Control – “they hope to save you from yourself”

From NPR

All are devotees of behavioral economics — a school of economic thought greatly influenced by psychological research — which argues that the human animal is hard-wired to make errors when it comes to decision-making, and therefore people need a little “nudge” to make decisions that are in their own best interests.

And that is exactly what Obama administration officials plan to do: By taking account of human psychology, they hope to save you from yourself.

This is the story of how obscure psychological research into human decision-making first revolutionized economics and now appears poised to remake the relationship between the government and its citizens.

Goes along with this quote by Michelle Obama:

Barack will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual, uninvolved, uninformed

Pajamas TV VIDEO on why this is a bad idea.

Sources:
Using Psychology To Save You From Yourself, Alix Spiegel, All Things Considered

New York Times, OP-ED COLUMNIST, Spock at the Bridge, MAUREEN DOWD, Published: March 1, 2009

Running from Taxes

1/3 of Maryland Millionaires Missing
The WSJ notes that since the state of Maryland imposed its new millionaire tax last year, one-third of all millionaires in the state have disappeared. No doubt a good part of that is economic related, but many have also picked up and left the state.

On those missing returns, the government collects 6.25% of nothing. Instead of the state coffers gaining the extra $106 million the politicians predicted, millionaires paid $100 million less in taxes than they did last year — even at higher rates.

Taxes To Move Microsoft Jobs Overseas

Microsoft Corp. Chief Executive Officer Steven Ballmer said the world’s largest software company would move some employees offshore if Congress enacts President Barack Obama’s plans to impose higher taxes on U.S. companies’ foreign profits.

“It makes U.S. jobs more expensive,” Ballmer said in an interview. “We’re better off taking lots of people and moving them out of the U.S. as opposed to keeping them inside the U.S.”

Oil Companies Hoping To “stay out of reach of Barack Obama” Move To Switzerland

Reuters: The tidy towns and mountain vistas of Switzerland are an unlikely setting for an oil boom.

Yet a wave of energy companies has in the last few months announced plans to move to Switzerland — mainly for its appeal as a low-tax corporate domicile that looks relatively likely to stay out of reach of Barack Obama’s tax-seeking administration.

Emerson Electric Co. Chief Executive Officer claims us is hurting manufacturing

Emerson Electric Co. Chief Executive Officer David Farr said the U.S. government is hurting manufacturers with regulation and taxes and his company will continue to focus on growth overseas.

“Washington is doing everything in their manpower, capability, to destroy U.S. manufacturing,” Farr said today in Chicago at a Baird Industrial Outlook conference. “Cap and trade, medical reform, labor rules.” . . . Farr, in his presentation, also said manufacturers are being hurt by taxes and regulation. He said companies will create jobs in India and China, “places where people want the products and where the governments welcome you to actually do something.” -Bloomberg

Notes to self – NY and CA exodus….

Sources:
The Wall Street Journal, MAY 27, 2009, Millionaires Go Missing
Maryland’s fleeced taxpayers fight back.
Bloomburg, Ballmer Says Tax Would Move Microsoft Jobs Offshore (Update3) , Ryan J. Donmoyer, June 3, 2009 16:12 EDT
reuters Corporate oil booms in low-tax Switzerland, Wed Mar 11, 2009 9:50pm EDT, Sam Cage

U.S. Will Pay $2.6 Million to Train Chinese Prostitutes to Drink Responsibly on the Job

Amazingly, the title of this post is not from the Onion but an actual news article:

Flag of the People’s Republic of China (CNSNews.com) — The National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAA), a part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), will pay $2.6 million in U.S. tax dollars to train Chinese prostitutes to drink responsibly on the job.

Dr. Xiaoming Li, the researcher conducting the program, is director of the Prevention Research Center at Wayne State University School of Medicine in Detroit.

I’d love to see that grant application:

Dear Uncle Sam,

Please send me $2.6 million to get drunk and hang out with hookers.

Thank you in advance.

Dr. Li.

Women not your thing? Well Uncle Sam will pay you to hang out with gay guys too:

Government researchers are spending more than $400,000 in taxpayer money to hit the [gay] bars in Argentina.

The National Institutes of Health are paying researchers to cruise six bars in Buenos Aires to find out why gay men engage in risky sexual behavior while drunk — and just what can be done about it.

The funniest thing is I know a ton of very talented cancer researchers that work 70+ hours a week and don’t get anywhere near that level of funding.

Source:
U.S. Will Pay $2.6 Million to Train Chinese Prostitutes to Drink Responsibly on the Job, Tuesday, May 12, 2009, Edwin Mora

U.S. Government Funds $400,000 Study on Gay Sex in Argentina Bars, Fox News, Friday, May 08, 2009

On gun registration

Numerous examples disprove gun-control propaganda. Hawaii has had licensing and registration of guns for about 50 years. After all of the administrative expenses and inconvenience imposed on gun owners, police there cannot point to a single crime that has been solved as a result of those programs. Given Hawaii’s remote island geography, this should be an ideal place to keep track of guns because movement in and out of the state is limited and legal importation is controlled. If registration is going to work anywhere, it should work there. Unfortunately, criminals seem to be able to get their hands on guns virtually anyplace in the world.

Other jurisdictions with a history of strict handgun bans, such as the District of Columbia and Chicago, have even required registration of hunting rifles and shotguns for more than 20 years. Neither the District nor Chicago can point to any crimes that have been solved using registration records.

The same rules apply across the border. Canada, which has imposed registration of handguns since the 1930s, does not have much to show for it. In 2006, when the Liberal Party under Prime Minister Paul Martin controlled the government, it was admitted in parliamentary debate that just three crimes in 70 years had been solved as a result of registration. A couple of those cases were debatable because other independent evidence helped solve the crimes. According to the Canadian Ministry of Public Safety, just 4 percent of Canadian handgun murders in 2005 and 2006 were committed with registered handguns, and none of those were registered to the people who committed the crimes. As for long-gun registration, at least as of 2006, not a single violent crime had been solved through registration.

