Like it or not—and many of us don’t like it at all — U.S. taxpayers are helping to bail out Greece and the rest of the financially-distressed euro zone. The International Monetary Fund has committed to providing the Europeans with a financing package totaling about 250 billion euros. The portion provided by American taxpayers, based on our 17.09% share of contributions to the IMF, is now at least $54 billion.
A handful of congressional Republicans steeped in the fiscal conservatism of the Tea Party have been agitating against backdoor U.S. bailouts for several years. In May 2010, for instance, Reps. Mike Pence of Indiana and Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington, along with Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina, introduced a bill prohibiting the IMF from using U.S. funds for the bailout of any foreign country in Greek-like straits. Similarly, Republicans in June 2009 attempted to block a $100 billion appropriation to the IMF for a $1.1 trillion economic-crisis bailout fund.
President Obama, who had pledged the money during a G-20 meeting that year, had buried the appropriation in a war-funding measure to avoid an up or down vote on the unpopular item. This outraged Minnesota Rep. John Kline, another Republican, who fumed: “I cannot support a bill that uses our military personnel currently in harm’s way to advance a political agenda that includes a $100 billion international bailout that has nothing to do with our troops’ safety or success.” And Kline added: “Already this year, Congress has forced taxpayers to shoulder $700 billion in bailout money, $1 trillion on a so-called stimulus, $410 billion on a massive spending bill larded with pork-barrel projects and $3.6 trillion on a budget that spends too much, taxes too much and borrows too much. We should not tack on an additional $100 billion for an international bailout.”
Daily Archives: November 5, 2011
19 facts about the rapid deindustrialization of America
Via Business Insider –
1 – The United States has lost approximately 42,400 factories since 2001
About 75 percent of those factories employed over 500 people when they were still in operation. Source: The American Prospect
2 – Dell Inc. has announced plans to dramatically expand its operations in China with an investment of over $100 billion over the next decade.
3 – Dell has announced that it will be closing its last large U.S. manufacturing facility in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Approximately 900 jobs will be lost.
4 – In 2008, 1.2 billion cellphones were sold worldwide. So how many of them were manufactured inside the United States? Zero.
Source: The American Prospect
5 – If our trade deficit with China increases at its current rate, the U.S. economy will lose over half a million jobs this year alone.
Source: Economic Policy Institute [PDF]
6 – As of the end of July, the trade deficit with China had risen 18 percent compared to the same time period a year ago.
Source: Economic Policy Institute [PDF]
7 – The United States has lost a total of about 5.5 million manufacturing jobs since October 2000.
Source: The American Prospect
8 – From 1999 to 2008, employment at the foreign affiliates of US parent companies increased an astounding 30 percent to 10.1 million
Source: Tax Analysts [PDF]
9 – In 1959, manufacturing represented 28 percent of U.S. economic output. In 2008, it represented 11.5 percent.
Source: The American Prospect
10 – Ford Motor Company recently announced the closure of a factory that produces the Ford Ranger in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Source: Economy In Crisis
11 – As of the end of 2009, less than 12 million Americans worked in manufacturing. The last time less than 12 million Americans were employed in manufacturing was in 1941.
Source: The American Prospect
12 – In America today, consumption accounts for 70 percent of GDP. Of this 70 percent, over half is spent on services.
Source: Economy In Crisis
13 – The United States has lost a whopping 32 percent of its manufacturing jobs since the year 2000.
Source: The American Prospect
14 – In 2001, the United States ranked fourth in the world in per capita broadband Internet use. Today it ranks 15th.
Source: MACLEANS.CA
15 – Manufacturing employment in the U.S. computer industry is actually lower in 2010 than it was in 1975.
Source: Businessweek
16 – Printed circuit boards are used in tens of thousands of different products. Asia now produces 84 percent of them worldwide.
Source: The American Prospect
17 – The United States spends approximately $3.90 on Chinese goods for every $1 that the Chinese spend on goods from the United States.
Source: The Economic Collapse
18 – A prominent economist is projecting that the Chinese economy will be three times larger than the U.S. economy by the year 2040.
Source: MarketWatch
19 – The Census Bureau says 43.6 million Americans are now living in poverty, which is the highest number of poor Americans in the 51 years that records have been kept.
Source: Washington Post
ABC News promoted militant Islamist as a “Peaceful representative of Islam”
Just a little reminder of how transparently corrupt the elite media has become.
Via Answering Muslims:
ABC News recently did a 20/20 special titled “Islam: Questions and Answers,” with Diane Sawyer, Bill Weir, and Lama Hasan. The program drew attention to moderate Muslims who will serve as America’s “first line of defense” against terrorism. Unfortunately, one of the moderate Muslims presented by ABC isn’t so moderate.
Video: The Bigotry of the Literati
Ludwig von Mises. He totally understand the leftist mentality. He said this in 1954 and yet Mises gives a flawless description of the leftist mindset and tactics.
Video: University of California Muslim Student Association Supports Genocide of Jews
Fact: The Klan Lynched Republicans Including 1,300 Whites
What public school history books often do not tell you is that the KKK was the militant wing of the Democratic Party.
Historian David Barton:
David Barton: Our Public School books have filtered out most of the good changes that American Christians carried out.
The Republican Party in many states such as Texas were founded by black Americans. The KKK was as partisan as it was racist.
Political Arena 