SOTU Speech last night

[Warph]

                 

To sum it up:

Rubio: drinking water. Obama: treading water. MSM: carrying water. Americans: underwater.

....Warph

[Warph]

What It's Like To View Obama Through The Left's Eye...

What most people saw last night:



"US President Barack Obama arrives to deliver his annual
State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress
inside the US House of Representatives February 12, 2013,
in Washington, DC."


What the liberals saw last night:

[Warph]

TV Ratings For Obama's State Of The Union Crater, Down Double Digits On All Networks...

"8:42a.m.
As usual, all the networks aired President Obama's annual State of the Union address live. In fast nationals, the first speech of Obama's second term before a joint session of Congress continued the downward trend of the past few years — from the high of his first official State of the Union in 2010. Additionally, last night's SOTU was down double digits on all the networks from Obama's January 24, 2012 speech.

"In preliminary numbers, CBS was the most-watched network for the one-hour-plus speech and coverage with 6.22 million viewers. NBC was next with 5.79 million, followed by ABC with 4.59 million and Fox with 2.37 million. Among adults 18-49, NBC was number one but everyone dropped from last year. In the demo, Fox took the biggest drop from the 2012 speech; the network's coverage last night posted a 0.9/2, down 47% from last year. Tuesday's CBS News Special (1.1/3) was down 27% from 2012, with the NBC News Special (1.6/4) down 20% and the ABC News Special (1.2/3) down 14%." Last year's State of the Union had a total audience of 37.75 million across 14 broadcast and cable networks. That was down from the 42.79 million who watched in 2011 and 48 million in 2010. Because the State of the Union was broadcast live, fast nationals will likely change in the final numbers. Time-adjusted ratings for the speech will be available later today and we will update when we have them. Cable news numbers are expected later this morning.




UPDATE 3:10p.m.:
"The first State of the Union of President Barack Obama's second term last night was watched by 33.5 million viewers. That's down 11.3% from the 37.75 million who tuned in for last year's State of the Union across 14 broadcast and cable networks. It's also State of the Union low for the President who has seen a decline every year since his first official SOTU in 2010 was seen by 48 million. This year the speech was live from around 9 – 10:15 PM ET on 15 networks and taped delayed on Univision. NBC was tops among broadcast networks showing the just over one-hour speech before Congress on Tuesday. Its 6.469 million total viewers last night was just ahead of the 6.4 million CBS pulled in. With 3.683 million watching, Fox News Channel was number one in cable news' coverage of last night's speech. However, CNN won in the key Adults 25-54 demographic with 1.436 million. FNC's total viewership dipped 3% from last year's speech. FOX, ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, Azteca, Univision, MundoFox, CNBC, CNN, Fox Business, Fox News Channel, MSNBC, Current, Centric and Galavision all carried the speech live last night."

At last, some relevant, comparable statistics on the event, as opposed to pundits spouting, political hacks positioning, or ninnified social media metrics tracking.

Guess people were tired of listening to his LIES!

[Warph]

Obama's Most Dishonest State of the Union Address

by Dan Greenfield

In 1986, at the closing session of the Communist Party shindig in the Karl Marx Theater in Havana, Castro had declared, "Let no one think that what I have here is a lengthy speech; it is the party's program." He then went on to speak for 7 hours and 10 minutes.

Obama's ridiculous 6600-word marathon is also not a lengthy speech; it is the party's program. The professional flatterers and fawners in the media have long since given up describing the teleprompter-in-chief as a talented speaker. These days Obama gives speeches that not only sound like they were read from a teleprompter, but also written by a teleprompter.

The obscene performance began with a celebration of an economic recovery that exists only in Washington, D.C., which has grown fat on the money that its corrupt political interests have stolen from the rest of the country, and ended by comparing a woman waiting in line to vote for him with a police officer who risked his life to stop a mad gunman.

And in between these two cynical and ugly bookends was a dog's dinner of out of control spending, class warfare and more bad ideas than even Castro could have come up with in seven hours.

As out of touch with the rest of the country as if he were speaking at the Karl Marx Theater in Havana, Obama claimed that spending was under control, the national debt was no longer a problem, the war in Afghanistan had been won, the economic recovery was here, unemployment was fading and Al Qaeda was a shadow of its former self.

Obama described the "sequester" that he had come up with as "a really bad idea" and blamed it on Congress. He took credit for the oil production that he had fought every step of the way and blamed Hurricane Sandy on global warming; a claim that even few global warming researchers are willing to make.

