Category Archives: Obama

Crony Capitalism At Its Ugliest

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Eric Clapton with Gibson Les Paul guitar

Is it any wonder American businesses are afraid to open their doors in the reign of King Obama?

Today Gibson Guitar’s CEO Henry Juszkiewicz announced that the company has settled with the Dept. of Justice, who ruled last year that Gibson had violated the Lacey Act by importing unfinished rosewood for guitar fingerboards from India and Madagascar.

It was clearly another case of “picking winners and losers”, the Obama administration’s favorite political tool – used to bludgeon opponents and reward cronies and contributors.

You see, most guitar fretboards are made with imported rosewood.  Guitar manufacturers often buy fretboards which have been manufactured in India, and the Indian government is grateful for the business (memo to Obama – most nations appreciate the chance to employ their citizens).  In fact Martin Guitars imports the very same rosewood for its guitars, from the same suppliers that Gibson does.  If this is a crime (which it has not been proven to be), it certainly is a victimless one.

Gibson plants were raided by armed federal agents, who confiscated $1 million worth of rosewood inventory.  They were shut down for a time, and now the company has been extorted for a $300,000 fine and a $50,000 “contribution” to the US National Fish and Wildlife Foundation.

Martin’s use of the same rosewood has never been questioned.

Oh, did I mention that Gibson’s CEO Juszkiewicz is a Republican supporter, while Martin’s CEO, Chris Martin, is a long-time donor to the Democrat party?

We have always been taught that there was a presumption of innocence in this country, and an opportunity for defense and redress if we have been wrongfully charged.  Unfortunately in today’s world where government agencies and czars rule with impunity, that’s no longer the case.  A bureaucrat can be judge, jury and executioner.

“We’re in this really incredible situation. We have been implicated in wrongdoing and we haven’t been charged with anything,” Juszkiewicz said. “Our business has been injured to millions of dollars. And we don’t even have a court we can go to and say, ‘Look, here’s our position.”

Due process be damned, this is politics.

The “picking winners and losers” tactic has worked so well on the national level that our Montana Democrat administration has taken the page from the Obama playbook.  Stay tuned as that story develops.

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

I don’t know how someone controlled you
They bought and sold you.

While My Guitar Gently Weeps – George Harrison
(guitar solo by Eric Clapton on a GIBSON LES PAUL )

Our Federal Govt. – Dumb and Dumber

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And now, here’s the latest headlines from Right Side News:

  • The IRS estimates they will pay out $21 billion in fraudulant refunds within the next five years.  I bet it’s triple that.  They received 2,137 returns from one address in Michigan in one year.  They sent him $3.3 million dollars in refunds.   It never occurred to the IRS top management to add one line of code to their program that checks for multiple returns or refunds at one address.  By the way, your kids and grandkids will have to pay the $21 billion (or more) back to the Chinese, who loaned it to us so we could give it to the crooks.  Nice work, guys.
  • Our Missile Defense Agency has been putting our top-security computers at risk by downloading porn from Russian web sites.   Well, it’s been kind of slow around the Missile Defense Agency office.  They don’t have anything important to do.
  • In spite of the mind-boggling increase in our national debt, the feds just keep buying more cars, increasing their fleet to 449,000 vehicles.   The taxpayers now provide only one car for every seven federal employees.  But we make it up to them by providing smart phones for all of them.  That way they can watch porn and play Angry Birds without having to use the office computers.
  • The Post Office is now in default, owing billions of dollars on union employee benefits that it can not pay for.   Oh well, it’s okay.  Hey Bernanke, could you start that printing press back up?

And that’s the news for this afternoon.  Actually there’s more, but I think I need a drink . . .

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

We think we know what we’re doin’
That don’t mean a thing
It’s all in the past now
Money changes everything

Money Changes Everything – Cyndi Lauper

Hooray! Shovel-Ready Green Jobs!

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James O’Keefe has done it again.

He has the union bosses on camera, saying “let’s get the money and then figure out what to do”.  Apply for a grant that includes the words “green” and “jobs”, call it “shovel ready”, and it’s automatic.  Dig a hole, fill it in.  Get the money.  Happens all the time, like for instance the “Green Jobs Green New York” program.  “It’s a lot of BS”, according to the union.

Watch the video – there’s nothing I can add to this:

 

God bless ya, O’Keefe, keep them coming!

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

Digging a ditch where madness gives a bit
Digging a ditch where silence lives
Digging a ditch for when I’m through
Digging this ditch I’m digging for you

 

Am I A “Birther?”

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Yes, President Obama came forward with a long-form birth certificate from Hawaii. And ever since, it has been taboo to even consider that something might be wrong, even among the most right-leaning journalists.  You could be accused of being . . . the “B” word.

Here’s my problem. I don’t care where President Obama was born. He may have been born in Kenya, or Hawaii, or maybe he is an alien from a distant nebula – it really doesn’t matter to me. His policies worry me to death, but where he was born? Who cares?

Here is what does matter to me: why did the president of the United States need to have his birth certificate forged?

Oh, it’s definitely forged. I have used Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator pretty much since they were first created. I know how pdf files work. I looked at the layers and layers of phony stuff cobbled together into an amateur pdf file and planted on the White House website. Anybody who has an even modest understanding of Adobe software can know in minutes that this is a forged document. There is no doubt about it.  The original scan might be part of the document, but a lot of the stuff that is there now is not original.  How arrogant of his staff to think that such an amateur attempt would not be detected by thousands of tech-savvy Adobe users.  And how easy it is for people who don’t understand the technology to just dismiss the smoking gun evidence because they don’t “get it”.

