posted March 23, 2011 02:44 PM            

Darth Ballooning anyone?

posted March 23, 2011 02:48 PM            

Gov. Scott Walker (R-WI) justified his high-profile push to eliminate collective bargaining rights for his state’s public employees by saying it was necessary to balance his state’s budget (even though Wisconsin’s union workers agreed to all of his pay and benefit demands). That budget also contains $900 billion in cuts to state education funding, but Walker claimed that the savings from eliminating collective bargaining and having public employees dedicate more of their pay to their health care and pension benefits would offset those reductions.

“If we did this in our life, it would be like saying you’re getting 5 percent less revenue but ignoring the fact that your car payment just went away,” said Walker. Walker even released a budget analysis purporting to show how much school districts would save under his plan. But school administrators looking at Walker’s numbers have found that they don’t add up:

Take the La Crosse school district as an example. Walker’s numbers show it will come out $1.77 million ahead after taking his proposed cut to state aid. The district’s own numbers show it comes up at least $1.2 million short. [...]

The governor calculates La Crosse can save $4.99 million by making employees pay more for retirement and health care benefits. Actual savings add up to about $3.7 million a year, according to Janet Rosseter, the district’s finance manager.

The La Crosse Tribune noted that Walker’s budget analysis has some fine print stating that the “actual impact of these reductions and savings on individual school districts in FY 2012 and beyond may differ significantly from these estimates.”

The differences arise in large part because Walker assumed that all school employees were paying below 12.6 percent of their paychecks into their health benefits. But many employees were already paying that much, if not significantly more. In the Holmen school district, for example, “almost all employees already contribute 20 percent of their insurance premiums. “There’s no savings for us in health insurance,” said Jay Clark, Holmen’s associate district administrator. “Us moving to 12.6 percent would actually cost us money.”

So Walker’s education cuts are very real. Of course, instead of papering over them and forcing schools into layoffs and increased class sizes, he could rethink some of the corporate tax breaks that he’s approved during the last few months
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

posted March 23, 2011 03:02 PM            

"Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who makes it's laws" — Mayer Amschel Bauer Rothschild

Federal Reserve reports record profit
By Peter Schroeder - 03/22/11 12:12 PM ET

The Federal Reserve turned a record $81.7 billion profit in 2010, up 53 percent from 2009, the central bank reported Tuesday.

The vast majority of the Fed's profit — $79.3 billion — will be turned over to the Treasury Department, with the rest being paid out to member banks in dividends.

A substantial chunk of that profit came from increased interest income from the $1 trillion in mortgage-backed securities the Fed purchased during the financial crisis to help stabilize the housing market. The Fed made $24.4 billion more in interest on those holdings in 2010. The central bank also made $3.5 billion in interest from its increased holdings in Treasury bonds, as it buys up Treasury debt in an effort to boost private lending.

While the Fed is still reaping profits from its intervention into the financial system during the crisis, it is beginning to wind down other areas where it had stepped in. Loans given to insurance giant American International Group, Inc. (AIG) declined slightly in 2010 to $20.6 billion, from $21.3 billion in 2009. As a result, the Fed made roughly $1 billion less in interest on those loans.

In addition, the Fed nearly halved its investment in the Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility, which shrank to $24.9 billion from $48.2 billion in 2009. That program, created by the Fed, was designed to boost credit lending by offering loans to back the issuance of securities filled with various consumer loans, like auto loans and student loans. The Fed stopped issuing new loans under the facility on March 31, 2010. The Fed reported Tuesday that its investment in the program shrank mainly due to early repayments from borrowers.

The combined annual financial statements for the Federal Reserve Bank system revealed that it had increased its asset holdings by $193 billion in 2010, reaching a total of $2.428 trillion.

The balance-sheet boost was driven in large part by the Fed's second effort at quantitative easing, which has the Fed buying up hundreds of billions of dollars in Treasury bonds in an effort to boost private lending.

