A friend of mine (Thanks, Chris!) recently sent me a video of Canadian soldiers disassembling and re-assembling a low-hood Willys Jeep during a holiday event in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Obama: Get Behind Entrepreneurs And Business!
With no money left in the government coffers, the “only strategy” for growth is to get behind America’s entrepreneurs, President Obama has said.
In a speech to his party’s spring conference, the president declared war on the “enemies of enterprise” – and said he was on the side of “go-getters”.
And he vowed 23 March’s Budget would be the “most pro-growth this country has seen for a generation”.
Obama’s press secretary, Jay Carney, has already told the media in DC that his Budget will be “unashamedly pro-growth” and will include 10 new enterprise zones to boost some of the most deprived areas in the United States.
Mr Obama used his speech to reinforce his pro-growth message, and to promise a “fundamental rebalancing of our economy” with “less debt, more saving; less borrowing, more investment; less dependence on financial services, more new industries, exports and trade”.
With interest rates at a record low, and no money to spare, the president said he wanted to champion the growth and ingenuity of the American people.
He said: “The spark of initiative. The courage to make your dream happen. The hard work to see it through.
“There’s only one strategy for growth we can have now and that is rolling up our sleeves and doing everything possible to make it easier for businesses to grow, to invest, to take people on.”
“Back small firms. Boost enterprise. Be on the side of everyone in this country who wants to create jobs, and wealth and opportunity.”
The words you’ve been waiting to hear from Mr Obama, yes?
Except: NO.
Those words are from Britain’s Prime Minister David Cameron, spoken on March 6th and documented here.
Britain “gets it.”
America does not.
Mr Obama has Historical Alzheimers and demands that our country repeat the failed ministrations of the UK and Europe. Europe is starting to come around. The US is on a crash course with history and finds itself startlingly ignorant of the past. And the oh-so-recent past!
Mr Obama, the dolt that he is, thinks that somehow he can do what the UK, Europe, the USSR and China hasn’t been able to do in over 100 years: install true Ideal Socialism.
Note to Mr Obama: you are clearly “educated.” But you have “learned” nothing.
BZ
In Obama’s World, The Homeowner Would Go To Jail:
From The Smoking Gun:
After breaking into an Oregon residence last night, Timothy Chapek, 24, barricaded himself in a bathroom after the owner unexpectedly arrived home. Chapek, you see, was worried that Hilary Mackenzie might be armed (or that her barking German Shepherds could prove problematic).
So he called 911 seeking help. “I just broke into a house and the owner came home,” Chapek told a police operator. “You broke into a house?” the surprised operator responded. “I think she’s got guns,” Chapek added.
Simultaneously, Mackenzie called police to report that there was an intruder in her Portland home (she told an operator that Chapek had reported he was taking a shower).
In the Perfect World envisioned by Mr Obama, it is clear to me that the homeowner would subsequently be arrested whether she possessed a gun or not, her home searched, a background check conducted on her personal affairs (Is she a TEA Party member? Subscribe to The Weekly Standard? What are her radio listening habits? Does she have a blog? What is her political affiliation?). Mere suspicion of possessing a handgun for defensive purposes would be sufficient for an arrest, “registered” or not. Clearly, it’s every bit as important what the female homeowner was thinking as compared to how she acted.
Just as clear is the fact that the true victim in this crime is the so-called “trespasser” who, obviously, isn’t a homeowning elitist.
He obviously had unfulfilled needs and the economy, his societal position and lack of personal empowerment placed him into that unfortunate circumstance.
There’s a glimpse at one possible future, America.
You like it?
Then re-elect Mr Obama come 2012.
BZ
P.S.
Finally:
According to a Portland Police Bureau report, Chapek told cops he was “taking a shower, nothing more.” Mackenzie reported that none of her belongings were out of place and that Chapek had “earlier made some utterance…that ‘Mexicans’ had kidnapped him and put him in the bathroom.”
Chapek, pictured in the above mug shot, was arrested and charged with criminal trespass. Go here for access to both 9-1-1 calls.
Huh. Imagine that. There still exists a bit of sanity, even in Leftist Portland.
I’m sure, however, the protesters are gathering who will insist he was framed. Framed, I tell you!
