BloggeRhythms 8/7/2013

I’ve used, Albert Einstein, several times in the past, in referencing things done by the incumbent. Not, however, to suggest the incumbent's a genius by any stretch. But because he continues to prove one of  Einstein’s most famous observations: "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

 

This time around, the inanity applies to the housing market where the incumbent wants to disband Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, quasi-government agencies that underwrite roughly 90% of the mortgages in existence, replacing them with regular commercial banks.

 

At the same time, he also wants those banks to once again lower credit-condition requirements for mortgage approval in order to make financing available to a wider range of presently sub-par applicants. Precisely the same thing that caused the second greatest recession of all time ten years ago, when mortgage defaults became so widespread they caused the financial collapse we, and the rest of the free world, have yet to fully recover from.

 

Now, from the outside looking in, lending and financing appear to be quite complex, intricate endeavors, and in many ways really are. But, in their most basic formats they aren’t very complicated at all. Especially today, where so much information has been amassed over considerable periods of time that can now be easily referenced and tapped, lenders have huge historical record performance to rely on.

 

In the most basic credit decision-making, what lenders do first when reviewing applicants is to assess their financial condition. The information sought includes subjects like how much income is earned compared to an applicant’s current obligations. If there’s enough revenue to cover existing debt, plus the new addition in question, that of course is a very big plus.

 

Another important factor is the time span that potential borrowers have been earning at current levels, because if there’s been a recent rise in income, such as a promotion or new job, that’s not as secure a situation as one where the applicant's been sustaining a level of income for a substantial period of time.

 

There are also instances where income’s been gained from one-time occurrences, such as an inheritance, proceeds from a lawsuit, sale of assets or other types of singular gains. In these cases, lenders have to be very careful, because while steady income can usually be relied upon to meet future payments, once “windfall” profits are exhausted, there’s not only no assurance they’ll ever occur again, the probability is that they won’t.

 

So, as lenders go down the list of simple queries, their intent is simply to determine where the funds will come from to satisfy new loans in question. And if the future “cash flow” can’t be determined,  the obvious need is to find out where it will come from. And if there’s no reliable, documentable answer to that, a new loan shouldn’t be granted.

 

But, the most important thing of all for any lender who has even the slightest hope of ever receiving repayment is maintaining minimum standards for loan approval. And whereas by now all lenders of any repute clearly understand how their own loan portfolios perform, including what the lowest applicant approval criteria should be, if the government forces acceptance criteria to be lowered, that’s a purposeful step toward another financial debacle.

 

So, once gain we have an example of either total financial ignorance on the government's part or a definitive objective of fulfilling the goal of economic redistribution, even though it can’t be accomplished.

 

And the most despicable aspect of the whole scenario is that once again, not a sole in the administration cares an iota that it’s the taxpayers who’ll pay the price of failure.  

 

That’s it for today folks.

 

Adios

BloggeRhythms 8/6/2013

In researching yesterday’s posting regarding significant errors the administration’s made in its failed attempts to replace free enterprise with government control, I found an article by Ashe Schow on blog.heritage.org going back to October 18, 2012.

 

Mr. Schow's subject was the massive amount of taxpayer funds wasted on “green energy” projects, and the most recent listed on-line. 

 

I bring this up again today because the article’s well worth reading, especially the list of failed investments, because, as Mr.Schow points out: “[The administration’s] foray into venture capitalism has not gone well. But the extent of its failure has been largely ignored by the press. Sure, single instances garner attention as they happen, but they ignore past failures in order to make it seem like a rare case.”

 

He goes on to write that, “The government’s picking winners and losers in the energy market has cost taxpayers billions of dollars, and the rate of failure, cronyism, and corruption at the companies receiving the subsidies is substantial. The fact that some companies are not under financial duress does not make the policy a success. It simply means that our taxpayer dollars subsidized companies that would’ve found the financial support in the private market.”

 

And this brings me back to my recurring question as to which premise is correct. Is the incumbent simply a misguided zealot whom totally disregards history, logic and basic common sense in a Machiavellian attempt to reshape the nation’s social structure? Or is he a dyed-in-the wool Chicago politician, ignoring the law, doing as he pleases regardless, and paying back those who put all the bucks into his campaigns without any real interest at all in their causes or intents?

 

Certainly not knowing the answer to my query, I do have some inklings as to which premise is correct. However, I think we’ll all have to wait a bit longer to find the truth. In the meantime, though, here’s a link to Mr. Schow’s article which helps to frame the subject:

 

President Obama's Taxpayer-Backed Green Energy Failures

 

That’s it for today folks.

