Obama’s bogus jobs data

THIS FATHERLESS CHILD IS THE BEST LIAR SINCE THE LAST FATHERLESS CHILD.

Congress should investigate cooked employment books

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By THE WASHINGTON TIMES

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The Washington Times

The White House hyped the news Friday that January payrolls had risen by 243,000. The hitch is the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) also dropped 1.2 million from the calculated workforce. Somehow this net loss of a million workers in a single month was transformed into an improvement in the unemployment rate. As the old saying goes, figures can lie, and liars can figure.

“Job growth was widespread,” the BLS reported, but most Americans sense that something isn’t quite right with the numbers. The most important change was the deep decline in the workforce. While the overall population jumped an 1.6 million in January, the workforce declined a record-setting 1.2 million. This figure represents those who out of sheer frustration or for other reasons have dropped out of what the government defines as the active labor pool. They are worse than simply unemployed; they are both jobless and hopeless.

The good news for Obama administration statisticians is that these unfortunates don’t factor into the official unemployment rate, which only counts those thought to be looking for work. So while five people drop out of the system in despair for every new job created, the official unemployment rate declines and the White House enjoys a good news day.

“The recovery is speeding up,” President Obama declared. However, the broader measures tell a different story. The employment-to-population ratio, the most comprehensive jobs number, remained flatlined at 58.5 percent, around where is has been for at least a year. The number lacking jobs has likewise remained steady at 41.5 percent. The overall participation rate, the percentage making up the workforce in the population, accelerated an already steep decline to a 30-year low of 63.7 percent. In short, the recovery is not speeding up – people are simply giving up.

The participation rate is a subjective measure and highly subject to manipulation. The lower it goes and the more people are dropped from the unemployment equation, the better the numbers will look for the White House. This figure has been dropping sharply since Mr. Obama took office. Last month, an analysis at the Zero Hedge financial website noted that by extending the logic of reporting progressively fewer labor-force participants, “America will officially have no unemployed when the Labor Force Participation rate hits 58.5 percent, which should be just before the presidential election.” Maybe that’s the plan.

A year ago, there were 99 million people either officially unemployed or otherwise not working, and the official unemployment rate was 9.1 percent. Now, unemployment reported by the government is down to 8.3 percent, but the number without jobs has topped 100 million. The disconnect between increasing joblessness in America and the rosy White House official statistics should be the subject of a congressional investigation. Something does not add up.

The Washington Times

Obama’s Debt-Solving Plan: Tax the Rich, Not the Rest
Brenton Stransky
The Occupy movement and the president either don’t realize or purposely neglect to mention that our country has one of the most level economic playing fields of any country that has ever been. More

When Obama Came into Office…
Yossi Gestetner
Liberals always rely on the “inherited economy” argument when defending Obama. So let’s remember exactly how things were when Obama came into office. More

Obama’s SOTU: Still No Manufacturing Jobs
Howard Richman & Raymond Richman
In his January 24 State of the Union speech, President Obama argued that American manufacturing is already coming back under his presidency. But his actual record on manufacturing jobs is dismal. More

Illinois is broke, so let’s spend more
February 4, 2012
Logic only a Democrat could love. More

Obama proposes another housing boondoggle to help ‘underwater’ homeowners
February 4, 2012
It’s the same mindset that believes that more “stimulus” will grow the economy. More

UN moves to promote a ‘world tax’
February 4, 2012
Funding planetary social welfare programs. More

January Unemployment Report: The Devil is in the Details
February 3, 2012
January’s unemployment numbers are much worse than reported. More

Don’t Get Too Excited About Jobs Numbers (Labor Dept. tries to bamboozle Americans)

• Fri Feb 3 18:25:19 2012 · by tobyhill · 7 replies

  Commentary Magazine ^ | 2/3/2012 | Peter Wehner

  I wanted to add a note of caution to John Steele Gordon’s post regarding today’s Bureau of Labor Statistics report on the unemployment rate. It’s certainly true there’s good news in the report. But if you examine the internal data, there are also grounds for concern. To be specific: the labor-force participation number fell to 63.7 percent, the lowest (seasonably-adjusted) figure since May 1983. If the economy were stronger, an increase of 250,000 jobs would actually move the unemployment rate up a bit, as people who had given up looking for work would once again start (meaning they would be…

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Matthew Boyle at the Daily Caller has this explosive story on DOJ officials taking bribes from people they are investigating. Yes, you read that correctly. More:

Documents say DOJ knew of Fast and Furious connection day after Terry murder

by Bob Unruh

An administrative law judge in Georgia could decide as early as this week whether voters in the state convinced him Barack Obama’s name should be removed from the 2012 presidential ballot because he is not qualified to hold the office.

