Threat of Beer Shortage Forces Republicans to Capitulate in Minnesota

President Obama – I have a solution for you!

Since the debt crisis will force a government shutdown – perhaps what needs to happen is to shut down beer production and delivery…

As the Olympic Beer riot showed, white folks in this country will go crazy with no beer! It would be National Tar and Feather a Rethugly Day…

In about 2 weeks.

One by one, bars get tapped out

Hundreds of bars, restaurants and stores across Minnesota are running out of beer and alcohol and others may soon run out of cigarettes — a subtle and largely unforeseen consequence of a state government shutdown.

In the days leading up to the shutdown, thousands of outlets scrambled to renew their state-issued liquor purchasing cards. Many of them did not make it.

Now, with no end in sight to the shutdown, they face a summer of fast-dwindling alcohol supplies and a bottom line that looks increasingly bleak…

Dayton, GOP reach a budget deal to end the two-week government shutdown

DFL Gov. Mark Dayton and GOP legislative leaders announced Thursday evening they have reached a budget deal to end a two week government shutdown.

After a three-hour meeting with GOP leaders, Dayton said the shutdown will be done “very soon, within days.”

Dayton agreed to drop his insistence on a tax hike and accept the Republican offer to borrow money to balance the budget.

But the governor said the deal must include a $500 million bonding package for new building projects around the state, withdrawal of the divisive social issue proposals now threaded through Republican spending bills, and elimination of the GOP proposal to reduce the state workforce by 15 percent.

House Speaker Kurt Zellers, R-Maple Grove, said he will have the votes in the House to pass the agreement.

Senate Majority Leader Amy Koch, R-Buffalo, agreed. “We believe the caucus will ultimately support this.”

President Obama… Is That a Spine?

Increasingly frustrated with Republican obstructionism, President Obama is finally doing something he should have been doing all along…

Getting out that rhetorical 2 x 4.

President Obama lashes out at Republicans: Raise taxes for the rich, don’t cut services for middle class

President Obama ratcheted up rhetoric in the heated deficit talks Saturday, challenging Republicans to support students and seniors rather than the rich.

Obama acknowledged that tough choices would be required as the budget deadline approached – and drew a stark contrast between the alleged priorities of the two parties.

“Now, it would be nice if we could keep every tax break, but we can’t afford them,” said Obama in his weekly radio address. “Because if we choose to keep those tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires, or for hedge fund managers and corporate jet owners, or for oil and gas companies pulling in huge profits without our help – then we’ll have to make even deeper cuts somewhere else.”

Obama echoed his frustrated remarks from his press conference last week, saying that sacrifices would be forced onto the backs of the less-fortunate if the Republicans would not consider taxes on the wealthy.

“We’ve got to say to a student, ‘You don’t get a college scholarship,’” he said. “We have to say to a medical researcher, ‘You can’t do that cancer research.’ We might have to tell seniors, ‘You have to pay more for Medicare.’”

“That isn’t right and it isn’t smart,” Obama said.

The President praised the first round of bipartisan deficit talks – led by Vice President Biden - that identified $1 trillion in possible cuts.

But negotiations stalled last week after Republicans refused to consider any tax increases. The Senate cancelled a planned recess next week to keep budget talks alive.

Federal officials said that he nation will reach its debt ceiling in early August and would no longer be able to borrow money to keep the government working. White House officials have said a preliminary deal must be reached by July 22 to guarantee there would not be a shutdown.

I don’t believe you wanna get up and dance…

Small Business Owners Leave Republican Plantation Over Tax Cuts For the Rich

It is becoming ever more painfully obvious that the Republican Tax Giveaway to the Rich is a major element in the country’s finances being in freefall. The Chamber of Commerce has increasingly become noting but a propaganda arm of the Republican Party, much like Faux News.

Small Business Owners Demand Repeal Of Bush Tax Cuts For The Rich

Michael Teahan, like his father, mother, and uncles before him, is a small business owner. The 52-year-old has spent most of his adult life running his own businesses: a restaurant, a coffee bar and various companies involved in the espresso machine business.

“I was the only person in my family to go to college, because that’s not what we did — we all opened up businesses,” Teahan says. “For some people, that’s a big hurdle … for us, it was like having lunch.”

