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Finance Minister Jim Flaherty safeguarded Canada’s status as the only Group of Seven country with a stable top credit rating after releasing a fiscal plan that eliminates the country’s deficit in two years. Flaherty’s budget presented Thursday projected Canada will swing to a surplus of about $800 million ($781 million) in the fiscal year that begins April 2015, from a $25.9 billion deficit in the year ending this month, by limiting spending growth to the slowest pace since the 1990s and banking on an accelerated recovery. Moody’s said in a statement the budget is in line with the government’s Aaa...

Michael Grab is an artist that has been ‘rock balancing‘ since 2008. Much of his recent work has been done around the Boulder, Colorado area. Grab finds the process both spiritual and therapeutic. On his site gravityglue.com, Grab explains:

The Congressional Budget Office says the current year's budget deficit will be a record $1.5 trillion. It also says that over the next decade we're on track for annual deficits of "only" $768 billion. I suspect the CBO has hired Rosy Scenario to do the bookkeeping, but let's take that number at face value. I'm now going to balance the budget, with the help of some experts. I'll begin with things I'm most eager to cut. Let's privatize air traffic control. Canada did it, and it works better. Then privatize Amtrak. Get rid of all subsidies for rail. That'll save...

Via Mediaite, "balanced approach" is Obama's Orwellian term for selling tax hikes to the public as a condition of spending cuts even though there's nothing remotely balanced about our fiscal problems. Spend 10 seconds looking at the graphs in Yuval Levin's new post at the Corner. That's the reality that the "balanced approach" pretends to address. As Levin said in another post today, “The fiscal trajectory of our welfare state is not sustainable, no matter how much taxes go up.”But okay. The left’s new talking point, pushed by The One himself, is that they absolutely positively won’t negotiate over the...

Sinclair Broadcast Group is under fire for an election special that aired on stations in battleground states Monday night. The half-hour special — broadcast on the eve of the election in Columbus, Dayton and West Palm Beach — is being criticized as a partisan attack on President Barack Obama. Talking Points Memo, which first reported on the special, writes it “sounded more like Fox News than local news”...

For much of the past few generations, the debate over balancing the federal budget has been a central feature of every presidential campaign. But over time, the goalposts have moved. As the amount of red ink has grown steadily larger, the suggested time frames to restore balance have gotten increasingly longer, while the suggested cuts in government spending have gotten increasingly shallower. In recent years, talk of balancing the budget gave way to vague promises such as “cutting the deficit in half in five years.” In the current campaign, however, it appears as if the goalposts have been moved so...

What if Syrian President Bashar al Assad really goes? There is an assumption in the West that the way to win a strategic victory over Iran and improve the human rights situation inside Syria is to remove the Syrian leader. It is true that Iran's prospects of keeping Syria as its own Mediterranean outpost are probably linked with the survivability of al Assad's regime. But his removal might well hasten the slide into chaos within Syria and in adjacent Lebanon, rather than slow it. Al Assad's departure could even ignite a disintegration of the Syrian power structure into various gangs...

Starting on March 26th, the Supreme Court listened to three days of arguments concerning the constitutionality of the healthcare act that has come to be known as “Obamacare.” Their ruling, which won’t come until the end of June, will shape the future of American healthcare. While the healthcare issue has been off the front pages since it was signed in March of 2010, the constituently of one of its more controversial requirements has been in and out of the federal court system. The ruling addresses an issue at the heart of how our nation is governed. The Constitution gives a...

Tea Party senators unveil five-year plan to balance the budgetBy Alexander Bolton - 03/08/12 02:16 PM ET Members of the Senate Tea Party Caucus on Thursday announed a plan to balance the budget in five years, cutting spending by nearly $11 trillion compared to President Obama’s budget. The plan, dubbed “A Platform to Revitalize America,” is a wish list of conservative policies, none of which have any chance of passing the Democratic-controlled Senate or being signed into law by a liberal Democratic president. The ambitious blueprint would achieve a $111 billion surplus in fiscal year 2017. “The whole point here...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House rejected on Friday the latest proposal from Republicans in Congress on a payroll tax cut, saying its costs needed to be offset in a balanced away and not with budget cuts exempting the rich. "We are open to looking at other ways to pay for this, but they have to be economically responsible and fair," White House spokesman Jay Carney said. "It is important that the overall package meet the standards the president has set."

