PROVOCATION

21 April 2011

Imbecilic Statements made by president Obama!
By Morris L. Clopton

These statements made this month by president Obama. Recall if you will that, this is the president who along with his democratic congress set forth on a sworn path to rape, pillage, and disembowel, our great Republic. His chosen methods included increasing spending to create a fourteen and one-half trillion dollar debt (that is with twelve zeros 14,500,000,000,000.00) a debt that unborn and even those that are not an idea in the minds of their mother and father are compelled to pay. These individuals have no say, no chance to repute this travesty imposed upon them by president Obama. Do you not find that gutless? President Obama forced a stimulus bill through congress that repaid his union thug friends but did nothing to stimulate the economy. The second stimulus went to the teachers union again nothing to help the economy. Yet the president touts his stimulus as generating jobs, while our un-employment rate is higher than it has ever been.

“Barack Obama was my college classmate (Columbia University, class of ’83). As Glenn Beck correctly predicted from day one, Obama is following the plan of Cloward & Piven, two professors at Columbia University. They outlined a plan to socialize America by overwhelming the system with government spending and entitlement demands. Add up the clues below. Taken individually they’re alarming. Taken as a whole, it is a brilliant, Machiavellian game plan to turn the United States into a socialist/Marxist state with a permanent majority that desperately needs government for survival … and can be counted on to always vote for bigger government. Why not? They have no responsibility to pay for it.” Shawn McCall

President Obama made the statement that “the government should not spend more than it takes in, in revenue” this from the same president who is and wants to continue spending our Republic into oblivion. President Obama speaking to gullible college students led them to believe that the proposed GOP budget would damn them to poverty and oblivion. The present democratic policy will ensure that there is no Medicare of Medicaid available for this generation under democratic policy presently in existence. On the other hand, the proposed GOP budget will enable future Medicare recipients to fund their own health care via wise investment choices. In Palo Alto president Obama speaking from an apparent scripted question and answer time with Mark E. Zuckerberg on Facebook, president Obama slammed Paul Ryan’s GOP budget as being cowardly and seeking to have economic recovery on the backs of the poor middle class. Recall again that it is the democrats who are cutting Medicare and Medicaid right now. Paul Ryan has proposed budget would not make any changes in Medicare or Medicaid until 2021. The president had to give a wavier to seniors on their Medicare benefits because of the cuts affected today by democratic supported health care bill. It is sad that our republican controlled congress does not have the intestinal fortitude to create and pass a bill requiring the government to not spend more than it receives in revenue and credit it to president Obama.

Please contact you U.S. Representative and Senators and let them know what you think.

I mentioned in this earlier email that I was going to start writing my representatives in Washington. I already sent on with regard to ObamaCare and I just sent another email to my Congressman, which I have included below. My email addressed what I consider the two most important issues that need to be resolved right now. Most of you do not need words from me, but I just want everyone to know that I’m in this fight and I hope all of you will join me.

I’ll be sending a weekly reminder to Congressman Conaway until I start to see some positive results from The House of Representatives.

Thanks, Al

I think most, if not all, of you have seen this at least once before. It’s time for “we the people” to do something to get all restrictions on oil drilling in the US lifted.

The last big argument in Congress on this issue occurred when Bill Clinton was president. The Republicans wanted to lift all drilling restrictions for oil in the US but the Democrats, including Clinton, argued that it would take 10 years to reap the benefits of drilling for oil in the US. Well guess what! That excuse took place over 10 years ago. Oil companies said at the time that it would not take 10 years, they said 5 years at the most. Even if it had taken 10 years, as the all knowing Democrats argued, we would now be enjoying much lower gas prices today.

The only way we’re going to get the restrictions lifted is to start hammering our representatives in Washington on a weekly basis. Fill their Inboxes with demands to lift the restrictions NOW!

What are we waiting for, another 10 years to pass and the price of gas to reach 8 or 10 dollars a gallon before we demand that Congress stop the absurdity, and permit drilling in the US once again? God put the oil in the ground for a purpose, to supply our needs, and we need to use it instead of continuing to pay the outrageous prices for foreign oil.

I’m going to start writing my representatives every week and I encourage each of you to do the same.

Thanks, Al

Dear Congressman Conaway:

A majority of the voters in last November’s election voted to return control of the House of Representatives to the Republicans, as we were tired of the direction president Obama and the liberal democrats were taking our country. We tried very hard to return control of the Senate to the Republicans as well, but came up a little short, however, we will finish that job in the 2012 election.

