Free Republic

Attempting to feign fiscal austerity, Democrats have looked to raise taxes on America’s oil and natural gas producers. With the nation fixated on deficits and debt, Senate Democrats, unwilling to seriously cut federal spending, have introduced the inaccurately named Close Big Oil Tax Loopholes Act of 2011—legislation to repeal expensing deductions and necessary tax policies employed by American oil and natural gas companies. Are oil companies the recipients of government subsidies? No, the federal government does not give oil and natural gas companies a cent to produce oil. Unlike other forms of energy, oil and natural gas producers receive zero...

...The White house has created an interactive map that highlights over 7,000 of the underused properties the U.S. government owns. You can view it by state and see how many properties the government owns along with the type of structure it is, the name of the structure, the use of the building, and the size of it. In the District of Columbia, it lists 5 properties as being unused and in the state of California a staggering 1,151 properties are listed. The White House defines excess properties to be an assortment of things, ranging from office buildings to labs to...

...Budget “deals” that consider revenue part of the problem always result in tax hikes while spending restraint is forgotten: Speaker Boehner: “Today some seem intent on recycling the 1990 budget deal, only this time with much larger tax increases. That's not going to happen, and I've told that to the president. A tax hike would wreak havoc not only on our economy's ability to create private-sector jobs, but also on our ability to tackle the national debt...” Read more: http://www.atr.org/speaker-boehner-refuses-make-taxpayers-responsible-a6129#ixzz1LxiJ4u9o

Sometimes we all get stuck in a rut. Events around us seem to be ever-changing but we just can’t seem to motivate ourselves to change with them. We do the same things we have always done and we end up with the same results we always get and there just doesn’t seem to be a way break the routines with which we have saddled ourselves. If this is you, let us provide you with some ideas – gleaned from literally a fraction of an hour of research on the internet – tailored to your specific situation. Let us help you...

VIDEO: Prominent pollster, Frank Luntz, after seeing his focus group's overwhelmingly positive (almost unanimous among the group) reaction to Herman Cain, said, "Something very special is happening this evening", and called it "unprecedented". Luntz asked the audience who before last night's debate in South Carolina, started out supporting Cain, and only one hand went up. Then, he asked how many supported Cain after the debate, and easily more than half of the hands went up. The responses from individuals in the audience were energetically positive...

After compelling the President to axe almost $80 billion from his desired spending levels for the fiscal year, House Republicans are once again faced with the prospect of negotiating with a recalcitrant President on the next spending battle: the approaching debt ceiling. In keeping with his inflated rhetoric on the threat of a government shutdown, President Obama is feigning exigency once again, claiming a “clean” debt limit vote is necessary to prevent government default and certain economic catastrophe. The request to increase the debt limit without confronting the actual causes of debt belies the wisdom of having a debt ceiling...

Unwilling to reign in Washington’s overspending problem, Democrats and their allies on the Left are stuck championing tax increases. Raising the corporate income tax rate—already the highest in the world—or increasing the personal income rate is untenable, leaving Democrats no choice except to try and repeal tax credits and deductions. With oil and natural gas companies releasing their first quarter earnings this week, look for revenue hungry Democrats and to set their sights on this industry. First out of the gate is the League of Conservation Voters (LCV) which began asking Members of Congress to pledge to raise taxes on...

...There are two ways to interpret this statement. The first is to believe the Secretary is claiming the debt limit has never been raised in exchange for cohesive reform, as both Republicans and Democrats in Congress are currently requesting. This is simply untrue. The Congressional Review Act, which the administration has been so keen on flouting, was a product of the 1996 debt limit debate; the same is true for the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings budget reforms in 1985 and their subsequent revision in the debt limit debate of 1987. It is anachronistic, not to mention irresponsible, to consider a vote on raising...

The Connecticut Senate plans to hold a floor vote today on the budget agreement recently reached by legislative Democrats and first term Gov. Dannel Malloy (D). The plan, which entails two dozen tax increases, would technically be out of balance the moment it is signed into law and therefore unconstitutional. The problem is that the budget assumes over $13 million in higher revenue from an online sales tax and cosmetic surgery tax. Yet, that revenue is highly unlikely to come to fruition according to Kevin Sullivan, Commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Revenue Services. CT News Junkie has the following...

More bad news for those budding Ernie Pyles of the world as The Daily Beast ranks journalism at the top of its most useless degree list. 1. Journalism Median starting salary: $35,800 Median mid-career salary: $66,600 Change in number of jobs, 2008-2018: -4,400 Percentage Change in number of jobs, 2008-2018: -6.32 Undergraduate field of study: Communications Number of students awarded degrees 2008-2009: 78,009 When those now-degreed students entered college, journalism was still doing fine, though beginning to feel the first effects of the Internet. But by the 2008-2009 period, the landscape had radically changed and anyone actually able to find...

