Liberal Seattle CEO who instituted minimum salary of $70,000 finds that doesn’t work so well

In a way, I have to admit, I have some sympathy for Dan Price and his quixotic quest to battle “income inequality” by instituting a minimum salary of $70,000 for all employees of his company. Not for the cause itself, which is merely the latest trend in left-wing economic illiteracy, but I too once ran a business in which I thought I could do amazing things by paying people way more than their experience levels or qualifications would earn them anywhere else.

It didn’t work for two reasons. First, a business can’t survive when employees can’t generate enough value to give you a big enough return on what you pay them. And if they can’t do that because you paid them too much, that’s not on them. It’s on you. Second, people don’t appreciate what they haven’t really earned. You think they’re going to be grateful and loyal to you because you were so good to them. It doesn’t work that way.

So as soon as I heard some months back that Price was going to wage his own one-man war against “income inequality” by paying everyone at Gravity Payments a minimum of $70,000 - and would even cut his own pay to help the company swing it - it wasn’t hard to see this coming:

What few outsiders realized, however, was how much turmoil all the hoopla was causing at the company itself. To begin with, Gravity was simply unprepared for the onslaught of emails, Facebook posts and phone calls. The attention was thrilling, but it was also exhausting and distracting. And with so many eyes focused on the firm, some hoping to witness failure, the pressure has been intense.

More troubling, a few customers, dismayed by what they viewed as a political statement, withdrew their business. Others, anticipating a fee increase — despite repeated assurances to the contrary — also left. While dozens of new clients, inspired by Mr. Price’s announcement, were signing up, those accounts will not start paying off for at least another year. To handle the flood, he has already had to hire a dozen additional employees — now at a significantly higher cost — and is struggling to figure out whether more are needed without knowing for certain how long the bonanza will last. 

Two of Mr. Price’s most valued employees quit, spurred in part by their view that it was unfair to double the pay of some new hires while the longest-serving staff members got small or no raises. Some friends and associates in Seattle’s close-knit entrepreneurial network were also piqued that Mr. Price’s action made them look stingy in front of their own employees.

Then potentially the worst blow of all: Less than two weeks after the announcement, Mr. Price’s older brother and Gravity co-founder, Lucas Price, citing longstanding differences, filed a lawsuit that potentially threatened the company’s very existence. With legal bills quickly mounting and most of his own paycheck and last year’s $2.2 million in profits plowed into the salary increases, Dan Price said, “We don’t have a margin of error to pay those legal fees.”

It wasn’t just good, experienced employees who had a problem with the plan. So did at least one employee who was a recipient of a huge raise:

Via: Canada Free Press

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[CARTOON] The Obama Recovery

Via: Western Journalism

MASSACHUSETTS; Somerville mayor hits back at Bobby Jindal over sanctuary cities

Somerville Mayor Joseph Curtatone today slammed Republican presidential candidate Bobby Jindal's call to charge “sanctuary city” mayors as accomplices in crimes committed by illegal immigrants as a campaign ploy and an appeal to the “lowest common denominator.”

“Come and get me,” Curtatone charged in a Boston Herald Radio interview, shortly after Jindal took to the station airwaves to detail his proposal. “You say something absurd, you fear monger, you play to the crowd … we're smarter than that.

“I love listening to Jindal, because I swear if you didn't know who he is, you swear it was Gomer Pyle,” the Democrat added. “We shouldn't lower ourselves to the lowest common denominator, and that's the brain of … Bobby Jindal.”

Jindal, the Louisiana governor who has framed himself as an anti-establishment candidate in the crowded Republican field, also said local mayors and elected officials in sanctuary cities – or those that defy federal immigration authorities – should be held liable civilly by victims or their families for the crimes of illegal immigrants.

He pointed to the death of Kathryn Steinle, who was killed in San Francisco, allegedly by an illegal immigrant who was released from police custody despite a detention request from the feds. The crime has sparked the push behind “Kate's Law” and has been repeatedly referenced by Republican presidential candidates, including Donald Trump, when discussing immigration.

