End Game

Well, the power play is under full effect. You only have to watch the way the dems are acting in Washington to see the writing on the wall. They're acting spoiled rotten life long diabetics, turned loose in a candy store with no adult supervision. It's like fifty years of pent up liberal drooling is on display as they're going for the full monty, every little socialist fascist fantasy is going to be passed even if it bankrupts the country, and it will. Oh, don't get me wrong, they're going to try and pay for it, they are so seriously going to try and pay for it. There are so many trial balloons floating over DC you'd think it was D-day on the English coast. Everything is being tried on for size from taxing private insurance to a national VAT. They've even tried two versions of VAT, one that would exclude the majority below $200k a year from income tax, the other that leaves things as they are and tosses in a 25% VAT.Isn't that awesome? If you are hard enough working to earn over $1 million a year, your total effective tax will exceed 88% (assuming you spend all the after tax money you earn, of course, which if they do this won't happen). The fact that these morons are even THINKING of a VAT proves that they're off the hinge. Every time this thing which has all but bankrupted business in Europe has been brought up in the past it was laughed off the stage, and cost more than a few dems their office.

I'm convinced there is only three things that can save us at this point, and I'll give them in increasing probability (should you believe we're not lost already).

1) The conservatives (hopefully not repubs) win HUGE in '10. About a hundred seats change hands (and 15-20 senators) and this shit is stopped...dead. The ridiculously slow rate they're actually spending the money means it might be possible to reverse a lot of the damage in spending. (not if they pass socialized medicine though, more on that later). These conservatives wouldn't be able to rest complete control, but the dems would be so freaked out and The One so afraid he would be a one term wonder they'd all back off and suddenly discover a moderate side.

2) A wave of tax revolts sweep the country in the next six months. I think a little of this is already under way. Evidence? Tax receipts are down by $375 billion. Pew research says it shouldn't be more than $150-200 billion at this point. Glenn Beck had a guest the other day, a rare conservative actor named Craig T. Nelson (Coach) actually said he was considering the idea of stopping paying his taxes. What? Wow, really? Yes, and I think some are doing it already, or going Galt. The government loves nothing more than throwing anyone who doesn't pay their taxes in jail (unless your a dem, then you get a job and forgiveness). They love it so much it's usually front page news, especially around tax time. But what do they do if a million, two million, ten million of us stop paying taxes? Throw us all in jail? Maybe, if you believe in the conspiracy theorists talking about concentration camps. If this movement grows in strength, it could turn the tide.

3) The government gets its wet dream and passes socialized medicine. Why is this a big one? Because it's MY TIPPING POINT. If they do this, I'll spend the next six months (they'll have to wait at least that long to get it off the ground) saving every dime I can, quit my job, and start sucking as much free shit from the government as possible. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to take the government down, I'm just hurrying it along a little. I will also encourage as many others to do the same as well. This is 'going Galt' for our modern world. I will deny the beast my brain, my effort, my care for the countries government. At that point it is obvious that there are more bottom feeders than workers, so I don't care any more. I'll ride it out and wait to see what comes out the other side. And I know there will be millions more like me. They can't keep it up forever, not without money and our cooperation. The world economy will collapse without our buying, giving, and caring. It is all but inevitable.

I think the damage is done. The nation will never be the same again, there is no way they can put the shit back in the horse. You can't run up a debt bigger than the entire nations GDP and suggest there is a way to pay it off. This president has not spent more money in 100 days, than all the presidents before him in the last 30 years. Even FDR would be agog at what is going on. Hyper inflation is right around the corner. Our treasurer is in China begging them to buy our bonds. And after spending a couple billion they're now slobbering over the idea of national healthcare (conservative estimates, $2.5 trillion over the next five years). Bye bye baby.

Remember, elections have consequences.

Sic Semper Tyrannis

Just another Oval Office meeting...

Okay, this is just too funny to be believed. You really have to wonder if this is how it's working. The only downside, it makes Chairman Zero look way to moderate.

Shit Sandwich

How else do you describe it? The biggest shit sandwich ever conceived of, ever made, and ever force fed to the American public. If you've been following along you've known that I don't approve of our newly minted and esteemed president, the one, high holiest, the anointed one, Barak Hussien Obama. McCain sucked, Obama is a nuclear powered Hoover. Sometimes I'm so sick of being a Libertarian (especially an Objectivist), I can't see straight. Anyway, on two the doodoo snack.

How do you go about destroying the most power free economy the world has ever know? Just watch TV, we're seeing a demonstration right now. First, when banks and businesses act like morons and become insolvent, continually throw billions of dollars at them and claim they are too big to fail. Second, threaten to raise taxes during a recession, and actually do it. Three, when no one will buy your increasingly worthless bonds to finance the biggest spending spree in world history, just monetize the debt! Tada! What is monetization? Well, when no one buys your worthless bonds, why you just buy them yourself! While the press has carefully been keeping your attention to the BS issue of a few million in bonus paid to a company execs (a company that should be in bankruptcy right now), the Fed (Federal Reserve) ordered the printing of a TRILLION is cash reserves, and then bought the bonds to coner that money. This is the real world equivalence of loaning yourself a hundred bucks, and writing a check from the same account to cover the withdrawal. The money doesn't exist, it's a paper trick.

So what does this mean? On it's surface, not too much. We've done it before for a few billion here and there. But for trillions? Never. Monetizing is extraordinarily inflationary by nature. Big surprise, when you dump super tanker loads of cash on the market, it gets less valuable. Worse in this case, the money is being printed to make it cheaper and more available for banks to borrow that money, but none of them are interested. They're driving up inflation for nothing. Banks won't start loaning money until the bleeding in the monetary and insurance market stops. And thanks to bailout after bailout, that won't happen any time soon. AIG is likely going to die anyway, the sad truth is their liability is in the trillions, not hundreds of billions. They ran up this debt by underwriting everything from toxic housing loans (you listening democrats?), to monetary hedge funds (and you too Republicans?). Like Madoff, it was a smooth gig until the markets went into the toilet.

To stop this decent into hell and save us all from ourselves, our illustrious prez, he who can do no wrong, is throwing trillions at the problem. We who studied economics even a little figure that lesson was learned by FDR and Johnson, namely you can't spend your way to prosperity. But suggesting FDR's spending was akin to a drinking problem, you'd have to say Obama is a remake of Leaving Las Vegas. He's determined to spend us into oblivion. Honestly, I'm at a loss for which scenario is more likely. Is he just trying to save us by spending the next five generations savings, or is this the classic example of a generation of pent up ultra liberal socialistic wet dreams come true? Either way, it ain't good kids. OMB guesstimates the deficit this year with Obama's first budget to be 2.5 TRILLION. One year. He is at a pace to double the entire national debt in one year. In never agreed he was the first black president, and many historian agree with me. But in this way, he is going to be historic, fo sho.

I've written about a tipping point, how far off can it be? Who guessed that Ayn Rand had is to right, and so wrong. The only thing she didn't take into account was the ability for a government to just run up debt until it all comes crashing down. If they'd been forced to actually generate revenue for all this bull shit, they'd have taxed this nations producers into Galt's Gulch a decade ago.

I've never been more happier to be living fifty miles from a major city. It all feels like a city of glass, built on a major fault line, right next to an active volcano. Oh boy.