35%, plus another $105 billion by raising the tax on dividends and capital gains to 20% from 15%, and another $500 billion by capping and phasing out exemptions and deductions.

Add it up and the government is counting on squeezing an extra $1.2 trillion over 10 years from a tiny sliver of taxpayers who already pay more than half of all individual taxes.

It won’t work. It never works.

The maximum tax rate fell to 28% in 1988-90 from 50% in 1986, yet individual income tax receipts rose to 8.3% of GDP in 1989 from 7.9% in 1986. The top tax rate rose to 31% in 1991 and revenue fell to 7.6% of GDP in 1992. The top tax rate was increased to 39.6% in 1993, along with numerous major revenue enhancers such as raising the taxable portion of Social Security to 85% of benefits from 50% for seniors who saved or kept working. Yet individual tax revenues were only 7.8% of GDP in 1993, 8.1% in 1994, and did not get back to the 1989 level until 1995.

Punitive tax rates on high-income individuals do not increase revenue. Successful people are not docile sheep just waiting to be shorn.

From past experience, these are just a few of the ways that taxpayers will react to the Obama administration’s tax plans:

• Professionals and companies who currently file under the individual income tax as partnerships, LLCs or Subchapter S corporations would form C-corporations to shelter income, because the corporate tax rate would then be lower with fewer arbitrary limits on deductions for costs of earning income.

• Investors who jumped into dividend-paying stocks after 2003 when the tax rate fell to 15% would dump many of those shares in favor of tax-free municipal bonds if the dividend tax went up to 23.8% as planned.

• Faced with a 23.8% capital gains tax, high-income investors would avoid realizing gains in taxable accounts unless they had offsetting losses.

• Faced with a rapid phase-out of deductions and exemptions for reported income above $250,000, any two-earner family in a high-tax state could keep their income below that pain threshold by increasing 401(k) contributions, switching investments into tax-free bond funds, and avoiding the realization of capital gains.

• Faced with numerous tax penalties on added income in general, many two-earner couples would become one-earner couples, early retirement would become far more popular, executives would substitute perks for taxable paychecks, physicians would play more golf, etc.

In short, the evidence is clear that when marginal tax rates go up, the amount of reported incomes goes down. Economists call that “the elasticity of taxable income” (ETI), and measure it by examining income tax returns before and after marginal tax rates claimed a bigger slice of income reported to the IRS.

The evidence is surveyed in a May 2009 paper for the National Bureau of Economic Research by Emmanuel Saez of the University of California at Berkeley, Joel Slemrod of the University of Michigan, and Seth Giertz of the University of Nebraska. They review a number of studies and find that “for an elasticity estimate of 0.5 . . . the fraction of tax revenue lost from behavioral responses would be 43.1%.” That elasticity estimate of 0.5 would whittle the Obama team’s hoped-for $1.2 trillion down to $671 billion. As the authors note, however, “there is much evidence to suggest that the ETI is higher for high-income individuals.” The authors’ illustrative use of a 0.5 figure is a perfectly reasonable approximation for most purposes, but not for tax hikes aimed at the very rich.

For incomes above $100,000, a 2008 study by MIT economist Jon Gruber and Mr. Saez found an ETI of 0.57. But for incomes above $350,000 (the top 1%), they estimated the ETI at 0.62. And for incomes above $500,000, Treasury Department economist Bradley Heim recently estimated the ETI at 1.2—which means higher tax rates on the super-rich yield less revenue than lower tax rates.

If an accurate ETI estimate for the highest incomes is closer to 1.0 than 0.5, as such studies suggest, the administration’s intended tax hikes on high-income families will raise virtually no revenue at all. Yet the higher tax rates will harm economic growth through reduced labor effort, thwarted entrepreneurship, and diminished investments in physical and human capital. And that, in turn, means a smaller tax base and less revenue in the future.

The ETI studies exclude capital gains, but other research shows that when the capital gains tax goes up investors avoid that tax by selling assets less frequently, and therefore not realizing as many gains in taxable accounts. In these studies elasticity of about 1.0 suggests the higher tax is unlikely to raise revenue and elasticity above 1.0 means higher tax rates will lose revenue.

In a 1999 paper for the Australian Stock Exchange I examined estimates of the elasticity of capital gains realization in 11 studies from the Treasury, Congressional Budget Office and various academics. Whenever there was a range of estimates I used only the lowest figures. The resulting average was 0.9, very close to one. Four of those studies estimated the revenue-maximizing capital gains tax rate, suggesting (on average) that a tax rate higher than 17% would lose revenue.