I’m sure you’re well aware of the many very important issues that must be addressed by the 112th Congress in order to save our country from the devastating and destructive direction president Obama and the liberal democrats have taken our country in just two short years.I am writing to you regarding the two most important issues, in my opinion, that need to be addresses immediately.

1) ObamaCare MUST be Repealed. We elected Republicans in November because they promised to do just that. While I’m certainly glad that the House wasted no time in voting to Repeal this horrible bill, I’m sad that the Senate did not have the votes to Repeal. However, the next best thing to Repealing the bill is to Defund it. But, if the House continues to pass Continuing Resolutions to fund Government for short periods of time, without stripping all funding of ObamaCare from any Continuing Resolution, including the recently discovered $105 Billion that was hidden in the bill to fund ObamaCare, regardles of how the November election turned out, you are in effect voting FOR ObamaCare. That is not acceptable by the American people.

I must say I am very disappointed in the House leadership for not taking the lead on this issue. They have failed to get out front and tell the American people just what has happened with this bill, why Obama and the liberal democrats hid this additional $105 Billion funding in the bill for the express purpose of deceiving the people. This can not stand. We need House leadership that will take the case to the American people and explain why and how this was done by Obama, Pelosi and Reid . The current House Speaker seems to have trouble standing up for the promises that were made by the Republicans during the November election. If the current Speaker can not and will not do the job we expect him to do, then the House needs to replace him with someone who can and will. It’s as simple as that. The only Congressional member that I have heard standing up for the American people on this issue is Freshman Congresswoman Michele Bachmann. While I are very pleased to see her trying to fulfill the promise made by the Republicans during the November election, I am very disappointed by the ABsence of anyone in a leadership position taking on this issue. It’s like they are afraid to stand up and be counted. Have they forgotten that a majority of the people are behind them?

We are tired of still being pushed around by the president and the democrats, even though they lost control of the House in November. We need and expect someone who will take on the president and the democrats and do what is necessary to get this country back on the right track. We will expect nor accept anything less. I would hope that you will remind the House leadership of their promises made during the November election.

2) We’ve got to lift all restrictions on drilling for oil, both on and offshore, in this country, as our future depends on this. We can no longer afford to be held hostage to the Oil Producing Countries of the Middle East. The lame excuse offered by Bill Clinton and the democrats, more than 10 years ago, was that it would take 10 years to see any results from drilling for oil right here at home. Many oil companies indicated back then that it would take only 5 years or less, not 10. Even if it had taken 10 years, as Clinton and the democrats insisted, had we started drilling back then we’d be paying a lot less at the gas pumps today. But, here we are, still sending billions of dollars overseas for a product we have in abundance here in the US. God put the oil in the ground for a purpose, to serve our needs, therefore, we MUST start drilling again. NOW not LATER!!!

These are the two issues that could be resolved right now, if the Republican leadership would take the argument to the American people, just as former President Ronald Reagan did so many times. They might be surprised with the support they would receive, as Health Care and Gas Prices are two things that every American can relate to. The cost of each of these not only affects our pocketbooks, it affects our way of life, in fact, the future of our country. Doing the right thing is not always easy, but it is always the right thing to do. The Republicans need to do the right thing for the people and for the country. The time is NOW. We’re all depending on you. I hope you will not let us down.

A Frustrated Conservative,
Al Couch
Kempner, Texas

12 August 2010

Where has the American Dream gone?
By Morris Clopton

Growing up the challenge to improve myself through study and hard work consistently drove me to seek to improve. Opportunities lost returned when thought, time and effort coupled with acquiring skills and knowledge provided open doors. The sixty-seven years that God is providing for me enabled a vast array of educational and school of hard knocks experiences. Like steel that is hardened and tempered by the application of intense heat and sudden cooling, life nurtures physical, mental, and spiritual maturity with experiences.

Today I am aware of an increasingly large portion of our population that rather than participate in the growth and prosperity of our nation chooses to take from those who generate income. The entitlement mentality spawns generations of individuals with no incentive to produce wealth. These individuals choose to demand that the government take care of them rather than build upon an educations, skills and knowledge acquired. The innate desire to consume rather than produce spreads like cancer through our nation crippling job production, product creation, and new inventions all with the skewed thought process of let someone else do it.