But win, lose or draw, the fight isn’t going to be over, as other cases are erupting across the nation, with challenges being raised anew even in Obama’s own adopted political network in Illinois.

The Georgia hearing was before Judge Michael Malihi, and while none of the lawyers who appeared in the proceedings was willing to predict what the decision will be, several did confirm that Malihi had considered simply granting them a default victory, because Obama and his lawyers expressly stated they would not participate in a hearing to provide evidence that he is qualified to be on the ballot.

A default presumably would have meant a recommendation from the judge that Obama’s name be stricken from the ballot, a decision which would head for review immediately by Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp.

He, however, was the one who warned Obama of the “peril” of not participating in the hearing when Obama and his attorney had asked that the event be canceled.

Discover what the Constitution’s reference to “natural born citizen” means and whether Barack Obama qualifies, in the ebook version of “Where’s the REAL Birth Certificate?”

Whatever the outcome in Georgia, the issue is gaining traction in other states, too, including Alabama, Tennessee, Arizona, New Hampshire, and even Illinois, Obama’s home political base.

There, in a complaint recently filed by Stephen F. Boulton of McCarthy Duffy LLP and Gary Kreep of the United States Justice Foundation, their client is asking for a change in state law to allow the vetting of political candidates.

Obama isn’t even mentioned by name, but don’t think for a minute that the requested change wouldn’t include his candidacy.

The plaintiff is Sharon Meroni, who long has fought inside the system for a way to challenge the candidacies there. In her new case, filed in the Circuit Court of Cook County, she is petitioning for a judicial review of the state’s election procedures as they exist now.

Targeted are the state Board of Elections, members of the board, several county clerks and others, including candidates Dan Duffy and Amanda Howland.

Meroni, a registered voter in the 27th Legislative District in the state, said her concern is that “only candidates qualified for office under the Illinois and United States Constitutions appear on the ballot.”

The state’s primary is in March.

The case alleges the candidates did not provide sufficient proof that they are U.S. citizens as required to hold the office being sought “as is required by the Illinois Constitution of 1970.”

State officials refused to remove the names from the ballots, so Meroni has gone to court. Granting ballot access, she said in the complaint, “is contrary to law, against the manifest weight of the evidence, arbitrary and capricious, and a denial of the rights of the petitioner.”

Kreep told WND the way the system is established in Illinois it essentially allows political parties to determine who runs for office, and unless voters find out about a filing and can assemble a formal objection within five days, their concerns are dismissed.

And the system has no procedure for verifying the eligibility of candidates, he said.

That particular issue has been in the headlines for the past four years, since before Obama’s 2008 election victory, because of the questions that remain over his eligibility. The U.S. Constitution demands a “natural born citizen” be president and the Founders probably thought that to be the offspring of two citizen parents when they wrote the term.

But Obama’s father never was a citizen. There also are those who contend he was not even born in the United States.

Kreep said the Illinois procedures make it virtually impossible for candidates to be challenged for their eligibility.

He said there likely will be raised in other states concerns similar to those in Illinois, where “barriers now in existence … bar voters from reasonable investigation of the citizenship of a candidate.”

That’s simply a deprivation of the constitutional right to due process, he said. The case seeks a declaration that the political maneuvers are unconstitutional.

There also have been assembled campaigns specifically to encourage voters to file eligibility complaints about candidates with states. One such effort is the Obama Ballot Challenge, which lists contacts for state elections offices across the country.

It is, of course, the states that actually run elections; a national election is just the compilation of the results from the 50 states.

“A candidate that is not legally qualified to be on the ballot, such as Barack Obama, steals votes from other candidates who are legally on the ballot,” the site advises.

WND previously reported that cases already have been begun in New Hampshire, where state officials rejected the claims; Alabama, Tennessee and Arizona.

The newest round of court actions do not try to have a judge determine Obama is not qualified for the Oval Office and remove him from it, they simply challenge his eligibility for the 2012 election.

Many of the cases cite Minor v. Happersett, a U.S. Supreme Court opinion from 1875 that said a “natural born citizen” would be a person whose parents both were citizens.

“This complaint does not request any injunction against any state or federal government official. Instead this complaint asserts that the private entity, Defendant Democratic Party, intends to act negligently or fraudulently in a manner that will cause irreparable harm to the plaintiffs, to the states, and to the citizens of the United States,” said one of the filings.