Sources:
Washington Times, EDITORIAL: ‘We want them registered’, Democrats are going after guns, Monday, April 13, 2009

Just Campaign Words: Flip Flopping on the Evils of Bush & Capitalism

Things that were once evil under Bush and capitalism during campaign time become standard practice post campaign:

Military tribunals

Debt
Once “pay as you go” is not $114,000 in interest for every man woman and child and a greater debt than every president since WWII?? (N2S – check source). The total liabilities of the United States government, including future social security and medicare payments that the U.S. government is already committed to pay out, now exceed 65 TRILLION dollars, which is more than the entire GDP of the whole world.

Traditions

Sources:
Newt’s Take, Thu, 16 Apr 2009, Former House speaker on media’s coverage of tea parties and Obama’s
Digg: 65 Trillion – U.S. Debt Exceeds The GDP Of The Entire World

Internat’l Law Enforcement Educator & Trainers on mass shootings

From Arms & Law:

The legendary Massad Ayoob is attending the annual conference of the International Law Enforcement Educators and Trainers Association. He writes:

“Thursday afternoon, I chaired the panel of experts discussion on deadly force issues. I had been able to assemble ten superstars of police training. [He lists them, and their credentials are indeed impressive].

One of the topics that inevitably cropped up was response to mass murders in schools and other public places. Among us was Ron Borsch, instructor at the Southeast Area Law Enforcement Academy in Ohio, who has been an advocate of “sole response” entry into such situations by the first responding officer. Though controversial in law enforcement, his theory was validated recently by the courageous 25-year-old cop who entered a mass murder scene only a few weeks ago at an old folks home, and stopped the killing with a single bullet from his Glock .40 service pistol coolly and expertly delivered to the gunman’s chest.

Borsch’s impromptu discussion revealed the fact that some 25% of mass murder shooting sprees he has researched were ended by armed private citizens. This led in turn to a discussion of the Israeli Model, in place since the Maalot massacre of schoolchildren decades ago, in which teachers and other school personnel were trained and discreetly armed with handguns, which has proven famously successful ever since in Israel. Across the ten-member panel AND the dozens of police instructors attending the discussion, not a single voice was raised against that concept, and many spoke enthusiastically in favor of it.

Don’t listen to the politically motivated figureheads. Talk to the REAL cops. They’re the ones who best understand the dynamics of violence, and of protecti

on of the innocent from evil.”

A ‘FIRST’ for the First Lady

This has to be driving the “Is Obama a Narcissist/Elitist?” repubs nuts:

Michelle Obama is the nation’s first first lady to add a full-time makeup artist to her traveling entourage, according to stylists who have worked with presidential wives over the past 16 years

Source:
GLAMOUR ‘FIRST’ FULL-TIME MAKEUP ARTIST FOR MICHELLE, by ANNIE KARNI, Last updated: 11:21 am April 12, 2009 Posted: 2:34 am April 12, 2009

Funny Mayors

22 year old Grocery cashier beats MIT grad to become Mayor

[Justin] Nickels, a grocery store cashier and college student, beat fellow Alderman Dave Soeldner, a 39-year-old civil engineer who holds a master’s degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, to be the city’s 27th mayor. He replaces Kevin Crawford, who has served since 1989.

A Sweet Transexual Transvestite clad in Leather, 36D breast implants, and Red Hair
Lets not forget the maroon stockings and high heals….

His name is Stu Rasmussen:

What he looks like is a man with gray roots and 36D breasts. A man with powerful arms and delicately turned legs. A man wearing a black leather skirt who thinks of 3-inch heels as “all day shoes.” A man who gently teases his longtime live-in girlfriend, Victoria Sage, and then stands perfectly still as she tames a cowlick at the back of his head.

Source:

Silverton gives its vote to transgendered mayor
Posted by Kimberly A.C. Wilson, The Oregonian November 07, 2008 17:40PM

Grocery cashier, 22, beats MIT grad to become Manitowoc mayor
Manitowoc mayoral recount not ruled out, Helen Clarke • Herald Times Reporter • April 8, 2009

NYT’s Union Hypocrisy

A note from powerline below:

The New York Times Company is threatening to shut down the Boston Globe:

The New York Times Co has threatened to shut The Boston Globe unless the newspaper’s unions agree to $20 million in concessions, The Boston Globe reported, quoting union leaders.

This is, of course, rich with irony. The Times endorses Big Labor’s legislative agenda pretty much down the line, but when it comes to its own business operations, it can’t help noticing that antiquated union contracts threaten its very existence. We’ve advocated bankruptcy for GM and Chrysler for exactly that reason. Maybe the Times, too, should take advantage of Chapter 11 to rid itself of unsustainable union contracts. And then maybe the Times’ owners, managers, editors and reporters should re-think their commitment to the destructive left-wing agenda of the labor unions

sources:
Is That A Threat Or A Promise?, PowerlineBlog, April 3, 2009 Posted by John at 7:47 PM
New York Times threatens to shut Boston Globe, Reuters, Fri Apr 3, 2009 8:23pm EDT,

Vindictive People Make Less Money

FuturePundit:
Some German researchers find that people who use more negative reciprocity in their dealings with others spend more time unemployed, have fewer friends, and are less satisfied.

EurekaAlert
Public release date: 26-Mar-2009
Contact: Dr. Armin Falk
armin.falk@uni-bonn.de
49-228-739-240
University of Bonn
Vindictiveness doesn’t pay
Study shows: The guiding motto of ‘an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth’ brings neither success nor happiness