Video: Ray Stevens Explains the Obama Budget Plan

A great video from Ray Stevens concerning President Barack Obama's "budget plan," if one can call it a plan.

Very humorous and very true, which, I guess, takes away from the humor.

Enjoy!

America: Superpower or Welfare State, But Not Both

The United States is stretching itself too thin, and I am not talking about defense. The liberal entitlement mentality is killing America.

In an opinion piece Saturday by The Wall Street Journal, it was pointed out that this year’s defense spending, including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, takes up about 4.5 percent of our gross domestic product, the lowest in decades. Meanwhile, entitlement spending, as of last year, stood at 9.8 percent of GDP, the highest ever. The above graph from the Journal tells the story wonderfully.

And there is no end in sight.

"Under current projections, entitlements will eat up 10.8% of GDP by 2020, while defense spending goes down to 2.7%," according to the Journal. "On current trends, those entitlements will consume all tax revenues by 2052, estimates Mackenzie Eaglen of the Heritage Foundation."

The United States has a real spending problem. While cutting defense spending is necessary, it simply will not be enough to counter the government’s spending habits, especially with the current administration and its spendthrift ways. In fact, if you cut the defense budget by 10 percent, you will only save $55 billion of a $1.4 trillion deficit. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t cut defense spending, but that we can’t solve our fiscal problems on the back of the Pentagon alone.

It doesn’t help that President Barack Obama has demanded cuts in defense spending but has thrown money at everything else. In fact, he has doubled the national debt in the last two years and pushed on us a $2.6 trillion health care entitlement that will bankrupt the United States if not stopped.

If the United States wants to survive the future as a world power — despite the liberal mantra, it is a good thing to be the world’s leading nation — then it needs to end these European-style entitlement programs and the subsequent entitlement overreach problem we face.

As the Journal noted, we can be a superpower or a welfare state, but not both.

Wealth redistribution? Then why not grade redistribution?

I received the below joke from a good friend a few weeks ago. Then, this week, Dan Mitchell, a senior fellow with the Cato Institute, posted the above video with his comments on his blog on the same topic as the below joke so I decided to share them both.

Both show that liberals simply do not fully consider their positions. Their belief system is often inconsistent, which shows the weakness of their positions.

The video was created by the University of California at Merced Republicans. According to the notes attached to the video:

Many students believe that it is moral to confiscate money from hard-working Americans and entrepreneurs and give it to those who didn't earn it, yet don't support the same philosophy when it is applied to their GPA scores.

I apologize for the quality of the video's audio in spots. I guess all the A/V students are Democrats!

Here is the joke:

Is Nancy Pelosi Insane?

I just can’t seem to figure out if U.S. Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., is a liar or simply insane.

At her last news conference as Speaker of the House, Pelosi defended her record on — and I am not making this up — deficit reduction.

During the conference the new House minority leader said, “Deficit reduction has been a high priority for us. It is our mantra, pay-as-you-go.”

Unbelievable.

The 111th Congress added more debt than the first 100 congresses combined! Under her watch, the national debt grew from $8.67 trillion on Jan. 4, 2007, when she took over as Speaker, to $13.86 trillion on Dec. 22 when the 111th Congress came to a close. That is $5.19 trillion. In fact, it grew by $1 trillion in just the last seven months.

The annual budget deficit itself has quadrupled under Pelosi from $342 billion in fiscal year 2007 to an estimated $1.6 trillion at the end of fiscal year 2010.

How can someone in her position actually look at these numbers and tell us her priority as Speaker has been deficit reduction?

This is just the latest evidence that Pelosi is either the biggest liar since President Bill Clinton or, more likely, she is either insane or intellectually vapid.

Bernie Sanders Speech More Class Warfare

While the tax package passed Congress, it was not before some liberal members of Congress tried to stir up a class war.

U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., made a speech on the floor of the Senate on Nov. 30 that has gone viral on YouTube.

In his speech, Sanders lamented the accumulation of wealth by the top 1 percent of earners and made the silly claim that these people were waging a war against working families.

Never mind that the top 1 percent probably pays the bulk of the salaries of those same working families, Sanders' speech is more collectivist claptrap designed to turn Americans against the successful and urge a more "equitable" redistribution of the wealth.

However, Sanders forgets a couple of facts.

His claim is that the top 1 percent of earners in this country made 23.5 percent of all the income, which is more than the entire bottom 50 percent.

My response is: "And?"

Great Moments in Unintended Consequences

Reason.tv has done it again. A must see, this video falls into the category of sad, but true.

From Reason.tv:

Reason.tv presents Great Moments in Unintended Consequences!

All actions have unanticipated side effects, but government acting through regulation or legislation is particularly adept at creating disastrous unintended consequences.

Great Moments in Unintended Consequences takes a look at three instances of epic government facepalm: Osborne Reef, Corn Ethanol Subsidies, and a particular clause in ObamaCare that is already doing more harm than good.

Approximately 3 minutes. 

Produced by Austin Bragg.

Visit Reason.tv for HD, iPod and audio versions of this video and subscribe to Reason.tv's Youtube channel to receive automatic notification when new material goes live.

Enjoy.

Poverty: Where We All Started

This is the fourth episode of the POP 101 series by the Population Research Institute. The group believes, rightly so, that overpopulation is a myth.

The group just doesn't throw videos out there. If you visit its website,www.overpopulationisamyth.com, you can read the science behind the video and check its sources.

CAGW Names Sens. Carper and Voinovich November Porkers of the Month

Here's a nice parting gift for Sen. George Voinovich: Porker of the Month from Citizens Against Government Waste. The award couldn't have gone to a nicer porker, who also happens to be a RINO.

Citizens Against Government Waste made the following statement along with the above video:

(Washington, D.C.) - Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) today named Sens. Tom Carper (D-Del.) and George Voinovich (R-Ohio) November 2010 Porkers of the Month for proposing a gas tax increase for infrastructure improvements, when tens of billions of dollars in gas taxes have repeatedly been wasted on frivolous infrastructure projects.

According to a November 9, 2010 article in The Hill, the two senators wrote to President Obama’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform advocating for a gas tax increase, suggesting, ‘“That the commission include an increase in the federal tax on gasoline and diesel as part of your report to the president . . . We suggest that the taxes be increased by one cent per month for 25 months — a total of 25 cents over a three-year period.”’

The Pilgrims and Property Rights: How Our Ancestors Got Fat and Happy

Yet another great video from my friends at ReasonTV. This would have been better on Thanksgiving Day, but it is so relevant to today's debate on socialism, I am sharing it today anway.

From ReasonTV:

The Pilgrims founded their colony at Plymouth Plantation in December 1620 and promptly started dying off in droves.

As the colony's early governor, William Bradford, wrote in "Of Plymouth Plantation":

"That which was most sadd & lamentable was, that in 2. or 3. moneths time halfe of their company dyed."

When the settlers finally stopped croaking, they set about creating a heaven on earth, a society without private property, where all worked for the common good. Everything was shared. Especially bitching and moaning about working for the common good. Bradford again:

Porker of The Month for October 2010: Debbie Wasserman Schultz!

October's Porker of the Month from Citizens Against Government Waste.

When reality goes against you, then just make things up. Debbie Wasserman Schultz is the poster child for what happens when a congressional district is made up predominantly of one party.