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If it’s not the global warming schemers deserting the cause, and global warming profiteers going belly up, and real life contradicting the premise, it’s another bulletin of bad news. Where will it all end for the global warming worshippers? Here’s the latest, which just happens to devastate another assumption of the warming theorists (emphasis ours): . . .

VIDEO Interview 4:47 minutes NLPC Associate Fellow Paul Chesser was interviewed on Fox Business Network's Willis Report on Thursday. Here's a transcript: Gerri Willis : Joining me now, Paul Chesser, Associate Fellow at the National Legal and Policy Center. Hey Paul, welcome back to the show, always great to have you here. Paul Chesser : Great to be here. Gerri Willis : Let me tell you, this is crazy, is it not? I want to just show folks with some of these companies that got loans from the Department of Energy - the jobs that were promised but never delivered....

This is our favorite news item this week, hands down. The Europeans, so enamored by things green that they have implemented subsidies, mandates and regulations that have nearly strangled their economy, have found a way out of their dilemma. “Energy from gas power stations has been rebranded as a green, low-carbon source of power by a €80bn European Union programme, in a triumph of the deep-pocketed fossil fuel industry lobby over renewable forms of power,” reports the Guardian in Great Britain. There you have it. To make the green quota, simply reclassify a fossil fuel as green enough. Voila! ....

General Motors reported that Chevy Volt sales for May came in at a paltry 1,680. To put this in perspective, GM sold 29,579 Chevy Malibus during the month. The funny thing is, I do not recall seeing as many TV ads for the Malibu as I have for the Volt. While GM's ad strategy (which has seen the company discontinuing advertising on Facebook and the Super Bowl) has received much attention, auto journalists and analysts do not seem to want to question the reason why GM is spending such a disproportionate amount of money advertising a vehicle that is losing...

According to an article on MLive, a budget plan put forth by Gov. Rick Snyder, Senate Majority Leader Randy Richardville, R-Monroe, and House Majority Speaker Jase Bolger, R-Marshall, would double the amount of money being spent on Michigan’s film subsidy program. Spending taxpayer money on millionaire Hollywood movie producers and stars is a bad idea. The budget spends an extra $25 million on top of the $25 million that has already been proposed for the program. Michigan’s film subsidy used to be the most generous in the country, reimbursing up to 42 percent of the cost of a production’s payroll...

Unemployment headed back in the wrong direction in May to 8.2%, with only a pathetic 69,000 jobs created. With all the folks that gave up looking for work in the last couple years -as many as 88 million people- some think actual unemployment numbers are in the low-to-mid teens (!) If you care to venture into such forlorn labor markets as -say- Detroit, those seeking the truth need to think in terms of fifty percent unemployed... and a median home value now standing at a mere $6000.But this latest bad news for the Obammunist regime comes on the heels of downgrades...

Much of the hype has involved comparisons of Facebook to Google. Facebook has more in common with AOL or even the US Treasury than it does with Google. My video commentary on the proper role of investment bankers... critique of FB...)

As of early last week, nearly 20,000 people have applied for the 877 new jobs that Montgomery's Hyundai plant created to add a new production shift. And the applications are still coming. "It just continues to grow," said Scott Gordy of Hyundai Motor Manufacturing Alabama's human resources department. The deadline to apply is June 2, but Hyundai was so overwhelmed by the initial response that they suspended the application process on May 18 because of the high volume. Last week, HMMA issued a statement saying that it would reopen the application procedure through June 2 but warned that anyone who...

Looks like JCPenney is sticking it to those who slammed Ellen DeGeneres' hiring as its spokeswoman. The company's new Father's Day ad shows two "real-life" dads playing with their two actual kids, JCPenney says. "First Pals: What makes Dad so cool?" the ad's copy asks, according to blogger Joe. My. God. "He's the swim coach, tent maker, best friend, bike fixer and hug giver—all rolled into one. Or two." The ad, Gawker notes, follows the American Family Association's One Million Moms' attempt to launch a boycott over DeGeneres' hiring earlier this year.

Let’s take a look at the stats: 88 Million Americans! – That’s the real number of people who are not employed and have stopped actively looking for a job. The number is at it’s highest levels since 1983, and completely debunks the 8.3% unemployment rate that the Government keeps repeating. 46.5 million Americans – That’s the number of Americans who are now relying on food stamps as their primary source of income to feed their family. U.S. food-stamp use has hit an all time record high, with the number of people receiving the benefit jumping by nearly 50% since the...

