I guess a lot of you were caught up in that drama at the Discovery Channel headquarters yesterday near Washington DC. It ended just the way it should have ... as soon as that idiot entered that place with a gun and took hostages he forfeited any right he may have had to continue taking breaths. The police dispatched him to his eternal celestial dirt nap when he started waving his gun at hostages.

Now there's two good reasons to celebrate the fact that this moron is in the morgue this morning instead of a cell. First ... the taxpayers aren't going to have to cover the cost of a trial and his lengthy incarceration. Second ... we would have had to endure months, maybe even years of his maniacal ravings about saving the earth and parasitic human children.

Now ... let's make this point and move on. It seems that this idiot was motivated in part by Al Gore's book "Earth in the Balance." Thus far I haven't seen anyone outside the walls of a psychiatric hospital blaming Al Gore for this incident. But imagine, if you will, what would be going on today if this man had listed a book by Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity or Mark Levin on his website. You can be absolutely drop-dead certain that the ObamaMedia would be teeming with experts telling all of us that this was the inevitable result of all the hatred spewed by those extreme right-wing talk radio hosts and Obama haters.

You know it's true.

PrezBo's departing economic dogwasher Christina Romer got it half right. In a farewell speech yesterday, she pointed to the fact that we need less taxes. So NOW she admits that reducing taxes on achievers encourages them to crank it up a notch or two. At a time when we are trying to get our economy moving again, taxing productivity is the last thing we want. Hopefully she had a little one-on-one with Obama .. maybe even some flashcards or something .. to explain this point. But then she went on to say that we need more government spending.

Huh? Romer says that Washington needs to move forward on policies that will cut taxes and increase government spending. Would Ms. Romer care to share with us just where the government should get all this extra money to spend? Did she happen to read the reports from the Census Bureau that were released this week? If she did, she would have discovered that federal domestic spending increased a record 16% in 2009. Just one year of domestic spending .. an increase of 16% to $3.2 trillion. This was the biggest increase in spending since the Census Bureau started collecting data in 1983. So where is all of our money going? Entitlements. Almost one half of all federal spending (46% to be precise) went to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. Read that again - almost half of all the money our federal government spends go toward these entitlement programs. Spending on unemployment compensation more than doubled from 2008 to 2009, costing $86 billion.

Oh and you will love this. What parts of the country are benefiting the most from this increase in spending? You guessed it - Washington DC. Among all 50 states, per capita spending averaged about $10,000. However, DC's per capita spending averaged more than $83,000. This is what you get when you have a party of government running the show. Everything surrounding their imperial federal government will flourish and be funded by your earnings, and what do you have to show for it? An unemployment that hovers around 10%. In fact when the figures are released tomorrow, the unemployment rate is predicted to rise to 9.6%.

So you just read all of the facts and figures, and yet PrezBo's departing economic dogwasher says that we need more spending? What is it with these people that they seem to universally agree that a dollar spent by government is so much more important to our economy than a dollar spent by the person who actually earned it? I've pointed you to this study before, but it is pertinent now more than ever. The Heritage Foundation: Why Government Spending Does Not Stimulate Economic Growth: Answering the Critics. Here are just a few examples of how government can't spend its way to prosperity:

• During the 1930s, New Deal lawmakers doubled federal spending--yet unemployment remained above 20 percent until World War II.
• Japan responded to a 1990 recession by passing 10 stimulus spending bills over 8 years (building the largest national debt in the industrialized world)--yet its economy remained stagnant.
• In 2001, President Bush responded to a recession by "injecting" tax rebates into the economy. The economy did not respond until two years later, when tax rate reductions were implemented.
• In 2008, President Bush tried to head off the current recession with another round of tax rebates. The recession continued to worsen.
• Now, the most recent $787 billion stimulus bill was intended to keep the unemployment rate from exceeding 8 percent. In November 2009, it topped 10 percent.

The likelihood of the Democrats falling out of love with government is about as likely as me having a chance with Angelina Jolie. We can't change their minds, but we can kick them out of office. November, folks. Be there.

Consider the facts that you just read. In particular, remember the fact that almost 50% of our federal expenditures go toward entitlement spending, and that includes Social Security. Clearly .. this level of spending cannot continue. Unless you are out to completely cripple or intentionally destroy our economy.