Raising the top tax on dividends to 23.8% would prove as self-defeating as raising the capital gains tax. Figures from a well-know 2003 study by the Paris School of Economics’ Thomas Piketty and Mr. Saez show that the amount of real, inflation-adjusted dividends reported by the top 1% of taxpayers dropped to about $3 billion a year (in 2007 dollars) after the 1993 tax hike. It hovered in that range until 2002, then soared by 169% to nearly $8 billion by 2007 after the dividend tax fell to 15%. Since very few dividends were subject to the highest tax rates before 2003 (many income stocks were held by tax-exempt entities), the 15% dividend tax probably raised revenue.

In short, the belief that higher tax rates on the rich could eventually raise significant sums over the next decade is a dangerous delusion, because it means the already horrific estimates of long-term deficits are seriously understated. The cost of new health-insurance subsidies and Medicaid enrollees are projected to grow by at least 7% a year, which means the cost doubles every decade—to $432 billion a year by 2029, $864 billion by 2039, and more than $1.72 trillion by 2049. If anyone thinks taxing the rich will cover any significant portion of such expenses, think again.

The federal government has embarked on an unprecedented spending spree, granting new entitlements in the guise of refundable tax credits while drawing false comfort from phantom revenue projections that will never materialize.

Mr. Reynolds is a senior fellow with the Cato Institute and the author of “Income and Wealth” (Greenwood Press, 2006).

“Health care” bill threatens your health care

by Brian Schwartz | 1:30 am, March 31, 2010

Paul Hsieh, MD describes how “bundled payments” give doctors perverse incentives misaligned with your best interest:
One planned cost-cutting measure will be a new system of “bundled payments” where hospitals and physicians receive a fixed fee to take care of Medicare patients’ conditions (e.g., a stroke or a heart attack) regardless [...]

Bureaucracies never die

by Al Maurer | 7:14 pm, March 30, 2010

Government institutions have a tendency to continue to exist long after their usefulness or original purpose is gone. They continue to exist whether they are successful or not. Remember that the original purpose of the Energy Department was to wean us off foreign energy? These organizations build up a constituency who lobby to keep them [...]

The State Board of Ed… According to Bob

by Jon Caldara | 3:36 pm, March 30, 2010

Ever wonder what the Colorado State Board of Education does?  I was curious myself, so I tuned in to this 2 part iVoices.org podcast between Fiscal Policy Center Director Penn Pfiffner and former legislator and now current State Board of Education Chairman Bob Schaffer.
In this first installment, Bob gives listeners news from board – what’s [...]

AG Suthers on the Obama Care Lawsuit

by Jon Caldara | 12:46 pm, March 30, 2010

We’ve got an extra special iVoices.org podcast today for you.  Colorado Attorney General John Suthers joins our Research Director Dave Kopel to discuss the lawsuit he and 12 others State Attorneys General have jointly filed, that claims that the health care bill recently signed by President Obama  is unconstitutional via a violation of the 10th [...]

Whoops, Bad Idea: Leaving Elmer Hicks in Charge of Colo. Democrat Funds

by Ben DeGrow | 12:32 pm, March 30, 2010

Democrats’ utter lack of fiscal responsibility with our tax dollars — which makes the hypocritical excesses of Republicans in the Bush-era Congress look downright measly — has become a byword, the stuff of legend. So I guess it’s not a huge surprise to see a Colorado Democratic official with a heavily irresponsible fiscal track record [...]

For Tea: Focus On Ideas, Not Personalities

by Ari Armstrong | 10:13 am, March 30, 2010

Late last year I observed the unfortunate fact: Tea Partiers Get Partisan.It looks like various “tea party” groups in Colorado continue to push an overtly partisan agenda, with the invitation of gubernatorial candidate Dan Maes to speak at the April 15…

Breaking Down Race to the Top Awards: Taking a Closer Look

by Eddie | 10:00 am, March 30, 2010

Yesterday I gave you the lowdown on the winners of Round One Race to the Top dollars. But we keep learning more all the time.
First, my Education Policy Center friends Pam Benigno and Ben DeGrow discuss the fact that Colorado missed out on the money and why prospects for the second round of reforms may [...]

Colorado Supreme Court Chief Justice is dominant decider in reapportionment of state legislative districts following census

by CTBC Director | 7:47 am, March 30, 2010

Need another reason why voting “NO” on the four Colorado Supreme Court justices up for re-election this year is the MOST important vote you can cast in this very important election year?
An editorial in this Sunday’s Pueblo Chieftain, “Chief justice wields clout over reapportionment” should make it clear:
Long after the concern about medical marijuana is [...]

