Does Obama push your button? WTF

Maybe the geniuses at the White House should have glommed on to the old Gerald Ford button, Whip Inflation Now. (It worked so well then too.)

The president votes present, in hopes of diverting most Americans from his "progressive" reactionary hooey.

Increasingly, Americans aren't buying it. That's what the midterms were all about.

The Pew survey of 2,257 adults also found that people using social media for political purposes were slightly more likely to have voted for a Republican in the 2010 midterm elections.

Because we know we're stuck with this crushing Big Government tab. WTF. Drivingordinarily mild-mannered Americans to join the World Taekwondo Federation.

P.S. WHY THEY’D RATHER TALK ABOUT SARAH PALIN (CONT’D): Initial jobless claims jump 51,000. Instapundit

--crossposted at BackyardConservative

100 Programs the RSC Wants to Abolish or Cut

The new Republican House voted to repeal ObamaCare with more votes than its original passage, making good on their winning midterm election platform. WSJ:

Democrats are deriding last night's House vote to repeal ObamaCare as "symbolic," and it was, but that is not the same as meaningless. The stunning political reality is that a new entitlement that was supposed to be a landmark of liberal governance has been repudiated by a majority of one chamber of Congress only 10 months after it passed. This sort of thing never happens.

Today, the Republican Study Committee lays down a marker, with a bid to cut $2.5 trillion over 10 years:

If year to year spending is not restrained and no plan to solve the problem with long term unfunded obligations is laid out and implemented, interest on the debt will begin to swallow up much of the annual federal budget. The nation’s ability to finance defense would be constrained to the point of rendering it a second tier world power, or worse, and domestic spending would be so squeezed that the negative consequences are hard to foresee.

Program after program is on the chopping block--we can't keep these going in good conscience. We can't saddle our children and theirs with a bleak and worse future than we were bequeathed ourselves by our parents, the greatest generation.

This is the mission of the TEA party--to get America back on a path to growth and leave a legacy of freedom to live the American Dream anew.

More. NRO. Meaningful Cuts
It’s a TARP! Geithner Won’t Show for First Issa Hearing

And George Will: The vicious cycle of government that should worry Democrats.

More. Repeal, Replace, Defund ObamaCare:

The House passed the ObamaCare replacement bill on Thursday by a vote of 253-175, with 14 Democrats voting with all of the Republicans. The resolution directs four House committees to immediately begin drafting solutions to replace the existing job-killing healthcare law.

While the GOP House passed the repeal of ObamaCare on Wednesday, the Democratic Senate is blocking a vote on it. So while the repeal is on hold, the House will begin the the process to defund and replace ObamaCare. [snip]

Upton said that he expects bipartisan support for several of the replacement provisions. “There are a number of areas where I think there is common ground. Pre-existing conditions, shopping across state lines, tort reform -- even the President supported tort reform,” he said. .

... A Principled Fight for Our Prosperity, and Posterity:)

--crossposted at BackyardConservative

Will the League of Women Voters come out of the political closet?

Coralville Courier. League of Women Voters Lobbies for ObamaCare

Who buys your lies any more.

The last time I had a run-in with them was at a public debate, in a public setting. I was distributing flyers--and they had a problem with that. They thought since they were sponsors, apparently, they had veto-power over information distributed to the public.

We saw the last election their objections to the Pledge of Allegiance.

Well, we know their allegiance is not to non-partisanship but to the leftist line.

...And the last lecture of theirs I attended, my table mates defended President Clinton's reception of the general who ordered the massacre at Tiananmen Square. Perhaps they were just uninformed. That would not be a surprise either.

Dem Senator Conrad Throws in the Towel

Is ObamaCare DOOMED in 2012. Ha. Look at the map:)Can we elect a veto-proof majority?

Can we sweep out The ONE? (Is Gov. Pat Quinn of Illinois running for president on the Dem paradise of Illinois model?)

