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The United States of Decline: America unravels at an increasingly dizzying pace.
The National Review ^ | February 17, 2014 | Deroy Murdock

Posted on 02/17/2014 12:39:35 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet

America is unraveling at a stunning speed and to a staggering degree. This decline is breathtaking, and the prognosis is dim.

For starters, Obama now rules by decree. Reportedly for the 27th time, he has changed the rules of Obamacare singlehandedly, with neither congressional approval nor even ceremonial resolutions to limit his actions. Obama needs no such frivolities.

“That’s the good thing about being president,” Obama joked on February 10. “I can do whatever I want.” In an especially bitter irony, Obama uttered these despicable words while guiding French president François Hollande through Monticello, the home of Thomas Jefferson — a key architect of America’s foundation of limited government.

That very day, Obama decreed that the Obamacare mandate for employers with 50 to 99 workers would be postponed until 2016 (beyond an earlier extension to 2015), well past the November 2014 midterm elections. This eases the pressure on Democrats, whose campaigns would suffer if voters saw their company health plans canceled due to Obamacare’s unnecessary, expensive, mandatory benefits — e.g. maternity coverage for men.

So, by fiat, Obama has postponed the employer mandate. When Senator Ted Cruz (R., Texas) effectively tried to do this through legislation last fall, Democrats virtually lassoed and branded him.

Also by decree last week, Obama decided unilaterally to soften political-asylum rules. Refugees and other immigrants who provide terrorists “limited material support” now can come to America. So what if someone merely clothed and fed Mohamed Atta or Khalid Sheikh Mohammed? After all, garments and meals don’t blow up. Welcome to America, Mustafa!

Meanwhile, the Justice Department is working hard to revoke the asylum of and deport the Romeikes....

(Excerpt) Read more at nationalreview.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Government; Politics/Elections; US: Texas
KEYWORDS: khalidsheikhmohammed; mohamedatta; obama; obamacare; tedcruz; texas
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To: Cringing Negativism Network

National Review is nothing but free trade.


81 posted on 02/17/2014 2:33:03 PM PST by Last Dakotan
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Comment #82 Removed by Moderator

To: Fledermaus
The “Bring Back the Jobs” crowd don’t realize that even if they did they’d be filled by illegal aliens and low paid unskilled morons.

Better they subsist on welfare and government handouts generation after generation, rather than be included in a culture of work, ... yeah right.

83 posted on 02/17/2014 2:36:11 PM PST by Last Dakotan
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To: Alberta's Child
Even if the U.S. didn't import a single manufactured product from a foreign nation, we'd be producing those things here in heavily automated facilities that don't have many employees at all.

This is a great idea of yours - do you have a downside?

84 posted on 02/17/2014 2:38:30 PM PST by Last Dakotan
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To: Alberta's Child
Comparing the U.S. to a highly homogenized modern socialist state in Europe doesn't do much to explain our competitive advantages and disadvantages compared to Asian countries.

Maybe not but it puts to bed the Free Traitor lie that having an advanced economy automatically means that American workers are out of a job.

85 posted on 02/17/2014 2:40:14 PM PST by Count of Monte Fisto (The foundation of modern society is the denial of reality.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

In a way, a fast decline is good. That way people will realize what is happening. Blacks are poorer, crime is higher, small business are closing shop, and now all we need is Wall Street Bankers, China, and the Middle East to crash and die, since they are the funding this Marxist take over.

That said it wouldn’t have happened if we were a Godly people. Americans, like Venezuelans, have always had the arrogance to think it could never happen to them. There but for the Grace of God go any of us.

The evil one usually has a slow boa constricter grip. It sucks the life out of you and you don’t realize it until it’s too late. Now that I think about it, this has all been going on for a,long time, and I think we’re are simply at the point when we realize we’re in the snakes death grip.

Prayers friends.


86 posted on 02/17/2014 2:50:37 PM PST by mgist (.)
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To: ex-snook
One big reason why we are a net importer is that our currency has traditionally been very strong compared to our biggest trading partners.

Secondly, crude oil imports skew those trade balance figures very heavily against the U.S.

For things that Asian countries don't produce themselves as well as we do here in the U.S., the numbers work surprisingly well on our side. Agriculture exports from the U.S. to Asia are enormous, as are heavy machinery and aircraft.

87 posted on 02/17/2014 2:50:41 PM PST by Alberta's Child ("I've never seen such a conclave of minstrels in my life.")
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To: Gritty

All that is true. But the days of 4,000 men walking to a steel mill from nearby homes in a “company town” in Pennsylvania are over. 74 jobs and several hundred secondary jobs is probably the norm for an advanced operation like the one described in that article.


88 posted on 02/17/2014 2:52:17 PM PST by Alberta's Child ("I've never seen such a conclave of minstrels in my life.")
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To: Last Dakotan
The downside is that the biggest competitive advantage the U.S. has over other countries in manufacturing is for products that are sold here in the U.S. The U.S. would have a hard time competing with Asian countries for most products sold in Asia even if U.S. labor was cheaper than Asian labor. If you're going to sell 500 million iPhones in China and 50 million of them in the U.S., it usually makes more sense to produce them in Asia.
89 posted on 02/17/2014 2:57:28 PM PST by Alberta's Child ("I've never seen such a conclave of minstrels in my life.")
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To: Alberta's Child

Asian markets are not open.