Even libertarians should support more regulation of food suppliers; fraud widespread

by Donald E. L. Johnson | 7:11 am, March 30, 2010

If you order snapper at your favorite restaurant, there’s a 77% chance that what you’re served is something else. If you try to buy foods without corn syrup because you’re allergic to it or are trying to control your weight, “pure” maple syrup and honey may be adulterated with it despite what the label says. Lindsey Layton reports that large food processors and sellers of accurately labeled foodstuffs are trying to get the Food and Drug Administration to crack down on fraudulent food importers and sellers. But they are talking to the wrong people. Only Congress can give the FDA the funding needed to support a stronger FDA enforcement drive. But Congress is more interested in wasting money on health care deform, green energy and climate change than in protecting our food supplies. Even libertarians recognize that consumers need to be protected from food fraudsters.

Dan Maes ended ‘09 with $5.48, not $4,374 in the red; raised $10,000 in 4th quarter, not $5,695

by Donald E. L. Johnson | 6:25 am, March 30, 2010

Republican gubernatorial candidate Dan Maes has filed an amended campaign finance report that shows his Dec. 31, 2009, financial status and fourth-quarter fundraising were better than previously reported, but still dismal. At the end of 2009, Mae had $5.48 in the bank. He wasn’t $4,374 in the red. During the fourth quarter of 2009, Maes raised $10,000, almost double the $5,695 previously reported. The campaign, as Maes previously reported here, said that 500 new contributors have given money to the campaign year to date but didn’t say how much they have contributed. First quarter campaign finance reports should be released within the next two or three weeks.
Dan’s wife, Karen, is his campaign’s new treasurer. Curtis Hubbard reports that Karen Maes issued a news release explaining how business executive Dan Maes lost control of his campaign reporting when his former treasurer decided that she didn’t want the job and didn’t tell him until it was too late. The release is not on Maes’ web site and it wasn’t distributed to bloggers, at least not this one. 
Lesson’s learned: When you promise to use your business experience to run Colorado, pay attention to what’s happening in your campaign and stay in touch with your small staff. And when you have bad news, tell the world, not just the Denver Post. Sneaky doesn’t sell.

Thank You Letter to AG Suthers from 10,000

by Lu Busse | 6:21 am, March 30, 2010

March 27, 2010 Dear Attorney General Suthers: Thank you for standing up and defending our individual rights and Colorado’s sovereignty by filing suit against the new federal health care insurance reform act with the other Attorneys General on March 23, 2010.  We truly appreciate your courage and conviction in helping the people of Colorado say “NO” to an [...]

Arnold Kling gets it wrong on breaking up big banks

by Rossputin | 5:56 am, March 30, 2010

Economist and usually-free-market scholar Arnold Kling has written a piece for National Review, cross-posted at the Cato Institute web site, in which he calls for for a policy to “Break up the Banks“.

I disagree with several important aspects of Kling’s thesis and explained those in the following e-mail to him.  (If Kling responds to me, I will add his response to this note.)

———————-

Good morning, Mr. Kling,

You and I agree on more than we disagree, but I would like to suggest a couple of problems with your article about breaking up big banks:

First, while you rightly note that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were big banks that caused tremendous economy-wide problems and have soaked up billions of dollars of taxpayer money, you incorrectly identify the primary cause of those outcomes as the fact that they were big.  The true cause was the fact that they had an implicit (now explicit) government guarantee.  That guarantee flowed through the securitized CMO market and caused problems right down the line.  It was stupid government policy, but it was not irrational for banks and investors to think that something with a government guarantee would be quite safe.  Without the government guarantee, everything would have been different, including the size of FNM and FRE which was far more an effect rather than a cause of the underlying problem.

Second, while you talk about the political strength of large institutions, you neglect the politics which would ultimately grow up around an organization with the right to break up a company simply because it was big.  Who gets to decide what big is?  Which parts of a balance sheet are counted toward bigness, and what makes you think that Congress, in a desire to help its friends, will not change that definition from time to time to ensure the safety of a bank which makes big political contributions or encourage the breakup of a bank which competes with big donors?

Finally, how can you make a case for government deciding what banks are “too big” and then be a champion for free markets and capitalism?  You sound like George W. Bush when he doomed himself to failure in any book of economic history: “I’ve abandoned free-market principles to save the free-market system.”  I threw the penalty flag on that one and feel compelled to do the same with your call to break up big banks just because they’re big.