Remember, now, Obama's deficit reduction commission. Soon we'll be hearing this commission's recommendations on how to tackle our deficit. We have been told that "all options are on the table." Well apparently if you are a Democrat, you are allowed to add a little asterisk to that quote. "All options are on the table .. *except for Social Security reform." Take Bernie Sanders' latest diatribe. He was spitting nails over the idea that Obama's deficit commission is seriously considering deep benefit cuts in Social Security. He says, "The hatred of Social Security from the right-wing, anti-government crowd is based on the fact that the government program has been enormously successful in accomplishing its mission. For 75 years, in good times and bad, Social Security has provided financial security for tens of millions of Americans." Therein lies the key - security. I don't know about you, but I do not believe that our founding fathers built this country to provide and protect the financial security for all its citizens. If I am not mistaken, the freedom, liberty and self reliance to provide for ones financial future is what is protected under our Constitution. Which version of the Constitutions do the Democrats receive in their welcome packets?

Anyway ... here's the point I wish to make. As we approach the November elections you can be assured that the Democrats will ... as they have done in every election since 1952 ... try to scare the wrinkles right off of our senior citizens by telling them that if they vote for Republicans they are going to end up losing their Social Security. This frightens our older voters ... and they rush to the polls to protect their checks.

The left has some additional ammunition to use this time because there actually is a plan proposed by Republican Paul Ryan for a partial privatization of Social Security. I think that Ryan's plan would call for people to be able to take 2% of their wages that would be headed for the non-existent Social Security trust fund and divert it to a private account. Now here are three key details of this private account:

1. You would get a guaranteed 1% rate of return on the money deposited in your account.
2. That money would be absolutely guaranteed to you. You may be surprised to know that your current Social Security benefits are not.
3. When you die your heirs will get that money ... or it will go to whoever you designate in your will.

Now just how dense do you have to be to say that this would not be a good idea? Social Security as it is presently funded and administered simply cannot survive. Each and every politician in Washington knows this. There are some politicians who are actually working on possible fixes .. and other politicians who see Social Security's main value in their ability to frighten senior citizens. Which group of politicians do you want to see running the show?

I'm resurrecting this post because Neal just discovered it and was talking about it this morning.... -ww

Dude throws first punch on a white-bearded guy on an Oakland, CA bus. Then gets it back plus some. WARNING: bad language. More of the story.

September 11th is right around the corner, and for the first time it is not going to be a day of remembrance. It is not going to be a day when we reflect on the tragedy of being attacked by Islamic goons. It is not going to be a day when we remember how our country stood united against the evil that wished harm upon our citizens, our liberty and our way of life - and acted on it. It is not going to be a day of honoring the victims whose lives were senselessly taken in the name of Allah. Thanks to the insensitivity of a few Muslims wanting to build a victory mosque near Ground Zero .. this September 11th is going to be political. You better be ready for the fight. We didn't let 9/11 destroy our nation and we sure as hell aren't going to let a Victory mosque destroy us either. Yet somehow, Muslims in America have managed to focus the debate on those who oppose the mosque. Yesterday I told you about a meeting of religious groups with the Justice Department. They want the Obama administration to speak out against those who oppose the mosque. Now we have this quote representing more than 50 leading Muslim organizations: It is "unethical, insensitive and inhumane" to oppose the planned mosque near Ground Zero. Inhumane? Are you kidding me? And just how sensitive is it to build a Mosque at Ground Zero to celebrate the Islamic attacks of 9/11? And yes ... you may disagree but I absolutely believe that this is the purpose of the Mosque and the reason for this particular location. Wake up folks .. Muslims have a tradition over centuries of building Mosques at the sight of great Muslim conquests. This Mosque at Ground Zero --- if it's ever built --- will be a destination for Muslims who wish to celebrate this great victory over America.

At a time when Muslim Americans could stand up in the face of the radicals who have hijacked their religion, at a time when they could show the up-most sensitivities for Americans who lost their lives .. these Muslims organizations decide to ban together and claim that the opposition to the mosque is "unethical, insensitive and inhumane."

Until charades like this come to an end, there is no chance that Americans are going to be accepting of the peaceful, serene religion of Islam.

Listen to yesterday's rountable with Scott Slade, Neal, Clark Howard and Jamie Dupree.

Here's a great column by Michael Barone: Down with Big Government, Big Business, Big Labor.

The Obama administration insists on this drilling moratorium that they KNOW will cost people their jobs. A judge continues to knock down the moratorium .. but that makes no difference to the rulers who create the laws as they see fit.

As if you needed it .. here are more arguments against the value-added tax from the Cato Institute.

Government schooling is almost always controlled by the people it employs because they are the most motivated to be involved in education politics. But is this good for your children?

This is Obama's idea of border security ...

In the market for a used car? Good luck finding a bargain: The price of "pre-owned'' vehicles has climbed considerably over the past year. You can thank inflated and artificial government policy for that.

The wussification of America .. if only we had a loser pays system in this country.

A short video from the Heritage Foundation on President ME's recovery summer.