It continued, “Because Mr. Obama has admitted that his father was not a U.S. citizen, and because this fact has been confirmed by the U.S. State Department, any reasonable person with knowledge of these facts would doubt Mr. Obama’s constitutional qualifications. Therefore, any representation by the Democratic Party certifying said qualifications would be negligent, absent further evidence verifying Mr. Obama’s natural-born status.

“Plaintiffs further request an injunction prohibiting the Democratic Party from making any representation to any state official asserting, implying, or assuming that Mr. Obama is qualified to hold the office of president, absent a showing by the party sufficient to prove that said representation is not negligent.”

Van Irion, lead counsel for Liberty Legal Foundation, also is working on several of the issues, and has brought the question in court in Arizona.

“We picked the Arizona court for several reasons, but the main one being that it is part of the 9th Circuit. The 9th Circuit has indicated in dicta that an FEC-registered presidential candidate would have standing for this type of suit,” he said. The organization is working with John Dummett, a Liberty Legal Foundation member who is a candidate for the office of president in the 2012 election.

Irion said the other lawsuit was filed in state court in Tennessee.

“The focus of the state-court suit is to prevent certification to the Tennessee Secretary of State. This suit puts greater emphasis on the negligent misrepresentation/fraud aspects of a certification from the DNC. It includes more facts regarding Obama’s Indonesian dual citizenship and fraudulent Social Security Number,” he said.

He said if the cases succeed, the Democrats would not be able to list Obama as their candidate for 2012.

“Neither lawsuit discusses Obama’s place of birth or his birth certificate. These issues are completely irrelevant to the argument. LLF’s lawsuit simply points out that the Supreme Court has defined ‘natural-born citizen’ as a person born to two parents who were both U.S. citizens at the time of the natural-born citizen’s birth. Obama’s father was never a U.S. citizen. Therefore, Obama can never be a natural-born citizen. His place of birth is irrelevant,” Van Irion’s group said.

WND also has reported that Maricopa, Ariz., County Sheriff Joe Arpaio has launched a formal law enforcement investigation into concerns Obama may submit fraudulent documentation to be put on the state’s election ballot in 2012.

Other attorneys involved in the Georgia case are J. Mark Hatfield and Orly Taitz.

Hatfield has told WND that the goal is for a court determination on the definition of “natural born citizen,” which then could be applied directly to Obama’s candidacy.

And speaking of past bailouts, some of the most vexing to the business community have been the bailouts to Big Labor. The most recent is the controversial (read: unconstitutional) appointments to the National Labor Relations Board. The NLRB has had quite a run during this Administration, attacking employers and job creators at a record pace. This reign of terror was about to run out as the Board had lost a quorum due to term limits on its members, and rather than a discussion and confirmation process the White House reloaded it.

The Washington Post reported the other day that, “Labor board chief says he won’t let recess controversy deter push for new rules”. And that: “Undeterred by Republican protests, Mark Pearce said he will urge the board to approve the new rules now that it has a full component of five members after President Barack Obama bypassed the Senate to fill three vacancies.”

These new rules include speeding up union organizing elections and requiring businesses to hand over emails and contact info for employees to union organizers, amongst others.

How does that not count precisely for bailouts, handouts, and copouts?

First of all, the division.  Our national politics is in a space very like the 1850s just before the showdown over slavery.  You remember the history.  For 60 years, ever since the ratification of the Constitution, the South had refused to discuss slavery, and would stage a tantrum if anyone raised the subject.  Eventually the North got fed up and organized an explicitly anti-slavery party.  It was called the Republican Party.

But why was the South so intransigent when “everybody knew” that slavery was immoral?  The simple answer is that business was too good.  Slavery was profitable, very profitable for the South.

The same thing applies to today’s America.  “Everybody knows” that the welfare state is finished, but the peculiar institution is profitable, very profitable — for liberals.  Look at usgovernmentspending.com.  Liberals get to spend $4 trillion a year on their favorite programs.   Conservatives get $1 trillion a year for defense.  Why would liberals give up on a deal like that without a fight?

Lachlan Markay

January 26, 2012 at 4:38 pm

George Soros, a billionaire investor and major backer of President Obama, stands to reap a windfall from legislation promoting natural gas-powered vehicles. The White House unveiled a proposal on Thursday that would do just that.

The proposal would offer incentives for companies to buy and use trucks powered by natural gas. Obama announced the effort at a UPS facility in Las Vegas that received stimulus funding to buy natural gas vehicles and build a fueling station for them.