Teahan currently operates Espresso Resource, a company that imports espresso machine parts from Europe to sell to U.S. restaurants and coffee shops. And he’s doing very well for himself: The two-man operation clears about $1 million a year in total sales, Teahan says — enough to secure himself annual income in excess of $250,000.

That makes Teahan one of the few small business owners to actually benefit from the Bush administration’s tax cuts for the wealthy. He says the cuts save him about $12,000 a year, compared to what he paid before they were enacted. But as debates over the federal budget deficit have intensified, Teahan has found the political discussion increasingly divorced from the reality of his experience as a small business owner.

Tax cuts for the wealthy, according to Teahan, will do nothing to bolster his firm. They won’t affect his hiring decisions, they won’t encourage him to buy new equipment or help him move into a bigger warehouse. He says all of those decisions — the nuts and bolts of actually running a small company — depend on the his customers’ economic conditions, not his personal tax rate.

“What we do in business, how we spend our money, how we allocate our resources — that has very little to do with tax policy,” Teahan says. “I map my business based on my customers, and what my customers want to buy, and what they can afford to buy.”

Texas Miracle… Anther Fraud

What do the Texas “Education Miracle” and the Texas “Budget Miracle” have in common?

Really Big, Really Deep Holes...Good Places to Put Dead Rogue Elephants.

They are both frauds perpetrated by Republicans.

The Texas Education Miracle? This from one of the first people who broke the story about the fraud, George Scott -

The leadership of the Texas Republican Party in the Legislature and at the TEA made a calculated decision (individually and collectively) to permit the State of Texas to lie to parents about the academic skills of Texas students.

In validating, promoting and enshrining the lie, Texas Republicans have followed the path of many of their national counterparts.  They abandoned their principles and recruited allies to validate the academic corruption.  In sum, politicians, bureaucrats, many academicians and scores of public policy researchers reaped great financial, professional or political benefits from the schemes.

The same Texas Republican Party and Legislature is now doing it with the Texas Budget. After supposedly defying the national trend by fueling growth by tax cuts and budget cuts… The Piper has come home with a vengeance. The State is now projected to be $25 BILLION in the red. But like the Enron disaster of cooked books…The $25 billion number may well be the tip of the iceberg, in that the books may have been cooked to show the state with a surplus all along when it was in the red.

Conservative philosophy fails… Again.

The Texas Omen

These are tough times for state governments. Huge deficits loom almost everywhere, from California to New York, from New Jersey to Texas.

Wait — Texas? Wasn’t Texas supposed to be thriving even as the rest of America suffered? Didn’t its governor declare, during his re-election campaign, that “we have billions in surplus”? Yes, it was, and yes, he did. But reality has now intruded, in the form of a deficit expected to run as high as $25 billion over the next two years.

How Stupid is the New Right?

In the new Republican tradition of never letting the facts get in the way of a good rant – the new Congressional Republican Clown Show proposes to balance the budget…

By cutting a program…

The Real Target

that doesn’t exist anymore.

Blinded by the word “Welfare”, and in a wild rush for a chance to take a shot at the people they percieve as beneficiaries (Black mothers and children)…

They didn’t bother to check their facts (again).

Republican Study Committee Recommends Cutting Welfare Program That Already Expired

The Republican Study Committee on Mondayrecommended reducing the deficit by cutting a welfare program that lards the federal budget with $2.5 billion in wasteful spending every year.

The Committee, led by Rep. Tom Price (Ga.), called for cutting the $2.5 billion Emergency Fund created by the stimulus bill to help states subsidize jobs via the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, formerly known as welfare. Price has targeted the program as part of House Republicans’ “YouCut” initiative to reduce federal spending.

“The goal of welfare programs should be to help people get back on their feet as quickly as possible rather than simply expanding dependence on government,” Price said in a statement. “In addition to saving taxpayers $25 billion over the next 10 years, cutting the emergency fund from the President’s failed stimulus package will refocus temporary assistance on its rightful role.”

Problem is, the TANF Emergency Fund has already expired, along with the 240,000 jobs progressive economists say it created.