 

Adios

BloggeRhythms 8/5/2013

Reading, compiling and digesting information is an extremely interesting beneficial aspect of writing these daily entries. Helping comprehend events and happenings in the nation and world, it forces pursuit of information otherwise possibly missed, ignored or forgotten about altogether.

 

It also provides opportunity to present views, thoughts opinions and predictions, pleasing when correct, yet not so great when off the mark or totally wrong altogether. But, what’s the very best is when things really do come together, proving theorems, and today’s one of those times.

 

For a very long while now, I’ve often mentioned the whole green energy farce as not only merely a political ploy, but disastrous to the economy in many ways as well. So much so that it underlies many of the nation’s fiscal problems including outrageous costs for imported oil, while greatly curbing the growth of employment.

 

And then, this morning in an interview on Fox News, a writer for the Wall Street Journal stated that the administration spent $501 million on “green jobs” that didn’t even exist. Wrong guesses on company’s like the now bankrupt Solyndra, Fisker and Abound Solar, all complete failures, created only 11,000 jobs in total, costing $45,545 each, if my math is correct.

 

Not only that, there were so few real jobs established at such outrageous costs that category definitions were stretched to prevent the statistics from appearing considerably worse. A few examples include, pouring cement for a wind turbine, picking up trash, and laying floors with “sustainable’ materials.”

 

Mark Muro, Policy Director, Metropolitan Policy Program at Brookings put it best when he told foxnews.com/politics that: “The moral of the story is that you need to know in some detail the nature of the economy you’re serving when you fund job training efforts.”

 

While the overall economy still struggles, and the entire green energy charade continues to collapse, other businesses are doing quite well nonetheless. Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc., for example, which owns the Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad just reported a profit margin of 22%, highest of all the company’s subsidiaries.

 

But, what was most interesting to me was remembering the several entry's I wrote last year about Buffett's touting of the incumbent’s fiscal policies, leading to a sweetheart deal helping to bail out a major bank in trouble. So, I just wonder if the fact that Burlington Northern is among the railroads that would transport oil produced in western Canada if the Keystone pipeline isn’t opened isn’t connected in some way to the Buffett/incumbent tie-in.

 

Especially since I also clearly recall typing the following back then : ‘Whatever people bring to us, we’re ready to haul,” Krista York-Wooley, a spokeswoman for Burlington Northern, a unit of Buffett’s Omaha, Neb.-based Berkshire Hathaway Inc., told Bloomberg News. If Keystone XL “doesn’t happen, we’re here to haul.”

 

And then, since politics, favoritism, cronyism and personal gain far outweigh consideration of the public need or maintaining honesty in governance for this administration, another instance of truth distortion occurred this weekend.   

 

According to Fox News, National Security Adviser, Susan Rice, “is playing a driving role in the decision to shutter U.S. embassies and consulates over a major terror threat. And the “the former diplomat is trying to avoid a repeat of the deadly Benghazi terror attack nearly a year ago.” 

 

In total “Twenty-two U.S. posts were closed over the weekend, and the State Department announced it will keep 19 embassies and consulates closed through Saturday "out of an abundance of caution.[While] lawmakers are describing the threat as among the most serious they've seen in years.”

 

So, here we have the woman who appeared on all the weekend talk-shows when the Benghazi terrorist attack took place, claiming that it was just a random act of violence. The incumbent himself declared that terrorism was over, he’d taken care of the problem and that critics should move on to something else.

 

But now today, not only is almost the whole Middle-East in turmoil because he’s made the U.S. a paper tiger none respect or fear, he’s sent a proven fabricator with no credibility or credential others esteem to handle a situation she denied existed in the first place. 

 

Consequently, as noted at the start today, the administration not only bats a thousand in incorrect decision-making most often, as time goes by damage from those errors tends to increase. And, at the moment, there’s very little going in the right direction for the incumbent or the nation itself anywhere you look. 

 

So, maybe the time’s come for him to stop all the politicking and hourly speeches and realize that since he was already elected, its time to get off the stump, look at the morass he’s created and do something to try to fix it. Instead of continually selling a bill of goods proven again this weekend, that can never work as touted for the common good.

 

That’s it for today folks.

