Conservative Wanderer

“A troubled and afflicted mankind looks to us, pleading for us to keep our rendezvous with destiny; that we will uphold the principles of self-reliance, self-discipline, morality, and, above all, responsible liberty for every individual that we will become that shining city on a hill.” — Ronald Wilson Reagan

Daily Archives: 1 June 2011

Ready For A “Great, Great Depression”?

Obamanomics at work:

Wall Street is having a hard time figuring out what to do now that the U.S. economy appears to be sputtering and yields are so low, Peter Yastrow, market strategist for Yastrow Origer, told CNBC.

“What we’ve got right now is almost near panic going on with money managers and people who are responsible for money,” he said. “They can not find a yield and you just don’t want to be putting your money into commodities or things that are punts that might work out or they might not depending on what happens with the economy.

“We need to find real yield and real returns on these assets. You see bad data, you see Treasurys rally, you see all bonds and all fixed-income rally and then the people who are betting against the U.S. economy start getting bearish on stocks. That’s a huge mistake.”

Stocks extended losses after the manufacturing fell below expectations in May and the private sector added only 38,000 jobs during the month.

“Interest rates are amazingly low and that, thanks to Ben Bernanke, is driving everything,” Yastrow said. “We’re on the verge of a great, great depression. The [Federal Reserve] knows it.

“We have many, many homeowners that are totally underwater here and cannot get out from under. The technology frontier is limited right now. We definitely have an innovation slowdown and the economy’s gonna suffer.”

In the face of this, what’s the answer from the Party of the Donkey?

Tax more, spend more. Then tax even more and spend even more. Repeat until the economy collapses.

Your Tax Dollars At Work: 77,000+ Federal Workers Paid More Than Governors

And the Ruling Class wonders why Tea Partiers think that government is bloated?

More than 77,000 federal government employees throughout the country — including computer operators, more than 5,000 air traffic controllers, 22 librarians and one interior designer — earned more than the governors of the states in which they work.

The findings, from a Congressional Research Service report requested by Sen. Tom Coburn, Oklahoma Republican, were released at a time when public workers’ salaries and benefits are under scrutiny across the country as governments try to streamline.

CRS reviewed 2009 salary figures, the most recent available, and found 77,057 employees who earned more in annual pay than their respective governors. Of those workers, 18,351 were doctors — the highest percentage. The second-highest total was for 5,170 air traffic controllers — likely both front-line controllers and their supervisors.

I admit that physician and air traffic controllers are high-stress, high-expertise jobs… but then so is being the governor of a state.

Just another example of Fedzilla gone wild.

Dr. Sanity, The Left, And The Left’s Narcissism

Dr. Sanity has posted part 2 of her essays on “The Political Left And The Seven Deadly Sins Of Narcissism,” and as usual, it’s worth reading. Here’s a snippet to whet your appetite (emphasis in original):

The psychological defect in malignant narcissism is a broken or distorted sense of one’s SELF. The excessive self-esteem and swaggering arrogance that you see in a typical bully comes from a distortion of reality that person has with regard to their own self. It was once widely believed that low self-esteem was a cause of violence–and you see that idea reflected today in the platitudes and rationalizations for terrorism or any destructive behavior– but, the reality is that most violent individuals, groups and nations think very well of themselves.

The triumvarate of cognitive contradictions promulgated by today’s narcissistic left, and which claim to be based on “scientific” psychology includes the hyping of (1) self-esteem (i.e., increasing your self-worth without having to achieve anything; (2) hope (i.e., achieving your goals without any real effort) and (3) victimhood (i.e.,it’s not your fault that you haven’t achieved anything or made any effort).

Read the whole thing, as usual.