Get rid of government guarantees and “too big to fail” and you’ve probably solved 90% of the problem.

Best regards,
Ross Kaminsky

Obama’s middle finger has a name: Craig Becker

by Rossputin | 5:27 am, March 30, 2010

On Saturday, among Barack Obama’s 15 “recess appointees” was SEIU attorney Craig Becker to a seat on the National Labor Relations Board. From that spot, Becker is likely to try to institute “Card Check” (or worse) through administrative fiat since it appears unable to pass Congress. Becker is as radical as anybody in (or formerly in) the Obama Administration. He’s as radical as the overtly socialist Carol Browner and the overtly communist Van Jones.

He believes that all businesses should be unionized, that unions “need” the right for “home visits” of workers, and that employers should have no right to discuss organizing with their employees.

It’s sadly predictable that despite Obama’s promises that he would not put people in positions of authority over issues directly relating to their prior employer, he has taken a lawyer directly out of the SEIU and put in him a critical position overseeing Federal labor policies.

And again, he’s not just any union lawyer.

In their op-ed entitled “Andy Stern’s Go-To Guy“, the Wall Street Journal notes that

In a 1993 Minnesota Law Review article, written when (Becker) was a UCLA professor, he explained that traditional notions of democracy should not apply in union elections. He wrote that employers should be barred from attending NLRB hearings about elections, and from challenging election results even amid evidence of union misconduct. He believes elections should be removed from work sites and held on “neutral grounds,” or via mail ballots. Employers should also be barred from “placing observers at the polls to challenge ballots.”

More extraordinary, Mr. Becker advocated a new “body of campaign rules” that would severely limit the ability of employers to argue against unionization. He argued that any meeting a company holds that involves a “captive audience” ought to be grounds for overturning an election. If a company wants to distribute leaflets that oppose the union, for example, Mr. Becker said it must allow union access to its private property to do the same.

For more about Becker’s radical views, you can read THIS.

But the Becker appointment was more significant than Becker and the NLRB.

It is a giant middle finger being waved by Barack Obama at Senate Republicans and at the American people.

Just before giving Becker the NLRB position, which will be held for a year under the recess appointment, Obama received a letter signed by all 41 Republican Senators asking him not to do so.  Obama also knew that at least one Democrat (Ben Nelson of Nebraska) is opposed to Becker and at least a few others probably are.

In other words, with Becker’s appointment, Obama is sending a message. And that message is “Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!”  Obama knows he’s going to lose much of his power in November and maybe all of it two years later, and he’s showing that he’s learned a particular lesson from the outcome of the ObamaCare saga. And that lesson is that he should push forward with the biggest, most expensive, most socialist, most anti-business agenda he can regardless of what the Republicans or even the American citizenry think.

For the Fabian socialists, transformation of society into their far-left utopian vision is a process – an evolution rather than a revolution.  Obama believes that this is his time to be the final agent of that century-long evolution.  I am convinced he doesn’t care if he wins reelection; he will gladly live with the legacy of being the man who gave us socialized medicine and, if he’s lucky, a raft of other disastrous Progressive measures including amnesty for illegal aliens, the Fairness Doctrine, Card Check, Cap-and-Trade, and a massive increase in government intrusiveness into the financial services industry.

As Human Events reporter Connie Hair noted while speaking with me on Backbone Radio on Sunday evening, the public has taken the mask off the Obama Administration, so the Administration is taking off its gloves.  And it’s going to beat up Republicans mercilessly as well attacking every aspect of our free enterprise system.

Make no mistake, we are living through the desired path of Obama’s true guiding light, Saul Alinsky, and we are living through it with tactics as close as one can get in this country at this time to those of any fascist or communist dictator in history.  As a friend said, “Hugo Chavez takes notes from these guys.”

The appointment of Craig Becker is Obama’s way of telling us that he’s coming after us, after our wallets, our liberty, and our children’s futures.  He has declared war on capitalism and freedom.  Will capitalists and free people go gentle into that good night, afraid to take on “The One” or simply in a media-fed Obama-Kool-Aid-induced coma?  Or will we, as I predict with more optimism than usual, finally recognize not just a tyrant but the entire tyrranical system of Progressivism which has created him and imposed him upon us? Will the majority of somnambulating Americans who were misty-eyed willing collaborators in Barack Obama’s election admit that they were deceived and have the courage to change their bad decision?  If so, we may indeed be seeing the rebirth of our republic.  If not, when Atlas does shrug, one wonders who will be left to sort through the rubble.