Elderly people should waltz around the living room three times a week to reduce their risk of falls, research suggests. Pensioners can also improve their balance by carrying a bag when they walk to the shops, say scientists. But walking and cycling, although good for overall health, are no good at reducing the number of falls.

n the first of what will be a closely watched selection process for a powerful new deficit panel, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced he will appoint Democratic Sens. Patty Murray (Wash.), Max Baucus (Mont.) and John Kerry (Mass.) as his three choices for a super committee charged with finding more than $1 trillion in spending cuts by the end of this year. Murray will serve as co-chair of the 12-member panel. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) will select her co-chair and two other panelists, as required by the debt limit agreement signed into law by President Barack Obama last week....

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced Tuesday he's naming Sen. Patty Murray to co-chair a powerful "super committee" charged with finding more than $1 trillion in deficit cuts this fall. Murray will be joined by Sens. John Kerry, D-Mass., and Max Baucus, D-Mont., on the panel, which was established last week by hard-fought legislation to increase the national debt.

One day after lowering the nation’s platinum triple-A credit rating, Standard & Poor’s analysts warned Saturday that the U.S. government could face a second downgrade if the economy continues to struggle and the government fails to make the cuts outlined in the debt ceiling agreement. The ratings agency on Friday downgraded the nation to AA+ for the first time in history, saying partisanship in Washington is preventing dramatic deficit reduction.

August will be the Time of Danger. 0bama is not going to get increased revenue from the House. Although he thinks he can order the House to write a bill in accordance with his desires he has been checked 0bama will attempt to get what he wants by going around the Constitution. he will attempt to bypass the Authority of the House -- and the American People there is a path known as "Special Drawing Rights" -- held by certain authorities -- one that he has command of. we had best post guards there, today.

With Friday's vote over, senators quickly moved to vacate the floor. Cars were waiting outside to whisk members to airports to take flights home. Though the Senate was originally scheduled to be in session, Reid, D-Nev., noted that would not be the case and no votes would be taken before Monday afternoon. Reid said that the session wasn't necessary because Obama and Boehner were working on a compromise measure. He said he understands the plan addresses both taxes and revenue, and therefore must originate in the House, giving the Senate no reason to work. Another person hot about the talks...

(CNN) – Republican Sen. Jim DeMint said he's "disappointed" Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann has not signed the "cut, cap, balance" pledge to slash spending and balance the budget. "I am disappointed," DeMint said Wednesday on CNN's "American Morning." "We have to stop spending more than we're bringing in." VIDEO at link

WASHINGTON -President Obama will lay out new plans this week to reduce the federal deficit in part by seeking cuts to government programs for seniors and the poor, a top political adviser said Sunday, adding that Americans expect both sides to work together. "You're going to have to look at Medicare and Medicaid and see what kind of savings you can get," Obama adviser David Plouffe said on NBC's "Meet the Press." The presidential speech on Wednesday will come during a week in which official Washington pivots from a painful standoff over this year's budget to next year's and beyond,...

If passed by the House and Senate and ratified by the states, the new Balanced Budget Amendment will: 1.Force Congress to balance the federal budget each year; 2.Limit federal spending to no more than 18 percent of GDP; and 3.Prevent tax increases Furthermore, the only way for Congress to get around these limitations is with a 2/3 super-majority vote in the House and Senate to waive them.

Illinois's Plan To 'Balance' The Budget: Borrow $15 Billion And Ignore $185 Billion HoleMike "Mish" Shedlock, Global Economic Trend Analysis Dec. 29, 2010, 5:29 AM The state of Illinois elected a Keynesian nutcase of epic magnitude in Governor Quinn. Quinn's latest brainstorm is to borrow $15 billion to "stabilize things". Quinn has not said how he will pay back the loans. Then again, he does want to raise taxes like mad and probably will do so. Regardless of what he does, Quinn is so beholden to unions, Illinois will need to borrow again 12 months from now. Please consider Quinn...