Obama gangland tactics at work.

White House pushing to gag stimulus critics
From Michelle Malkin.com
By Michelle Malkin
May 30, 2009

In keeping with his past campaign tactics to shut critics up through brute force, the White House appears to be taking steps to crack down on critics of the trillion-dollar porkulus law.

Is anyone surprised? Mark Tapscott at the Examiner reports:

A new White House policy on permissible lobbying on economic recovery and stimulus project has taken a decidedly anti-First Amendment turn. It’s a classic illustration of Big Government trying to control every aspect of a particular activity and in the process running up against civil liberty.

Check out this passage from a post on the White House blog by Norm Eisen, Special Counsel to the President on Ethics and Government Reform (emphasis added):

“First, we will expand the restriction on oral communications to cover all persons, not just federally registered lobbyists. For the first time, we will reach contacts not only by registered lobbyists but also by unregistered ones, as well as anyone else exerting influence on the process. We concluded this was necessary under the unique circumstances of the stimulus program.

Writes Tapscott:

The key passage is the reference to expanding regulation from registered lobbyists to “anyone else exerting influence on the process. We concluded this was necessary under the unique circumstances of the stimulus program.”

This is the Camel’s nose under the tent…

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YOU now OWE more than HALF A MILLION DOLLARS, not counting your mortgage, credit cards and other debt!

From Investor's Business Daily
May 29, 2009

What We Owe: $64 Trillion, And Counting...

Debt: OK, take a deep breath. You might need it after we tell you this: You now owe more than half a million dollars, not counting your home mortgage, credit cards and other debt. Don't remember running it up?

Well, technically, you didn't. The government did it for you. And USA Today has done us all a favor by taking out a calculator and doing the basic math. It's beyond ugly.

Each household owes an additional $55,000, thanks to the soaring spending by the federal government on retirement programs just in the past year.

All told, each household at the end of 2008 owed $546,668. That's four times what American households owe for mortgages, car loans, credit cards and other debt.

Looking long term is where it really gets scary. Recently, we learned the U.S. had $101 trillion in retirement and health care obligations over the next 75 years. The only problem is, at current tax rates we'll have only $53 trillion to pay for it all.

That leaves a gaping hole of $48 trillion.

It gets worse. The stimulus plans and bailouts pushed into the budget by President Obama and congressional Democrats will add $9 trillion to our national debt over the next 10 years alone.

Add to that an expected $1.1 trillion spent over the same time to fund a government takeover of our health care system — an estimate most health care experts, by the way, believe is laughably low — and you have the makings of an epic financial tragedy.

Total federal debt will soar from 41% of GDP to 82% in just 10 years — more debt than we rang up in 235 years of existence. And over the next half-century, Americans will owe $63 trillion — 4.5 times our current GDP of $14 trillion.

"We have a huge implicit mortgage on every household in America," David Walker, former U.S. comptroller, told USA Today. "Except, unlike a real mortgage, it's not backed up by a house."

Americans can't be blamed for hyperventilating when they see such numbers emerging from the most fiscally irresponsible government in our nation's history.

Even the nation's president, in a moment of unguarded frankness last week, admitted that "we are out of money."

Was that supposed to inspire confidence? Or was it merely a prelude to asking for a spate of new taxes to pay for it all — turning the U.S. economy from a vibrant, job-creation machine into a stagnant, European-style welfare state?

The current administration already has proposed or is mulling as many as 10 new taxes — everything from a European-style VAT (a national sales tax) to intrusive new taxes on beer, fast food, cigarettes and other sinful indulgences, to cap and trade, which is nothing more than a federal tax on energy.

Two weeks ago, Standard & Poor's warned Britain it could lose its AAA rating because its national debt will soon hit 100% of GDP. Well, guess what? We're heading down the same road. A story in the usually staid Financial Times of London last week said it all: "Exploding Debt Threatens America."

More brutal was last week's assessment of Russia's Pravda, the former house organ for the Soviet communist regime: "The American descent into Marxism is happening with breath taking speed." Ouch.