Legislation to ban sex-selective abortions failed to pass today despite it being supported by the majority of the House. The final vote was 246-168. The reason it failed was that this particular proposal required a two-thirds majority to pass; therefore the bill fell 30 votes short. This is just one more sign of how morally bankrupt some in this nation have become. There are many of us out here who are as disgusted by the wickedness that permeates every fiber of the Democrat Party. However, just like in Nazi Germany and other moments of darkness in world history - enough...

The Detroit Free Press reported on Friday that General Motors failed to initially disclose possible conflicts when it awarded a $600,000 contract to Mother New York, an ad agency with ties to GM's Chief Financial Officer, Dan Ammann. Ammann's wife, Pernilla Ammann, is a partner and Chief Operating Officer at the ad agency. In typical Government Motors' fashion, Ammann dubiously denies having had knowledge of the deal. Before looking at what the money purchased, let's look at the likelihood that Ammann really knew nothing. Honestly, is it likely that a CFO at a major corporation would not know that...

Many NIMBYs weren’t bothered by the idea that the City of Irvine would siphon off millions of dollars in property tax to develop the ostentatiously named Great Park on the closed El Toro Marine base, turning the expanse into a place to romp and play for those who live around it. We wonder how they feel now that the park is destined to be not so great, thanks to a ruling by state officials that $1.4 billion (with a B) in property funds can’t be spent on the boondoggle, also known as the Balloon-doggle, after its signature floating orange balloon....

Emirates? Lufthansa? JAL...? _____________ ___________ Try Olivia... India's premier long-distance luxury coach line! Their motto: Travel Redefined... Olivia.in   h/t El Roberto

Throughout the 1960s the G-men eavesdropped on the private conversations of Meyer Lansky by bugging his personal residence where he lived with his wife in Hallandale, FL and the hotel rooms in which he stayed when in New York City according to FBI files. Although Lansky may have had a mind for numbers in handling the casino skimming and money laundering rackets of the Genovese mobsters for whom he worked, his own words reveal a small-minded man who was both embittered by and self-deluded about his station in life. Perhaps the most shocking revelations from the recorded confessions involved jealous...

Actually, I know the answer to my own question. The answer is manyfold: Hussein has lifted the drilling moratorium; Hussein approved Keystone; Hussein has opened domestic exploration, drilling, and production; Hussein has opened the "strategic reserve"; Hussein didn't actually "invest" all those billions in Brazil's, etc. petroleum industries, he invested it our petroleum industry; Hussein Obama pees oil thereby increasing domestic supply driving the price down; isn't Obama wonderful? NOT I'm not an industry economist so what did I miss? Don't tell me it's all because of Memorial Day and summer's arrival, that doesn't make sense. This is not an...

Very quickly, today's ECB data shows that Euroland's money supply is contracting again. M3 fell by €51bn in April. M1 fell by €55bn. Private credit fell €55bn. I don't yet have the country breakdown. My guess is that the Club Med implosion is grim. The chart is based on the annual rate. It has not yet picked up the month-on-month contraction. Clearly the sugar rush from the ECB's 3-year credit blitz has worn off, leaving behind some very toxic effects. Those banks in Italy and Spain that used the money to play the Sarkozy redemption trade by purchasing sovereign debt...

TrimTabs President & CEO Charles Biderman dissects Europe's "Delay and Pray" and the issues facing state and local governments [in USA].

Remember the Credibility Gap? It was a phenomenon that rose to public awareness in the late 1960s (and even inspired a funny comedy group) when reporting showed a great difference between what government claimed and reality. It lives. According to Bloomberg: “As California Governor Jerry Brown seeks a temporary 5 percent pay cut from public employees to fill the largest state deficit in the U.S., many of those same workers are poised for raises next year . . .

One can’t but hear the almost daily drumbeat from the left about how unequal things are in the United States. There is an income disparity between the haves and the have-nots where Wall Street bankers take millions of dollars home to their Greenwich mansions while millions of others work for minimum wage and can’t afford their own home, never mind something resembling a mini-Versailles. That may be true, but the reality is, inequality exists today, inequality has always existed, and inequality will always exist. Why? Because people are simply different. People have different motivations, different skillsets, different temperaments, different...