P.S. Can we quote Teddy now, on deregulating health care? (not just JFK on supply side econ)

Beginning in 1975, Kennedy held U.S. Senate hearings that showcased the fact that the cost per mile for an inter-state air ticket from -- say -- New York to Washington, D.C. was several times higher than it was for trips of comparable distance inside Texas. Roused by this evidence, Kennedy thundered on the Senate floor: "Regulators all too often encourage or approve unreasonably high prices, inadequate service, and anti-competitive behavior. The cost of this regulation is always passed on to the consumer. And that cost is astronomical.

RIP Teddy. Your legacy lives on. From sea to shining sea.

Kent Conrad. To the left of Teddy. Blue Dog Dems on the run with their tails between their legs.

...And here's the ticking time bomb on the economy:

In addition to the two recessions since 2001, and in addition to increased security costs, by far the biggest problem that the industry has faced over the past decade has been increased fuel prices. Since 2002, the cost of labor, measured in cents per available seat, has been reduced by more than 25 percent -- going from a little more than four cents per mile to under three cents. Unfortunately, over the same time, the cost of fuel has shot up from a little more than one cent per mile to more than three cents per mile. For the first time, the cost of fuel equals or exceeds the cost of labor.

Well, we don't have an energy policy, do we. We have a ride your bike to work and pay through the nose for the privilege approach. (A really big hit outside Dem urban enclaves, you betcha.) Couple that with a possible rise in food prices here along with continued joblessness and you've got the makings of an economy stupid election.

--crossposted at BackyardConservative

A New Crop

People voted for specific things last election and expect delivery Coralville Courier

New York Russians Are Creeped Out By Democrats Chicks on the Right

Hollywood's Aaron Sorkin: "elite is not a bad word, it’s an aspirational one" Critical Narrative

instapundit instapundit.com

AT AMAZON, markdowns on flashlights….: AT AMAZON, markdowns on flashlights. http://bit.ly/efm1kV

A new day:)

And this, which we've all been waiting for: GOP to Start on Spending-Cuts Measure Wednesday

NY Times Nuance Misses Chicago

The NY Times' crack reporter in Chicago--nuance means you can't see the nose on your face. You can't talk about Illinois without Chicago [note colored map]--and Chicago is bankrupt too. It has very high taxes. And very poor schools run by the teachers' union for its benefit, yielding an unskilled workforce and crime-ridden neighborhoods. Then there's Cook County, otherwise known as Crook. It remains to be seen whether that will change. Corruption and patronage are the name of the game at every level of government in Illinois.

Minnesota may high taxes but they also have a high level of services, delivered A-rated living within their means.

Indiana has among the lowest tax burdens in the country.

And Wisconsin's new Republican governor, the former reformer of Milwaukee County, is taking a look at privatizing as much government as he can, and boosting economic development.

Chicago's Cook County and (on the watch list, Madison, St. Clair and McClean county) Illinois have the dubious honor of ranking high as judicial hellholes.

And while other big Blue states like New York and California are actually making spending cuts, Illinois continues to ramp up spending--even as our retire in your 50's public employee pension burden is the most underfunded--and probably the most undeserving--in the country.

People and jobs have been leaving Illinois for years. Voting with their feet. As plain as the nose on your face. If you're honest.

P.S.

Illinois Republican Party Chairman Pat Brady said in a statement that he’s not buying Quinn’s claim that Gordon’s appointment came after the vote. “That’s like saying it was simply a coincidence that the governor vetoed McCormick Place reforms last year after getting a $75,000 donation from the Teamsters Union,” Brady said in the statement.

--cartoon by Scott Stantis, Chicago Tribune

Related posts: Murder Mac and Cheese. Your Neighbor is Suspect, NJ Bond Flops, Crunch Time for Dissolute States, Illinois Signs Its Death Warrant

--crossposted at BackyardConservative

Half the states now suing the federal government over Obamacare

Via Lucianne, DC Examiner:

While Obamacare will pay for all of the benefit expansion for the first three years of the law, and 90% of it after that, Obamacare never pays for any of the state administrative costs for adding those 18 million Americans to their welfare rolls. That amounts to billions in unfunded federal mandates for states to absorb. That is why 33 Republican governors signed a letter to the White House and Congress making an emphatic appeal that Obamacare’s Medicaid provisions be repealed.

