Posted on 02/27/2013 3:32:38 PM PST by whitedog57
The clock is ticking on the slowdown in Federal spending growth (aka, sequestration). According to Reuters, Republicans are digging in on sequestration and are resisting the charms of Reid and Pelosi to raises tax taxes again.
John Hinderaker at Powerline has a good analogy on sequestration.
$44 billion equals one eightieth of the federal budget. A Big Mac extra value meal contains 1,320 calories. One eightieth of 1,320 is 16.5 calories. An average McDonalds french fry has 6.5 calories. So now the arithmetic is simple: if we were to cut the equivalent of the sequestration dollars out of a Big Mac Extra Value Meal, we would eliminate 2 1/2 french fries.
The sequester impact is in the pink box.
I agree with Lan-hee Chens assessment of the sequester. It is much ado about nothing (unless you are an employee that was sequestered, of course).
In todays House hearing with Fed Chairman Bernanke, Sean Duffy (R-WI) had an interesting exchange with Bernanke. According to Bloomberg in their article Ben Bernanke, Sean Duffy, and the Watermelon Queen, Duffy told Bernanke to cut the Federal fat, like shrimp treadmill studies, $27 million on Moroccan pottery classes and $2.2 billion in free cell phones and pays for the pottery classes of the watermelon queen of Alabama.
Duffy was righteously indignant, but Bernanke was his usual bland self, responding like the academic economist he is to Duffys accusations that the Fed was discouraging Congress from being fiscally responsible.
Hey, thanks Bloomberg for lumping us all together with Barbital Ben.
I just wish The Bastiat Institute had a better picture of me talking about housing. I look like I am craving a good Reuben sandwich.
The stock market has risen dramatically over the past two days. Notice that the sequester seems to be missing.
Maybe it has risen on the news that the Godfather and architect of The Sequester, Jacob Lew, has been confirmed as our next Treasury Secretary.
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