Our government seeks to foster this entitlement mentality, because such mentality provides office holders with power by creating a population, which is obligated to the office holder. The sad result the recipients of government entitlements are too ignorant to realize that the office holder providing the miniscule entitlement is raping those same individuals to increase his or her own wealth. Our politicians berate the rich while stuffing their pockets with millions seeking to elevate their personal wealth and well-being at the expense of the people that elected them. How intelligent people listen to the diatribe coming out of Washington about how the Democrats are going to tax the rich or take from the rich and re-distribute wealth and not realize that the office holder is extremely wealthy himself is mind boggling. Do what I say not what I do seems to be the order of the day for politicians. They want you and I to believe it is ok for them to be rolling in wealth as long as they pretend to care about you.

The ruling Left would have us believe that their actions no matter how macabre they may be are reasonable and just. Consider for a moment the consistent beating of political drums by the Left that prohibits any hint of offering thanks to the God who created all that is; in any form or fashion in any avenue of our society today. However, it is perfectly ok according to the left to take your tax dollars and spend them to promote Islam at the expense of Christianity. Where is the separation of State and Church here?
EDITORIAL: Tax dollars to build mosques
U.S. underwrites fundraising tour for Islamic shrine at Ground Zero

By THE WASHINGTON TIMES
The Washington Times
7:46 p.m., Tuesday, August 10, 2010
The State Department is sending Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf – the mastermind of the Ground Zero Mosque – on a trip through the Middle East to foster “greater understanding” about Islam and Muslim communities in the United States. However, important questions are being raised about whether this is simply a taxpayer-funded fundraising jaunt to underwrite his reviled project, which is moving ahead in Lower Manhattan.

Mr. Rauf is scheduled to go to Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Bahrain and Qatar, the usual stops for Gulf-based fundraising. The State Department defends the five-country tour saying that Mr. Rauf is “a distinguished Muslim cleric,” but surely the government could find another such figure in the United States who is not seeking millions of dollars to fund a construction project that has so strongly divided America…

Further expenditures of our tax dollars to rebuild mosque in foreign countries: Where is the separation of Church and State here?
Comments: EDITORIAL: Tax dollars to build mosques – Washington Times
Aug 10, 2010 … In NYS we had tax payer money accumulated in excess of our awful tax … Why should we spend a penny rebuilding some dilapidated mosque …

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/…/tax…mosques/comments/…

In Montana, a Fight Over Separation of Church and Fairgrounds
By Tess Civantos
Published August 11, 2010
FoxNews.com

Our government controlled judicial system continues to destroy the moral fiber of out great nation by over ruling the voice of 7 million voters:

WISDOM: Marriage over the rainbow
Ruling would make traditional believers enemies of the state

By Alan F.H. Wisdom

-

The Washington Times

6:32 p.m., Wednesday, August 11, 2010

U.S. District Judge Vaughn R. Walker’s Aug. 4 ruling striking down California’s Proposition 8 asserted far more than was necessary to redefine marriage as being between any two persons. Judge Walker’s decision included controversial “findings of fact” that amounted to a massive new salvo in the culture wars over sexuality.

Drawing up his judicial robes, Judge Walker rejected “stereotypes and misinformation” that “have resulted in social and legal disadvantages for gays and lesbians.” He denied that there is “any rational basis” for distinguishing the marriage of man and woman from same-sex relationships. For example, Judge Walker found no reason why the state should prefer that a child grow up with his or her mother and father. “The genetic relationship between a parent and a child is not related to a child’s adjustment outcomes,” he declared as “fact.”

Having dismissed the stated motives of Proposition 8 supporters, the judge claimed to have “uncloak[ed]” their true motives: “The evidence shows conclusively that moral and religious views form the only basis for a belief that same-sex couples are different from opposite-sex couples.”…

KNIGHT: Marriage ruling is only a ‘ban’ on truth
Intelligentsia morph language to disguise immorality

By Robert Knight
The Washington Times

6:32 p.m., Wednesday, August 11, 2010
The word “ban” is negative. Like “taboo,” the term offends modern sensibilities trained to be ever more accepting of any envelope-pushing behavior.

That’s why the media describe California’s Proposition 8 constitutional marriage law as a “ban,” not the codification of something positive and timeless. The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) has been misreported for years as the “federal ban on gay marriage.” So when “smarter than God” federal Judge Joseph L. Tauro in Massachusetts dispatched DOMA on July 9, the media thundered as one: “Judge Strikes Down Gay Marriage Ban.”