Jindal said mayors like Curtatone – who has signed an executive order pulling the city out of the federal Secure Communities program – should be “criminally liable as accessories,” adding that, “If you're going to flaunt (sic) federal law, there should be a consequence.”

But Curtatone rejected that thinking, pointing to what he called “misinformation” around the concept of sanctuary cities, which he said is an effort to build trust in communities, not give criminals a free pass.

He said in the case of Steinle's murder, Somerville would have turned the suspect over to federal immigration authorities.

“Unfortunately that terrible incident (in San Francisco) is being used to describe an entire population and its being used by people like Bobby Jindal who say the most absurd, offensive things against one segment of the population. As a society, we have more compassion than that,” Curtatone said.

He said Jindal's comments are simply a move to push him “beyond the 1 percent right now” in presidential polls. He sarcastically said “Sheriff Bobby Jindal” hasn't put him in handcuffs.

“More like, Deputy Barney Fife, has not arrested me yet,” Curtatone said.

Via: Boston Herald

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CALIFORNIA: DOCTOR SHORTAGE LOOMS AS OBAMACARE ROLLS OUT, SAYS EXPERT

America faces a deep shortage of doctors as Obamacare is implemented. That is the view shared by 100 health care professionals who gathered at the 33rd annual meeting of Doctors for Disaster Preparedness in Ontario, California over the weekend. They forecast a future of decreased quality of health care and access to doctors if current policies continue.

“What do I mean by medical meltdown? Well, sadly ,I’m here to tell you that the medical care you’ve enjoyed in the past in your life is simply not going to be there in the future,” said orthopedic surgeon Dr. Lee Hieb, who addressed the conference.

Just like a black hole is so dense that no light gets out, “We have so much regulation that almost no medical care gets out,” Hieb told the audience. “We have over 160,000 pages of Medicare regulation and counting.” She continued, “Obamacare is Medicare on steroids.”

“The reason we have a shortage of doctors today and we’re going to get worse in the future began in the early 70s because the great gurus of government looked around and they said probably…look at all this money that’s being sent to all these specialists.”  Hieb went on to say that government bureaucrats decided to limit the number of specialists.

However, Lieb notes,  that the U.S. is only seeing 350 new general surgeons a year. That is not even a replacement rate, she observed.

Hieb professed that being taxed to death and having to send so much money to the government is a disincentive for doctors to work at full capacity.

“Our young people are not trained as well as we were,” she continued.

“We are now the number one profession for suicide. We lose 400 doctors a year to suicide. That’s like losing an entire medical school,” Hieb stated.

Hieb also cited a shortage of “things” or medical supplies–the first she has seen in her 40 years of involvement in medicine. She recalled almost having to close an operating room for shortages of propofols, which are used to put people to sleep; as well as shortages of tetanus vaccine, shoulder catheters and thyroid medication shortages, among other items.

The cause, according to Hieb, is “this huge over-regulatory environment.”

She elaborated on the thyroid example, saying,

These are old medicines that have lost their patent and they’ve been produced without a problem in these factories for years, but the government rolls in and says you have to bring this factory up to some arbitrary new standard and these guys say, well, we can’t do that because–guess what? you guys price fixed. You tell us what you’re going to pay, Medicare’s going to pay for this stuff. We can bill anything we want to, we get paid what you tell us you get paid, and now you’re telling us we have to spend all this money to modernize our factories. We’re going to lose money, we can’t do that, so we’re going to shut down. So after a few factories shut down in one of these nationwide shortages in classic bureaucratic fashion, the government says well wait a minute, wait a minute, you can’t shut down.

You said, “what, what do you mean we can’t shut down?”

[They say] Well, okay, I guess you can shut down, but you’re going to have to give us six months notice.

They just don’t get it.

She pointed the audience to Venezuela as a picture of the “end game.”

Hieb cited a story written by Dr. Richard Amerling and published in the Wall Street Journal (and summarized in Newsmax) that documented the plight of Pedro Gonzalez. Gonzalez, Amerling wrote, checked into a leading Venezuelan public hospital for life saving heart valve surgery. About two months later, all of the cardiac ward patients were discharged due to lack of operating room supplies according to a letter issued. Gonzalez collapsed and died a week later.

