Friday, March 11, 2016

VACATION

In order to escape the embarrassing actions of the Establishment Right and the Old-lady Left, my beloved wife and are visiting close friends in the Republica Dominicana. NOT Cuba since dictators steal, imprison and kill their fellow countrymen who disagree with tyranny. And though the President of the Democrats embraces the Castros, Chavez (may he rest in hell), Hamas, the ayatollahs and other dictators and terrorists, I vehemently disagree with him.

Sunshine and deep friendships in a democracy is wonderful!

Later, Amigos and amigas.

Friday, March 4, 2016

A Random Walk Through the Wall Street Journal, March 4, 2016.







A Random Walk Through Today's Wall Street Journal



Another takeover of an industry: He wants to stop commissions, he see’s selling anything on commission is unscrupulous since everyone is business is crooked and all consumers are naïve and stupid. He’ll fix everything as he wants it.


Brokers Brace for Tighter Standard on Retirement Accounts

Firms say change will drive up compliance costs and could force them to drop middle-class clients

“The Obama administration is changing the structure of the stock brokerage industry to better control it in the future. This will make bigger firms even bigger and destroy much of the competition. Obama wants to eliminate all commission-based sales. He thinks all sales people are dishonest and his way: fees, are the only way to protect the helpless consumer.

“Thousands of small brokerages are bracing for a tighter rule governing investments they recommend to retirement savers, a change they say will drive up compliance costs and could force them to drop middle-class clients.

“The idea of the regulation, which could be released this month by the Labor Department, seems unobjectionable enough—that brokers would follow a ‘fiduciary’ standard when making investment recommendations. Currently, brokers’ advice only has to be ‘suitable,’ which critics say is a weaker standard that allows the sale of expensive products that eat into returns.

The rule’s opponents, including many in the brokerage industry, say it will increase their costs and make providing investment advice to small-balance retirement accounts less profitable.

Already, anticipation of the rule is pushing some companies to scale back their business in the brokerage area. The associated compliance costs were a key motivator, among other factors, behind American International Group Inc.’s decision in January to sell its brokerage unit, AIG Advisor Group.

About $3 trillion of more than $7 trillion in individual retirement accounts is expected to be affected by the rule, according to research firm Morningstar Inc. About $19 billion in revenue related to those IRA assets could be affected, and operating margins on IRA assets could fall up to 30%, Morningstar said.

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Obama Administration Hits Medicare Payment Target Early

“Shift in the way payments are made emphasizes quality of care over quantity”



Obama believes all providers of healthcare are dishonest and will change that according to his own politics or beliefs…having never touched the private sector or the industry. He is changing it to his hope. Yes, consumer you are stupid.

WASHINGTON—Obama administration officials said Thursday they were almost a year ahead of their target to change the way Medicare pays hundreds of billions of dollars to providers for treating older Americans.” This is his definition of ‘quality of care’ or that of Harvard Elites.

“The Department of Health and Human Services had wanted the federal insurance program for seniors to make 30% of its payments to doctors and hospitals on the basis of the quality of care they provide, rather than the quantity, by the end of 2016. That was seen as a step toward hitting 50% by 2018, beyond the lifespan of the Obama administration.”

Of course all definitions are political and based on the need to make political achievement for Obama’s Legacy rather than actually providing better care and lower prices. More bureaucrats rarely achieve those two goals. Obama said of his headguy: “You get bragging rights this year!” He said. “You’re proof that the law works.” And “We’ve been moving Medicare to a payment model that rewards quality of care over volume,” clearly ignoring that an aging population will force “volume.”

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Government bureaucracy (not) at work:


Home Builders Slowed by Permit Delays

“Housing market is starting to heat up, but understaffed city governments are failing to keep pace”

“Bradley Gaskins, chairman of the codes and standards committee of the American Institute of Architects, said the group’s members are seeing permit approvals take six to eight months in hot markets such as Florida and California, versus the typical two to three months.

“The delays come as housing affordability is a growing challenge in many cities around the country. Rents have risen 20% over the past five years, according to data provider Reis Inc. and home prices have risen 25% during the same period, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Index.

“In Denver, home prices have shot up more than 40% over the past four years, according to Case-Shiller, while rents have jumped 25%, according to Reis.”

*          *          *

The American political divide brings smaller spending increases demanded by Republicans than Democrats. But increases anyway. Corruption. Maybe Trump is the answer.


Senators Split on FDA and Medical Research Funding Bill

“Health panel’s Democrats plan to offer their own version in unusual move”

“WASHINGTON—Senate Republicans are moving ahead with their own legislation to relax Food and Drug Administration approval processes and boost medical-research funding, after talks to produce a bipartisan bill broke down.

“The legislation being developed by Senate Republicans would create an NIH Innovation Fund to pay for certain priorities of the Obama administration, according to Sen. Alexander. He declined to specify how much would go to this fund, though the administration is asking for amounts of about $1 billion or more. The Democrats’ bill calls for $5 billion in annual new funding for the NIH and the FDA.

