forgottenliberty.com

The communist regime of North Korea, following in the foot steps of China, was forced to abandon it’s planned, centralized, government controlled economy in favor of a free market in order to keep it’s citizens from starving to death.  The economic policies of communism/socialism/Marxism have shown themselves once again to be unsustainable.  The Washington Post has the story,

Bowing to reality, the North Korean government has lifted all restrictions on private markets — a last-resort option for a leadership desperate to prevent its people from starving.  In recent weeks, according to North Korea observers and defector groups with sources in the country, Kim Jong Il’s government admitted its inability to solve the current food shortage and encouraged its people to rely on private markets for the purchase of goods. (emphasis mine)

In essence, the communist government of North Korea has realized it is unable to ration food and control the economy in a sustainable way and has given up trying.  Food has always been in short supply in North Korea.  Because of this, a large black market developed over the years that provided much of the Communist citizenry with food.  However, many of the merchants involved in the black market food trade began to acquire some degree (by North Korean standards) of wealth.  This was understandably an outrage to any self respecting communist/socialist/Marxist regime.  It’s just downright evil for someone to make a buck by selling food to hungry comrades, right?

In order to stick it to the ‘greedy’ black market capitalist who were feeding the nation,

President Bush, with the help of Congress, ran up gigantic yearly deficits in the the hundreds of billions of dollars.  President Obama on the other hand, has managed to dwarf Bush’s record deficits.  Despite the good game Obama has been talking the last few days about cutting the deficit and being fiscally responsible, his new budget for the 2011 fiscal year still contains another record deficit.  I know what every liberal is thinking, “Yes, this new budget still has a big deficit, but Obama said he cut out 20 billion dollars.  At least he is moving in the right direction.”  It’s true, Obama claims he cut 20 billion out of the new federal budget.  But if this budget actually increases the total amount of spending, is it truthful to say that 20 billion has been cut?  Being truthful has not been one of Obama’s strong points so far in his presidency.

This new budget will total 3.8 trillion, which is 250 billion more than last years 3.55 trillion dollar budget.  Obama claims to have cut 20 billion, but he is actually raising the amount of government spending by 250 billion.  How is this being fiscally responsible?  How is this cutting the deficit?  If I told someone that I was going to get my finances under control by cutting back on the amount of money I’m spending in one area of my budget, but then increased the amount I’m spending in another area, am I really cutting anything?  Of course not!

It goes without saying that this budget has

President Obama is positioning himself to introduce a second stimulus bill.   However, because of the obvious failure of the first stimulus bill, this one will be called something else.  Based on what he has been saying for the last week, I’m guessing it will be disguised as a job bill and will probably be introduced during his State of the Union address.  If he doesn’t bring it up at the State of the Union it will be within the next month because the economy will most likely turn around this year.  Because of this, Obama wants to pass something soon so he and his fellow Democrats will be able to claim credit for the economic upswing.

Dan Mitchell from the Cato Institute has made a video describing why this second stimulus bill will be detrimental for the long term health of our country and economy.

Here really nails it, doesn’t he?  I guess we’ll have to wait and see if Obama announces a new “Jobulus” bill on Wednesday’s State of the Union address.

Republican Scott Brown has a real chance of pulling off an upset victory in Tuesday’s special election for the Massachusetts Senate seat formerly held by Ted Kennedy.  If Brown wins, the Democrats will loose their 60 vote super majority in the Senate required to overcome Republican filibusters.  This could be trouble for 2 of Obama’s top legislative priorities, health care and cap and trade.  The health care and cap and trade bills are bad for American businesses, and smart investors know this.  However, if Brown wins, the passage of these two job killing bills could be doomed.  This would be great for our economy and may spark a rally in the stock market.

Jim Cramer of CNBC’s Mad Money, a long time Democrat agrees.  In his own words he believes, “… investors who are nervous about the dictatorship of the Pelosi proletariat will feel at ease, and we could have a gigantic rally off a Coakley loss and a Brown win.”

Below is a partial transcript and video clip of Cramer’s show where he commented on the Massachusetts Senate race.  The best line of the clip has got to be, “Pelosi politburo emasculation!”

I saw this political cartoon, and I had to post it.  It is so true.  Huge deficit spending and threatened tax increases during a recession takes away the ability for small businesses to create jobs.  Democrats don’t understand this, do they?  Why would a small business owner, who is worried about inflation, possible tax increases, and a greatly increased cost for employee health insurance, be willing to risk more of his capital by hiring new employees?  He won’t, because he may have to lay them off a few months down the road due to new government policies and mandates.  Instead, he will wait to see what the government is going to do.  If health care dies in Congress, and the small business taxes that Obama has proposed are voted down, it will become much easier for small business owners to hire new employees.  Until then, the foundation of our economy will remain on shaky ground.  This cartoon illustrates my point perfectly.

It appears President Obama may be realizing that his deficit is becoming a huge problem. In light of many economists warning of the pending inflation risk and foreign creditors becoming nervous of buying U.S. debt, President Obama is eying a domestic spending freeze. According to the AP,

The Obama administration has alerted domestic agencies to plan for a freeze or even a 5 percent cut in their budgets, part of an election-year push to rein in record deficits that threaten the economy and Democrats’ political prospects next fall.

The deficit-cutting drive comes as President Barack Obama traveled to Asia where several nations, especially China, have expressed concerns about the size of U.S. deficits. China is the largest foreign holder of U.S. Treasury securities and policymakers worry that alarm over deficits could push foreigners into cutting back on their purchases of Treasury debt.

I seem to remember John McCain proposing a spending freeze during the campaign.  I also remember Obama criticizing such a plan.  From the J Post,