“The free market doesn’t come up with shortages this way, but we are starting to see it,” Hieb said. “If you live in a very affluent area and you’re privately insured and your neighbors are privately insured, you will probably not…won’t see it as quickly as other places.”

Hieb referenced work in an Arizona area where 85% of payers were government-paid through Medicare, Medicaid and Tricare. Four orthopedic surgeons would do the work that 10, 11 or 12 in more affluent Flagstaff would take on. She said the average orthopedic surgeon in America takes care of 12,000 people. Conversely, the region where Hieb worked was serving approximately 90,000, which later ballooned to 120,000 as Hieb left and only three surgeons remained. She said her 53-year-old former colleague from the region died thereafter under the long and strenuous work.

“The big black hole is already starting to open up,” Hieb said.

She mentioned traveling two hours to reach an obstetrician, waiting six hours to be seen by an orthopedic surgeon, or three or four months to see a rheumatologist as problems facing those in less affluent regions.

“In a free market, when there’s a shortage, it gets filled,” Hieb said.

Hieb then launched into health recommendations for “how to save yourself.” She said going into the future, “you want to be so healthy that you don’t need a doctor” in light of the impending medical shortages which she had detailed.

Dr. Hieb is listed in the Doctors for Disaster Preparedness program as “an orthopedic surgeon specializing in spine surgery and a past president of the Assn. of American Physicians and Surgeons.”

Follow Michelle Moons on Twitter @MichelleDiana

Via: Breitbart

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Government Slowly Kills the Private Sector – And Blames the Victim for Its Sputtering Demise

One of the advantages Big Government advocates have in their efforts to end the private sector – is the size of the victim. A $17-trillion-a-year economy is so huge – it almost always takes a lot of time to dismantle.

It’s like taking down those giant oliphants in the “Lord of the Rings.” Our economy can take a LOT of government arrows – and continue its march forward. Slowed, bowed – but still moving.

And here’s the really obnoxious part. As the private sector is dragged down by the government assaults – Big Government advocates say it’s proof that the PRIVATE SECTOR doesn’t work.

Which is like being shot – and then having the shooter yell at you for bleeding on them.

Occasionally, the government attack is so huge – it does rapid, recognizable damage. And the line of correlation can be easily drawn. See: ObamaCare.

Far more often, the injuries take time to accrue. An ever-increasingly regulated sector doesn’t go from 60mph to 0mph. It goes from 60 to 55. Then 55 to 50. Then 50 to 45….

So the Big Government advocates get away with the damage they do – and with blaming their victims for ultimately collapsing in a taxes-and-regulations-addled heap.

We Less Government advocates do our best to make people understand all of this. We are, as always, woefully outgunned – but we occasionally win a skirmish here or there.

For instance, we have successfully explained the damage government is poised to do to the Internet. With Network Neutrality. With unilateral regulatory “Reclassification” – which is the Barack Obama Administration all by itself deciding to impose on the Web 1934 land line telephone and railroad law.

We have successfully detailed the looming huge regulations. And huge taxes. And how any new regulation diminishes private investment – and how these huge new regulations will hugely diminish it.

In short, how the Internet was pre-Obama likely the freest part of the private sector – and is now likely the most under government’s thumb.

How do we know we won this fight? Because we never were given a chance to actually fight it.

Big Government advocates didn’t get Congress to pass a law creating Net Neutrality and/or Reclassification – because they couldn’t. Big Government big-footing the Web has never been popular. In 2010, ninety-five Democrats signed a pre-election Net Neutrality pledge. All ninety-five lost.

Having lost the messaging war – Big Government advocates turned to tyranny. And had three unelected Democrat bureaucrats at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) unilaterally slam the Net.

How else do we know we won? Because they are spending a lot of time trying do undo our explanations of what they’ve done.

FCC Chief (Tom Wheeler) Argues That Net Neutrality Won’t Gut Broadband Investment

Tom Wheeler Claims (Reclassification) Order Won’t Affect Taxes

The new imposition has only been in place for less than half a year. Most of the (tens of) thousands of pages of new regulations – haven’t even yet been written.