“The fund would pay for Vice President Joe Biden’s cancer “moonshot,” the president’s Precision Medicine Initiative on genetic health research and help fund the work of young scientific investigators.”

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Yes, Hillary is Bernie Light, but Robbing Hood with your money.


Clinton Tax Plan Would Raise $498 Billion but Hinder GDP Growth — Analysis

“Hillary Clinton’s tax proposals would raise $1.1 trillion over the next decade, and the highest-earning 1% of households pay more than 77% of the tab.”

That would actually reduce revenue by $374 billion over the decade because the higher rates would encourage taxpayers to hold onto assets rather than sell them and pay taxes…”

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Obama is giving away over ONE TRILLION of taxpayer dollars. Is no one insanely angry? Or does no one know of this? He’s increasing his bureaucracy to give it away.


The Feds and Students vs. Taxpayers

“Obama is encouraging loan recipients to claim they were misled by colleges. Guess who will pay.”

Last month President Obama announced the creation of a ‘Student Aid Enforcement Unit’ that could end up costing taxpayers billions of dollars and reduce access to career training in the U.S. Housed in the Education Department, this unit follows the president’s complaint last year that many schools—especially career-training, for-profit schools—rely heavily on federally funded loans yet do not reliably graduate students equipped for jobs.

The Student Aid Enforcement Unit will greatly increase the use of two little-known Education Department regulations, first enacted in 1994. The ‘borrower defense’ permits students to claim they owe nothing on their student loans because they enrolled based on a school’s misleading assertions about job-placement and graduation rates. The ‘closed school’ regulation relieves students from their debt when a school they are attending shuts down. Federal education loans that are forgiven become liabilities of the government, i.e., the taxpayers.

“Now that students are being encouraged to claim that they were misled, a small industry has already taken root, with online forms asking students if they feel they have been misled and then detailing how they can file for relief from loan repayment. Class action law suits are also being readied and filed to discharge even more student loans.

Certainly, the federal government has a responsibility to protect students from bad schools engaged in deceptive practices, especially since the federal government provides over $100 billion in loans each year to students enrolled in public, private and proprietary college and universities.

“The expansion of the application of borrower-defense regulations—from a handful of cases over 20 years to potentially thousands annually—has opened the door for any students, from any institution, nonprofit or for-profit, to claim they were lured to the school by deceptive practices. As the new Student Aid Enforcement Unit (which adjudicates the claims based on state laws) overflows with claimants alleging unfulfilled promises of employment, postgraduate education or a rewarding career, taxpayers will be left holding the bag.”

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No comment needed.


President Obama Created Donald Trump

“After the cool, weak and endlessly nuanced Obama, no wonder voters are going for a strong, blunt leader.”

“President Obama doesn’t get enough credit for his accomplishments. I know this because he often tells us it is so. I happen to agree that he doesn’t get enough credit. No, not for slowing the rise of the oceans or healing the planet, as he immodestly claimed he would, even before taking office. He has succeeded handsomely, though, in living up to his vow to be a transformative president, like Ronald Reagan, and not an incremental one in the Bill Clinton mold. Mr. Obama has accomplished many changes—they just aren’t the ones we were waiting for.

“Mr. Obama has alienated allies like Israel while encouraging adversaries like Iran and Cuba. He has fostered Americans’ record-breaking dependence on government programs and record-low participation in the workforce. He has expanded the power, size and expense of the federal government in unprecedented ways, all at the expense of Americans’ freedom, standard of living and economic well-being.

“But the president truly doesn’t get enough credit for creating one of the most polarizing forces in American politics today. No, not Hillary—that is more Bill’s doing. Let’s be honest: There would be no Donald Trump, dominating the political scene today if it were not for President Obama.

“I believe that voters tend to act in open-seat presidential elections to correct for the perceived deficiencies of the incumbent. In 1980, after four years of President Carter’s telling us to turn up the thermostat and wear a cardigan, while the Soviets invaded Afghanistan and the Iranians invaded the U.S. Embassy, the fed-up American people elected a cowboy to the White House who made it clear that the evil empire’s days were numbered.

“After eight years of President Reagan’s supply-side economics and broadsides against welfare queens, we got a kinder, gentler President H.W. Bush. After four years of international diplomacy without the “vision thing,” we got a loquacious Arkansas governor promising to invent a third way forward focused on the economy at home. After eight years of Clintonian empathy and skirt-chasing, we got a plain-spoken President George W. Bush, who promised to restore integrity to the Oval Office. After Hurricane Katrina and post-Hussein Iraq, we got the professorial President Barack Obama, who seemed to many to promise competence.