The proposal is remarkably similar to the New Alternative Transportation to Give Americans Solutions (NAT GAS) Act.

One company that stands to benefit handsomely from the president’s proposal is Westport Innovations. The company converts diesel engines to be fueled by natural gas. Wall Street analysts predicted a boom for the company if the NAT GAS Act were passed. CNBC analyst Jim Cramer said he “expects shares to absolutely explode” in the event the legislation were to pass.

Jim Cramer made positive mention of Westport, calling it a solid play on natural gas should Congress pass its pending Natural Gas Act. Westport converts diesel engines (i.e. – those found in semi trailers) into ones that run on natural gas.

Benefiting Westport is that it’s: A) basically first to the market, at least in terms of mass production, and B) high barriers of entry for competition because of the complex technology involved in the transformations.

If Westport reaps the predicted windfall, one of the chief beneficiaries will be George Soros, a major Obama donor and supporter. Soros’s hedge fund holds 3,160,063 company shares (as of its last SEC filing).

1/26/12 12:56 PM EST

Jay Westcott/POLITICO

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Thursday that she’s ready to step off “the high wire of American politics.”

Clinton, who’s already made it clear that she won’t be serving in a second Obama term if there is one, told State Department employees that she’s ready to be out of the public eye.”I think after 20 years — and it will be 20 years — of being on the high wire of American politics and all of the challenges that come with that, it would be probably a good idea to just find out how tired I am.”

Clinton finds it “a little odd for me to be totally out of an election season” after being involved as a presidential and senatorial candidate, and as a key surrogate for her husband’s White House campaigns.

Still, she said she’s enjoying being out of the political back-and-forth and has not watched any of the Republican presidential hopefuls’ debates. “You know, I didn’t watch any of those debates,” she said with a smile.

Clinton also ducked a question about being President Obama’s runningmate this year, a rumor that’s been boomeranging for months. “I am happy to work with Vice President Biden, who does an excellent job,” she said.

THE AMERICAN MEDIA HAS PROVEN REPEATEDLY THEY ARE AN EXTENSION OF THE DEMOCRATIC PROPAGANDA MACHINE AND DO NOT DESERVE THE TITLE  “FREE  PRESS”.

By Cindy Simpson

Last week, I noted that Obama turned his back not just on Arizona’s Governor Jan Brewer, but also on the laws of the State of Georgia.  I closed my column, “Georgia Ballot Challenge: Obama Walks on By,” with the observation: “And most of the media has followed along right behind him.”

At the time, I had just witnessed an historic hearing that actually discussed the eligibility of the sitting president of the United States to run for a second term.  The president had been subpoenaed to appear, and instead of his attorney respectfully following protocol to have that subpoena recalled, both Obama and his attorney, Michael Jablonski, simply failed to show up at all or offer any defense whatsoever.

Isn’t there a headline in there somewhere?

The hearing proceeded as planned, even though the table for the defense was empty.  Attorneys Van Irion and J. Mark Hatfield presented their cases first and offered compelling arguments — not regarding Obama’s birthplace, but rather that the non-U.S. citizenship of Obama’s father precluded Obama’s “natural born” eligibility under the Constitution and existing Supreme Court precedent.  Attorney Orly Taitz, however, did present interesting evidence that questioned the validity of Obama’s birth certificate and questions surrounding his Social Security number.

When the hearing ended, the media in attendance almost literally pounced on Taitz.  Irion and Hatfield and their clients had left the premises earlier, while Taitz was still presenting her case; however, Irion asserted to me that not one member of the press stopped them on their way out.  Doubtless the media did not want to discuss the law — they’d rather write their usual stories on the birth certificate and interview the one they’ve dubbed the “birther queen.”

Attorney Taitz handled herself well, even though the press taunted her with rudeness and leading questions she has doubtless experienced many times.  After the reporters finished letting Taitz feel the full extent of their contempt for both her and the entire morning’s event, they packed up to leave.

I walked up to one particular reporter from one of the prominent mainstream entities, noting that he seemed frustrated that he didn’t get a clear answer from Taitz to one of his questions, and I informed him that I did know the exact answer, if he’d like to hear more about it.  He said no, he didn’t.  I asked then, wasn’t he a reporter, and why did he ask the question if he didn’t want the answer?  And as I was speaking, he turned and walked away from me.