And the Internet sector is 1/6th of our entire economy – i.e. HUGE. This oliphant won’t immediately keel over.

Thus, to say that the mostly-unwritten rules haven’t yet broken the Net – therefore the rules will NEVER break the Net – is…absurd. But Big Government advocates specialize in the absurd.

So Far Net Neutrality Hasn’t Broken The Internet

Net Neutrality Hasn’t Stalled Investment After All

The investment argument is especially ridiculous. Many companies plot their investment allocations YEARS in advance. They are currently investing money for which they budgeted – in the 2000s.

What hasn’t taken very long – is Big Government advocates using this newly minted Big Government to attack the sector.

FCC Swamped by 2,000+ Net Neutrality Complaints Against ISPs

Of course, taking them at their word is always…dubious.

Yet Again, the Left is Caught Fraudulently Faking Support for its Ridiculous Policies

We can’t be sure if the FCC has actually received 2000+ complaints. After all, we were told – about theactually-fifty-fifty nature of the Net Neutrality Comments the FCC received – that they were overwhelmingly pro-Big Government.

Remember when we said the FCC hadn’t yet actually fleshed out the rules? That’s not nearly all of the uncertainty that exists.

What is not clear, however, is exactly how the FCC is supposed to enforce its rules against companies that violate the open Internet laws. 

Speaking earlier this week in front of a congressional subcommittee, FCC chairman Tom Wheeler admitted to the commission that the FCC had yet to figure out how exactly it will be able to exercise its authority over ISPs and enforce penalties.

Get that? The FCC has “yet to figure out how exactly it will be able to exercise its authority over ISPs and enforce penalties.” This MASSIVE uncertainty won’t hurt the Internet at all, I’m sure.

But wait a minute. Wheeler and his FCC have in fact already figured out how to use its undefined, amorphous power-grabbed powers to line its pockets at the expense of We the Consumers – I mean, enforce penalties.

AT&T Faces $100 Million Fine in FCC’s First-Ever Net-Neutrality Case

Seems pretty figured out to me.

Of course, every penny government forces out of companies – forces companies to charge us more for their goods and services. Because pro-consumer – or something.

Anti-consumer is huge new government power grabs – with prospectively tens of thousands of new pages of regulation. Which are “in place” – but haven’t yet been written.

Anti-consumer is a huge grab that empowers the government to impose confiscatory new taxes. And unlimited fines.

All of that – and more – is what Big Government just did to the Internet.

Think that won’t damage the Web? Not necessarily now – but over time as the government poison seeps throughout the system?

Of course you know it will. So too do the Big Government advocates.

They just can’t admit it – and must instead blame the private sector at which they take perpetual aim.

Via: Red State

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CA intervenes in Planned Parenthood video sting

Undercover videos that sent Planned Parenthood into crisis mode have drawn the concern of California Attorney General Kamala Harris, whose interest in reviewing their legality helped put the Golden State at the center of a dramatic national controversy.

Harris, embarked on a campaign to replace outgoing Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., promised lawmakers to “carefully review” the organization behind the tapes for “any violations of California law,” according to the Sacramento Bee.

The lawmakers, four Congressional Democrats, had “asked Harris and U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch to determine if officials from the Irvine-based Center for Medical Progress broke any laws when they posed as workers for a biotech company while recording Planned Parenthood physicians without their consent,” the Bee reported.

“Reps. Jan Schakowsky, Zoe Lofgren, Jerry Nadler and Yvette Clarke cited reports that founder David Daleiden filed paperwork to create a phony entity. They also asked the state’s top law enforcement official to look into possible violations of the Invasion of Privacy Act, which bars recording people without their permission.”

Swift litigation

The company, StemExpress, swiftly filed suit to protect themselves, drawing a temporary restraining order from Los Angeles Superior Court. According to the Associated Press, the order “prohibits the Center for Medical Progress from releasing any video of three high-ranking StemExpress officials taken at a restaurant in May. It appears to be the first legal action prohibiting the release of a video from the organization.”Unlike previous efforts by activists to cast an unflattering light on the organization, the videos produced by the Center for Medical Progress captured lurid remarks concerning the sale and use of aborted fetal body parts and organs. In addition to creating a public relations mess for Planned Parenthood, the videos also raised alarms for a company that acts as procurement middleman between the abortion provider and researchers desirous of the parts.