We'd like to disagree, but at least one of those newspapers is right. And unless we Americans stand up and tell our elected officials to stop this insane surge in spending and taxing, we'll pay for it for decades to come.
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IRS Tax Revenue Falls 34% in April vs a year ago - Oh, Oh! - bigger deficits than projected

IRS tax revenue falls along with taxpayers' income

from USA Today
By John Waggoner
USA TODAY

Federal tax revenue plunged $138 billion, or 34%, in April vs. a year ago — the biggest April drop since 1981, a study released Tuesday by the American Institute for Economic Research says.

When the economy slumps, so does tax revenue, and this recession has been no different, says Kerry Lynch, senior fellow at the AIER and author of the study. "It illustrates how severe the recession has been."

For example, 6 million people lost jobs in the 12 months ended in April — and that means far fewer dollars from income taxes. Income tax revenue dropped 44% from a year ago.

"These are staggering numbers," Lynch says.

Big revenue losses mean that the U.S. budget deficit may be larger than predicted this year and in future years.

"It's one of the drivers of the ongoing expansion of the federal budget deficit," says John Lonski, chief economist for Moody's Investors Service. The Congressional Budget Office projects a $1.7 trillion budget deficit for fiscal year 2009.

The other deficit driver is government spending, which, the AIER's report says, is the main culprit for the federal budget deficit.

The White House thinks that tax revenue will increase in 2011, thanks in part to the stimulus package, says the report from AIER, an independent economic research institute. But it warns, "Even if that does happen, the administration also projects that government spending will be so much higher each year that large deficits will continue, and the national debt held by the public will double over the next 10 years."

The government may have a hard time trimming spending to reduce the deficit when the recession ends. The 77 million Baby Boomers— those born in 1946 through 1964 — will start tapping their federal retirement benefits soon, which means increased government outlays for Social Security and Medicare.

"It will be doubly difficult for federal government to reduce expenditures and narrow the deficit as rapidly as they did following previous recessions," Lonski says. At the end of the last major recession, in 1981, Boomers were in their 30s. Their incomes were expanding, as was their appetite for goods and services.

The Boomers now are in their 50s and 60s and unlikely to keep increasing incomes for long, which means that revenue from income taxes could flatten in the next few years. Also, Lonski says, they are more likely to save for retirement than spend — and consumer spending is a big driver of the economy.

"The American consumer led us out of previous recessions with some semblance of gusto," Lonski says. "They're too old to do it now."
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CBO Fires Another Shot At Cap & Trade - A huge Tax On Everyone

from Cheat-Seeking Missiles
May 20th 2009
by Laer

The Dems dream of a vast new IRS is still alive even as Congressional Dems back off from Obama’s concept - cap and trade as a tax - in favor of a seemingly less onorous cap and trade as a grant concept. But that darn Congressional Budget Office just keeps on pointing out the obvious: No matter how its structured, cap and trade will be an economic Katrina on the American economy.

The CBO has issued a second letter opining on the Dem scheme, WashTimes reports:

Congress’ chief scorekeeper says the global warming bill moving through Congress will either be scored as a major tax increase or a massive expansion of the federal government - and either one could give opponents substantial ammunition to complicate Democrats’ efforts to pass a bill.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO), in a letter sent last week to House Energy
and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry A. Waxman, said Democrats’ approach of creating allowances for emitting greenhouse gases requires developing from
scratch a market worth hundreds of billions of dollars. …

The six-page CBO letter also listed repeated examples of situations in which, for purposes of the federal budget, it will assume that the cap-and-trade approaches will dampen businesses’ income, meaning less revenue to the federal government.

The Dem response? Well, they’re trying to work with CBO. They figure that maybe if they threaten the CBO budget or start making personal attacks on its staff, they’ll be able to get the watchdogs to change a couple assumptions and come out with a rosier report. In other words, they’re not looking at the bill, seeing it for what it is and deciding to wait until the economy is back on its feet to cut its legs out from under it. Instead, they remain intent on kicking the economy while its down and want to get fudged numbers to excuse their action.

Meanwhile, the environmental lobbying machine is busy discounting the CBO:

Dan Lashof, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council’s climate center, said the CBO will still have to issue a final score on the bill when it passes the committee, and NRDC hopes the letter is not the last word.