Similarly, in California, federal Judge Vaughn R. Walker was widely reported to have struck down the state’s “ban on gay marriage” in his Aug. 4 ruling. The New York Times put it this way: “Court Rejects Same-Sex Marriage Ban in California.” Actually, Judge Walker took his activist ax to the meaning of marriage itself and the meaning of representative democracy in a free republic…

Our government seeks to deny entrepreneurship, destroying private enterprise by race and politics.

EDITORIAL: Engineered by Obama Motors
Automakers run on race-based political calculations

By THE WASHINGTON TIMES

The Washington Times

7:46 p.m., Tuesday, August 10, 2010
A report by the Troubled Asset Relief Program’s inspector general, Neil M. Barofsky, underscores the danger of handing control of private enterprise to government bureaucrats. In running General Motors and Chrysler, the Obama administration’s Auto Team made decisions based on what its members know best: race and politics.

After taking over the bankrupt carmakers, the administration ordered the immediate termination of one-quarter of existing dealerships – but not for business reasons. “Key members of the Auto Team … stated that they did not consider cost savings to be a factor in determining the need for dealership closures,” Mr. Barofsky wrote in his July 19 report. “Nevertheless, GM officials stated that they developed the cost-savings estimate … after being ‘pressed’ during meetings with congressional representatives to explain the cost savings that would result from the dealership terminations.”

These after-the-fact justifications were needed after Congress learned that closing 2,243 dealerships would cost nearly 100,000 jobs. GM invented a savings estimate of $2.6 billion, and Chrysler said its closings would save $35.9 million. Insiders reported the numbers were little more than a “math exercise” based on highly questionable assumptions, with one GM official admitting the hasty closure plan “might even cost GM money.”

GM set up a scoring system to determine the most valuable dealerships, but affirmative action was used to pick which survived. “Other dealerships were retained because they … were minority- or woman-owned dealerships,” Mr. Barofsky explained. The administration also pressured GM to cut rural dealerships. Mr. Barofsky’s office interviewed independent experts who confirmed that domestic automakers “had an advantage over their import competitors” in rural markets and that cutting dealerships in those areas would harm domestic sales. The O Force’s disdain for red states and their tendency to “cling to guns or religion” can’t be coincidental…

Our challenge today is clear, we must continue to educate ourselves, stand up for what is right, challenge our elected government, and VOTE!

Becoming involved in local, county, state and national politics is more important than ever before in our short history as a nation. Do not let a group of self-serving politicians destroy the greatest nation in the world. Each individual is responsible do not depend on someone else to do for you what you must do for yourselves.

Social Security!

I COULDN’T forward this FAST enough……….!!

2010 is an election year for 1/3 of the senate and ALL of the house of
representatives. It would be nice if congress got the message; the
voting taxpayers are in charge now.

LET US SHOW OUR LEADERS IN WASHINGTON “PEOPLE POWER” AND THE POWER OF THE INTERNET. PLEASE FORWARD TO ALL OF YOUR FRIENDS.

IT DOESN’T MATTER IF YOU ARE REPUBLICAN OR DEMOCRAT!

KEEP IT GOING!!!!

Propose this:

START A BILL TO PLACE ALL POLITICIANS ON SOCIAL SECURITY

———— ——— ——— —-

SOCIAL SECURITY:

(This is worth reading. It is short and to the point.)

Perhaps we are asking the wrong questions during election years.

Our Senators and Congresswomen do not pay into Social Security and, of
course, they do not collect from it.

You see, Social Security benefits were not suitable for persons of their
rare elevation in society. They felt they should have a special plan for
themselves So, many years ago they voted in their own benefit plan.

In more recent years, no congress person has felt the need to change it.
After all, it is a great plan.

For all practical purposes their plan works like this:

When they retire, they continue to draw the same pay until they die.
Except it may increase from time to time for cost of living adjustments.
….

For example, Senator Byrd and Congressman White and their wives may
expect to draw $7, 800,000.00 (that’s Seven Million, Eight-Hundred
Thousand Dollars), with their wives drawing $275, 000….00 during the
last years of their lives.
This is calculated on an average life span for each of those two
Dignitaries.

Younger Dignitaries who retire at an early age, will receive much more
during the rest of their lives.

Their cost for this excellent plan is $0.00. ZIP!! NADA!!! ZILCH!!!