In one video, a former StemExpress employee told the Center for Medical Progress that she expected to be “drawing blood” rather than “procuring tissue from aborted fetuses,” according to the Federalist.

Center for Medical Progress David Daleiden hit back at the StemExpress suit in a statement, calling the litigation “meritless” and accusing StemExpress of fostering an “illegal baby parts trade,” AP added.

Via: California Political Review

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Obama Takes Air Force One Jet And Marine One Helicopter To Play Round Of Golf Less Than 48 Hours Before Today’s Big Climate Speech…

Via: Weasel Zippers

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Kasich makes quick rise in polls

It could have been embarrassing: The sitting governor of Ohio left off the primetime Fox News debate stage in his home state because of low poll numbers.

But in the two weeks since he launched his presidential campaign, John Kasich has bypassed New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, former Texas Gov. Rick Perry and other Republicans who have been in the race longer.

Last week, the main super-PAC backing Kasich’s candidacy announced it raised more than $11 million, tapping into a surprisingly deep well of influential Ohioans for a haul that puts him squarely in the middle of a well-funded pack of GOP candidates.

“Someone in that campaign knows what they’re doing,” said Tom Rath, a Republican strategist in New Hampshire, where Kasich has leaped into third place, according to one recent poll.

And Kasich’s late entrance — he was the 16th Republican to launch a presidential bid — appears to have been perfectly timed to give him a boost in the polls nationally, potentially propelling him onto Fox News’s primetime debate stage this week. 

“The timing was good,” said Doug Heye, the former communications director for the Republican National Committee. “But don’t forget, this is a guy who has had a national presence for a while now, first in Congress, and then as the host of a Fox News show. He’s got that base of people who already knew him from being cabled into people’s homes and many of them just needed a reminder.”

If Kasich can ride the momentum he has onto the debate stage this week, it will be a big early victory for his campaign. Fox News is capping the number of candidates at 10 based on national polling numbers. 

Right now, Kasich is alone in ninth place with 3.5 percent support, according to RealClearPolitics average of polls, more than double the support he had at the beginning of July. Kasich leads Christie and Perry, his two closest challengers for the final spots on the debate stage.

A Quinnipiac University survey released last week shows Kasich in even better shape, taking 5 percent support and sharing eighth place with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas). In the same poll from May, Kasich was tied for 10th place with only 2 percent support.

It’s the second national poll to be released since Kasich officially launched his bid for the White House that shows him making gains. A CNN/ORC poll that went into the field the day after Kasich’s announcement also registered an uptick in support, from 2 percent to 4 percent, putting him in an eighth-place tie with Christie and Ben Carson. 

Via: The Hill

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What the Latest National GOP Poll Means for Thursday’s Fox Debate

The headline may read “Trump Widens Lead,” but the biggest implications of Monday’s new Monmouth University Poll have much more to do with the candidates towards the bottom of the list.

With Fox News just a little more than 24 hours away from announcing the 10 candidates who will have the honor of appearing on the primetime debate stage in Cleveland, three Republican governors are vying for the bottom two spots.

As of last Thursday, some predictors had Rick Perry as the eleventh name on the list, while others were predicting that current Ohio Governor John Kasich would be left out of the debate in his home state. The third man on that list, Chris Christie, has been acting very confident, but still risked getting cut if he had a particularly bad performance in any new polls.

Assuming Fox decides to take the Monmouth poll into consideration, Christie should be resting easy right about now. With 4.4% in today’s survey, Christie tied Rand Paul and Marco Rubio for seventh place. They are followed by Kasich with 3.2%, while Perry’s name appears even further down the list with just 1.8%. That puts Kasich at #9 and Christie at #10 on Real Clear Politics’ average, both ahead of Perry, who still sits at #11.

If this ends up being the final major poll to be released before Fox announces the 10 candidates Tuesday evening, it is bad news for Perry. In order to avoid what is looking like an inevitable fate, he would have had to outperform Christie and Kasich. Instead, he couldn’t even beat Carly Fiorina, who is already not expected to appear on the main stage.

