Posts Tagged ‘datechguy's magnificent seven’

Joe Manchin’s capitulation to the Biden Regime will be catastrophically bad for the economy of the United States

Posted: August 4, 2022 by Jon Fournier in Uncategorized
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A few months ago, I praised Senator Joe Manchin for standing strong against the Democrats’ plans to fundamentally transform the United States into socialist third world hellhole.  With this article I am now singing a different story because just this past week Joe Manchin announced that he will now join forces with the Democrats in the destruction of the economy of the United States when he declared support for the ironically named Inflation Reduction Act.    

First, the bill proposes $433 billion in new spending programs, including $369 billion for “energy security and climate change” and $64 billion (at least) for more Obamacare subsidies.

Given the fact that energy prices have been soaring ever since Biden entered the Oval Office and declared war on American energy production, doubling down on green energy policies by throwing another $369 billion in subsidies for renewable energy is an unwise decision.  It will have no effect on bringing down the price of energy for the vast majority of Americans, which is one of the key drivers of inflation throughout the economy.

Inflation is commonly defined as too much money chasing too few goods and services.  When the federal government increases spending, the money supply increases.  When the money supply increases, the value of each dollar in circulation decreases.  Hence, inflation.  This is not rocket science.

Second, the bill calls for $739 billion in new taxes, including a 15-percent hike in the corporate minimum tax.  But here’s the thing: corporations do not pay taxes; people do.  When the government raises taxes on corporations, people end up footing the bill via higher prices, lower wages, less availability of goods and services, and reduced research and development.

In other words, increasing taxes on corporations compounds inflationary pressures because it deters production; therefore, we get less in goods and services.

This pile of refuse will also cripple the economy of the United States by raising taxes, despite the protestations of the factually challenged Democrats who wrote this bill, which is nothing more than a lighter version of the Green New Deal.

The Congressional Joint Committee on Taxation found that taxes would jump by $16.7 billion on American taxpayers making less than $200,000 in 2023 and raise another $14.1 billion on taxpayers who make between $200,000 and $500,000.

During the 10-year window, the average tax rate would go up for most income categories, the Senate GOP said, citing the data from the joint committee. And by 2031, new energy credits and subsidies would have people earning less than $400,000 pay as much as two-thirds of the additional tax revenue collected that year, the release said.

“Americans are already experiencing the consequences of Democrats’ reckless economic policies. The mislabeled ‘Inflation Reduction Act’ will do nothing to bring the economy out of stagnation and recession, but it will raise billions of dollars in taxes on Americans making less than $400,000,” said Sen. Mike Crapo, an Idaho Republican who sits on the Senate Finance Committee as a ranking member, and who requested the analysis.

As always, the Democrats can only claim the Inflation Redaction will be beneficial to the economy of the United Stated by playing fast and loose with the truth.

Democrats are at it again using budget gimmicks and fake sunsets to create savings on paper – just like they did in the $5 trillion Build Back Broke bill that passed the House last year – while in reality delivering more spending, more inflation, and more debt. In total, the Democrats’ current inflationary reconciliation bill will spend $728 billion and add $114 billion in new debt. It will dump more fuel on the inflation fire while layering on top billions in new taxes that will hit middle class families and U.S manufacturers. One has to ask a simple question, how will this do anything to help lower prices?

Joe Manchin appears to be delusional when he announced support for this farce.

I always wanted to do something I could for my country, and this is all about my country,” Manchin outlined. “It’s not about my politics or someone else’s politics or my friends on the Republican side or my friends on the Democrat side or whoever is upset with me. It had nothing to do about any of us. This is about what can we do for the country.”

He continued, “And right now, inflation is the greatest threat that we have. It’s hurting every West Virginian, I can assure you, at the gas pump, at the food store, and their energy bills, and just their daily lives. And if we have a chance — and I’ve said this all along — if I ever had a chance to have an energy policy that was balanced and we could basically make sure we were producing more energy for what we have rather than going around the world asking other people to produce for us, shouldn’t we do that? That’s something we all wanted, and that’s what we got out of this. It’s a great bill.”