Attorneys General from the southwest states have been ramping up their criticism of federal officials for allowing tens of billions in drug money each year to flow over the border from the U.S. into Mexico. Terry Goddard, a former Arizona attorney general, says that the federal government must do a better job to prevent the Mexican drug cartels from reaping the cash rewards -- perhaps as much as $85 billion each year -- generated by the sales of their illicit products in the United States as reported by Mary Sanchez for The Kansas City Star: This money is laundered and...

Regardless of how much of your money Obama throws at them, Government Motors clearly has NO interest in working with his UAW pals over the long-run- and why should they?  GM executives were left to do pretty much as they please... You can be forgiven for thinking that the serially-incompetent Obama Administration might have placed some restraints upon the $80B TARP bailout- but they didn't.  The result? GM has been aggressively expanding not only sales networks but manufacturing and R-n-D work to the People's Republic of China, where Buick is their leading brand. Since the TARP bailout of GM, almost...

The Sun News Network in Canada extensively covered our Seventh International Conference on Climate Change at the Hilton Chicago. For that, The Heartland Institute is very grateful — but the viewers of the excellent network should be even more appreciative. The sharp and entertaining Ezra Levant anchored the coverage, and his dispatches are not to be missed. Below you can view seven videos of his reports for his program, “The Source.”

American Mosaic: Last Best Hope on Earth or a thousand Years of Darkness. The verdict will soon be decided. Video montage starring Occupy Wall Street degenerates, Ronald Reagan, Whitney Houston & Billy Graham, Jerry Springer and Billy Graham...

The damage caused by the global financial crisis requires additional federal intervention, according to the Obama Administration, which is launching a new program to “foster growth and stability at a time of increasing economic turmoil.” This particular endeavor, however, will focus its efforts on improving conditions in Eastern Europe, the Western Balkans, and the “newly independent states,” or NIS, of the former Soviet Union. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) is designing this Europe & Eurasia (E&E) regional project in order to “promote trade, investment and regulatory integration; enhance regional competitiveness, and support financial sector stability.” The agency did...

One of the showcase companies of the green energy movement propped up by the federal stimulus questioned in recent filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission whether it can survive with its mounting debt and problems with defective batteries. Yet, even with its struggles, its top executives were awarded sweetened severance packages that would give them an extra six-figures in payout if they lose their jobs. A123 Systems, which opened a Livonia lithium-ion battery plant that is to supply electric cars, has an accumulated deficit of $774 million, according to SEC filings, and stated in its quarterly report that its...

A spate of recent articles -- see for example here, here, and here -- have noted Detroit’s population implosion and financial woes, along with the proposed solution of shutting off street lights in underpopulated neighborhoods to save money. (Cue the obligatory “Will the last person to leave Detroit...” joke. The last article, in particular, notes that the solution is designed to drive people away from the poorest, most sparsely populated neighborhoods.) And why? Because, supposedly, there is not enough money to pay for the services.
This is an important concept, and deserves further investigation, as it contains the answer to the...

Ryhmes with 'weirdo'- get it? beardo

The planning, says Dixons chief Sebastian James, may look alarmist but it’s good to be prepared. Company bosses around Europe agree. As the financial crisis in Greece worsens, companies are getting ready for everything from social unrest to a complete meltdown of the financial system. Those preparations include sweeping cash out of Greece every night, cutting debts, weeding out badly paying customers and readying for a switch to a new Greek drachma if the country is forced to abandon the euro. … Chief Executive James says the company has contingency plans to shutter up its 69 wholly owned and 29...

The global warming alarmism that has pretty much faded from public concern always has been transparently fraudulent for those who care to look closely. And now as the world’s nations desire to carve up the carbon footprint profit, you have to love the arguments. “BONN, Germany — Another round of U.N. climate talks closed without resolving how to share the burden of curbing man-made global warming, mainly because countries don’t agree on who is rich and who is poor,” reports the Associated Press. For those who haven’t been keeping score...