And yes, as Monmouth’s press release revealed, Trump has opened up his widest lead yet, more than doubling any other candidate with 26%. Jeb Bush (12.2%) and Scott Walker (11.1%) have to settle for second and third place, respectively. While Perry likely won’t get the chance to challenge Trump directly Thursday night, his two closest rivals will be looking to do something — anything — to improve their standing moving forward.

Via: Mediaite

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Psychopathy in the White House

It’s clear that Barack Obama is a narcissist, so I wasn’t surprised when he paraded around the White House making faces to his selfie stick then stopping to admire his gaunt profile in the mirror the way an insecure teenager might.  Selfie obsession, however, can be a symptom of something more sinister – the Dark Triad of personality traits

The Dark Triad consists of narcissism, Machiavellianism and psychopathy, and it turns out Obama is riddled with all three, especially the darkest category -- psychopathy.  Narcissists generally cause themselves harm, and one could easily argue that to become president one must be a bit self-absorbed, if not cocky.  But psychopathy is particularly pernicious as the perpetrator appears normal, and often quite charming, which even Obama’s detractors admit he occasionally exudes.

Personality psychologists have constructed a “Dirty Dozen” scale to identify the Dark Triad.  Let’s take a look, focusing especially on the behaviors associated with psychopathy, behaviors that Obama exhibits in abundance.

M = Machiavellianism, N = Narcissism, P = Psychopathy.

1. I tend to manipulate others to get my way.  (M)
2. I tend to lack remorse. (P)
3. I tend to want others to admire me. (N)
4. I tend to be unconcerned with the morality of my actions. (P)
5. I have used deceit or lied to get my way. (M)
6. I tend to be callous or insensitive. (P)
7. I have used flattery to get my way. (M)
8. I tend to seek prestige or status. (N)
9. I tend to be cynical. (P)
10. I tend to exploit others toward my own end. (M)
11. I tend to expect special favors from others. (N)
12. I want others to pay attention to me. (N) (…continued below)

Obama would score highly in each measure. For example, for number 5, the Washington Post awarded him the Lie of the Year “award” for “If you like your health-care plan, you can keep it."    Similarly, his real-time obsession with his legacy supersedes most presidents’ conceit -- who heretofore mostly focused on policy first then later massaged it for posterity.

But it is Obama’s proclivity for P which is particularly disconcerting; whereas most politicians have N, and a more devious minority exhibit some M, far fewer wallow in P.  Furthermore, whereas N infects the victim with self-destructive, perhaps supercilious visions of grandeur, P envelops those under his influence in the dark side.

Consider number 2 in the scale:  “I tend to lack remorse.”  Well, politicians at various points along the ideological spectrum may disagree wholeheartedly, but still have remorse should something untoward befall an opponent.

But there is evidence that Obama is remorseless.  Charles Woods, father of a Navy SEAL killed in the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, was only looking for some emotional support from the Commander in Chief.  Instead, here’s how he described his meeting with Obama at Andrews Air Force base:  “His face was pointed towards me but he would not look me in the eye," Woods says of meeting Obama. "I could tell he was not sorry. He had no remorse." 

Want more recent evidence of Obama’s lack of remorse?   On 21 July, 2015, he had the impudence to deny that there was anything wrong with the IRS targeting conservative groups.    His lack of remorse that the IRS caused turmoil to American citizens’ lives is pathological because when it seemed politically expedient he condemned the IRS abuses and found the inspector general’s findings “inexcusable.”

Now consider number 4 on the scale:  “I tend to be unconcerned with the morality of my actions.” 

That pretty well captures Obama’s un-American grounding in morality.  Perhaps his umbrage at American exceptionalism was instilled while he was a child in Indonesia, or from lurking on the periphery of American society in Hawaii or in Chicago’s Saul Alinsky-inspired radical community organizations.  Something definitely warped his confused soul to apply this bizarre moral equivalence: Obama compares medieval Christian actions to present-day Islamic barbarism.

Obama’s actions, or lack thereof, in deploying resources to combat radical Islamic jihadists are ultimately immoral.   Another AT author did an exemplary job of exposing his immorality.