Report from Louisiana: Back to School Wish Lists

Posted: August 1, 2022 by Pat Austin in Uncategorized
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By:  Pat Austin

Photo by Sharon McCutcheon on Unsplash

SHREVEPORT – This will be my second fall NOT to return to the classroom as a teacher! I retired a year and a half ago and let me tell you, I have zero regrets. Ze.Ro.

I loved my students, I loved my school, I loved my classroom, I loved my principal.

I did NOT love scripted curriculums. I hated dumbed-down curriculums. I hated the politics of it on all levels. The pure, unbridled vitriol from the public whenever the school board asked them for a raise. It was ugly.

So many things about public education are wrong. And so many good teachers have left the classroom because of this.

The pay is abysmal. And I have heard it all before: “You knew the pay was low when you signed up for this job.” Or, “You do it for the children, not the money.” Even, “But you have three months off in the summer and all those holidays!” 

In response: Yes, I knew the pay was low but I thought it would at least be a living wage without having to get a side hustle. Yes, I love the children, but I have bills to pay. And No, I do NOT get three months off in the summer. I was paid for nine months of work which was divided by twelve months so that I got a check every month. I never got paid for not working.

Now that my friends are returning after their summer break (which included professional development and workshops, all on their own time), they are posting pictures on social media showing off their classrooms “ready to go!”. And I am so glad I don’t have to do that.

They are also sharing their Amazon Wish Lists. This is one of the things wrong with public education. I was the beneficiary of many a gift through Amazon; I published my own Wish Lists and man people are generous! And when I decided to create a classroom library, and published a book wish list, people came through in spades. It was AMAZING!

But why oh why does an American public school educator have to do this? Most of these wish lists include items like looseleaf paper, pencils, pens, spiral notebooks, chalk, dry erase markers, tissue, hand sanitizer. It just seems to me that parents and schools should supply these very basic materials. And while I realize there are parents in need, and times are tough, we have “Stuff the Bus” campaigns all over town. And churches collecting supplies. And businesses collecting supplies.

I true “Wish List” should not have to include the minimal basics to educate a child. A “wish list” should include things like pretty room décor, a new teacher desk chair, a fancy keyboard, that sort of thing. Non-necessary things. My classroom library was a luxury – a Wish. It was great to have and my students benefitted greatly from it, but it wasn’t a basic necessity like paper and pencil.

It is sad to me that teachers have to beg for these supplies. It makes me wonder where is all the public education money really going? Over-inflated salaries? Sports programs? It’s certainly not being spent on the cafeteria lunches!

I picked a couple of teachers from my old school and sent a few things from their wish lists. I want to help where I can and I know how hard their job is.

And I’m really really glad it’s not MY job anymore!

Fact-checkers are gaslighting Americans over definition of a recession

Posted: July 31, 2022 by John Ruberry in business, economy, News/opinion, opinion/news, politics
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By John Ruberry

“The fliparoo theory of PolitiFact is now confirmed,” Dan Bongino said early in his July 28 podcast, “The fliparoo theory is this: If a fact-checker, airquotes, PolitiFact, says something is true it is probably false. If PolitiFact says something is false it’s probably true.”

Which means, of course, that we are now in a recession. PolitiFact, in a piece written by propagandist Louis Jacobson entitled, “No, the White House didn’t change the definition of ‘recession,'” he fact-checked a claim that originally came from an Instagram post. In seemingly 10,000 words, meant to overwhelm low-information voters, Jacobson ruled that statement false.

Jacobson is wrong, he’s gaslighting us. We are in a recession.

And Jacobson is not alone.

The Biden White House, led by the embarrassment of a press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, has been redefining “recession” for at least a week. For decades, the generally accepted definition of a recession has been two successive months of negative GDP growth. In the first quarter of 2022, the American economy shrank by 1.4 percent, and it contracted by 0.9 percent in the second quarter. These are facts. 

“However, the two-quarter threshold cited in the Instagram post has never been official,” Jacobson said in his so-called fact-check. “It’s more like a rough guide,” he continued, “one piece of a complicated puzzle.” Translation: the wise and oh-so-brilliant Jacobson is right, and you are a semi-literate yokel for accepting the commonly agreed upon description of a recession. 

In another overly long fact-check, Newsweek’s Tom Norton, another hack apologist, also ruled “false” the claim that the Biden White House is redefining what a recession is. “Furthermore, the White House website doesn’t have a dictionary or catalog of all political terminology and jargon it uses (that is the case for other governments, such as those of the UK and Canada, too),” Norton offered. 

