The Obama Double Standard

Posted on October 6, 2011 by steve

When a company in the private sector makes a risky investment with other people’s money it is immoral, reckless, irresponsible, new regulations need to be implemented and criminal prosecution is not out of the question:

Well, first on the issue of prosecutions on Wall Street, one of the biggest problems about the collapse of Lehmans and the subsequent financial crisis and the whole subprime lending fiasco is that a lot of that stuff wasn’t necessarily illegal, it was just immoral or inappropriate or reckless. That’s exactly why we needed to pass Dodd-Frank, to prohibit some of these practices.

The financial sector is very creative and they are always looking for ways to make money. That’s their job. And if there are loopholes and rules that can be bent and arbitrage to be had, they will take advantage of it. So without commenting on particular prosecutions — obviously that’s not my job; that’s the Attorney General’s job — I think part of people’s frustrations, part of my frustration, was a lot of practices that should not have been allowed weren’t necessarily against the law, but they had a huge destructive impact. And that’s why it was important for us to put in place financial rules that protect the American people from reckless decision-making and irresponsible behavior.

On the other hand, when the government (i.e. Obama and his fellow liberals) make a risky investment with other peoples money (our tax dollars- where we have absolutely no say in the matter) and it fails, well that is the nature of the beast. Case and point: the Solyndra fiasco:

Solyndra — this is a loan guarantee program that predates me that historically has had support from Democrats and Republicans as well. And the idea is pretty straightforward: If we are going to be able to compete in the 21st century, then we’ve got to dominate cutting-edge technologies, we’ve got to dominate cutting-edge manufacturing. Clean energy is part of that package of technologies of the future that have to be based here in the United States if we’re going to be able to succeed.

Now, the loan guarantee program is designed to meet a particular need in the marketplace, which is — a lot of these small startups, they can get angel investors, they can get several million dollars to get a company going, but it’s very hard for them to then scale up, particularly if these are new cutting-edge technologies. It’s hard for them to find private investors. And part of what’s happening is China and Europe, other countries, are putting enormous subsidies into these companies and giving them incentives to move offshore. Even if the technology was developed in the United States, they end up going to China because the Chinese government will say, we’re going to help you get started. We’ll help you scale up. We’ll give you low-interest loans or no-interest loans. We will give siting. We will do whatever it takes for you to get started here.

And that’s part of the reason why a lot of technologies that developed here, we’ve now lost the lead in — solar energy, wind energy. And so what the loan guarantee program was designed to do was to close that gap and say, let’s see if we can help some of those folks locate here and create jobs here in the United States.

Now, we knew from the start that the loan guarantee program was going to entail some risk, by definition. If it was a risk-free proposition, then we wouldn’t have to worry about it. But the overall portfolio has been successful. It has allowed us to help companies, for example, start advanced battery manufacturing here in the United States. It’s helped create jobs. There were going to be some companies that did not work out; Solyndra was one of them. But the process by which the decision was made was on the merits. It was straightforward. And of course there were going to be debates internally when you’re dealing with something as complicated as this.

But I have confidence that the decisions were made based on what would be good for the American economy and the American people and putting people back to work.

The amazing thing is these conflicting statements are in response to a two-part question from Jake Tapper during today’s ‘press conference.’

Video: Vintage Car Racing Crashes

Posted on October 5, 2011 by steve

This is crazy:

Extra big tip O’ the hat to my StumbleUpon friend Lee.

Real reasons for optimism… Post Obama

Posted on October 3, 2011 by steve

The brilliant Victor Davis Hanson sees real reasons for optimism for America post Obama. He lays out several compelling reasons for optimism (2013 and beyond) and the one idea I found most interesting is that a significant number of Americans have figured out that liberalism, and especially liberal economics, doesn’t work:

Fourth, that psychology of catharsis that accompanies the end of this administration will last for sometime. The next time Keynesians lecture us on more borrowing or greater spending (fill in the blanks), Americans will perhaps ask, “So we need to borrow at least $5 trillion within three years? Keep interest rates at near zero? Vastly inflate the money supply? Extend unemployment insurance to over 100 weeks? Exceed 50 million on food stamps?”