 

Adios

 

BloggeRhythms 8/4/2013

Just yesterday I mentioned the continuing mass of evidence that “global warming” doesn’t exist and that any efforts to affect the patterns of nature are wastes of time, effort and especially, money.

 

Then yesterday afternoon, I caught a few minutes of Forbes on Fox TV when the topic happened to be, Regina "Gina" McCarthy, new head of the EPA. And whereas the panel is made up of business experts, the general consensus was that climate change is not only a politically motivated ploy, but its costs are astronomical while economic growth is significantly stifled if not completely curtailed.

 

Since I agree completely with the panel’s conclusions, I looked up Ms. McCarthy’s CV today on Wikipedia and found that she is, “an American public administrator and an environmental health and air quality expert, currently administrator for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. She is known for her dedication to "common-sense strategies to protect public health and the environment".

 

There was also a comment from Daniel Fiorino, director of the Center for Environmental Policy at American University, who said that ‘Her nomination signals that the president really wants to deliver on his State of the Union objectives to take serious action on climate change." He then went on to state that, “Despite speculation that this will affect Obama's decision on the Keystone XL Pipeline, he believes that this doesn't affect the dynamics of the decision significantly as other considerations are paramount, but adds: "she knows air and climate issues very well and she's a very strong environmentalist."

 

As for myself, having written often about the incumbent’s continually stalling the pipeline for no real reason at all, and coupling that belief with the comments made by the panel on Fox about how much the inanities of the global warming farce costs, I did some further research and found that, according to Steve HargreavesIn of CNN Money: In a report earlier this year, the Brookings Institution put green stimulus spending at $51 billion. From 2009 to 2014, Brookings estimates the federal government will spend over $150 billion from both stimulus and non-stimulus funds on green initiatives.

 

So, on top of the strangulation of the economy, stifled fiscal growth and the loss of thousands of job opportunities, energy experts also say that “Subsidies for renewable power are particularly problematic, as electricity from wind and solar is still generally more expensive than that from coal or natural gas.” 

 

Furthermore, Diana Furchtgott-Roth, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and former chief economist at the Labor Department under George W. Bush adds that "It makes companies not want to move here and leaves consumers with less money to spend. It's actually de-stimulative as opposed to stimulative." 

 

And that brings me to the fact that it’s the government that’s supplemented the role of private industry in clean energy funding, which concerns many stimulus critics as well. Because using Solyndra as an example, that Department of Energy Program debacle, expanded under the stimulus package, cost taxpayers over half a billion dollars.

 

However, although Ms. Furchtgott-Roth believes this “demonstrates that the government doesn't have the expertise to pick winning companies in the fast-moving alternative energy space, especially at the commercialization level," her final thought made the most sense to me of all: “If conservation efforts like home weatherizations made sense, people would do it themselves." She said the same is true for high speed rail and electric cars: "More businesses would invest in these areas if there was greater demand.”

 

And there we have the crux of the entire matter, because she’s absolutely right. This nation was built by a self-sufficient, free thinking, extremely intelligent population that continually created products, services and solutions to whatever was required at the time. The things that worked well and filled the needs became successful and the rest fell by the wayside as they should. 

 

Government's role was to provide public services, keep the peace and protect the borders. 

 

And for over two hundred years, except for a major depression and a few wars, things went extremely well because the population was left alone to expand and grow. And then this inexperienced, unqualified, misguided zealot came along and turned the entire picture upside down. Personal freedoms shrank, government grew and free enterprise got buried under regulations and taxes. 

 

But the worst part of it all is, that while the nation and its economy are going backward the remedies are glaringly obvious. However, since that would mean reducing the government's power, any kind of real recovery won’t happen at all. Because this administration has no interest in the nation whatsoever, self-serviance and feathering the nests of co-conspirators are all that count.

 

That’s it for today folks.

 

Adios

BloggeRhythms 8/3/2013

Whatever the hype and blue smoke of the day emanating from the administration, if you do some homework there's plenty of information indicating that folks are now rapidly waking up to real, and very disturbing, facts.

 

Furthermore, actual world practicalities are slowly but surely proving that continual speechmaking doesn’t affect the economy, only fiscal reality does. All of which adds up to several very bad days for the incumbent.   

 

According to J. D. Heyes of Alex Jones’ Infowars.com, “One of the “Affordable” Care Act’s most recent casualties is Anthem Blue Cross, which has announced it will shun California’s small-business health insurance market, which the Los Angeles Times describes as “a potential setback in the state’s rollout of the federal healthcare law.”