“After seven years of the cool, weak and endlessly nuanced “no drama Obama,” voters are looking for a strong leader who speaks in short, declarative sentences. Middle-class incomes are stagnant, and radical Islam is on the march across the Middle East. No wonder voters are responding to someone who promises to make America great again. You can draw a straight line between a president who dismisses domestic terrorist attacks as incidents of workplace violence and a candidate who wants to ban Muslims from entering the country.

“Mr. Obama likes to bemoan the increasing partisan divides across the country, as if he were merely a passive observer at best and a victim at worst. Uncharacteristically, the president is being too modest. He has created the very rancor he now rails against. Imagine how different things would be if Mr. Obama had pursued a stimulus bill that included targeted tax cuts and infrastructure spending balanced with gradual entitlement reforms—instead of a stimulus that merely dusted off congressional Democrats’ wish list of pork-barrel projects and ideological experiments.

“Imagine if Mr. Obama had actually worked with Republicans in an open process to bring down health-care costs—instead of pushing through, on a partisan vote, the largest expansion of government-welfare programs in a generation. Or if he had listened to the message that voters sent in the first midterm election by putting Republicans in charge of Congress—instead of petulantly relying on executive orders, and using an eraser and whiteout on the Constitution, to shove the Environmental Protection Agency and other federal agencies deeper into Americans’ lives.

“Over the past seven years America could have been transformed in an inspiring way if its education system had been opened up, if its energy policy had been liberated, if the entire approach to governing had been overhauled. President Obama chose the opposite approach, favoring a closed education system that fails millions of children and an energy policy that chains the economy to his green agenda.

“President Obama loves to construct straw men so he can contrast his heroic self against them. But Donald Trump needs no characterization; he is capable of being absurd on his own, no outside help required. Without President Obama, there is no Donald Trump. Mr. Trump often diagnoses the ills Mr. Obama has caused, but his prescriptions are just as often wrong. America deserves better.”

Mr. Jindal is the former governor of Louisiana.

Thursday, March 3, 2016

IT LOOKS LIKE THE ELITES ARE LINING UP AGAINST "WE THE PEOPLE"



Mitt-toast spoke. He, who is one of Trump's "losers," (no doubt there) said Trump is dangerous, unfit, a danger, the Devil incarnate...whatever.

But could it be Romney simply doesn't want a fellow businessman to win after Romney should have won in 2012 but was too lame (in my view) to stand up for 1) business 2) free enterprise 3) venture capital 4) capital 5) capitalism 6) freedom from government 7) other stuff. If the man could not proudly call out the anti-American, anti-business Megaphone of the Left, The New York Times, and his anti-law, anti-American opponent while defending that what he did in venture capital and private enterprise: creating prosperity and jobs. [Like the run-on sentence?] And defending and defining "profits" and the America that is (was?) great. He actually had the election if he would have been proud of his own accomplishments. He was not (or possibly was too polite) and lost. Why would anyone listen to him castigate the Republican front runner, who has brought out Republicans to vote in greater numbers than Mitt-toast did? And more independents are joining Trump's Republican Party?

It is about power.

Trump does not need lobbyists, rich contributors, the powerful, the Elites. Nor does he need The New York Times or, for that matter, Fox News. He does not need the same people Bernie is rejecting (and gaining a huge following). The same people The Bitter Old Bitty with Baggage NEEDS. Rubio supporters, who want and can get something from him.

Huh? So both Bernie and Trump have "We the People" on their sides. From 100% different angles. One from socialism and tight authoritarian control over everyone's lives, taking from the successful and doling it out carefully to advocates, adherents and those wanting a free ride. The other -- Trump -- comes from freedom, the right to choose (choose your life not simply to kill fetuses) and the right to try to accomplish.

Trump is a person to look up to, with respect, a little envy, but an enjoyable winner. An icon with a sense of humor in a humorless profession.

Sanders is a person to want something free from.

Both want to end "Citizens United" -- the buzz word meaning money in politics -- in their own way. Sanders by fiat, Trump by freedom. Both are desperately threatening to the Elites with power, raw power over "We the People."

These Elites, both Left and Right,  crushed the Tea Party. The Tea Party is on a surge for Trump (Trump Party)? Surge for Trump! A great marketing phrase, since the surge in Iraq was winning until Obama's arbitrary and stupid retreat not under fire except by politicians. The Elites are running scared and fighting back like a caged tiger, a mother bear, a threatened politician.

The only reason so many are lining up against Trump is fear. The question is: Is it fear of chaos? Yes, Trump will bring chaos. ("Out of Chaos, Comes Order" said Nietzsche.)  Is it fear of Elites hanging on to the status quo of their power? Trump doesn't need them, so...yes. Will Trump be a crazy man with the bomb, like Putin, Kim Jong-un or the Ayatollahs? Unlikely since he'd want to protect his wealth from them. Is he a racist? Misogynist? Democrat? Whatever. He's no Black Lives Matter racist. No Clinton. Seems to have a nice wife and kids.

More periodically later.