Today Sheriff Joe Arpaio from Arizona announced that the birth certificate is “definitely forged”.   Aside from the obvious Adobe chicanery, Arpaio’s chief investigator, Mike Zullo, said that they learned from a retired state employee about birth certificate numeric codes which identify the status of certain fields of information.  Codes on the document indicate that some fields, such as the father’s race and occupation, were not filled out, but in the adulterated version – surprise!  There they are!

There are so many rumors about his social security number, his draft card, his college transcripts, his scholarships, the loss of his license to practice law. These concerns may or may not be legit – President Obama doesn’t seem inclined to put them to rest, and maybe that in itself is cause for concern.

Maybe the many mysteries that surround Barack Obama matter, and maybe not.  But when a guy has to forge his own birth certificate, it makes me fear that something is dreadfully wrong.

Does that make me a “birther?”

Good Times in Canada, Eh?

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We just returned from a fantastic football weekend in Canada.

Yes, they do play football in Canada, and for football junkies like my son and I, it’s a great excuse for a summer road trip.  The Saskatchewan Roughriders beat the BC Lions 23 – 20, and the big play was a missed field goal attempt that was run back 129 yards for a touchdown!  Now that’s something you don’t see in the NFL!

Aside from getting our summer football fix, the thing we enjoy most on our northern excursions is our Canuck friends.  They always make us feel welcome, show us a good time, and are as curious about our everyday lives as we are about theirs.

I was delighted to learn that the economy is great in Saskatchewan.  The mean family income is now $73,000, second among the provinces to Alberta.   New shops and restaurants are popping up all over, and business is brisk.  New football stadiums are planned around the country, including Regina. The streets are filled with shiny new cars and trucks, and pockets jingle with loonies and toonies (one- and two-dollar coins).

On the other hand, my Canadian friends worry about public services.  The health care system is a mess.  The average wait time to even see a specialist is now ten weeks, and the six-month wait time after that for routine surgical procedures forces many patients to spend their hard-earned Canadian money at hospitals south of the border.  They view their health care as “free” but when pressed, they admit that they don’t always get the best value for their tax dollars.  It is a sneak preview of ObamaCare.

For all Saskatchewan’s apparent wealth, we couldn’t help but notice the shabby condition of their highways and other infrastructure.  They definitely have some “shovel-ready” jobs.  It seems that Canada has the same problem we have in the US – things left up to the free enterprise system seem to work out just fine, but anything filtered through the mud-bog of government slows to a crawl.

One of my Canadian friends was fascinated to learn that I own guns, and usually keep one close by for personal and family protection, thanks to our second amendment and my Montana concealed carry permit.  “We can’t even buy a bullet, eh?” he lamented.  “Only the bad guys have guns here.”

I didn’t run into any bad guys.  Just a bunch of good guys who love their country, Riders Football, and Canadian beer.  (PS –  no US flags anywhere – no Star Spangled Banner at the game either!  See my blog about that)

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

Green is the Colour.
Football is the Game.
We’re all together
and Winning is our aim!

Green Is The Colour – Saskatchewan Roughriders

Hey Barack – Send Your Poor Brother George a Check

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My wife (that lovely, delicate, sensitive little flower) often exclaims (rather loudly) to any liberal who feels the government does not do enough for their parents/siblings/children or somebody else’s parents/siblings/children, “If you don’t care enough about your family to take care of them, why should I?”

She has a point.  Take our president, for example.  His aunt, Zeituni Onyango, lives in Boston in subsidized housing, on disability payments.  For years she was on the public dole as an illegal alien, but eventually she and her taxpayer-funded attorney got a “waiver” to avoid her deportation to her home country, Kenya.  So she is no longer technically “illegal.”

Um, Mr. Obama, if you don’t care enough about your aunt to slip her a check once in a while, why should the taxpayers take care of her?

The latest Obama relative in the spotlight is his brother George.  It seems George, who lives in Kenya on a few bucks a day, doesn’t hear much from his big brother, Barack, these days.  “He’s got other issues to deal with,” George says.

For someone so insistent on “sharing the wealth”, and someone who continues to amass personal wealth, our president appears kind of, well . . .  niggardly (please look it up before you call me a racist).

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

I pay my money to the welfare line –
I see you standin’ in it EVERY TIME!

Why Can’t We Be Friends – War

Let’s Just Ignore That Law

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I’ve heard it said that the United States is “a nation of laws.”  I’m not aware of any recent re-write of the Constitution, but last week it seems something changed.

Oh, the laws are still there, but our current president and attorney general have decided that they don’t feel our law officials need to enforce some of them.  For instance, they say that as many as 800,000 illegal immigrants will not be deported “as long as they aren’t doing something ‘illegal’.”  You can’t make this stuff up.

White House advisor David Ploufe insisted on TV that it’s not a political move intended to pander to Hispanic voters.  I’m sure the thought of trading amnesty for votes never crossed their minds.

My lovely bride had a great idea.  She said, “Why don’t we decide to not enforce the capital gains tax?”

That got me thinking.  There are a lot of laws that might be best forgotten.  I’ll bet the rancher who lost 58 of his sheep to a single grizzly bear last week near Conrad, Montana would like to say, “Oh sorry – heh, heh – I thought I could just ignore that little rule about shooting grizzlies.  My bad!”

MUS - Mexico Borderaybe next time I’m in that long line at the airport waiting to get groped by the TSA guy, I might just jump right over their little retaining rope, bypass the whole security checkpoint, and have time to grab a tasty Cinnabon roll  before my flight.  I say the groping laws should only be applied to nervous-looking bearded guys in turbans praying in Arabic, anyway.

But I suppose I am just dreaming.  Ordinary citizens don’t get to choose which rules they want to have enforced, at least not in our “nation of laws”.  Only a dictator could get away with something like that.

 

Tom Balek – Rockin’ On the Right Side

“I Fought the Law, and the Law Won” – Bobby Fuller Four