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when it comes to public employee benefits and the damage they wreak on local governments, scoundrels have another refuge: blaming racism for concerns about lavish, unaffordable benefits and broken governments. ”Public-sector workers are disproportionately black. In 2011, about 19 percent of black workers were employed by the government, compared with 14 percent of whites and 10 percent of Hispanics. The upshot is pretty clear: Reducing the value of public pensions and other benefits wouldn’t just hurt blacks disproportionately; it would do so at a time when other economic trends have already hurt them more than most. So the question isn’t...

What do the despised rich, smart kids, and fallen heroes have in common? They are all victims of the progressive movement. When being rich is finally made synonymous with undeserved privilege, individual achievement in other areas will be targeted. When success is considered unfair, then being unsuccessful will be called unfair and undeserved. And those of means and ability who reject this burden will be demonized. Progressives have turned society against conservatives who are successful through business; they claim that the rich have hoarded the profits that they made on the backs of the public. "Spread the wealth around" and...

UPDATE: Twinkies-maker Hostess Brands says it has asked court to allow it to close its business and sell its iconic brands. PREVIOUS STORY: NEW YORK -- Is this the end for Twinkies? Hostess Brands said Wednesday that it will go into liquidation unless bakers striking in protest against a new contract imposed in bankruptcy court return to work by the end of the day Thursday. "We simply do not have the financial resources to survive an ongoing national strike," Hostess CEO Greg Rayburn said in a statement. The liquidation would result in Hostess' nearly 18,000 workers losing their jobs. The...

Hostess Brands said Wednesday that it will go into liquidation unless bakers striking in protest against a new contract imposed in bankruptcy court return to work by the end of the day Thursday. "We simply do not have the financial resources to survive an ongoing national strike," Hostess CEO Greg Rayburn said in a statement. The liquidation would result in Hostess' nearly 18,000 workers losing their jobs. The bakers' union represents around 5,000. The union did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday, but has called the concessions demanded in the new contract "outrageous." "Our members are on...

HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. — The room set aside for reporters to watch Tuesday night's debate erupted into applause after President Obama ridiculed the size of Mitt Romney's personal wealth. Mr. Romney was trying to make the point that both his and Mr. Obama's investment funds probably include investments in China — something the president has attacked Mr. Romney for. "Mr. President, have you looked at your pension?" Mr. Romney said. "You know, I don't look at my pension. It's not as big as yours, so it — it doesn't take as long," Mr. Obama retorted. His reply prompted laughter in the...

Obama: 'We Don't Believe Anybody Is Entitled to Success in This Country'

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Obama is in Fairfax, Virginia, and I told you a couple things that he said during his speech, or his campaign appearance out there. He continued to tell the lie that Romney wants to cut taxes $5 trillion for the wealthy. Five trillion tax cut. That has never been said by anybody at any time, ever. It's not possible. Five trillion is the amount of debt that he has run up in terms of spending. So he's continuing that lie. Romney refuted it three times during the debate. In addition, he is continuing this notion that the...

CHARLOTTE, N.C.—Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory Booker delivered a passionate defense of Democratic efforts to raise taxes on the wealthiest Americans, insisting it's about love of country. "Being asked to pay your fair share isn't class warfare. It's patriotism," Booker said, disputing an attack line often mentioned by Mitt Romney and his GOP allies. Everyone, Booker argued, must pay their "fair share" at a time when the country is facing the enormous burden of paying down debts incurred by two wars.

The Train Wreck of Progressive/Liberal/Leftist Class Envy It's time to once and for all debunk the progressive liberal destructive arguements about class envy and put them in their place and hold them accountable for the fallacies they foist on the public in a singular effort to divide this nation. It is creating a train wreck in America, and they know it, and are willfully making it happen. They do so soley to win elections and continue to promote and push their socialist/marxist agenda. Because that is exactly what it is. They try and indicate that the so-called "wealthy," do not...

First lady Michelle Obama took her inspirational family story on the road over the weekend, telling the graduating class of Oregon State University that having a corner corporate office and a big paycheck isn’t the prize it looks like when entering the job market. “Success isn’t about how your life looks to others, it’s about how it feels to you,” Obama said Sunday, retelling how she and her brother, Oregon men’s basketball coach Craig Robinson, grew up in a small Chicago home pushed by parents who said “be true to ourselves.” For both, she said, that meant throwing away their...

