Category Archives: Britain

NoBamas Bearing Presents, Please

Barack Obama, Britain, Celebrity, English, Foreign Policy

The singularity solipsistic Obama and his uncouth wife once gave the Queen of England an iPod filled with images and audio of his Highness’s inaugural and DNC addresses.

From the grandeur of her White House Crib, the FLOTUS is famous for giving Prime Minister Brown a box of 25 DVDs including “ET,” “The Wizard of Oz,” and “Star Wars,” “a cheap gift which spoke to the giver’s impoverishment. The DVDs were also region-encoded for North America and could not be played in Britain. Brown gave Obama ‘a pen holder carved from the timber of an anti-slave ship.'”

“Sarah Brown lavished books and ball gowns on the Obama girls. Mrs. Obama reciprocated by giving the Brown boys two lousy, plastic, ‘matching models of the helicopter which ferries her husband around.”

MORE in “Gangsta Gifts.”

“Before the DVD and gift-shop gaffes, there was the weightier matter of the bust of Winston Churchill. ‘The valuable bronze by Sir Jacob Epstein had been loaned by the British government to George W. Bush,’ wrote syndicated columnist Diana West. ‘One of President Obama’s first acts as president was to consign that symbol to a box and send it packing.'”

As Daniel Hannan noted, Obama “used the Louisiana oil spill to attack an imaginary company called ‘British Petroleum’ (it has been BP for the past decade, ever since the merger with Amoco gave it as many American as British shareholders). … He managed, on his visit to West Africa, to refer to the struggle for independence, but not to the Royal Navy’s campaign against slavery.”

The return of the Churchill bronze confirmed the suspicion that Obama was anti-Occident. The habit of giving inappropriate, thoughtless presents—as he and his family are deluged with wild effusions of love and lavish gifts—this shows Obama to be, well, a bit of a pig.

Maybe Prince William and Kate Middleton think that inviting the rude American duo to their wedding is infra dig. Or, perhaps it’s as the press has reported, and “President Obama and his wife Michelle will not be invited to Prince William’s wedding next year’ because the ‘royal couple is eager to ask ordinary citizens to attend rather than VIPs.'”

Because Prince William is not yet heir to the throne, his wedding to Kate Middleton is not classed as a ‘state occasion’ – and the couple feel under no pressure to fill the 2,000-strong guest list with heads of state, the Mail understands.

Dead-In-The-Water Debt Commission

Britain, Debt, Economy, Government, Inflation

My maxim,“Government commissions are where accountability goes to die,” played out today when, as the Washington Examiner reports, “President Barack Obama’s deficit commission failed to forge consensus on what to do about an increasingly urgent debt problem …”

“The 11-7 vote in favor of the panel co-chairmen’s recommendations for a painful mix of spending cuts and tax increases foretells a bitterly partisan and possibly unproductive debate in the House. If there’s a deal to be had, it will likely be reached in the Senate. Fourteen votes were needed to officially send the plan to Congress now for quick action on it.”

“The Details” of the thwarted plan, have been distilled by The Huffington Post’s Sam Stein:

“The draft put out by the commission chairs has been released, coming in at 50 pages. The overarching goal, Simpson and Bowles write, is to achieve ‘nearly $4 trillion in deficit reduction through 2020’ while reducing ‘the deficit to 2.2% of GDP by 2015.'”

“How they get there is going to be a matter of contention as other commission members have already stressed their displeasure with the suggestions. But here are a few of the more noteworthy suggestions.”

* Roll discretionary spending back to FY2010 levels for FY2012, requires 1% cut in discretionary budget authority every year from FY2013 though 2015;

* Fully offset the cost of the ‘Doc Fix’ by asking doctors and other health providers, lawyers, and individuals to take responsibility for slowing health care cost growth;

* Reduce farm subsidies by3 billion per year by reducing direct payments and other subsidies;

* Achieve100 billion in Illustrative Defense Cuts;

* Index retirement age for Social security to increases in longevity. ‘This option is projected to increase the age by one month every two years after it reaches 67 under current law, meaning the normal retirement age would reach 68 in about 2050 and 69 in about 2075.’ There will be a ‘hardship exemption’ for those unable to work beyond 62;

* Give retirees the choice of collecting half their benefits early and the other half at a later age to minimize impact of actuarial reduction and support phased retirement options;

* Reduce corporate tax rate to 26% and permanently extend the research credit;

* Gradually increase gas tax to fund transportation spending.”

[SNIP]

Think about it: The American president appoints a select group of like-minded officials tasked with coming up with a plan to tackle the deficit, the debt and the government’s long-term, looming liabilities. The commission completes its task by agreeing not to tackle the task. Meanwhile, the British PM has fired hundreds of thousands of state worker and slashed departmental budgets.

UPDATED: McCain’s Idea Of A Spending Cut

Britain, Conservatism, Debt, Foreign Policy, Government, John McCain

How serious are Republicans about revolutionary cuts in state spending? John McCain serious.

McCain’s idea of “spending cuts,” just articulated to Fox News’ Shepard Smith, is cutting National Public Radio loose, and doing away with earmarks. I doubt these will cover a day’s interest payment on the national debt.

McCain’s notion of heeding the voter: securing the borders and reforming, not repealing, ObamaCare. Remind me again why movement conservatives betrayed J. D. Hayworth, who ought to have beaten Senator John McCain in the Arizona GOP primary.

Contrast McCain’s worse-than-futile slashes to the state with the reductions the British have begun to make.

