The cost of going green

Neal Boortz  "For a man who claims that his administration is focused on creating jobs, Barack Obama sure is doing his best to destroy them.  He is doing this by imposing more government regulations and placing impossible demands on industries to produce products, regardless of the law of supply and demand."

Fed standards may swell prices by $10K, cut 260K jobs by '25  "Sharply higher fuel efficiency standards by 2025 could force vehicle prices up by nearly $10,000, reduce sales by 5.5 million vehicles annually and eliminate more than 260,000 jobs, according to a study by the Ann Arbor-based Center for Automotive Research. "

Shocking! EPA cost benefit predictions based on “feelings”  "Well, it’s certainly hard to argue with that, isn’t it? The economy is in dire need of a boost of that magnitude and, just as obviously, we definitely need all the new jobs we can get, right? There’s just one little problem with this masterful plan. A recent independent study of the EPA’s cost benefit predictions shows that they are almost entirely vaporware."

http://townhall.com/political-cartoons/bobgorrell

Father’s Day and the Importance of Marriage

capturingdelight.com

Heritage "Fathers are essential to protecting the well-being of children and, subsequently, to promoting the stability of society. Being raised by a married father and mother is vital to preventing childhood poverty and the host of social ills related to it. On this Father’s Day, the nation should recommit to strengthening and promoting the institution most likely to help fathers fulfill their crucial role: marriage."

Spotlight on Civil Society: “Courageous” Film Highlights Importance of Fathers  "Recognizing that changing culture’s opinion of men and fathers will take more than a trip to movie theaters, Sherwood Baptist has also developed individual and small group resources to accompany the release of the film. The curriculum and books are meant to encourage men in their roles as fathers and promote the benefits of stable families."  More from Heritage on Marriage and fatherhood

Where Have all the Fathers Gone? A Sobering Challenge for Dads  "Do your children know you to be a worshiper? How would they know? They would see you in worship. They would join you in worship. They would know whether worship for you was something that came out of the fullness of your heart or whether it was just something to get by one hour in the week to get on with the rest of life. When the pastor calls on your home and gathers the children around him and says, ‘Tell me some of your father's favorite hymns,' will they be able to answer? Or if he asks them, ‘Tell me some of your dad's favorite verses,' will they have anything to say? [If he says] ‘show me your dad's well-worn Bible,' will there be anything to pick up?"" CBMW.org

The Question of Slavery

Breakpoint  "Without a doubt, Christians (or those claiming to be Christians) can commit all kinds of wrongdoing. What happened in the Old South is a serious stain on Christian history, a horror to be confessed as sin and never to be repeated. It was wrong."....

"But the abolition movement also was led by Christians, both in England and America. Christians have led in eliminating slavery everywhere we have gone. Granted, not all Christians have done so. But in the beginning, only Christians—and more recently, others whose cultures have been profoundly influenced by Christianity—did so."
"All cultures and religions have practiced slavery if they had the economic means. Only one has eliminated it. That’s telling."....
"...far from being a “moral monster,” God is good, and far from being morally backward, God’s Word has led the world forward toward human freedom."

Thomas Nast, anti-slavery art

Reset Regret: U.S. Should Rethink Relations with Russian Leaders

Heritage  "To uphold the “reset,” the Administration agreed to cut U.S. strategic nuclear forces under New START, abandoned missile defense deployment in Poland and the Czech Republic, engaged Russia in missile defense talks, pursued a policy of geopolitical neglect in the former Soviet Union, and toned down criticism of political freedom violations in Russia. However, Putin remains Russia’s “national leader” and the real power behind—and on—the throne. Top White House and State Department officials now privately recognize that they bet on the wrong horse..."

Amateurs in the White House. And you can be sure the average Obama lover has not a clue about any of this.

Restaurant Groups Sue Labor Department .

Wall Street Journal  ""Under the new regulations, the additional information required is so specific and detailed that one small misstep by an employer can result in substantial liability while not providing employees with additional helpful information," Mr. Amador says."

Don't expect this administration to do anything to help those who give their constituents jobs.

Bush Did It! Bush Didn’t Do It!

Victor Davis Hanson  "When George Bush was president, promoting democracy was derided as an arrogant neoconservative imposition of our values onto different cultures. Now pushing democracy in the Arab world is called advocacy for human rights. Yet once more, Obama never explains why he channels the prior president’s policies without even the barest reference to his name."
"Obama knows the media are invested in his success. Therefore he feels no urgency to explain to the public why policies enacted years ago deserve blame for their failures and receive no praise for their successes."...


