"Arbitrary and Capricious"

Federal Judge Martin Feldman inadvertently summed up the the entire Obama Administration in his decision overturning the president's "arbitrary and capricious" six-month moratorium on deep-water oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.  Painting his sharp reprimand with detail he added, that even presidents couldn't impose an unjustified "edict"'; that the administration couldn't even define "deep water";  that it didn't mention any "irreparable harm" to justify such a sweeping moritorium; that it offered "no evidence" of a balance of environmental concerns with the immense scope of the moratorium's "irreparable harm" to jobs.  And finally, that the administration's claim that its so-called "safety report" was "peer reviewed" was a lie - "factually incorrect" plus it "abuses reason, common sense and the text at issue".  That there was no "probity" (defined as "absolute moral correctness" and "a very moral and honest way of behaving") in its decision.

In summary the Obama Administration was:

arbitrary and capricious
incoherent
one-sidedly prejudiced
immoral
lying.

Now let's glide over the headlines and body of today's Wall Street Journal (Wednesday, June 23, 2010):

"Business Group Slams 'Hostile' Policies on Jobs" of the Obama Adminsitration. (page A4)

Director of Obama's Office of Management and Budget Office decides to resign after overseeing a 2009 Obama Budget deficit of $1,400,000,000,000 ($1.4 trillion) or 10% of U. S. GDP a number not seen since World War II.  Projections are for it to skyrocket to $11,000,000,000,000 ($11 trillion)over the next ten years.  I'd quit, too.  Peter Orszat helped ram through the "stimulus" (see next) and the healthcare industry takeover, which is looking like an additional major deficit producer. (page A4)

"States Face New Pinch as [ineffective] Stimulus Ebbs".  Of the $787,000,000,000 so-called "stimulus", $150,000,000,000 went to states to prevent union-member layoffs and provide temporary funding for federal government-mandated healthcare (primarily Medicaid) which runs out at the end of the year and the rest went for tax relief, grants (many to non-profits), contracts, and awards (none of which demonstrably created any  jobs).  Scott Pattison, executive officer of the National Association of State Budget Officers, said "Stimulus is going to run out and there isn't sufficient economic growth that's going to come in and make up for the loss of those funds".  The "stimulus" is an abject failure.  But state and local government (union) jobs have been protected, losing only 230,000 jobs against 8,000,000 gone in the private sector.  States want $24,000,000,000 more to balance their budgets on the backs of U. S. citizens at large.

"Obama Tangles With Insurance Executives Over Rates" (page A4).  President Obama warned health insurance executives not to raise rates "unreasonably" (an arbitrary and un-definable word).  Obama's new hugely-costly regulations which cover people without insurance, prohibit denial of care (which is highly-regulated by states already), stop lifetime caps and limit annual caps, force adults up to age 28 to be covered on their parents' plans vastly increase insurance companies' costs.  Finally it fixes profits ("price fixing") of health insurance companies at 15% to 20% of premiums (depending on type of insurance, which figure includes administrative costs), but, of course, the Health and Human Services Secretary can by law modify such regulations on a case-by-case arbitrariness (undermining, of course, the Rule of Law completely).

But the greatest set of articles concern the upcoming G-20 (Group of worldwide twenty major industrial and developing countries) meeting.  "France's Lagarde Forecasts Austerity", "U. K. Unveils Severe 'Unavoidable Budget'", "Japan Lays Groundwork for Cutting Massive Public Debt" and "Bank Tax Gains Backers Before G-20" (all page A11), "Russia's Economic Czar Tackles Deficit, Bureaucracy" (page A13).  All these articles highlight the unavoidable need for countries to slash deficits.  Except America.  Obama tells other countries to slash and burn deficits AND to force their conumers to save less and spend more on imports (hopefully from America) WHILE the U. S. needs to continue its deficits and sell more of its imports.  DO AS I SAY NOT AS I DO.

As for the slashing and burning our deficit, Mr. Obama slyly slides it under the table with a "deficit commission" to report AFTER the upcoming mid-term elections while continuing to spend like a cocaine-addled maniac. "White House Backs Electric-Car Aid" (page B3).  Yes, Mr. President, toss out another $8,000,000,000 ($8 billion) to spend on his favorate subsidies to build electric plug facilities, car-batteries.  While the most efficient, low-cost, reliable transportation source, the internal-compustion engine, recipient of over a century of innovation and investment is disregarded along with other possibilities such as fuel cells.  This is in addition to $25,000,000,000 ($25 billion) given to help auto makers retool for electrics; $2,400,000,000 ($2.4 billion) for battery development and an unspecified number of billions of dollars for paying consumers $7,500 each to buy the unwanted vehicles.  (The same amount it a paid consumers a year ago to destroy old gas-powered cars.)

But is there a sliver of hope?  Mr. Obama's $24,000,000,000 ($24 billion) of desired further "aid" to states for another six months of unemployment payments was stripped out of a House bill and may be by Senators.  Hmmmm.  But it's only a sliver by Congresspeople hungrily doing anything the can -- even slow spending increases --  to keep their cushy jobs.

ARBITRARY AND CAPRICIOUS IS ABSOLUTELY OPPOSITE TO THE RULE OF LAW, where citizens can rely on laws passed by legislatures, not the offhanded arbitrary decisions by monarch-wannabes like Barack Obama and his far-left posse to buy votes, reward supporters, subsidize things they want. 

Thank you judge.