ObamaCare fallout: employers are hurting

by Brian Schwartz | 1:30 am, March 30, 2010

From the Wall Street Journal:
ObamaCare passed Congress in its final form on Thursday night, and the returns are already rolling in. Yesterday AT&T announced that it will be forced to make a $1 billion writedown due solely to the health bill, in what has become a wave of such corporate losses. …
On [...]

Why are Ken Buck’s, Mark Hurlbert’s budgets up so much?

by Donald E. L. Johnson | 8:57 pm, March 29, 2010

Ex-Pat Ex-Lawyer has done some excellent research and is asking why Eagle County District Attorney Mark Hurlbert’s budget has increased so rapidly during his seven years in office, and a Jane Norton supporter has asked the same questions about Ken Buck’s budget increases. Hurlbert is running for the state senate from district 16, and Ken Buck is a leading candidate for the Republican’s nomination to the U.S. Senate. Both men claim to be fiscal conservatives, and people who oppose them are questioning how conservative they are given their budgetary records as DAs.
Since I don’t know much about DAs’ budgets, I’m 

15 Economy killing taxes Obamacare will bring to you and your employer

by Mr. Bob | 12:34 pm, March 29, 2010

Hat tip Press Collective

Taken from The Business Insider, CLICK HERE for the entire article.
1. Excise tax on high cost employer-sponsored health coverageRead more: http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#excise-tax-on-high-cost-employer-sponsored-health-coverage-1#ixzz0jalib0o3

2. Increase in additional tax on distributions from HSAs and Archer MSAs not used for qualified medical expensesRead more: http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#increase-in-additional-tax-on-distributions-from-hsas-and-archer-msas-not-used-for-qualified-medical-expenses-2#ixzz0jaloZUsD

3. A tax on failing hospitals: http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#a-tax-on-failing-hospitals-3

4. Imposition of annual fee on branded prescription pharmaceutical manufacturers and importersRead more: http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#imposition-of-annual-fee-on-branded-prescription-pharmaceutical-manufacturers-and-importers-4#ixzz0jam2sOPA

5. Imposition of annual fee on medical device manufacturers and importersRead more: http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#imposition-of-annual-fee-on-medical-device-manufacturers-and-importers-5#ixzz0janKLHTB

6. Imposition of annual fee on health insurance providersRead more: http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#imposition-of-annual-fee-on-health-insurance-providers-6#ixzz0janOspib

7. Additional hospital insurance tax on high-income taxpayers http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#additional-hospital-insurance-tax-on-high-income-taxpayers-7

8. Excise tax on elective cosmetic medical procedures; http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#excise-tax-on-elective-cosmetic-medical-procedures-8

9. Tax on individuals without acceptable health care coverageRead more: http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#tax-on-individuals-without-acceptable-health-care-coverage-9#ixzz0janm0iKB

10. Health insurance fee; http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#health-insurance-fee-10

11. Tax on non-electing businesses who refuse to supply health careRead more: http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#tax-on-non-electing-businesses-who-refuse-to-supply-health-care-11#ixzz0janwAaca

12. Imposition of tax on indoor tanning. http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#imposition-of-tax-on-indoor-tanning-12

13. 1% surcharge on individuals making more than $350,000Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#1-surcharge-on-individuals-making-more-than-350000-13#ixzz0jao8O0ru

14. 1.5% surcharge on individuals making more than $500,000Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#15-surcharge-on-individuals-making-more-than-500000-14#ixzz0jaoD36K6

15. 5.4% surcharge on individuals making more than $1 millionRead more: http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#54-surcharge-on-individuals-making-more-than-1-million-15#ixzz0jaoHZdFD

Now Check Out 50 Depressing Facts About The Health Care System That Will Make You Beg For ReformRead more: http://www.businessinsider.com/healthcare-bill-new-taxes-2010-3#now-check-out-50-depressing-facts-about-the-health-care-system-that-will-make-you-beg-for-reform-16#ixzz0jaoNBDRp

What Kind of Reform Does Race to the Top Want, and Why Am I Not Impressed?

by Eddie | 10:56 am, March 29, 2010

It’s a beautiful day, the sun is shining, and the big news in the education world? Colorado didn’t win any Race to the Top (RTT) federal grant money the first time around. Since only two awards were given out — Delaware and Tennessee of all places were the winners — there should be lots of [...]

