Linkaround 6-4-2010

The Coming Economic Collapse
Economist Arthur Laffer is warning that then end of the Bush Tax Cuts in 2011 will create  an Economic collapse : On or about Jan. 1, 2011, federal, state and local Tax Rates are scheduled to rise quite sharply. President George W. Bush's Tax Cuts expire on that date, meaning that the highest federal Personal Income Tax Rate will go 39.6% from 35%, the highest federal dividend Tax Rate pops up to 39.6% from 15%, the Capital Gains Tax Rate to 20% from 15%, and the Estate Tax Rate to 55%...

The Case Against More Stimulus
This week Congress will try to pass (or kill) a Stimulus bill designed to extend Benefits to the unemployed and send money to States to keep them laying off hundreds of thousands of Public Sector workers. Republicans and conservative Democrats are dragging their heels and raising concerns about adding to another trillion-dollar Deficit. As readers of this blog know, I'm a regular defender of more Stimulus Spending in the short term followed by higher taxes and entitlement reform in the medium...

Helen Thomas retires
The Hill: Helen Thomas announced Monday that "she is retiring, effective immediately," according to a statement from   Hearst   Newspapers. Her decision comes after her Controversial Remarks about Israel hit the blogosphere. She later apologized for her comments, saying she "deeply regretted" making them. Well it looks like old Helen Thomas has finally written a check that her butt couldn’t cash. Pressure for her Resignation came in hot and heavy after her now famous YouTube...

Democrats to Defend their Greatest Achievement: Because Great Legislation Needs Serious PR Work
By Conservative Generation for Left Coast Rebel I don't envy congressional Democrats this November.  As each of the Incumbent congressmen step up to the microphone over the next few months, they are going to be asked what it is that they've accomplished over the last two years.  If they are smart, they will simply let the crickets gently chirp in their response.  It will be far worse for those that are willing to tout congressional Legislation over the last two...

Progressives criticize White House, Democrats
Washington (AP) - Progressive Activists who helped elect Barack Obama president complained on Monday that the administration and congressional Democrats have been too timid and too willing to Compromise. Even though Obama’s major first-term achievement - an overhaul of the nation’s Health Care system - passed without a single Republican vote, progressive leaders who gathered in Washington criticized the president for failing to create a government-run Insurance option to...

Former New York governor poised to be next cable news talker
New York — Eliot Spitzer became a national punch line after he resigned in disgrace as New York Governor, following a Prostitution scandal. Two years later, he's a hot commodity in Cable television News. Executives at both CNN and MSNBC have talked to Spitzer about jobs hosting programs on their networks. The increasingly visible former Governor had a handful of test drives, most recently last week when he filled in for Dylan Ratigan for an hour in the afternoon at MSNBC, and he's a...

YIKES!!! Helen Thomas Tells Jews, 'Get the Hell Out of Palestine' and Go Back to Germany & Poland
  Helen, how do you really feel about Jews? First Helen Thomas, the senior most White House correspondent ripped WH Press Secretary Robert Gibbs for America’s initial reaction to the violence created by the Guerrilla Flotilla. The 89 year old Thomas

Mitch Daniels Garners 2012 Presidential Buzz
Gov. Mitch Daniels, R-Ind., on "Face The Nation," Feb. 22, 2009. (Credit: CBS) The Midterm Elections have yet to take place. President Obama isn't even halfway through his term. And yet, for all intents and purposes, the 2012 Presidential Election isn't all that far away. Consider the 2008 Election cycle: Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John McCain all announced they were jumping into the race in early 2007 - and they did much of the hard work to lay the groundwork for their runs...

The Early Word: Spill Concentration
President Obama will spend his Day dealing with the Oil Spill crisis in the Gulf of Mexico, meeting with his Cabinet to discuss the administration’s response and receiving a briefing by Adm. Thad Allen, the commandant of the Coast Guard and the point-man for the Federal response to the Spill. The Coast Guard warned this weekend that cleanup — once the leak is contained — could continue well into the fall and beyond. At 10 a.m., Admiral Allen will join Robert Gibbs, Mr....

Call to Act: Save and Strengthen Financial Reform
DANNY SCHECHTER FOR BUZZFLASH An Appeal for a Financial Crisis Education Outreach Campaign from "Plunder" Filmmaker and Author Danny Schechter We have less than a month to go before the Congress votes on Financial Reform. Ironically, the deadline seems to be July 4th, our Independence Day, an occasion that will likely Usher in ever more dependence on Wall Street despite appearances. The conference on the Hill formally begins this week after weeks of behind-the-scenes legislative...

An End for Helen Thomas and the Helen Thomas Rules
Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum Helen Thomas, above with President Ronald Reagan, has covered every president since John F. Kennedy. To many in Washington, two sets of rules seemed to apply for Journalists covering the president: those for regular White House correspondents, and those for Helen Thomas. Ms. Thomas, 89, made a name for herself asking tough, provocative questions of every president since John F. Kennedy, but her tart tongue may have finally brought her career to a...

Whitman Holds Lead in Cal GOP Gov Race
One day away from California's May 7 th gubernatorial primaries and all eyes are on Republican Candidates Steve Poizner and Meg Whitman. While former Senator, and current Democratic Candidate, Attorney General Jerry Brown is unopposed by any genuine competition, state Insurance Commissioner, Poizner and former eBay executive, Whitman, have been locked in an aggressive campaign for the Republican Party nomination.

Analysis: Voters reward purists, not pragmatists
Washington — Two more members of Congress have fallen to strategies that worked before, but not this year: switching parties to avoid defeat and edging to the political center in the early going. This time it was political purists in Alabama who tossed out lawmakers from both parties in Primary Elections, which often are dominated by highly motivated and ideological voters. As in Utah, Pennsylvania, Florida and other states, these voters are demanding Party fealty, making the political...