Even Down East in Maine.

Alan Dershowitz defends Palin, while GOP establishment doesn't

Riehl World View.

Gee, what a surprise.

You want to throw in with Krugman by your silence or faint words we'll throw you out at the ballot box.

Where is the decency in that?

“So as the usual talking heads begin their ‘have you no decency?’ routine aimed at talk radio and Republican politicians, perhaps we should turn the question around. Where is the decency in blood libel?…

“To be clear, if you’re using this event to criticize the ‘rhetoric’ of Mrs. Palin or others with whom you disagree, then you’re either: (a) asserting a connection between the ‘rhetoric’ and the shooting, which based on evidence to date would be what we call a vicious lie; or (b) you’re not, in which case you’re just seizing on a tragedy to try to score unrelated political points, which is contemptible. Which is it?

“I understand the desperation that Democrats must feel after taking a historic beating in the midterm elections and seeing the popularity of ObamaCare plummet while voters flee the party in droves. But those who purport to care about the health of our political community demonstrate precious little actual concern for America’s political well-being when they seize on any pretext, however flimsy, to call their political opponents accomplices to murder.

“Where is the decency in that?”

Via HotAir.

Update. I repeat. A sanctimonious Sen. Dick Durbin. A sanctimonious Chicago Tribune.

U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., was right Sunday in saying on CNN that, during the fall campaigns, a much-circulated conservative appeal, with cross hairs on congressional districts, crossed a line.

Oh really.

A monstrous lie. And now we see this guy had been planning this since 2007. And this: Have you no shame.

--crossposted at BackyardConservative

Down with the czars!

Republicans Introduce Bill to Eliminate Obama’s 39 Czars

Be sure we've got them all.

And then let's go after the Czar's Czar.

Enter the States. Stage RIGHT

6 states to watch on health reform Politico looks at it with emphasis on the left. They do have Wisconsin and Alaska, but how can they leave out Virginia? Well, they are inside the beltway guys.

Walker OKs Wisconsin joining health care lawsuit Plus a look at (outgoing Gov. and presidential candidate) Minnesota's PawlentyCare:

Suppose we had a system whereby the government gave our employers control of our housing. That is, instead of a mortgage-interest tax deduction, the home you occupy would be a non-taxable benefit. You would live in it for as long as your employers’ HR manager decided, and would have to move whenever she decided to change benefits. Furthermore, when you needed a new refrigerator, for example, you wouldn’t go out and buy a new one, but go to an in-network kitchen-appliance dispensary where you’d pay a $20 co-pay to pick up the fridge that was on the list of kitchen appliances available to employees of your firm.

I continue to hedge my criticism by noting that Pawlenty has unambiguously championed reforming the federal tax code to allow individuals and families to control their health dollars. Furthermore, because a state has more general powers than the federal government, it may be more appropriate for a governor to take a greater operational interest in health care than a president should.

Let the play begin.

More. In tandem with a Republican House:

Conservatives should wrap their repeal-and-replace efforts into bipartisan discussions about how to fix the budget and improve the U.S. economy through tax reform (the employer deduction should be scrapped and replaced with a tax credit) and by seriously considering the Ryan-Rivlin plan as a starting point for making Medicaid and Medicare sustainable. Both would go a long way towards improving incentives in health-care markets. And if we can do that, as Hyman points out, “most of the big problems will take care of themselves,” leaving policymakers with a “far smaller and more tractable set of problems.”

ObamaCare repeal starts. Reaction from the reactionary left, and reaction to that:

But polls have found that other aspects of the bill, including the individual mandate to buy insurance, aren't popular with the public.

"Maybe it's not ideal — it's certainly not communism," Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) said of the individual mandate, according to the Toledo Blade.

Well, these guys have cut Medicare Advantage so don't pretend you care. As for not being a commie--talk about being damned with faint praise for yourself.