This little perk they voted for themselves is free to them. You and I
pick up the tab for this plan.. The funds for this fine retirement plan
come directly from the General Funds;

“OUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK”!

From our own Social Security Plan, which you and I pay (or have paid)
into, every payday until we retire (which amount is matched by our
employer ), We can expect to get an average of $1,000 per month after
retirement.

Or, in other words, we would have to collect our average of $1,000 mo
nthly benefits for 68 years and one (1) month to equal Senator Bill
Bradley’s benefits!

Social Security could be very good if only one small change were made.

That change would be to

Jerk the Golden Fleece Retirement Plan from under the Senators and
Congressmen. . Put them into the Social Security plan with the rest of
us

Then sit back…..

And see how fast they would fix it!

If enough people receive this, maybe a seed of awareness will be planted
and maybe good changes will evolve.

How many people can YOU send this to?

Better yet……

How many people WILL you send this to ?
PS. The same goes for their health plan Read the rest of this entry »

What’s Wrong with a little Wealth Redistribution anyway?
By Daniel Greenfield Friday, May 29, 2009

Word that the Obama Administration may have used its power over Chrysler’s restructuring process to shut down dealerships whose owners donated to Republican candidates, while leaving open dealerships that donated to Obama is spreading across conservative blogs. But while this kind of abuse of government power is shocking, it really shouldn’t be.

Government is an engine of wealth redistribution, and when it gains control of businesses, it redistributes wealth in a way that benefits its supporters. That is what government always does, no matter how it disguises it.

That is why despite all the leftist wishful thinking in the world, centrally planned economies are corrupt, inept and inefficient.

The free market operates based on profit motive. A store owner’s goal is to sell products in order to earn a profit. If he provides discounts, he has to do it based on an economic incentive, for example selling at a lower cost per unit to a purchaser who buys large quantities. A store owner who sells products at a lower price to Democrats and at a higher price to Republicans, or who sells at a lower price to whites and at a higher price to blacks… is hurting his own profit margins and so is really hurting himself.

The profit motive “purifies” economic behavior in the free market to a degree. By contrast within government there is no “purifier”, except the legal system, which is also controlled by the government.

A government’s economic behavior is controlled by politicians who have only one goal, Patronage. Politicians gain control of resources in order to reward their supporters. This takes the form of providing government contracts or jobs to the individual supporters. It also takes the form of providing general forms of aid targeted at their base, e.G. Welfare, union jobs.

When government gains control of businesses, it naturally goes into wealth redistribution mode and begins providing patronage to the supporters of the ruling party. Communist countries are a example of the system taken to its limits, with the entire economy controlled by the ruling party and wealth distributed to supporters of the party, based on their level of support and affiliation.

The more wealth the Federal government took in and gave out, the more it got into the patronage business. And that corrupted the free market and the national economy. Where individual businesses have economic disincentives for practicing discrimination or handing out wasteful contracts, the government has none.

Where individual free market profit is economic in nature, governments spend money in order to reward supporters and expand their base of support. Everything the Obama regime has done is textbook Machiavelli, but it is also the inevitable result of letting the same government that has treated the national budget as a pork barrel take holds of banks and the auto industry.

The rape of the American auto industry by Obama and his henchmen
No doubt there is a long list of industries that Obama will be happy to “bail out”, and by bail out, we mean of course spend billions in taxpayer owned debt to take over, carve up and hand out to their supporters.

The rape of the American auto industry by Obama and his henchmen was a classic case of a gang of politicians robbing the country blind in order to provide patronage to their backers, both at the union and the dealership level. But that is par for the course.

Obama promised to fix the capitalist arrogance of the free market with some wealth redistribution, which is a lot like a mugger telling you that he can cure your credit card debt by taking all your money. Now we’re seeing just how far that mugging went and how many victims it’s leaving behind. And we’re not done yet.

If the initial phase was the mugging, the next phase is that the beating the mugger dished out transmitted a disease which is now in the veins of his victim. When government takes control of an industry, it immediately promotes rent seeking behavior in order to increase its own wealth and power. This naturally drives up the cost of everything, produces inferior products and adds layers on bureaucracy on top of everything.

CAFE and a big package of regulations will insure that Chrysler and GM produce cars that meet the standards of the left, and that no one will actually want to buy or drive. The government naturally will buy the cars, both for itself, and subsidize their purchase for the “disadvantaged.” Sallie Mae and Freddie Mac will have an auto buddy who exists to insure the “right” of everyone to own a car, with loans to people who can’t pay them, for cars they can’t afford.