And the US Military currently has hundreds of experts combing-though a reported "treasure trove" of actionable Al Qaida intelligence contained in computer files snatched in Sunday's raid on the Abottabad compound. According to one US official: "They cleaned it out... can you imagine what's on Osama Bin Laden's hard drive?" A brief, interesting account of the AQ courier  who unwittingly got Geronimo scalped -here- _________________________________________________ More at Reaganite Republican _________________________________________________ The Pentagon Politico Bin laden compound diagram, pentagon, abbottabad compound diagram, xxx, Bin laden compound diagram, pentagon, abbottabad compound diagram, xxx, Bin laden compound abbottabad compound diagram, xx

I really wish we added as a topic: like we have wot=war on terror... SWBC= Slick Willy Bull Crap. Pakistan aided and abetted and provided comfort to the world's most wanted DEAD OR ALIVE terrorist no #1 leader AKA OUR enemy. Hey Slick Willy: They halped after they said oh frick and were shaked and baked by the Ops team. The mansion guards... Pakistan (Pakistahn like Odumbo pronounces it) provided HELP after they were caught. Sorry I just had to get that out.

It's been in the back of my mind now that there are certain dates throughout the year that The Almighty uses as lynchpins for his purposes. God does not play dice, as we've been told. This is not to say that human decisions do not cause less-than-earth-shaking events, or that random chance does not exist, or that coincidences on a grand scale don't happen, because they do. However, it is obvious that God prefers certain days to orchestrate historic events that are, shall I say, "plotline resolutions", where several building threads meet. Let's look at today in history - I'll...

...The tax reform package, which will pave the way for the forthcoming budget, builds off Gov. Snyder’s tax reform proposal. The reforms eliminate the Michigan Business Tax and replace it with a 6 percent flat corporate rate, while eliminating credits and deductions. Eighteen members of the Michigan House have signed the Taxpayer Protection Pledge, promising their constituents to “oppose and vote against any and all efforts to increase taxes.” Since the reform package amounts to a $712 million net tax cut, it is consistent with the Pledge... Read more: http://www.atr.org/michigan-house-passes-tax-cut-reform-a6106#ixzz1Kwth7nqv

"...The Committee on Reduction of Nonessential Federal Programs is not a new idea – in fact, the committee existed first in the 77th Congress after it was proposed by Senator Harry F. Byrd Sr. (D-Va.). Named after its creator, the “Byrd Committee” was tasked solely with cutting unnecessary and redundant federal programs and was able to enact real reform to that end – the Committee netted over $38 billion in savings (in adjusted dollars) in just its first few years of existence. Created in 1941, the Committee was integral in dialing back some of the exponential New Deal growth in...

You'll see Ben Bernanke in the video below, in his own words, being wrong time after time in the years leading up to the housing bubble bursting, the sub-prime mortgage fiasco, unemployment and the overall state of the economy...

In most plans to reduce the deficit “tax expenditures” is a phrase that comes up often. We have to “reduce tax expenditures” or “get rid of spending in the tax code”. This is a popular way politicians try to sell their plans to eliminate credits and deductions that families or businesses count on when filing tax returns. The idea of reducing tax expenditures is central to the plans proposed by President Obama, the Senate Gang of Six, and the Simpson-Bowles debt commission. The popularity of this phrase and idea is nothing short of astounding, considering the fact that, in the...

Freepers: Due to last night's storms in Central Arkansas, our family found out the HARD WAY just how important communications (commo) is when the power goes out, telephone lines get blown down, the cell towers are destroyed, and we are left in the dark with multiple tornados inbound.Anyways, I wanted to solicit Freepers help on unconventional communications with family such as Citizen Band (CB), FRS, GMRS, etc. I am going to attend our Central Arkansas Ham Radio meeting next month and see about going "one step further" to get my ham radio license. Please read below for my situational needs.

...In scoring the Death Tax Repeal Permanency Act, Entin acknowledges that a static score reveals a substantial loss in tax revenues over ten years. A static score refers to the method in which changes to current law assume the exact same behavior, often ignoring even commonsense changes that would take place as a result of changes in law. If the Act is scored on a static model $460 billion is lost in revenues from 2011-2021. The majority of the report however, demonstrates that if the law were repealed many changes in behavior would take place. By raising wages, capital investment,...

We are rightly concerned with the poor, who always will be with us and to whom we owe our support and aid. Of course, it’s quite another thing for the government to take from you to give to the poor. The presumption that the government can be compassionate with someone else’s money is absurd on the face of it. Robin Hood was a thief first, and the ends don’t justify the means. Every theft does someone some good. But that doesn’t justify theft. But being poor is quite another thing in itself. What is poverty? . . .