China won’t compete fairly. America is being stripped bare, because China is cheap. But China is a closed society and a closed economy.

That is a fact.


90 posted on 02/17/2014 2:59:58 PM PST by Cringing Negativism Network ( http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html#2013)
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To: Fledermaus
Don’t you get it? American jobs paying $15-20 an hour with benefits and gov’t taxes driving the cost up to $25-30 an hour along with massive restrictions and regulations by OSHA, EPA, Labor Dept., Interior Dept., will come back in droves from China to make $.05 trinkets to throw in a Happy Meal! /s

You are absolutely correct. Even if a company could somehow be forced to manufacture in the US, there is no way they could produce a profit competing with China's slave labor. The Union thugs are another huge problem that drove out Jobs. They drove Eastern Airlines out of business in Miami and we lost thousands of jobs in one day, and 18,000 total. Fortunately we have other industries, and foreign investment. We are in great shape compared to other major cities such as Michigan and Chicago

91 posted on 02/17/2014 3:01:30 PM PST by mgist (.)
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To: Secret Agent Man

bingo.


92 posted on 02/17/2014 3:01:39 PM PST by Donnafrflorida (Thru HIM all things are possible.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Have to wonder what will happen when an Obamacare case involving one of Obama’s decrees inevitably makes it to court. Will the court arrive at a finding based on the law as written and passed by congress or as deemed by one of Obama’s extra-constitutional decrees? If the court rules on the latter, then the rule of law is no more and the imperial presidency will be codified in court precedent.


93 posted on 02/17/2014 3:03:35 PM PST by IamConservative (There is no place like 127.0.0.1)
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To: OldPossum

China now exports more than America.

American companies are being co-opted by Communist China.

Let me repeat this: China now exports more than America.

Bring back manufacturing to America.


94 posted on 02/17/2014 3:10:36 PM PST by Cringing Negativism Network ( http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html#2013)
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To: mgist

Just look at foreign car companies that build plants in America. The UAW can’t stand it and try every year to unionzed them, usually to no avail. Eventually they’ll get the feds, bought by unions, to punish them.

If the illegal NRLB can “force” Boeing to not open a plant they build in SC (right to work state) then what incentive is there to keep jobs here? Much less attract more foreign investment.

GM/Chrysler were almost forced to deal with the UAW (in a dispute federal arbitration always sides with labor) and went bankrupt. How Ford wasn’t in the same boat surprised me.

GM built Saturn just south of me in Spring Hill, TN and “promised” they’d hire from the local area. Instead, the UAW “forced” them to use Detroit refugees that came down here and whined like babies about right to work, etc.

Union workers are mostly parasites. One went face to face with me and told me I couldn’t take care of myself without a union. I asked him if his union would cover the medical cost of my foot going into his a$$.


95 posted on 02/17/2014 3:13:01 PM PST by Fledermaus (If we here in TN can't get rid of the worthless Lamar, it's over.)
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To: Alberta's Child
74 jobs and several hundred secondary jobs is probably the norm for an advanced operation like the one described in that article.

Probably. But that is the future - if we want to make one. How about 100,000 such success stories scattered all over America? That would be a huge start.

It sure beats a food stamp budget bigger than our entire military budget - and getting bigger.

96 posted on 02/17/2014 3:27:46 PM PST by Gritty (Inside every liberal is a totalitarian screaming to get out! - David Horowitz)
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To: Fledermaus

Since WWII in which I served and my brother was killed, unions of all groups especially public ‘servants’, have become societal parasites. Like lemmings members give up any independence to follow the great leader. I experienced and saw the need for ‘workers’ unions in the early 1930s but during and immediately after WWII unions of any kind became extortionists by group power mostly for the benefit of thug leaders.


97 posted on 02/17/2014 3:36:18 PM PST by noinfringers2 ( /*)
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To: Alberta's Child

It’s funny how this didn’t used to be a problem to the USA in our early years. The Yankee Clippers sailing to China, the Far Eastern trade, Perry going to Japan, etc.

Asian customers should be a boon to us, not a deterrent. I don’t know how to make that happen (or I’d be a millionaire, not surfing Free Republic), but surely we should be encouraged to sell to them?


98 posted on 02/17/2014 3:39:47 PM PST by Alas Babylon!
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To: SkyPilot

You are correct. The root of the problem is fundamentally spiritual, with disbelief and rebellion against God and His rule.

The solution is to go out and make disciples of the unbelievers, just as the Christians of the vicious and hedonistic Roman empire did.


99 posted on 02/17/2014 3:43:46 PM PST by bkopto (Free men are not equal. Equal men are not free.)
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To: Alas Babylon!

No problem. As soon as Americans are willing to work for 30 cents an hour we should be able to compete in that market.


100 posted on 02/17/2014 3:47:58 PM PST by Trod Upon (Every penny given to film and TV media companies goes right into enemy coffers. Starve them out!)
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