“Republicans claim to be serious about reducing the deficit but yet they roll out a proposal to eliminate a program that no longer exists,” said Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.) in a statement. “What’s next — claiming savings for cutting New Deal work programs that were terminated over 70 years ago?

“The real question is when are Republicans going to abandon this sort of hollow rhetoric and get serious about the problems facing this country?”

A spokesman for the committee did not immediately respond to a request for comment from HuffPost.

 

Gov David Paterson – And the New York Budget Axe

Most dangerous politician in the world is one with nothing to lose. Faced with a totally currupt and dysfunctional legislature, some rather questionable judges, and a complete refusal by the State’s Labor Unions to negotiate any solution which might ward off disaster…

Governor David Paterson dropped the axe. And it’s just the beginning of what needs to be done to get the state back on it’s financial feet. Since Paterson doesn’t have any expectation of an elected political future – he may be just the guy to clean up the mess in NY.

The Axeman Cometh

Gov. David Paterson orders layoffs of 8,900 New York state employees amid economic downturn

Gov. Paterson ordered 8,900 state jobs slashed Tuesday to help close a budget deficit that has ballooned by another $2.2 billion.While some jobs will be lost through attrition, the bulk will be through layoffs that would begin in July, Paterson budget spokesman Jeffrey Gordon said.

Paterson aides say the cuts – the first large-scale layoffs since Gov. George Pataki laid off 2,500 workers in 1995-96 – would save the state $481 million.

Gordon said the governor was forced to make the move after the state’s major unions refused to agree to concessions – or come up with a savings plan.

“The governor believes this is a truly unfortunate situation,” Gordon said. “It is not where he wanted to end up. He worked very hard to avoid this outcome.”

Gordon said the administration has been talking with the unions about concessions since October.

“We tried numerous times to modify proposals to minimize the potential impact on state employees,” he said. “All offers were rejected.”

NY Gov. David Paterson – Budget Battles and Conservative Welfare Queens

The State of New York is $9.2 billion underwater this year. With a New York Senate in virtual gridlock, this means spending a lot of time trying to figure out what to cut and how. The NY Legislature is again – Missing in Action.

The NY Legislature has left town with no budget, leaving the status of a number of things in doubt. It now appears that the State’s once ubiquitous Off Track Betting Parlors are out of business. The results of the budget crisis will also be felt in the Parks and Schools. One of the other issues is State employee salaries, which have risen 3% in each of the last 3 years, and are scheduled to rise 4% this year.

Lastly – yesterday was “Tax Day”, where a bunch of Republican Tea Bagger clowns running around the country protesting whatever.  Governor Paterson points out indirectly that the states which are in the Republican Red Zone, are the ideological center of the Tea Baggers – and are now threatening to raise Militias to protect themselves from the “evil” Federal Government…

Are the biggest Welfare Queens in the country.

There are at least 25 states that get more Federal aid back than they pay in to the system. Of those 25, 19 are “red states,” i.e., voted Republican in the last presidential election.

For example, Gov. Sanford’s South Carolina gets back $1.35 for each dollar paid in federal taxes. Gov. Jindal’s Louisiana gets $1.78 on every dollar sent in.  And Gov. Palin’s Alaska gets a whopping $1.84 in federal aid for every dollar it sends to Washington.

And that’s not counting stimulus funds.

On the flip side, Michigan — with a 12.6% unemployment rate — loses 8 cents on every dollar it sends in federal taxes. California (10.4% unemployment), gives up 22 cents. Illinois, 25 cents. And New Jersey (8.2%), coughs up 39 cents on every dollar of federal tax paid. All of them are, of course, blue states — and they’re not the only ones.

That is, these Red States tend to receive a lot more Federal Tax money than they pay out. So when these Tea Bagger monkeys jump up and down about their “taxes” – you need to remember that in large part, they are not paying the freight for the services they receive. Federal spending doesn’t create jobs? OK – let’s shut down a few of those big arsed Military Bases in the Red Zone, and let’s see about those “jobs”.

The right wing wants to play “Starve the Beast“, and obstruction – maybe it’s time to take that down to the State level – and put some of these Bozos on a “Pay as you go” plan.

Meanwhile, in New York…