Number 6 on the scale is the next measure of psychopathy:  “I tend to be callous or insensitive”

It was truly unbecoming as well as insensitive when Obama, during his 2010 State of the Union address, criticized SCOTUS for their Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission decision.  The justices were sitting ducks in this unprecedented presidential petulance that sullied an event in which members from all three branches of government are under one roof.  Magnanimity is clearly not in his makeup.

Obama seems to relish the callous and insensitive tactic of attacking others who are constrained from immediate rebuttal.  He also invited Paul Ryan to a budget speech (though Obama later lied about that) then proceeded to criticize his budget plans severely, knowing Ryan couldn’t respond.  At least not until after, when Ryan said this:

“I’m very disappointed in the president. I was excited when we got invited to attend his speech today. I thought the president’s invitation… was an olive branch. Instead what we got was a speech that was excessively partisan, dramatically inaccurate and hopelessly inadequate in addressing our country’s fiscal challenges… Rather than building bridges, he’s poisoning wells.”

Obama also demonstrated a callous indifference to the family of Kate Steinle who was shot dead by an illegal immigrant given sanctuary in San Francisco.  Ironically, unlike other personal tragedies where he promptly intruded for political gain, this one actually had some federal policy overtones.

Number 9 on the scale is another measure of psychopathy: “I tend to be cynical.”  Unlike the first three, where Obama occupies rarified territory, this is a bit more common amongst politicians.  Nevertheless, he out-cynics most. 

This headline says it all:  President Obama lied about gay marriage, Axelrod says. This is why we’re cynical

Via: American Thinker

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WH Anticipates 'A Difficult Transition' to 'Clean Power'

(

CNSNews.com) - President Obama will unveil the Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Power Plan on Monday, imposing stricter-than-expected carbon dioxide limits on the states.

"There's no doubt that this is going to be a difficult transition," Obama's spokesman Josh Earnest told MSNBC's "Morning Joe" on Monday. "But it's a transition that is clearly in the best interests of our economy, it's clearly in the best interest of the health of children all across the country, and it's in the best interests of the planet."

Earnest said he thinks the EPA Clean Power Plan "is the culmination of what the president talked about in 2007 and 2008."

Even before he became president, Barack Obama campaigned on a promise to wean the nation off coal.

"If somebody wants to build a coal fired plant, they can. It's just that it will bankrupt them because they're going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that's being emitted," Barack Obama told the San Francisco Chronicle in January 2008.

He added later in the same interview, “Under my plan -- electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket.”

Rates may skyrocket, but the White House insists customers' bills will come down -- likely because people won't be able to afford as much electricity.

"If we actually make progress in investing in this clean energy, what we're actually going to do, we're actually going to lower costs for consumers," Earnest said on Monday.

The new rules take effect in 2022, and states must meet the carbon dioxide reduction targets -- a 32 percent reduction from 2005 levels -- by 2030. Obama's proposed rule last year called for a 30 percent cut.

"We're going to take the most important, substantial step that our country's every taken to reduce the causes of climate change," Earnest said on Monday. "And what we're going to do, we're going scale back the carbon pollution that our power generators are currently allowed to spew into the atmosphere."

"For too long, we've seen Washington, D.C., putting off and delaying action, serious action, to fight the causes of climate change. And we've seen special interests mobilize to try to fight any effort to do that. And I have no doubt that special interests in Washington, D.C., are going to squeal -- as are the politicians who are in their pocket.

"But the fact of the matter is, these rules are going to do something to finally confront the causes of climate change, it's actually going to have significant benefits for public heatlth, particularly children with asthma, and it's going to accelerate the progress that we've made already in transitioining to a clean energy economy."

As the Associated Press noted, it will be up to Obama's successor to implement the EPA's Clean Energy Plan. The AP also reported that the Obama administration estimated the emissions limits will cost $8.4 billion annually by 2030.

The actual price won't be clear until states decide how they'll reach their targets. But people in the energy industry said the stricter limits make Obama's mandate even more burdensome, costly and difficult to achieve.

Via: CNS News

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