Wow. I’m convinced. Not.

In Norton’s Newsweak–or is it Newspeak?— fact-check, Norton quotes Secretary of Treasury Janet Yellen, who, by the way, was wrong about inflation being “transitory,” that it is really up to a secretive private organization to determine a recession. Who knew? “There is an organization called the National Bureau of Economic Research that looks at a broad range of data in deciding whether or not there is a recession,” she revealed.

Another fact-check fabulist, the Washington Post’s Glenn Kessler, appears to be on vacation so he hasn’t weighed in on the leftist-induced recession debate. Three years ago, while fact-checking Donald Trump, Kessler wrote, “A recession is two quarters of negative economic growth.” But Joe Biden wasn’t president then.

Another prominent (along the lines of someone having an ugly prominent nose) fact-checker, USA Today, also hasn’t recently given its opinion on what a recession really is. Oh, what’s this? In a 2020 fact-check USA Today informed us, “A recession is generally defined as two consecutive quarters of declining GDP, or gross domestic product, a monetary measure of the market value of all the final goods and services produced during a specific time period.”

But on the other hand, Snopes is bowing to the Democrat Party mantra about recessions. Referring to a couple of social media messages, “The tweets quoted above may give readers the misleading impression that the Biden administration literally tried to revise the criteria economists use to determine when a recession has occurred. But that was not the case,” Bethania Palma chimes in for Snopes.

It is the case. Snopes is lying.

Here are some media talking heads talking not too long ago, based on who I see here and the chyrons, using the classical definition of a recession, in a montage compiled by the Media Research Center. You know the, you know the thing, as Biden likes to say, two consecutive quarters of declining GDP growth. C’mon man!

But, assuming briefly we are not in a recession when will we be in one? The Biden administration won’t say. Is it a recession when we have three successive quarters of declining growth? Four? Five-and-a-half?

Or will it be a recession only when there is a Republican president?

Dan Bongino is right. The fliparoo theory of “fact-checkers” is now confirmed. 

John Ruberry regularly blogs at Marathon Pundit.

How to know you’re in a recruitment crisis

Posted: July 30, 2022 by navygrade36bureaucrat in Uncategorized
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The news media has finally jumped on the military recruitment crisis. The smart, intelligent, witty and dashingly handsome readers of this blog that look just like you already knew it was coming because of all the previous reporting here. But let’s say you weren’t so smart, intelligent, witty and perhaps only average in your looks. Let’s say that this not-nearly-as-good version of you wanted to know the truth, because the media likes to blow up a small story into something big to make money. Would there be a way to figure out if the military was really struggling to recruit new members?

Well, stand-in dumber-version-of-you reader, there is, because you can use the military’s readily available instructions to figure out just that! But first, we need a primer on military recruitment and promotion.

Military manpower is a big pyramid scheme, with lots of young blood on at the base of the pyramid, and fewer crusty old folks at the top ranks. Most military members only serve for 3-5 years, getting out for the much greener pastures in the civilian world. The one’s that stay in have some pretty good incentives: guaranteed pay, a pretty cool mission, a chance to get skills and experience on fancy, taxpayer funded weapon systems, and that sweet, sexy uniform that entices all the ladies.

Well, and the guys too, I mean, its 2022 and we have to be all inclusive.

Anyway, this pyramid scheme of manpower relies on a big influx every year of new recruits. We’ve already talked at length about why normal recruiting isn’t working. If recruitment sags, the military has other tricks to keep its numbers up, namely by making it more difficult for people to leave. They can do this by not letting people leave early, or even go so far as to force people to stay.

Let’s say that hypothetically we recruit a lot more people then we really need. Instead of showing them the door, the military can allow other members a chance to leave early. OR the military can tighten down on physical fitness standards, which they can use to boot people out. OR they can create some new stupid rule that will piss people off, which will cause more existing members to leave. These rules are like the handle on a water faucet that you can adjust so the water flow is just right.

Knowing this, guess which way the handle is moving?

