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BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: I practically had my heart ripped out when I saw this story. It's about all the college graduates that don't have jobs, that are on food stamps, that are on the WIC program: Women, Infants and Children. And there's a story about a specific college graduate, a guy who has a PhD who was on WIC, food stamps, and a couple of other programs. He can't find work. He's a PhD. The guy got his doctorate! (interruption) Oh, in what? (interruption) Oh. Well, this might be a factor. His doctorate...? Now, remember, this is 2012. The Vietnam...

Obama Voters Losing Jobless Benefits Due to the Manipulation of Workforce Numbers May 11, 2012 BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Michael in Momence, Illinois. Great to have you on the EIB Network. Hello. CALLER: Thanks a lot, Rush, first-time caller. I'm calling because I was at the unemployment office just yesterday, and they have tables there where people fill out the paperwork that they have -- RUSH: Wait, wait, wait whoa, whoa, whoa, just a second. I need you to go slow here. CALLER: Okay. RUSH: Why were you at the unemployment office? It may seem like an obvious question, but...

"Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but they are not entitled to their own facts." -- Daniel Patrick Moynihan Conservatives and liberals may disagree on reasons, motivations, and excuses for Barack Obama's performance, but the facts are still facts. There may be many reasons that a pro football coach goes 1-15, but everyone can agree that his record is still 1-15, right? Well, here are some basic facts about how the country is faring with Barack Obama in the White House. Take a look at the numbers, sans commentary, and make your own judgment about whether Barack Obama deserves...

While we have rescued our economy from catastrophe, we have also begun to build a new foundation for growth." Barack Obama from the White House, August 7, 2009 In 2008, Obama inspired legions of young Americans who bought into his "Change you can believe in" campaign message. According to the Pew Research Center, voters under the age of 30 supported Obama over John McCain 66:31 – by far the largest disparity between young voters and other age groups in any presidential election since exit polling began in 1972. In addition to the critical vote totals, Obama attracted thousands of high...

Probably the last person you’d expect to cite Sarah Palin favorably is Noam Chomsky. Yet in an interview with the Leftist news organization Democracy Now, Chomsky did precisely that, saying Palin was right to mock Obama for his lack of substance. “I don’t usually admire Sarah Palin,” Chomsky said, “but when she was making fun of this ‘hopey changey stuff,’ she was right, there was nothing there.”

By The states that voted to put Barack Obama in office are suffering for supporting him. A recently releast Investor’s Business Daily report provides some telling data derived from comparing economic conditions in the so-called Blue States (those who voted for Obama) with those in the Red States that voted for John McCain. Income growth in Blue States trails per capita income growth in Red States by about .07%. Job growth which has been slow nationwide has Blue States lagging by .08%. Home prices in Red States actually climbed slightly by .03% but Blue State home prices dropped about 3.8%....

With elections less than eight months away, rising prices at the pump are threatening to derail a tenuous economic recovery. And President Obama, to mitigate political fallout, embarked this month on a four-state swing to promote his "all of the above" energy strategy, a broadly supported approach to increasing domestic development of natural gas, solar, wind, hydro, nuclear and yes, oil. But if the president has begun to or at least talk about some moderate sensibilities on domestic energy production, he hasn't changed a bit on tax policy. Every policy and campaign speech the president has given since taking office,...

The National Debt has now increased more during President Obama's three years and two months in office than it did during 8 years of the George W. Bush presidency. The Debt rose $4.899 trillion during the two terms of the Bush presidency. It has now gone up $4.939 trillion since President Obama took office. The latest posting from the Bureau of Public Debt at the Treasury Department shows the National Debt now stands at $15.566 trillion. It was $10.626 trillion on President Bush's last day in office, which coincided with President Obama's first day. The National Debt also now exceeds...

A new report by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office states that by 2016, Obamacare will result in 4 million people fewer people getting health insurance coverage from their employers.The estimate is a vast increase from the CBO prediction just a year ago that 1 million would no longer obtain coverage from their employers. And it raises substantial questions about the veracity of one of Obama’s key pledges in selling the health care law – that everyone who wants to keep their current health insurance plan and doctor could do it.It’s not clear how many of the 4 million would be...