Ex-gov calls tax policies a hindrance to business; current gov announces jobs at Md. business
GAITHERSBURG, MD. — Former Gov. Robert Ehrlich said Monday he would work to improve Maryland's business climate by exploring how to best lower the State's corporate Income Tax and reduce regulatory hurdles for entrepreneurs, if he gets another chance as Governor. The announcement marked the latest volley of Task Forces and commissions that Maryland's two leading Candidates for Governor have discussed as tools in a Campaign year to help revive the State's economy from the...

GOP consultant in Arizona pulls strings to get Green Party on Texas ballot
GOP consultant in Arizona pulls strings to get Green Party on Texas ballot 01:11 AM CDT on Sunday, June 6, 2010 By WAYNE SLATER / The Dallas Morning News [email protected] Austin - The liberal Green Party's uphill battle to get on the Texas ballot this fall has been fueled by a surprising benefactor: an out-of-state Republican consultant with a history of helping Conservative causes and GOP Candidates. Also Online Texas Political Heat Index: Fact-check claims from the...

Sen. John Cornyn: Porous border opens door for Mexican drug cartels
Just last Year, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano testified before a Senate panel that Mexican Drug Cartels were operating in as many as 230 American cities. During her Testimony, she claimed that Cartels are the greatest Organized Crime threat to the United States. The Federal Government’s refusal to secure the Border has enabled Mexican Cartels to operate across America. In April, a North Carolina DEA Special Agent reported that Mexican Drug organizations have taken over...

CNN's Erickson falsely suggested Obama ignored Tennessee flooding
Erickson alleged that President Obama "never addressed" the floods in Tennessee  Erickson: "Barack Obama never addressed [Nashville] after its horrific floods."  From a June 7  post  on RedState.com: I mean, surely someone is working in the White House to solve this [Oil Spill] unless ... unless ... they really don't care. After all, not to repeat myself, none of the states affected are going to go their way in 2012 anyway and none of them did in 2008 and they...

Blogger back up, What's up:Helen Thomas Gooooone
Chris Muir . Pat Hickey takes on the feckless Zorn. More on the planned Mosque at Ground Zero. Not exactly a place of worship that comports with our Constitution : SPENCER: Well, Sharia Law denies equality of rights... HANNITY: To women. SPENCER: ... to non-Muslims, to women. HANNITY: Right, right. SPENCER: And it does not allow for them to operate in an equal system. See, the thing about Sharia is unlike — you mentioned Jewish courts in the beginning, Sean. The thing, the...

Helen Thomas lynched over comments on Israel
The American President Obama will not stand up and denounce Israel’s execution and slaughter of peaceful Activists, one of them an American Citizen shot multiple times in the face at point blank range. Our Mainstream Media lends Israel the ‘protecting our national Sovereignty’ argument without even charging a royalty fee for We the Patent Holders. All around this country, on the air and off, Israel gets a pass for murdering unarmed civilians. A few days before Israel’s...

Ex-Spokesmen Lead Charge for White House Reporter Helen Thomas to Be Fired
"She should lose her job over this," Fleischer reportedly wrote. "As someone who is Jewish, and as someone who worked with her and used to like her, I find this appalling." Lanny Davis, former special counsel to and White House spokesman for President Bill Clinton, issued a statement on Sunday saying Thomas, who he used to consider a close friend, "has showed herself to be an anti-Semitic bigot." "Her statement that  Jews in Israel should leave Israel and go back to Poland or Germany is an...

Flotillas and the End of Helen Thomas
If you are a political blog reader, you couldn't have missed Veteran White House reporter Helen Thomas' remarks about Jews and Israel. A rabbi video taped Helen saying that Jews should "get the hell out of Palestine" and ' go home" to Germany and Poland. On Friday Helen apologized for her remarks. She didn't show up for the daily briefing today, and Press Secretary Robert Gibbs called her remarks, "offensive and reprehensible." And finally, Helen Thomas announced today that she is retiring,...

Politicians Turn On Labor Unions
Politico: Spurred by state Budget crunches and an angry Public mood, Republican and some Democratic leaders are focusing with increasing intensity on Public workers and the Unions that represent them, casting them as overpaid obstacles to good Government and demanding cuts in their often-generous Benefits. Unlike past battles over the high cost of Labor, this time pitched battles over wages and Pensions are being waged from Sacramento to Springfield to New York City and the conflict is marked...

Our hard-core, adversarial press corps
twitvid screen shot (updated below) On Friday, CNN's Ed Henry posted a series of giggly, adolescent updates on his Twitter feed, describing the events that took place at a "beach" party thrown by Joe Biden, at the Vice President's mansion, for various "reporters" and White House officials.   Digby excerpted just a sampling of Henry's giddy outburst : Henry also posted videos and photographs he took of the Vice President and White House Chief of Staff playing with water...

States see first surplus in years
States and local governments took in more money than they spent in the first three months of this Year — their first surplus since 2007 — in a sign that the worst of the Budget Crisis may be over. The fortunes of many governments could improve dramatically this Year if the national Economic Recovery continues, a USA Today analysis found. A flood of Federal Stimulus money and a modest upturn in Tax receipts have improved the health of states after two Years of Financial...

Ramping up praise for Arizona crackdown
Reporting from Tempe, Ariz. — Tina McClendon was finally surrounded by her own People. The 39-year-old postal worker stood in a Minor League Baseball stadium here last week with thousands of others who backed Arizona's new Immigration law. McClendon sported a T-shirt that read "Arizona: Doing the Job the Feds Won't Do!" It's one of four similarly-themed shirts she wears regularly. Her sartorial choices earn her frequent compliments from strangers — not a surprise, as polls...