Let’s look at the Navy, which releases NAVADMIN messages. These are bland, dull administrative things that nobody except slightly-inebriated Sailors actually read. At the end of June, the Navy released NAVADMIN 142/22 titled FISCAL YEAR 2022 ACTIVE COMPONENT ENLISTED FORCE MANAGEMENT ACTIONS (CORRECTED COPY), because I guess the admin person made a mistake and had to correct it.

Doesn’t inspire much confidence in our administrative people!

Anyway, let’s read the message.

1.  The purpose of this NAVADMIN is to implement key force 
management personnel policy actions in the enlisted active component 
to ensure the Navy remains fully manned and operationally ready. 
References (a) and (b) are hereby updated for enlisted personnel. 
For those who have decided to separate, please review reference (c) 
for additional career progression opportunities in the Navys 
Selected Reserves.  Navy encourages all qualified Sailors to stay 
Navy.  See your career counselor for more information.  While we 
strive to retain all qualified Sailors, commanding officers should 
continue to exercise their obligation to document performance and 
adjust their recommendation for retention, accordingly. 
 
2.  Sailors are encouraged to look for selective reenlistment bonus 
(SRB) updates frequently to take advantage of the opportunities 
published on the Navy’s SRB website at: 
https://www.mynavyhr.navy.mil/References/Pay-Benefits/N130D/. 
Please keep in mind SRB levels may be adjusted up or down depending 
on rating health.

OK, not much here. Maybe this section was put in to put the inebriated Sailors to sleep?

3.  Early Separation Cancellation.  Effective immediately, all 
enlisted early out programs and new time in grade requirement 
waivers are hereby cancelled.  Service commitments such as 
enlistment contracts, service obligations for accepting permanent 
change of station orders, advancements, bonuses, training, etc., 
will be fulfilled.  Service members experiencing difficulty in 
fulfilling obligated service requirements are encouraged to work 
with their chain of command and respective detailers to examine 
available alternatives to complete their obligation. 
    a.  Commanding officers still retain the 90-day early out 
authority for policy outlined in references (d) and (e). 
    b.  Service members previously granted approval will not be 
affected by this policy change. 
    c.  Service members interested in pursuing commissions in the 
Navy are still encouraged to submit requests.  As always, these 
requests will be considered on a case by case basis. 
    d.  United States Space Force applicants are not affected by 
this policy change.

Well, that’s a change! No early-out options. Definitely closing the faucet handle.

4.  Delaying separation or retirement.  The Navy is accepting 
applications from enlisted personnel who desire to delay their 
separation or retirement.  The deadline for application submission 
is 31 August 2022.

How about that! Did you want to rethink getting out? Well, now you can, just delay that separation or retirement for another year! Unless you didn’t take the COVID vaccine, in which case you better be part of the class-action lawsuit or else you’re out on the street!

The rest of the NAVADMIN is the dirty details of who can or can’t apply. Another NAVADMIN to look at is 172/22, titled: ACTIVE DUTY ENLISTED ADVANCE-TO-POSITION PROGRAM UPDATE. No corrected copy, looks like they got this one right the first time. I’ll summarize it: enlisted members can apply for billets one paygrade above their current one.

That sounds good right? Let people take on more challenges early? You might think that, until you realize the reason this is happening is because there isn’t enough people at that paygrade to fill all the slots…meaning the Navy is desperate to fill them, even if it means sticking otherwise not-as-qualified individuals in there to meet their numbers.

By the Navy’s own admission, it is hitting a personnel wall that it can’t seem to scale. One contributing reason might be all the “smart people” in the room telling us we could use part-time people, cut back on pay and benefits, and magically we’d have a better, cheaper Navy. I’m not making this up, see every single report that Beth Asch authored at RAND. She’s one of many “smart people” that writes up nice looking reports about policy that influences many people in Washington DC, but don’t seem to understand the nuances associated with a job where you actively kill people while they try to kill you. Since the military services did put into place many of RAND’s recommendations, how’s that working out?

The next steps I expect to see is the military suspending physical fitness separations. After that, expect waivers galore for things like tattoos and prior non-violent felonies. After that…expect stop-loss and calls to bring back the draft.

2023 is going to be even worse. So buckle up and hope we don’t go to war with China.

This post represents the views of the author and not those of the Department of Defense, Department of the Navy, or any other government agency, because those people will simply point you to some RAND report to justify their actions.

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