I"m a nurse anesthetist, and I just got a work-related email from my boss. Basically it said "please conserve midazolam, fentanyl, morphine, and hydromorphone.....supplies are CRITICALLY short & the hospital is struggling to maintain supplies". Um, ok. The last time I checked, this was the United States, not Crapistan. How are we "critically short" on all of the major anesthesia drugs that we use??? Am I supposed to offer the patient a bullet to bite? Are there any FReepers out there who have ties to the pharm industry and can explain this? Speaking with others throughout the hospital, I have...

Gasoline prices could soar as high as $7 a gallon this summer thanks to supply threats stemming from Middle East unrest as well as OPEC policy, says real estate mogul Donald Trump. Iran has already cut off supply to France and to the U.K. to protest sanctions from the west, who accuse Tehran of developing a nuclear weapons program. U.S. military officials have said they feel they can ration with Iran, although fears are growing that Israel may consider a unilateral strike on Iran anyway, which is sending crude oil skyrocketing.

The problems Obama will face are growing not subsiding. In just the last month the pump price of gasoline has risen .20 a gallon. ……..higher than it has been in February since 1981. The reason for the rise totally out of Obama’s control; he can’t lie his way out of it. The Iranians want to squeeze the Europeans who are already looking at $8.00 a gallon gas so they are denying France and England oil. The Europeans will come here to buy their gasoline because our $3.52 per gallon looks great! When they do our price will go up whether...

After three years with unemployment topping 8 percent, the U.S. has seen the longest period of high unemployment since the Great Depression, the Congressional Budget Office noted in a report issued today. And, despite some recent good news on the economic front, the CBO is still predicting that unemployment will remain above 8 percent until 2014. The report also notes that, including those who haven't sought work in the past four weeks and those who are working part-time but seeking full-time employment, the unemployment rate would be 15 percent.

President Obama released his FY 2013 budget [Monday] morning. By his own numbers, his budget raises net taxes over the next decade by $1.56 trillion (Table S-9, page 225). As a percentage of the economy, tax revenues would rise all the way to 20.1% of GDP in 2022, far higher than the historical tax revenue average of 18.3% of GDP (Table S-1, page 205). Here are some of the tax lowlights: All 20 of the new or higher taxes in Obamacare are assumed to take place. That means that there will be a 3.8 percentage point surtax on investment income....

When Barack Obama entered office in January, 2009, the labor force participation rate was 65.7%, meaning nearly two-thirds of working age Americans were working or looking for work. When the recession supposedly officially ended in June, 2009, the labor force participation rate was still 65.7%. In the latest, much celebrated, unemployment report, the labor force participation rate had plummeted to 63.7%, the most rapid decline in U.S. history. That means that under President Obama nearly 5 million Americans have fled the workforce in hopeless despair. The trick is that when those 5 million are not counted as in the work...

President Obama last week brandished new jobs numbers as proof that his policies were having an effect on the unemployment rate, which the report said declined to 8.3 percent in January. The president is right about one thing: his big government agenda and class warfare tactics are having an effect -- but it's not the one he claims. In truth, last month's drop in the unemployment statistic was due largely to the evaporation of 1.2 million people from the labor force number. When people become so discouraged they stop actively looking for work, they are no longer counted as unemployed...

<p>As searches dragged on, many just stopped looking. Now they aren’t even counted among the jobless.</p> <p>Jackson Julien looked for a fun job, then for anything. Finally, demoralization set in.</p> <p>Millions of Americans have vanished from the US labor force in the past three years, many of them so discouraged by long, fruitless job searches that they have given up looking for work, convinced that no employer wants them, according to a new study.</p>

The American public's dependence on the federal government shot up 23% in just two years under President Obama, with 67 million now relying on some federal program, according to a newly released study by the Heritage Foundation. The conservative think tank's annual Index of Dependence on Government tracks money spent on housing, health, welfare, education subsidies and other federal programs that were "traditionally provided to needy people by local organizations and families." The increase under Obama is the biggest two-year jump since Jimmy Carter was president, the data show. The rise was driven mainly by increases in housing subsidies, an...

Some issues fade; others fester. The Obama administration’s contraceptive mandate for religious charities, hospitals and universities is the festering kind. The initial reaction concerned the rights of institutions. Catholic organizations naturally resent being forced to buy health insurance that covers sterilization, contraceptives and drugs that can end a pregnancy soon after conception. The Obama administration seems to have calculated that, since contraceptives are popular and the Catholic Church is not, the outcry would be isolated. But religious liberty is also popular, given the Constitution and all that.