“What they have left out of their analysis is the benefit to consumers of energy efficiency - that actually lowers their bills. I don’t see anywhere in this long set of examples this accounts for that,” Mr. Lashof said.

That’s because the CBO hasn’t yet come up with the metrics to measure pipe dreams and fantasies. There is no energy efficient replacement immediately available that would allow us to avoid the immediate impacts of cap and trade. As one commenter to the WashTimes story sarcastically put the Dem view of things,

The CBO is full of partisan hacks who want to do nothing more than destroy this once great nation. But, the Natural Resources Defense Council’s climate center is a straight down the middle lovable group who would never do anything that might tear apart the very foundations of our economy.

The new bill gives the GOP and blue dog Dems some hope that cap and trade might be the first Obama policy initiative to fall flat on its face. That certainly must be the goal, both to protect the economy from Warmie lunacy and to signal an end to the devastating run Obama’s enjoyed.

Do your part. Write your member of Congress and demand they tell you before they vote how the bill will impact your power bill and the price at the pump. Keep asking; hold them to it.
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Tim Geithner the Tax Cheat Wants to Cut Down on Tax Cheating

Taxpayers to get rude surprise - Millions of couples, retirees may have to repay some of Obama tax credit

Geez, what a shock that Obummer didn't happen to mention this last night at his press conference when he could easily have informed millions of people.

Oh, wait, that's right! This would have been bad news that would have spoiled the lovefest the media was having with him. Yeah, it might just have provoked an uncomfortable question or two.

Oh, never mind, that would never have happened. Wow, I just never cease to be amazed at him. It's just hard to imagine how Obama has enough time to sleep with all these journalists. He truly is Superman.
Rees

Please! Obama! Say it ain't so...What a bammer! oops, I mean bummer!
from Yahoo News
by Stephen Ohlemacher
Associated Press Writer
Thursday April 30, 2009

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Millions of Americans enjoying their small windfall from President Barack Obama's "Making Work Pay" tax credit are in for an unpleasant surprise next spring.

The government is going to want some of that money back.

The tax credit is supposed to provide up to $400 to individuals and $800 to married couples as part of the massive economic recovery package enacted in February. Most workers started receiving the credit through small increases in their paychecks in the past month.

But new tax withholding tables issued by the IRS could cause millions of taxpayers to get hundreds of dollars more than they are entitled to under the credit, money that will have to be repaid at tax time.

At-risk taxpayers include a broad swath of the public: married couples in which both spouses work; workers with more than one job; retirees who have federal income taxes withheld from their pension payments and Social Security recipients with jobs that provide taxable income.

The Internal Revenue Service acknowledges problems with the withholding tables but has done little to warn average taxpayers.

"They need to get the Goodyear blimp out there on this," said Tom Ochsenschlager, vice president of taxation for the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

For many, the new tax tables will simply mean smaller-than-expected tax refunds next year, IRS spokesman Terry Lemons said. The average refund was nearly $2,700 this year.

But taxpayers who calculate their withholding so they get only small refunds could face an unwelcome tax bill next April, said Jackie Perlman, an analyst with the Tax Institute at H&R Block.

"They are going to get a surprise," she said.

Perlman's advice: check your federal withholding to make sure sufficient taxes are being taken out of your pay. If you are married and both spouses work, you might consider having taxes withheld at the higher rate for single filers. If you have multiple jobs, you might consider having extra taxes withheld by one of your employers. You can make that request with a Form W-4.

The IRS has a calculator on its Web site to help taxpayers figure withholding. So do many private tax preparers.

Obama has touted the tax credit as one of the big achievements of his first 100 days in office, boasting that 95 percent of working families will qualify in 2009 and 2010.

The credit pays workers 6.2 percent of their earned income, up to a maximum of $400 for individuals and $800 for married couples who file jointly. Individuals making more $95,000 and couples making more than $190,000 are ineligible.

The tax credit was designed to help boost the economy by getting more money to consumers in their regular paychecks. Employers were required to start using the new withholding tables by April 1.

The tables, however, don't take into account several common categories of taxpayers, experts said.