When prominent Democrats maintain the philosophy that government should never let a serious crisis go to waste it’s no surprise that they assume government has to react to every market hiccup, particularly after the Great Recession. What they don’t think about is perhaps doing nothing is as good as, if not better than drafting expansionist policies. JP Morgan’s much maligned $3 billion hedging failure is the crisis of the day and there hasn’t been a shortage of pundits and Democratic policymakers who urge action in the face of this “crisis.” Paul “Blame Bush” Krugman wrote that the situation means reform...

American Mosaic: Last Best Hope on Earth or a thousand Years of Darkness. The verdict will soon be decided. (CAST: Starring Ronald Reagan, Billy Graham, Chuck Colson, Occupy Wall Street degenerates, Whitney Houston and a bunch of militant homosexuals). Video montage...

Earlier [last] week, MarketWatch’s Rex Nutting claimed President Obama has not increased federal spending dramatically. Despite four years of evidence to the contrary, Nutting posits that the whole “misunderstanding” comes from widespread naiveté of the federal budgeting process—in fact, federal spending has grown 27 percent in just the last four years alone. To start, Nutting claims that since the 2009 Fiscal Year began in October of 2008, President Bush is responsible for the “major spending decisions in the 2009 fiscal year.” Really? For someone who spent an entire article bloviating on his budget acuity, Nutting has evidently not been paying...

http://www.google.com/finance?q=fb

El Mundo reports that the country can no longer resist the bond markets as 10-year yields flirt with 6.5pc again, and the spread over Bunds – or `prima de riesgo' — hits a fresh record each day. Premier Mariano Rajoy and his inner circle have allegedly accepted that Spain will have to call on Europe's EFSF bail-out fund to rescue the banking system, even though this means subjecting his country to foreign suzerainty. Mr Rajoy denies the story, not surprisingly since it would be a devastating climb-down, and not all options are yet exhausted. "There will not be any (outside)...

Reparations. That single word has the power to bring forth memories of slave screams, blood-shed, lynching, raping and the unrepentant theft of generations of successful Black families by the United States of America. It also has the power to breed resentment, as the 40 acres and a mule that Black Americans were promised by General William Sherman at the close of the American Civil War were snatched away by President Andrew Johnson and returned to their White owners. Watch the 2008 presidential hopefuls debate whether African Americans should receive reparations here: (VIDEO AT LINK) Primarily left landless, fragmented, disconnected from...

The Obama Administration has arranged to provide—free of charge—several customized special-operations military vessels to the Government of Kenya, U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor has learned. Finalization of those plans came exactly one week prior to today’s explosion in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi. Although officially it remains unclear whether the blast was the result of a utility problem or the work of terrorists, Reuters reports that a witness saw a man place a suspicious package in business-district building right before the explosion. The U.S. Naval Sea Systems Command is awarding a noncompetitive “sole-source contract to United States Marine Incorporated (USMI)...

"How can you be the president with the worst  unemployment record since the Great Depression  -and pick a fight over job creation?  There's a point where this becomes ludicrous..." ___________________________________________________________________ "Bain as an issue doesn't work, because people look at it on balance... and they say 'wait a second -yeah- you can pick a couple companies that lost. You can pick a lot of companies that succeeded.' And as even as the governor of Massachusetts said last week, it is a good company." "This is going to fall flat on its face ... Obama picking a fight on the economy is probably...

California government may receive a windfall from huge capital-gains taxes on the sale of Facebook stock following the Palo Alto social-networking behemoth's recent initial public offering. Or not. Some were disappointed that the stock opened at $38 only to drop within a few days to $31. A worst-case scenario for Gov. Jerry Brown and his Democratic Party colleagues desperate to shore up the state budget would be if resales of Facebook stock kept declining in value, not only eliminating capital gains, but providing tax deductions for selling shares at less than their purchase price...

Now is the time for all good men and women to put Country above Party. For far to long the RINO Wing of the Republican Party has been in control of losing National Elections. The time has come to cast aside the hold-your-nose clothespins that the RINOs expect us to use when we vote for their tweedle-dumb or tweedle-dumber Candidates. To all Primary voters: List the top 10 demonstrated positive values for each Candidate for all offices, and vote accordingly. If there is no Candidate that meets your values for a given office, then leave that slot blank. This will...