Sarah Palin Headlines Tea Party Rally in Sen. Harry Reid’s Hometown: Searchlight, NV

by elpresidente | 9:39 am, March 29, 2010

Another fantastic photo essay from El Marco at Looking at the Left.

GOP Senate primary: Jane Norton vs. Ken Buck and Tom Wiens

by Donald E. L. Johnson | 9:39 am, March 29, 2010

Ken Buck and Tom Wiens are likely to split the anti-Jane Norton vote in the August 10 Republican primary election. Wiens announced plans to petition on the primary ballot while Norton and Buck will win their places on the ballot at the party’s state assembly in Loveland on May 22. The way the primary is shaping up, it looks like Buck and Wiens will make Norton spend a lot of money to be the party’s nominee in the general election. Appointed Democrat Senator Michael Bennet also faces a primary from Andrew Romanoff. Self-funded candidates like Wiens never have won Senate or gubernatorial races in Colorado, according to party veterans. In the March 10 caucuses, Wiens recieved only 35% of the votes from party activists who know him best in his home county, Douglas County.

The Silencers

by Rossputin | 5:46 am, March 29, 2010

Usually it’s the cry of “racist”.  This week, it’s that plus rhetoric like “inciting violence”, “over the top”, “uncivil”.  What do all these descriptions have in common?  They’re all used to describe conservatives or Tea Party activists with the sole purpose of silencing political dissent against the tyranny of Barack Obama and Democrats in Congress.

DON’T fall for it.

I just heard a Republican and Democrat Senator being interviewed on Fox News.  The Republican (Lamar Alexander of Tennessee) essentially agreed with the Democrat (Barbara Mikulski of Maryland) that too much of the recent anti-Obama and more specifically anti-ObamaCare rhetoric has been “over the top”, that we need to restrain ourselves and have “civil” discussions about politics as they do in the oh-so-civil US Senate.

Bullshit!

This is an utterly appropriate time to be angry.  Note that I am not saying it’s an appropriate time to be violent or suggest violence, or to be a moron, meaning hurling epithets or sputum.  That sort of behavior does nothing but damage the fight for liberty.  But anger, even LOUD anger, is part of the American tradition from time to time.

Do you think the First Continental Congress was kept “civil” by the Nannies who said that we should just talk calmly about whether or not King George III deserved America’s continued loyalty?

Do you think the man in the street in Boston was told not to be “over the top” in their rhetoric when their lives and liberties were being destroyed by tyranny?

Did people tell civil rights leaders in the 1950s or abolitionists in the 1850s to muzzle themselves because people might see them as rude if their voices were a few decibels too loud?

HELL NO!

I will not be silenced by bogus accusations of racism or inciting violence, the utter falseness of which is as plain to those making the accusations as those bearing the brunt of them.

If you, brother fighter for liberty, run into an Obama Zombie (quoting Jason Mattera), who fires their Silencer at you, accusing you of being racist, uncivil, or wanting to provoke violence, call him (or her) on it.

Fight back directly:  “You know I’m not a racist”.  “Of course I’m angry.  If you realized what government was doing to your children, you’d be angry, too.”  “I am not arguing for violence, as you well know.  But I am arguing for unelecting every possible Democrat until the day comes when a Democrat can stand for liberty and limited government rather than for increasing union money and power at the expense of everything and everyone else.”  “I would be angry at these policies if the president were black, white, or green.”

Make up your own response.  But DO NOT be silenced.

And let your elected representatives of BOTH PARTIES know that you WILL NOT BE SILENCED, that their condescending tut-tuts over raised voices will only make us raise them louder, and that we will neither forgive nor forget those who stole our liberty or their unindicted co-conspirators.  Don’t forget that only a handful of current Congressional Republicans are true fighters for liberty.  Most of the rest are run-of-the-mill politicians who care more for their own re-election than anything else.  To the extent that our anger is anti-incumbent and not just anti-Democrat – and it certainly is to a large degree – they want to Silence us too.

To the Silencers: You have indeed wakened a sleeping giant. You cannot put him back to sleep.  You cannot silence him.  He is about to crush you as you so richly deserve.  So keep flapping your worthless gums for the short remaining duration of your political career.  Then go home and figure out how to live with yourself.

And for those of you who continue to support the Silencers, the Moochers and the Looters, perhaps in the naive hope that some particular redistribution of other people’s money to you will give you the free lunch you’ve always thought you were entitled to, please keep in mind the words of Samuel Adams:

If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or your arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.

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