Corporations To Obama: We’re Not Indentured Servants
Businesses and corporations aren’t perfect. We know that. But they create the wealth, not government. Small businesses employ most people, but big businesses do what’s left of heavy manufacturing and allow the US to have a presence in world markets for goods and services. Even and particularly in down economic times, business needs a break with regulations and taxes. And the die has been cast:
3M chief warns Obama over business regulationBy Hal Weitzman in ChicagoPublished: February 27 2011 19:27 | Last updated: February 27 2011 19:27The head of one of the US’s biggest industrial groups has launched a scathing attack on Barack Obama’s attempts to repair relations with companies, dubbing him “anti-business”.Manufacturers could shift production out of the US to Canada or Mexico as a result, warned George Buckley, chief executive and chairman of 3M.
But it’s the tax benefit of overseas operations that is the biggest reason why multinationals end up with lower tax rates than the rest of us. It only makes sense that multinationals “put costs in high-tax countries and profits in low-tax countries,” says Scott Hodge, president of the Tax Foundation. Those low-tax countries are almost anywhere but the U.S. “When you add in state taxes, the U.S. has the highest tax burden among industrialized countries,” says Hodge. In contrast, China’s rate is just 25%; Ireland’s is 12.5%.Corporations are getting smarter, not just about doing more business in low-tax countries, but in moving their more valuable assets there as well. That means setting up overseas subsidiaries, then transferring to them ownership of long-lived, often intangible but highly profitable assets, like patents and software.
Mr Buckley, who has run the diversified manufacturer since 2005, said: “There is a sense among companies that this is a difficult place to do business. It is about regulation, taxation, seemingly anti-business policies in Washington, attitudes towards science.”He added: “Politicians forget that business has choice. We’re not indentured servants and we will do business where it’s good and friendly. If it’s hostile, incrementally, things will slip away. We’ve got a real choice between manufacturing in Canada and Mexico – which tend to be pro-business – or America.”
The 3M chief also criticised US immigration policy, saying the difficulty of obtaining visas was forcing companies to move research and development overseas. “About 68 per cent of our science PhD candidates are from outside the US,” he said. “Many want to stay here afterwards but we’re not allowed as many visas as we would like.”“We are now exporting science overseas to China, India, Germany, building labs there. There’s a good strategic reason for it, but we also have no choice – if we can’t get the people here and we’re competing with the people there, we have no choice but to do it locally.”
Naturally the Obama administration has proposed doing away with tax deferrals on overseas income. If the plan passes, a U.S. company that pays a 25% tax on profits in China would have to pay an additional 10% income tax to Uncle Sam to bring it up to the 35% corporate rate. “Eliminating deferrals would put U.S. companies on an unlevel playing field,” says the Tax Foundation’s Hodge, “especially if competing with the likes of Germany, which only taxes companies on domestic operations.”
Would no more tax holiday for GE really end up helping Mr. and Mrs. Taxpayer? Doubtful. “The average Joe should be in favor of lower corporate taxes,” says Hodge, “because ultimately they are paying the corporate income tax. Either as workers, getting lower wages and fewer jobs, or as consumers, paying higher prices, or as retirees, getting lower dividends and earnings on their investments.”
In the same vein, JPMorgan Chase ( JPM – news – people ) Chief Executive Jamie Dimon has spoken out against an Obama proposal to levy a special tax on banks to recoup bailout costs. “Using tax policy to punish people is a bad idea,” said Dimon. “All businesses tend to pass costs on to customers.”
Bean Bags vs AK-47s
Kind of like taking a carton of eggs to a gunfight.
The U.S. Border Patrol is under fire for allegedly ordering its elite, SWAT-style units to use non-lethal bean bag ammunition before responding with deadly force – even against suspects armed with high-powered semi-automatic and automatic weapons like AK-47s.The controversy over the agency’s “bean bag” policy began in the days following the Dec. 14 killing of U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry and has escalated recently as more information is uncovered in the investigation of the fatal shooting.“When the suspected aliens did not drop their weapons, two Border Patrol agents deployed ‘less than lethal’ beanbags at the suspected aliens,” according to a FBI search warrant request filed in the U.S. District Court in Tucson on Dec. 29. “At this time, at least one of the suspected aliens fired at the Border Patrol agents. Two Border Patrol agents returned fire, one with his long gun and one with his pistol. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry was shot with one bullet and died shortly after.The warrant appears to support claims made by Terry’s brother, Kent, and former U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo that Terry’s team — part of the U.S. Border Patrol Tactical Unit, also known as BORTAC — was under standing orders to always use bean-bag rounds first before using live ammunition.“There was a group of four guys with my brother and two had lethal and two had non-lethal weapons there,” Kent Terry told Fox News Friday.Tancredo wrote about the issue in a Dec. 18 op-ed article here.