The chart Obama wants us all to forget about: Over the past 50 years, 10 U.S. presidents have made annual budget requests to Congress, projecting deficits both big and small. But no other president compares to Barack Obama when it comes to the size and scale of the current budget deficit facing the United States. The country is facing an 8.3 percent estimated average national deficit of a two-term Obama administration — the biggest of the past 50 years. By comparison, the current estimate for Obama is nearly double the percentage under Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush —...

Repetitious Rhetoric vs. Genuine PoliciesBy: Larry Walker, Jr.According to Barack Obama, “the President’s job is to make sure everyone has a fair shot." But as I explained in Part I, the United States Constitution declares that a President’s real job is, “to the best of his/her Ability, to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” Whether or not Mr. Obama has abided by the true standard will soon be revealed, with the Supreme Court’s ruling on Obamacare. However, when judged according to his self-contrived measure, based upon his job performance to-date, Mr. Obama’s policies actually ensure that...

Despite running up federal deficits at a faster pace than any previous president, Obama says he is not at fault. “Deficits aren’t the result of spending alone,” the President pointed out. “Deficits occur when there is a gap between spending and revenue. If you look at the trends for both you will see that it is the revenue line that has flattened while the spending line has remained pretty much on track with prior periods.” Of course revenues aren’t keeping up because taxpayer earnings aren’t keeping up. Business profits are down. Employees have been thrown out of work. The base...

It was an ordinary Saturday morning at 51st Ward Party Headquarters. The Boss was in his office with the door open; his tweed blazer hung on the coat rack, his collar and tie loosened in the heat. It was just he and Pockets, after all; no Machine pols to impress, no volunteers to order around. With no mailing, no lit drop, and no fundraisers scheduled for this holiday weekend, he and Pockets were just polishing off a few things, and planning to wrap up by lunch. But then he heard a voice from the doorway: “Mornin’, Paulie! Always good to...

Best political humor from around the USA this week... The Looking Spoon More at Reaganite Republican...

President Obama’s reelection campaign press secretary, Ben LaBolt rebuffed criticism that the campaign’s acceptance of donations from Bain Capital employees is hypocritical. Bain has been castigated by Obama for preying upon vulnerable businesses and looting them for selfish gain. Bain is the firm that GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney worked for before he became governor of Massachusetts. “Those who don’t understand the President’s thinking imagine that he is inconsistently benefiting from the ill-gotten gains of those engaged in reprehensible conduct,” LaBolt said. “In reality, he is recovering this money, purifying it, and putting it to use is his crusade to...

There are those who claim that rating agencies are utterly irrelevant, incompetent, behind the curve and merely echo chambers of popular opinion. They are 100% right. There is, however, one critical function that rating agencies execute - they put into words what everyone else knows is fact, but are simply unwilling to recognize due to the systemic implications of admitting yet another lie: subprime, failed banks, Europe, etc. By the time a rating agency has finally opined on something in a way indicative of the truth, it is too late to stick one's head in the sand. Yesterday precisely this...

VIDEO 3:30 minutes NLPC Associate Fellow Mark Modica appeared Wednesday on Cavuto on Fox Business Network to discuss the new "partnership" between the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR). Here's a transcript: Liz MacDonald : Well, next up, the EPA, you know what, it is all about clean air. But now critics are saying it is full of hot air. That is because it is partnering with NASCAR to push green initiatives. That includes encouraging the tracks to recycle more, conserve water, sustainability. You get the picture. Mark Modica from the National...

Ecorse has struggled since 1986 with public officials whose interests weren't always focused on the city, and with chronic overspending. In 2009, former Gov. Jennifer Granholm selected Joyce Parker as Ecorse's emergency manager. Parker helped privatize most services, restructure the city's debt and renegotiated union contracts when she could. The city went from spending $5 million more a year than it took in, to escaping bankruptcy. "She has been a savior for our city," said city resident William Holmes. While some say pushing elected officials aside so an outside can run the city sounds like an extreme idea, in Ecorse...

In 2006, the underpinnings of the American financial system began to crack from a speculative bubble in the countryÂ’s housing market. Fueled by irrational exuberance in which homeowners believed their home prices would rise forever, this was made worse by Main Street and Wall Street, both of whom repackaged mortgage loans for sale to everyday investors through a process called securitization. ThatÂ’s right, this was a multipronged problem, not the hell-bent desires of a few financial fat cats, as Occupy Wall Street would have you believe. When the bubble burst and home prices began to decline, this not only hurt...