 

Mr. Heyes adds that: “Actually, it’s more like a “potential setback” for small businesses needing competitive insurance rates to remain afloat. 

 

Anthem is California’s largest insurer for small employers, thus its pullout raised concerns about the state’s ability to offer competitive rates and attract businesses to its new Covered California exchange that opens Jan. 1. Although the giant became the first insurance company to opt out of California’s small-business insurance market, other major insurer’s, UnitedHealth Group, Inc., and Aetna, Inc., previously announced they would not offer individuals coverage in California.

 

In the same vein, I then found that the second-largest health insurance company in South Carolina, Medical Mutual of Ohio, is pulling out at the end of the year because of the Affordable Care Act. It’s the parent company of the Carolina Care plan, which insures about 28,000 people in the state.

 

Its also leaving Georgia and Indiana because, according to spokesman Ed Byers: “Under new regulations, which are vast and quite complex, it is in our best interest to focus on our core market of Ohio where we are headquartered and have been doing business successfully for nearly 80 years.”

 

But here’s the really, really important part; “South Carolina Insurance Director Ray Farmer says the loss of the state’s second-largest health insurer could raise rates for everyone. “If you have less competition, not only in insurance but in any marketplace, it could result in higher rates. I don’t think there’s going to be a big groundswell of other companies leaving the marketplace, though.”

 

As a side-note, I also read that many hard core leftists are very pleased that hated capitalists, such as insurers, are leaving the scene. That way, the government will take over the entire health care system which, many of them feel is the best for all whereas free enterprise is to be avoided at all costs.   

 

Then, in another subtler instance, the financially troubled New York Times announced it sold the 141 year-old Boston Globe to Boston Red Sox owner John Henry for a “mere $70 million.” Having paid a then-record $1.1 billion in 1993, that's a straight 93% loss. It also was forced to retain the Globe's pension liabilities, estimated at over $100 million. 

 

In 2002, the Globe circulation rate was 413,000. Today it’s 230,351 or nearly half. With plummeting circulation due to online competition, both the Times and Globe have been plagued by collapsing ad revenues, that have only worsened in recent years. Friday the Times reported its 11th straight quarter of falling ad revenue. 

 

However, the most important factor of all to me is that both the Globe and Times continually strongly endorse and champion the incumbent and his economic policies, “even though those policies have failed to create the kind of economic growth necessary to create a boom in advertising spending. [And] the future doesn't look much brighter.” 

 

So, what that says to me is that folks are tired of reading biased and distorted pap while everyday circumstances present an entirely different and far less acceptable reality. Especially since the growing majority of governmental laws, policies and intervention simply don’t work on the public’s behalf.  

 

An example of how damaging overbearing lawmaking is, last quarter the American economy only grew by 1.7%. And worse, although only 162,000 new jobs were created, most of them part-time because businesses are preparing for the suspected increasing costs of taxes on income and healthcare.

 

Along the same lines of governmental interference where it doesn’t belong, and the current administration’s practice of continuing to pursue theories that are totally wrong, Climate Depot via Drudge reports that the “North Pole Sees Unprecedented July Cold – Arctic Sees Shortest Summer On Record — ‘Normally the high Arctic has about 90 days above freezing. This year there was less than half that’ 

 

Here’s a link to the article: Unprecedented July Cold -- Arctic Sees Shortest Summer On Record

 

And in conclusion, according to Fox News.com: “The United States will temporarily shut down its embassies and consulates around the world Sunday -- including those in Iraq, Afghanistan and Egypt -- as a precautionary measure over terror-related concerns, State Department officials said.”

 

So here we have the administration closing foreign embassies, especially those in the Middle-East, due to fears of terrorism, which is something the incumbent stated no longer exists.

 

But then again, if the House continues its probe of Benghazi and the proof of terrorism ultimately occurs as it should, when you add that to all the other fabrication’s, deceptions and distortions of truths, the administration will continue to slowly unravel, exposed as the monumental fraud that it is.

 

That’s it for today folks.

 

Adios

 

BloggeRhythms 8/2/2013

More and more frequently lately, I read about growing concern regarding the administration’s blatant disregard for many laws as written, overstepping of Constitutional bounds, and refusals to cooperate in any way at all in issues where violations may have occurred.

 

In most cases, the issues involved are composed of actions taken improperly or illegally, such as the IRS targeting political foes, or the gross negligence occurring in the mishandling of the embassy attack in Benghazi. There are also the festering situations regarding the Fast and Furious gun-running scheme and the Justice Department's improper harassment of James Rosen, reporter for Fox News.