If Obama gets his way, the US auto industry will wind up looking like it’s Soviet counterpart, a government subsidized white elephant that will benefit no one but politicians and their supporters. And it will once again serve as a textbook example of what’s wrong with wealth redistribution, and how absolute government power over the free market, corrupts it absolutely into patronage.

Obama’s Stimulus Creates Useless Jobs
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
By Ben Shapiro

There’s one reason, and one reason only, that President Barack Obama’s “stimulus” passed so swiftly through Congress: Most Americans are worried about their jobs. And Barack Obama promises to save or create four million jobs.

Even Obama’s most ardent opponents embrace the “make jobs” programs embedded in the stimulus. “Construction projects that put people to work, that fits the bill,” Sarah Palin told Greta Van Susteran of Fox News. “But these big, huge, expanded social programs … that’s not right, that’s not fair.”

Neither Republicans nor Democrats get it. The problem isn’t just the pork barrel social welfare spending. It’s not merely the redistributionist scheme disguised as “tax cuts.” The public relations backbone of this bill—government spending on our nation’s “crumbling infrastructure”—is misguided. While the country’s infrastructure may need revamping, this sort of spending will not stimulate the economy. It will not create the kind of jobs Americans need.

When politicians embrace government “make jobs” programs, they demonstrate a fundamental misunderstanding of the role of employment in the economy. The goal of a thriving economy isn’t full employment—it’s raising the standard of living. Employment rate means nothing if the jobs it measures do not create wealth for the economy.

During the Great Depression (1930-1940), the United States had an average unemployment rate of almost 18 percent; the USSR, by contrast, had “full employment.” And yet when the Oscar-nominated movie “The Grapes of Wrath,” chronicling the Great Depression, premiered in 1941, the USSR banned the movie for the simple reason that the poverty-stricken Joads owned a car—a luxury virtually no Soviet outside the government enjoyed. Full employment did not breed prosperity.

That’s because not all jobs are created equal. Valuable jobs provide products and services the free market supports; useless jobs provide products and services the free market would not support. Valuable jobs provide products and services that enrich quality of life, making it cheaper to live better; useless jobs provide products and services that have minor impact on quality of life.

Here’s the magic of private sector jobs. Imagine Bill owns a fruit stand. He sells his fruit for $2 per pound. Herman sees that Bill is doing well, and decides to open a fruit stand of his own. He figures he can undercut Bill and live on less of a profit margin, so he sells his fruit at $1 per pound. Pretty soon, Herman runs Bill out of business. It’s tough for Bill.

But meanwhile, customers are spending $1 less for their fruit than they were. They’re spending that extra money at Bob’s clothing store, keeping Bob employed—and Bob can now hire Bill. The bottom line is this: The power of free enterprise creates competition that raises production, lowers prices, and makes lives better for consumers and producers. And that’s true even if employment declines in the fruit stand business.

Now let’s look at government jobs. Imagine Cool Hand Luke works for the government as a menial laborer. He builds roads in New York. People don’t choose to pay Cool Hand Luke—the government forces them to pay his salary.

Now, certain people in New York may benefit from the new road. But they would rather have spent their cash on a new car, or a new computer, or a new business. And the people who live in California, who are also paying Cool Hand Luke, get nothing for their money. Their quality of life is not improved one iota. The bottom line is this: The government can always provide employment, but that employment will not benefit the public nearly as much as a private sector job would.

Americans instinctively understand that quality of life matters far more than employment rate—and that only valuable jobs increase quality of life. That is why Americans oppose Obama’s “stimulus” package.

According to the latest Rasmussen poll, 53 percent of Americans think the “stimulus” will either fail to stimulate or actually hurt the economy. Unsurprisingly, the only sector of the American economy that overwhelmingly supports the stimulus plan is government employees, by a margin of 49 percent to 24 percent.

And yet our politicians think they can appease us by offering us useless jobs. They think investment bankers will be happy to staff the bureaucracy at the Bureau of Indian Affairs. They believe Americans will be glad to subsidize Caterpillar Inc. Employees, rather than putting that cash in their own checking accounts.

Obama might prevent rising unemployment. After all, so did President Jimmy Carter. But he’ll do so at the cost of private sector employment. Americans will pay the price in standard of living—but at least they can say they have a job, no matter how useless.