For example:

--A single worker with two jobs making $20,000 a year at each job will get a $400 boost in take-home pay at each of them, for a total of $800. That worker, however, is eligible for a maximum credit of $400, so the remaining $400 will have to be paid back at tax time -- either through a smaller refund or a payment to the IRS.

The IRS recognized there could be a similar problem for married couples if both spouses work, so it adjusted the withholding tables. The fix, however, was imperfect.

-- A married couple with a combined income of $50,000 is eligible for an $800 credit. However, if both spouses work and make more than $13,000, the new withholding tables give them each a $600 boost -- for a total of $1,200 -- so the remaining $400 will have to be paid back at tax time -- either through a smaller refund or a payment to the IRS.

There were 33 million married couples in 2008 in which both spouses worked. That's 55 percent of all married couples, according to the Census Bureau. - that will have to pay money back

-- A single college student with a part-time job making $10,000 would get a $400 boost in pay. However, if that student is claimed as a dependent on a parent's tax return, he/she doesn't qualify for the credit and would have to repay it when he/she files next year.

Some retirees face even bigger headaches.

The Social Security Administration is sending out $250 payments to more than 50 million retirees in May as part of the economic stimulus package. The payments will go to people who receive Social Security, Supplemental Security Income, railroad retirement benefits or veteran's disability benefits.

The payments are meant to provide a boost for people who don't qualify for the tax credit. However, they will go to retirees even if they have earned income and receive the credit. Those retirees will have the $250 payment deducted from their tax credit -- but not until they file their tax returns next year, long after the money may have been spent.

Retirees who have federal income taxes withheld from pension benefits also are getting an income boost as a result of the new withholding tables. However, pension benefits are not earned income, so they don't qualify for the tax credit. That money will have to paid back next year when tax returns are filed.

More than 20 million retirees and survivors receive payments from defined benefit pension plans, according to the Employee Benefit Research Institute. However, it is unclear how many have federal taxes withheld from their payments.

The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union raised concerns about the effect of the tax credit on pension payments in a letter to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner in March.

Geithner responded that Treasury and IRS understood the concerns and were "exploring ways to mitigate that effect."

Rep. Dave Camp of Michigan, the top Republican on the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, said Geithner has yet to respond to concerns raised by committee members.

"So far we've got the, 'If we don't address this maybe it will go away' approach," Camp said.

IRS withholding calculator:
http://www.irs.gov/individuals/article/0,,id96196,00.html
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Income Tax Deadline Changed

Income Tax deadline change:

Income taxes are normally due on April 15th, unless that date falls on a Saturday or Sunday in which case they are due on Monday the 16th or 17th.

However, there's been a recent change, and so for the next 4 years, they will not be due until you are nominated to a cabinet position.

h/t Mark

The Stench of Scandal Nails Obama Nominee for Deputy EPA Administrator

from Cheat Seeking Missiles
Posted by: Laer
March 25, 2009

Jon Cannon, the prez’s nominee for deputy EPA administrator, is cannon fodder this afternoon, the latest scandal-plagued nominee to have to resign in shame even before confirmation. Here’s Cannon’s statement:

“Today I am voluntarily removing my name from consideration to be Deputy Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. It has come to my attention that America’s Clean Water Foundation, where I once served on the board of directors, has become the subject of scrutiny. While my service on the board of that now-dissolved organization is not the subject of the scrutiny, I believe the energy and environmental challenges facing our nation are too great to delay confirmation for this position, and I do not wish to present any distraction to the agency.”

Michelle Malkin dug into the Cannon/Clean Water Foundation deal and found sewer water, not clean water - the mishandling of $26 million in federal funds. The Foundation was either Geithner-like in its ineptness or just plain crooked, because EPA said it could not provide support for any of its general journal entries; included duplicate transactions in its accounting system; recorded labor charged to EPA grants incorrectly; could not support the recorded indirect costs; claimed unallowable pre-award costs (a really stupid move - anyone who’s bid on a government contract knows that’s verbotin!), and three other assorted crooked acts.

So to recap, Obama nominated as Dep. Dir. of EPA a guy from a group that scammed EPA. That would be about as dumb as appointing a Treasury Sec. who scammed the IRS. Hey, wait a minute …
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