BBC News: “Chancellor George Osborne has unveiled the biggest UK spending cuts for decades, with welfare, councils and police budgets all hit.”

A “19% average cuts to departmental budgets,” as well cutting “higher education spending by 40%, flood defences by 15% and sport England and UK Sport by 30%”—this is better than increasing spending as we are. Of course, price controls, such as on rail fares, are being tinkered with, namely “allowed to increase by 3% above RPI inflation from 2012.”

No doubt, certain cuts in the UK are an illusion, to be replaced by other, slightly modified programs. But again: better to fire 500,000 state workers than to hire 1.4 million census stalkers.

Prick up your ears when you hear promises to dismantle the IRS, the Department of Education, and to recall ALL troops, and the installations erected to satisfy their needs, from the over 100 countries in which they are stationed. That’ll be a modest beginning.

UPDATED: As to “Fair Tax,” campaigned for by the likes of Mike Huckabee and liberventionist Neal Boortz. When these two are right, it is only by accident. So you’re safe opposing most of their pet issues. I don’t like the “Fair Tax.” Granted, a tax on consumption is only an indirect tax on income.

Here’s Ron Paul:

A: We have to cut spending. You can’t get rid of the income tax if you don’t get rid of some spending. But, you know, if you got rid of the income tax today you’d have about as much revenue as we had 10 years ago, and the size of government wasn’t all that bad 10 years ago. There are sources of revenues other than the income tax. You have tariff, excise taxes, user fees, highway fees. So, so there’s still a lot of money. But the real problem is spending. But, you know, we lived a long time in this country without an income tax. Up until 1913 we didn’t have it.

Q: But if you eliminate the income tax, do you know how much lost revenue that would be?

A: A lot.

Q: Over a trillion dollars.

A: That’s good.

But since I have been called a Pollyanna, let me say this: the 16th is “The Number of The Beast”; it needs to be abolished. Taxation is immoral and naturally illicit. But given that, realistically, the state will not so do, a a flat, low tax is a pragmatic solution. Let the poor set the rate. The Russians have a low flat tax. As Dan Mitchell reports, “The former communists running Russia apparently understand tax policy better than the buffoons in charge of U.S. tax policy. Not only does Russia have a 13 percent flat tax, but the government has just announced it will eliminate the capital gains taxA pure flat tax would preclude any capital gains tax.

The Fair Tax our local buffoons propose is prohibitive.

UPDATED: McCain's Idea Of A Spending Cut

Britain, Conservatism, Debt, Foreign Policy, Government, John McCain

How serious are Republicans about revolutionary cuts in state spending? John McCain serious.

McCain’s idea of “spending cuts,” just articulated to Fox News’ Shepard Smith, is cutting National Public Radio loose, and doing away with earmarks. I doubt these will cover a day’s interest payment on the national debt.

McCain’s notion of heeding the voter: securing the borders and reforming, not repealing, ObamaCare. Remind me again why movement conservatives betrayed J. D. Hayworth, who ought to have beaten Senator John McCain in the Arizona GOP primary.

Contrast McCain’s worse-than-futile slashes to the state with the reductions the British have begun to make.

BBC News: “Chancellor George Osborne has unveiled the biggest UK spending cuts for decades, with welfare, councils and police budgets all hit.”

A “19% average cuts to departmental budgets,” as well cutting “higher education spending by 40%, flood defences by 15% and sport England and UK Sport by 30%”—this is better than increasing spending as we are. Of course, price controls, such as on rail fares, are being tinkered with, namely “allowed to increase by 3% above RPI inflation from 2012.”

No doubt, certain cuts in the UK are an illusion, to be replaced by other, slightly modified programs. But again: better to fire 500,000 state workers than to hire 1.4 million census stalkers.

Prick up your ears when you hear promises to dismantle the IRS, the Department of Education, and to recall ALL troops, and the installations erected to satisfy their needs, from the over 100 countries in which they are stationed. That’ll be a modest beginning.

UPDATED: As to “Fair Tax,” campaigned for by the likes of Mike Huckabee and liberventionist Neal Boortz. When these two are right, it is only by accident. So you’re safe opposing most of their pet issues. I don’t like the “Fair Tax.” Granted, a tax on consumption is only an indirect tax on income.

Here’s Ron Paul:

A: We have to cut spending. You can’t get rid of the income tax if you don’t get rid of some spending. But, you know, if you got rid of the income tax today you’d have about as much revenue as we had 10 years ago, and the size of government wasn’t all that bad 10 years ago. There are sources of revenues other than the income tax. You have tariff, excise taxes, user fees, highway fees. So, so there’s still a lot of money. But the real problem is spending. But, you know, we lived a long time in this country without an income tax. Up until 1913 we didn’t have it.

Q: But if you eliminate the income tax, do you know how much lost revenue that would be?

A: A lot.

Q: Over a trillion dollars.

A: That’s good.

But since I have been called a Pollyanna, let me say this: the 16th is “The Number of The Beast”; it needs to be abolished. Taxation is immoral and naturally illicit. But given that, realistically, the state will not so do, a a flat, low tax is a pragmatic solution. Let the poor set the rate. The Russians have a low flat tax. As Dan Mitchell reports, “The former communists running Russia apparently understand tax policy better than the buffoons in charge of U.S. tax policy. Not only does Russia have a 13 percent flat tax, but the government has just announced it will eliminate the capital gains taxA pure flat tax would preclude any capital gains tax.

The Fair Tax our local buffoons propose is prohibitive.