The bond-buying program, dubbed "QE2," is evident on the central bank's balance sheet. The Fed's holdings in Treasury securities increased nearly $261 billion in 2010, to a total of $1.06 trillion. The Fed expects to buy roughly $600 billion in Treasury bonds under QE2, which is due to conclude at the end of June.
~~~~~~

America is not broke.

Contrary to what those in power would like you to believe so that you’ll give up your pension, cut your wages, and settle for the life your great-grandparents had, America is not broke. Not by a long shot. The country is awash in wealth and cash. It’s just that it’s not in your hands. It has been transferred, in the greatest heist in history, from the workers and consumers to the banks and the portfolios of the uber-rich.

posted March 27, 2011 10:52 PM            

Wow, isn't hypocrisy wonderful?

Dems Defend Taking Koch Money From Same PAC That Gave to Scott Walker
12:24 PM, Mar 25, 2011
Michael Warren

Another note on the Koch money funding Democratic campaigns. While Harry Reid and the DSCC try to raise money off the liberal animus against the Koch brothers, the DSCC and a handful of Democratic senators have given no indication that they are willing to give back the thousands of dollars their campaigns received from KOCHPAC, the political arm of Koch Industries. In fact, a spokesperson for Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) justified the at least $10,000 the Landrieu campaign received from KOCHPAC last year because the money was not directly from the Koch brothers but comprised of donations from Koch Industries employees in Louisiana.

Why, then, is there so much outrage at Wisconsin governor Scott Walker for accepting donations from the same PAC? The nefarious connection between the Kochs and Walker that had so many Madison protesters up in arms and even prompted a liberal journalist to attempt a "gotcha job" on Walker by pretending to be David Koch is a $43,000 donation from...KOCHPAC. This $43,000 is the source of practically all the liberal animosity toward the Kochs in regards to Wisconsin's public-sector union battle.

So to keep this all straight: If Koch Industries' political action committee contribute money to Republicans, it's the end of our democracy. If the same political action committee contributes money to Democrats, it's all kosher. Got it?
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/dems-take-money-same-pac-scott-walker-did_555487.html

posted March 28, 2011 03:36 PM            

House
Total to Democrats: $87,500
Total to Republicans: $912,000

Senate
Total to Democrats: $25,000
Total to Republicans: $232,500

Total D

112,500

Total R

1,114,500

and 1 Independent

Heck of difference I would say. 1 for every $10 going to R

I am not a Dem, but I hate to see any one take Koch money. But they are not the only Mega Corp running the country.
This has been going on forever.

My question is have those Democrats supported the Koch brothers agenda? One of the largest receivers was a Democrat, Blanche Lincoln. And yes, she has supported the Koch agenda.

Also, most of congress have multiple owners.

Open Secrets

And now there's a report showing the SCOTUS sided with big business 13 times in 15 briefs filled before the court. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/16/magazine/16supreme-t.html

quote:

---

...What should we make of the Supreme Court’s transformation? Throughout its history, the court has tended to issue opinions, in areas from free speech to gender equality, that reflect or consolidate a social consensus. With their pro-business jurisprudence, the justices may be capturing an emerging spirit of agreement among liberal and conservative elites about the value of free markets. Among the professional classes, many Democrats and Republicans, whatever their other disagreements, have come to share a relatively laissez-faire, technocratic vision of the economy and are suspicious of excessive regulation and reflexive efforts to vilify big business. Judges, lawyers and law professors (such as myself) drilled in cost-benefit analysis over the past three decades, are no exception. It should come as little surprise that John Roberts and Stephen Breyer, both of whom studied the economic analysis of law at Harvard, have similar instincts in business cases.

---

posted March 28, 2011 11:39 PM            

What's true is that the Koch pac contributed to both demoscats and Republicans.

posted March 29, 2011 08:36 AM            

Why do you think this is 'news' that some democrats took Koch money?