With an inept Carter, the left’s lament was “weak messenger.” With the triangulating Clinton, it was “weak message.” With Obama, despite the recent defections and liberal angst, there were both the messianic messenger and the true-blue message. What’s left? The American people turned on both in less than two years. That change of mood will lead the way to necessary reform in a way a less harmful McCain administration could not have achieved: greater revenue from tax simplification, tax reduction, and greater tax compliance, less regulations, entitlement reform, and budgetary discipline. Obama is doing to liberal politics what no right-wing activist could dream up.

I’m liking the whole idea of a “post Obama” discussion.

Video: The USPS warning of the dangers of e-mail

Posted on October 3, 2011 by steve

I think the technical term for this is desperation:

Infographic: How’s that hopey, changey thing working out for ya?

Posted on October 2, 2011 by steve

It’s not not working to well for most Americans.

click for a larger version

Be sure to click here to see the rest. A picture is worth a thousand words, and there are a lot more pictures.

Google wants to be “the operating system of your life”

Posted on October 2, 2011 by steve

No, really… They do:

As John Battelle of Federated Media notes, the urgency of this goal was communicated by CEO Larry Page when he changed the compensation scheme at the search behemoth — in one of his first moves as the new chief executive — to create incentives for staffers to try harder at making Google’s social efforts a success. Battelle says in talks with Googlers over the past while, it has become obvious that Larry Page “is obsessed with Google+,” and that for the Google co-founder, the new social network has become the core of what he wants the company to become: namely, Google as “the operating system of your life.”

This push to integrate all the different Google services (GMail, YouTube, Picassa, Doubleclick, ITA Travel, Zagats and on and on) using Google+ as the common thread connecting these disperse products can lead to some serious privacy issues.

And that brings up another tricky aspect for Google: if my activity through Google+ starts to influence everything that Google does, including search and search-related advertising, how will it keep from stepping over the kinds of privacy boundaries that have caused Facebook so much difficulty? The number of Google Circles that I appear in has already started showing up in search results, and the things that I give a +1 to are affecting my search as well. Tying all that to my real name and my Google+ posts is another step down the road towards a potential personal privacy debacle.

I’m so glad one of Google’s core philosophy’s is “you can make money without doing evil” so this new push to become the operating system of your life shouldn’t be a cause for anyone’s concern. Right?

Saturday Night Links: The Chickenfoot Edition

Posted on October 1, 2011 by steve

Chickenfoot released their 2nd CD (I’m so old school) Chikenfoot III.

Via VHND:

So when Chickenfoot hooked us up with an advance copy of their second album, jokingly titled “Chickenfoot III,” we were salivating for our first taste.

If you own their first album and you thought you knew what Chickenfoot was all about musically, you’re wrong. The group’s sophomore set is in no way a carbon copy of the first record. In fact, it’s quite different. It features several rockers as expected, but the band boldly expanded their sound, delving into some unexpected directions, such as pop, blues, soul, and even a couple slow-tempo cuts. Many fans will enjoy these new directions, but others will likely wish that the group had stuck with the same successful formula it tapped for its debut.

While it’s a great album, “Chickenfoot III” sounds a little less uniquely “Chickenfoot” than the group’s inaugural set. Throughout the album, Sammy brings it lyrically and vocally, and Michael’s solid bass playing and completely unique background vocals are evident. Joe’s guitar playing and Chad’s drumming shine a little less often than they did on the debut, however, which leaves a few of the tracks sounding like a mixture of a Chickenfoot song and a Sammy Hagar solo song. It seems that Satch was purposely playing less technical and flashy, and more in a song oriented style.

In honor of the new Chickenfoot CD, I’m blatantly ripping off Matt from Conservative Hideout 2.0 “video interspersed with links” format for my (sort of) weekly right wing link round up.

First up, the latest Chickenfoot video, Bigfoot.