 

Jonah Goldberg Discovers Creeping Fascism at the NY Times

Verum Serum  "Liberalism likes to portray itself as high-minded, and in some ways it is, but Kristof’s column shows what lies behind all that. The ideal liberal system is one in which the state comes first and the individual’s freedom–of speech, of association, of choice–matters very little. It’s a progressive daydream that has to be killed anew by each generation."

lumaxart

White House Denies Cozying Up to Special Interests; Reality Begs to Differ

Weekly Standard  "I guess Obama could argue that the wealthy folks funding his campaign aren't "special interests." But if he did so he would be lying or twisting words beyond recognition.
"Is Cecile Richards, head of uber-powerful abortion lobby Planned Parenthood not a "special interest"? Because she dined with Obama at a fundraiser in Austin earlier this year. How about Google lobbyist (unregistered) Vint Cerf, who gave the max to Obama?" Mark Hemingway

The Gossips: Curses, Sarah; we'll get you yet!

http://terrellaftermath.com

Our regulatory burden grows, still the clueless love this man's administration

Thousands of Cribs Headed to the Dump Unless Federal Agency Delays Regulation  "The inventory of cribs is not considered unsafe, a hazard to children or subject to recall. They simply don’t meet the CPSC's latest safety test. Congress mandated the agency implement the regulation, but let CPSC commissioners come up with the date retailers must comply.
"Any cribs not meeting the current standard must be destroyed if they’re not sold by June 28. Industry estimates put the number between 10,000 and 20,000 cribs. Some retailers, panicking to sell the cribs before the deadline, have offered steep discounts to consumers. Manufacturers, meanwhile, may still have stock in warehouses that must go or be junked.
"“Overregulation is going to lead to the destroying of thousands of cribs that are perfectly good — many that are better than what will come out after the new regulations,”"... (Emphasis added.)  Why can't these people leave this nation alone? Or, better yet, just leave this nation.

Obama's Regulatory Tsunami More Destructive than Taxes  "As Obama travels about the country, speaking of the need for “shared sacrifice” and the need to increase taxes, he doesn’t say a word about the tsunami of new Obama regulations ranging from light bulbs to ozone pollution to painkillers to foreign travel to vending machines that is about to hit America. Their impact will be huge and do serious damage to our economy. "....
"These new regulations will be piled atop the Mt. Everest pile of regulations Obama has already produced."
Lurita Alexis Doan is an African American conservative commentator who writes about issues affecting the federal government.
 

about.com

Red Tape Rising: Regulation in the Obama Era "Americans are endlessly paying taxes--on their income, on their property, on almost anything they purchase. But the heavy burden that the U.S. government places on its citizens does not stop there. It continues with a slew of hidden taxes imposed by an ever-larger number of government regulations. These regulatory taxes do not appear on any balance sheet, yet cost Americans about $1 trillion every year."

Coulter: Get Rid of Government-But First Make Me President!

Ron Paul
Gage Skidmore

Ann Coulter  "There are reasons we have laws governing important institutions, such as marriage. As in landscaping, you don't remove a wall until you know why it was put there.

Marriage is a legal construct with legal consequences, particularly regarding rights and duties to children. "Libertarians would be better off spearheading a movement to get rid of stop signs than to get rid of officially sanctioned marriage. A world without government stop signs would be safer than a world without government marriage.

"It's true that eventually -– theoretically -- there could be private institutions to handle many of these matters. But for anyone calling himself a libertarian to put eliminating official marriage above eliminating Social Security and Medicare is certifiable."

 

Perry will be targeted by Ambulance Chasers

American Thinker  "...Rick Perry telegraphed which issue may separate him from the herd of Republican candidates if he enters the presidential race: tort reform... Perry stated, then reiterated, that successful tort reform had played a major role in the Texas economic renaissance by establishing that state's reputation as a business-friendly environment. He pointedly mentioned the important role medical technology and research were playing in Texas' economic growth, an industry that is frequently victimized by ambulance chasers. He then rang the Liberty Bell of Legal Doom by saying that tort reform nationwide is essential in any successful campaign to turn the American economy around."
Emphasis added

What Is Tort Reform?  "While each tort reform law is different, they all share one or more of the following goals:"

•To make it more difficult for injured people to file a lawsuit.
•To make it more difficult for injured people to obtain a jury trial.
•To place limits on the amount of money injured people receive in a lawsuit.

Federalism and Tort Reform  "In this post*, I explained why federally mandated tort reform is, in most cases, both constitutionally dubious and unnecessary. The better way to restrict abusive tort suits is through interstate competition combined with constraints on states’ ability to regulate conduct outside their borders."....

*Even Alabama, notorious for being the nation’s worst tort “hellhole” in the 1980s and 90s, has to a large extent cleaned up its act. Alabama ultimately replaced its pro-plaintiff state supreme court justices with ones that took a dimmer view of tort litigation. State leaders worried that Alabama would lose business if they did not. In most cases, “voting with your feet” is an excellent solution to the problem of runaway state tort law.