“Let me tell you about the very rich,” F. Scott Fitzgerald famously wrote. “They are different from you and me.” He was absolutely right. And we need look no further than Dina Eastwood for confirmation. On a recent episode of her new E! reality show, “Mrs. Eastwood & Company,” the wife of famed actor Clint Eastwood stood idly by as her stepdaughter Francesca and her photographer beau destroyed a $100,000 Hermes Birkin handbag to make an artistic statement. To flaunt wealth in such a manner is nothing short of obscene. Especially, when there are so many needful people throughout the...

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: The Facebook IPO. Ho-ho-ho-ho! Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho! Somebody's gonna have to pay for this. These are Obama's buddies at Facebook. (interruption) Well, because the bottom's falling out. They can't maintain the initial price, the 38 bucks. (interruption) Right. Well, okay. So somebody's gonna have to pay the price for this. Somebody's gonna get the blame for this. You can't have these people losing Obama money like this. That can't happen. You can't blame Goldman Sachs. They're underwriters. They were in for $500 million at the outset, before the IPO. You can't blame Goldman Sachs because they're Obama buddies. And...

'It is the tragic story that everybody knows the end to - the doomed Titanic sinks. Its final hours have become the stuff of myth - but how much have the various film versions of the story helped to create and reinforce these legends?'

Two months after successfully marshaling public support to extend a payroll tax cut for all Americans, President Obama today is attempting to do it again. At the White House this morning, Obama will showcase supporters who were among the thousands that spoke out online and over social media in December to pressure Congress to compromise. But the deal was only temporary. Taxes will rise on 160 million Americans at the end of the month unless lawmakers act again, and congressional negotiators remain at impasse. “Your voices changed the debate and reminded Washington what was at stake,” Obama says in a...

The theme President Obama gave to his State of the Union address was “An America Built to Last.” But his vision would be better described as an “An America Built to Be Last.” As the president asked us to be patient and keep drinking the same kool-aid he’s been serving up for three years, the New York Times reported that the Federal Reserve’s latest assessment of our economy is that “…a full recovery is years away.” Even his most loyal constituency, black Americans, is losing patience. In Gallup’s latest tracking poll, black approval rate for Obama was 79 percent. This...

EDITORIAL What They Don’t Want to Talk About January 14, 2012 Ever since Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry started criticizing Mitt Romney’s actions at Bain Capital — and talking about the thousands of people laid off as a result of Bain’s investments — party leaders have essentially told them to shut up. That response is a pretty good indication of how deeply party elders fear the issue of economic inequality in the campaign to come. “What the hell are you doing, Newt?” Rudolph Giuliani asked Thursday on Fox News. “This is what Saul Alinsky taught Barack Obama, and what you’re...

SPARTANBURG, S.C. — Newt Gingrich signaled Wednesday that he believes his criticism of Mitt Romney’s record at Bain Capital is a mistake — and that he’s created an impression that he was echoing Democratic rhetoric. Gingrich conceded the problem when pressed by a Rick Santorum supporter at a book-signing here Wednesday. “I’m here to implore one thing of you. I think you’ve missed the target on the way you’re addressing Romney’s weaknesses. I want to beg you to redirect and go after his obvious disingenuous about his conservatism and lay off the corporatist versus the free market. I think it’s...

Barack Obama channeled Teddy Roosevelt this week in a speech in Osawatomie, Kan. Supporters are calling it the most significant economic speech of his administration. But critics rightly point out that the Teddy Roosevelt whom Obama invoked was not the beloved 26th president and standard-bearer of the GOP. Instead, it was the radicalized third-party candidate seeking a third term and the man whose progressivism was a precursor to the rise of big government in the later 20th century. What's more, President Obama's speech was so full of reckless accusations and misinformation that The Washington Post's Fact Checker blog gave it...

President Obama has decided that he is more likely to win if the election is about big things rather than small ones. He hopes to turn the 2012 campaign from a plebiscite about the current state of the economy into a referendum about the broader progressive tradition that made us a middle-class nation. For the second time, he intends to stake his fate on a battle for the future. This choice has obvious political benefits to an incumbent presiding over a still-ailing economy, and it confirms Obama's shift from a defensive approach earlier this year to an aggressive philosophical attack...

From “An Open Letter to the People of California”: I am filing today an initiative with the Attorney General’s office that would generate nearly $7 billion in dedicated funding to protect education and public safety. I am going directly to the voters because I don’t want to get bogged down in partisan gridlock as happened this year. The stakes are too high.