 

While each of these situations has likely illegal elements of their own, the nefarious actions taken have been politically motivated. The primary intent has been to either cover up significant malfeasance and incompetence, or to stem exposure of evidence damaging to the image of the incumbent and/or his representatives.

 

But now, today, while we have another significant mis-step, this one goes the the heart of the monumental problems with the new health-care tax. And the complainants here aren’t every day tax-paying citizens, political foes or other types of outside adversaries. The victims now are members of Congress and their aides.

 

John Bresnahan and Jake Sherman, of Politico via Drudge write that: “The Office of Personnel Management [OPM], under heavy pressure from Capitol Hill, will issue a ruling that says the government can continue to make a contribution to the health care premiums of members of Congress and their aides, according to several Hill sources.”

 

It seems that Senator Chuck Grassley, Republican of Iowa, inserted a provision in the new heath-care tax saying members of Congress and their aides must be covered by plans “created” by the law or “offered through an exchange.”

 

Until now, OPM hadn’t said if the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program could contribute premium payments toward plans on the exchange. However, if the current payments stopped, ”lawmakers and aides would have faced thousands of dollars in additional premium payments each year. Under the old system, the government contributed nearly 75 percent of premium payments.”

 

Facing the possibility of losing this huge perk, paid for by the public, panic reached the extent from both parties, that the incumbent “told Democratic senators that he was personally involved in finding a solution.”

 

Apparently there was much serious griping from both sides of the aisle about the potential of a “brain drain,” which is the “fear that aides would head for more lucrative jobs, spooked by the potential for spiking health premiums.”

 

So, here we have a situation not only proving the heath-care tax is unaffordable to those forced to pay it, the government's own employees would prefer to find new careers, rather than watch their incomes dramatically sink. 

 

However, by issuing the ruling that says the government can continue to make a contribution to the health care premiums of members of Congress and their aides, the problem got fixed due to presidential pressure. 

 

But while the taxpaying public has the exact same problems, or worse, if they don’t pay for the coverage they’ll be fined, penalized or thrown in jail. So my question for today is: “How long will the public sit still while this kind of total abuse of power and financial rip-off goes on?”

 

That's it for today folk's.

 

Adios

BloggeRhythms 8/1/2013

Watched a recording of Greta Van Susteren’s hour-long talk with Rush last night on the Fox News channel  That way, I zipped through all the commercial breaks, watching only the conversation itself.

 

I mention this because, although  a long-time Limbaugh listener and admirer of his style and vast knowledge of politics, among a whole host of other subjects, I tuned him out when commercial messages became so prevalent, it seemed there was more huckstering and sponsor breaks than there was of Rush himself.

 

To my recollection, the last time I listened to him on the radio was about five years ago, and since then I’ve read a few transcripts of his dialogues piquing my interest. But other than that, I haven’t paid much attention to him at all. Consequently, I found it notable that hearing last night’s subject matter, not very much of it has changed from the last time I tuned in to his daily show.

 

To a great extent, I can certainly identify with many of the reasons there’s so much repetition in his program. He’s on the air three hours a day, five days a week, and the focus of his efforts remains the same: Doing whatever he can to stem the tide of government growth and power, and helping restore freedom to the people where it belongs. Consequently, there’s only so much that can be said or explained in different ways without frequently repeating yourself. 

 

The one thing that really stood out, however, and which I found to be perfectly true, was his analysis of the incumbent’s (and many other high-profile Dems') approach toward Rush himself.

 

Rush thought it was remarkable that the most powerful man on the planet, the incumbent, specifically targets him whenever he can. Especially since Rush doesn’t have any “real” power” at all but sits all by himself behind a microphone, talking on the radio.

 

And that to Rush is the key. Because what he believes the incumbent, (and all Dem’s in politics)) fear the most is an educated public that understands what freedom truly is and that government's merely there to service their needs and was never meant to have any “power” at all.

 

So, to that extent, Rush and I have something very much in common. Because I sit here typing every day trying to get the same thing done in my own small way. And even though he’s quite repetitive as mentioned, he’s still the best at what he does by light years compared to others.

 

Thus, if he could only find some way to eliminate the incredibly irritating commercial breaks, I’d tune back in this afternoon and every weekday thereafter in the future.   

 

That's it for today folks.

 

Adios