Is it equally embarrassing and hypocritical for Gov Wilson to state that it is the budget he is 'fixing' when he has in fact made it worse?
Is it hypocritical for Republican "Rule of Law" - When we like the law we follow it, when we don't, we don't. As the Gov of Wisconsin acts on the `law` that the court has ordered a stay on?

He might very well find he and his cronies are in contempt, and impeached.

or that Walker's budget repair bill, now law, allows him to appoint whomever he wishes to 37 posts handling open records requests -- jobs that used to be plain old civil-service gigs? The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel also reports that Mr. Walker now gets to make the top attorney job for state labor law his own political appointment, even though that agency sometimes has to face down the governor.

What's that got to do with repairing the budget?

Do not play the lilly of saints about hypocrisy....you really do not want to go there.

posted March 29, 2011 09:48 AM            

The relative "amounts" is a non-issue in determining the hypocrisy of demoscats and their union supporters who screech and howl.

Now, I notice demoscats and their union toadies never mention the $25,000,000 George Soros contributed to the traitor John Kerry and Socialist demoscats to get them elected in 2004.

Neither do they mention the hundreds of millions contributed by labor unions to elect Barack O'Bomber and demoscats in the last presidential election. AND

when I bring it up here, demoscats just don't wanna talk about it.

When I post the words of the head of Move On..."We own the democrat party...We bought it"...demoscats don't wanna talk about that either!

posted March 29, 2011 02:01 PM            

this is disingenuous jwhop. they donated pennies to the democrats, why would anyone care when it is obvious who they were backing? the relatively paltry amounts given to the dems make ALL the difference unless you just want a ludicrous "out"...

and as far as the unions go, they are made up of many workers, not two corporate emperors who want slaves not self-respecting working men and women...

as for soros millions, didn't match those donated to bush, did they? nor did they "throw" the election.

and as to those given to obama, they were no match for the droves who fled the republican ticket when our sweetheart sal climbed on!

posted March 29, 2011 05:41 PM            

And

posted March 29, 2011 06:54 PM            

• Brothers worth 43 Billion (#3)
  
• Bank rolled the Tea Party-> 31 Mil
  
• Contributed just under 50 Mil to organizations denying Climate Change
  
• Contributed over 34.6 Mil to Union-Busting organizations
  
• Spent over 10.5 Mil on Lobbying & Politics

  There are more being investigated.

  Names on some of the umbrellas:
  

• Americans for Prosperity
  
• Pacific Research Institute for public policy
  
• Citizens for Congressional Reform Foundation
  
• Ethics and Public Policy Center Inc
  
• Cato Inst
  
• The Heritage Foundation
  
• Institute for Justice
  
• Bill of Rights Institute
  
• Action Institute
  
• Federalist Society
  
• Brookings Inst
  
• Freedom Works
  
• Manhattan Institute

  My personal fave
  

• National Center For Policy Analysis...and a dot org to boot~!

posted March 29, 2011 09:56 PM            

quote:

---

Ummmm katatonic, who do the "two oligarchs" want to work for less than a living wage?

And

How much is a living wage anyway?

---

posted April 28, 2011 11:44 AM            

I thought it was only those evil conservative Republicans who were attacking those poor state unionists at the urging of the Koch brothers.

Oh brother!

Mass. Dems target collective bargaining rights
By Michael Levenson - Boston Globe Published: 9:51 PM 04/27/2011

Massachusetts House lawmakers voted overwhelmingly last night to strip police officers, teachers, and other municipal employees of most of their rights to bargain over health care, saying the change would save millions of dollars for financially strapped cities and towns.

The 111-to-42 vote followed tougher measures to broadly eliminate collective bargaining rights for public employees in Ohio, Wisconsin, and other states. But unlike those efforts, the push in Massachusetts was led by Democrats who have traditionally stood with labor to oppose any reduction in workers’ rights.

Unions fought hard to stop the bill, launching a radio ad that assailed the plan and warning legislators that if they voted for the measure, they could lose their union backing in the next election......
http://dailycaller.com/2011/04/27/mass-dems-target-collective-bargaining-rights/