The same thing happened with another reporter from another major network.  He had asked Taitz why no one cared that there were past presidents who had fathers not born in the country.  I explained to him that it was not the place of birth of the presidents’ fathers that was the issue, but rather the status of their citizenship at the time of their sons’ births.  The reporter scoffed and told me that that was just my opinion, but when I attempted to inform him that it was also the opinion of the Supreme Court, he turned and walked away from me while I was in mid-sentence.

Does this behavior seem familiar?

Even though I saw reporters from every major network on the scene, the actual reporting of the event was scant — primarily only in blogs or local news.  Google “Georgia Ballot Challenge” and note the non-mainstream coverage of the event.

Rachel Maddow must not have gotten the memo, though, because she dedicated a full 8 minutes of her January 26 show to telling her viewers why they should “feel almost duty-bound as a patriot to ignore” the hearing and not to “dignify this nonsense or elevate it by paying it any attention.”  Not only were none of the legal points addressed in the hearings brought up by Maddow, but Maddow excused the extraordinary fact that Obama and his counsel, instead of respecting the law, had simply snubbed it, calling the case “ridiculous.”

As Sunny of Sunny TV points out in this hilarious but uncomfortably true video, “Tyranny is as Tyranny Does”; “[l]et’s just hope the next President is just as benevolent as Obama because they could really use that power for bad.”  At the end of the clip, as Sunny pretends she is Obama, issuing orders right and left, she points to her crown and says: “This makes me in charge.”  As Teri O’Brien noted in her interview discussing Obama’s penchant for walking away from those with whom he disagrees, “[g]ods don’t debate.  They issue decrees.”

Attorney Irion, in this follow-up letter from his Liberty Legal Foundation, pointed out: “Yesterday President Obama completely ignored a court subpoena, and the world shrugged.”

Yes, Obama shrugged, and the media has shrugged along.  Irion further noted:

Obama’s behavior yesterday is even more disturbing than Nixon’s. Nixon at least respected the judicial branch enough to have his attorneys show up in court and follow procedure[.] … Nixon acknowledged the authority of the judicial branch even while he fought it. Obama, on the other hand, essentially said yesterday that the judicial branch has no power over him. He ordered his attorneys to stay away from the hearing. He didn’t petition a higher court in a legitimate attempt to stay the hearing[.] … Rather than respecting the legal process, Obama went around the courts and tried to put political pressure directly on the Georgia Secretary of State. When that failed, he simply ignored the judicial branch completely.

It is disconcerting to see that the president, whose primary duty is to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, has turned his back on the rule of law of one of those states.  Especially, as Sunny uncomfortably reminded us, since this is the same president who routinely sidesteps the law or places himself above it.

Even more troubling is the fact that the mainstream media not only seems to approve — but they fail to report it at all.

The death of the Keystone XL pipeline was a blow to economic development in every state through which it would have run and has cost by, some estimates, 20,000 jobs.

What many people don’t realize is that portions of the pipeline have been done for years.

The phase 1 section, which runs through Kansas, went online in 2010. According to testimony from Jeff Glendening, vice president of political affairs for the Kansas Chamber of Commerce, before the State Department, it cost nearly a half billion dollars and generated millions in revenue for the state:

The Kansas sections of the Keystone pipeline have been completed, and its construction has been extremely beneficial to the state’s economy in a time when it was sorely needed. During the construction of the first two phases of Keystone in Kansas, it is estimated that TransCanada spent approximately $481 million in our state.  This generated significant job creation and increased sales and use tax receipts by $8 million, all of which greatly benefited Kansans.

None of this mattered to the Obama administration, which killed the pipeline earlier this month.

President Barack Obama had been forced, as part of a deal to extend a payroll tax cut, to decide within 60 days whether or not the pipeline would be in the national interest or not.

According to Rayola Dougher, senior economic affairs advisor of American Petroleum Institute, he failed to do so:

Obama was just being asked to decide if this pipeline was in the national interest or not. He decided to punt on that.

As Redstate.com reported on Jan. 18 when the bill was killed, the State Department actually made the decision so Obama wouldn’t have to:

Today, the Department of State recommended to President Obama that the presidential permit for the proposed Keystone XL Pipeline be denied and, that at this time, the TransCanada Keystone XL Pipeline be determined not to serve the national interest. The President concurred with the Department’s recommendation, which was predicated on the fact that the Department does not have sufficient time to obtain the information necessary to assess whether the project, in its current state, is in the national interest. Since 2008, the Department has been conducting a transparent, thorough, and rigorous review of TransCanada’s permit application for the proposed Keystone XL Pipeline project.

Apparently three years wasn’t long enough to make the decision, but the idea that it was not in the national interest was ludicrous to say the least.