There were more calls to fix all those broken bridges, which he had somehow been unable to fix for four years, despite running trillion dollar deficits. And finally a proposal to really help the economy take off by legalizing 11 million illegal aliens and thereby doubling the unemployment rate in a single year.

Any Diogenes in the audience taking it upon himself to shout "liar" at every lie would have worn out his vocal chords in a matter of minutes.

Like most bad speakers, Obama has been reduced to relying on props. And since he isn't allowed to bring a slideshow, the props are his designated victims.

"Gabby Giffords deserves a vote," Obama insisted toward the end of his Castroesque word jumble of Soak-the-Rich, Ban-the-Guns and Help-the-Poor-by-Taking-Away-their-Jobs.  "The families of Newtown deserve a vote."

They have a vote, of course, but what he really meant is that they should have not only a vote, but a veto on account of their moral supremacy as official victims. Before Havana-on-the-Potomac got started, one of the designated victims from three years ago came forward to say that Obama had betrayed her. But that's also part of the program. The designated victim of today is Obama's victim of tomorrow.

The people that Obama promises to help today will be put out of work by him tomorrow.

During the word marathon, victims come in handy as human touches in the middle of Obama's latest expensive technocratic gimmick, but as soon as Obama gets what he wants, they're yesterday's news. And there are always gimmicks; whether it's trading hubs with 3D printers or an Energy Security Trust.

With the 2013 State of the Union address, Obama finally discovered his inner Castro. Anyone who took part in a drinking game based around class warfare would have been under the table by the 2000th word as Obama dressed up all of his proposals with scarecrows made out of the rich.

Obama announced that he was in favor of Medicare cuts, further cuts than those already made by ObamaCare, but immediately tried to hide them by assuring his audience that the "wealthiest seniors" would have to pay more. Whenever any unpopular proposal was mentioned, the class warfare came out as a cheap distraction. And when the strawman in a top hat and monocle wouldn't do, the leader of the least transparent administration brought out the euphemisms.

"We'll bring down costs by changing the way our government pays for Medicare," Obama said, "because our medical bills shouldn't be based on the number of tests ordered or days spent in the hospital – they should be based on the quality of care that our seniors receive." This is one of those ominous things that sound reassuring if you don't think about them.

Hospitals charge based on expenses. If a hospital isn't reimbursed for a test, it stops ordering it. If it isn't reimbursed for a day spent in the hospital, it stops admitting Medicare patients. Quality of care is a euphemism for cutting Medicare expenses by forcing hospitals to reduce admissions through fines and denial of reimbursements. That not only cuts Medicare expenses directly, it also cuts them indirectly by killing senior citizens.

"Tonight, let's declare that in the wealthiest nation on Earth, no one who works full-time should have to live in poverty, and raise the federal minimum wage to $9.00 an hour," he declared, as if wages could be somehow separated from the rest of the economy without affecting the cost of living and the existence of those low-paying jobs that keep people from joining the masses of the unemployed.

Raising the minimum wage is just another scam. A tasty treat that looks good up front but leads to more lost jobs and a higher cost of living. Tethering minimum wage to the cost of living is like trying to lift yourself up off the ground by your own belt.

"We can say with confidence that America will complete its mission in Afghanistan, and achieve our objective of defeating the core of al Qaeda," Obama bragged. The core of Al Qaeda had not been located in Afghanistan at any time during his administration, which made it that much easier to defeat.

While Obama lost the War in Afghanistan to the Taliban and will "complete the mission" by retreating and letting them have the country, Al Qaeda has spread across North Africa and came within a hair of taking over Mali.

North Korea had detonated a nuclear weapon and Obama warned its regime that successfully testing nuclear weapons "will only isolate them further"... except to countries like Iran and Pakistan looking to buy their nuclear technology.

Obama carefully tiptoed away from his disaster in Egypt, issued some more toothless warnings to Iran and Syria, and then having completed the demonstration of his international impotence, turned to the inevitable assault on the Bill of Rights.

And then finally the leader who has refused to be constrained by the Constitution, by any law or limitation, by the rights of others or by the laws of economics, by the truth or by any sense of shame, declared that, "this country only works when we accept certain obligations to one another and to future generations; that our rights are wrapped up in the rights of others."

The man who had rejected all obligations and bankrupted the United States for generations to come, who had cut healthcare for seniors and destroyed the economic future of the young, concluded his speech with the same cynicism and dishonesty with which he had begun it.

"Our conscience, a communist spirit, and a revolutionary vocation and will, were, are and will continue to be a 10,000 times more powerful than money," Castro had declared at the end of his speech in 1986. In less than 15 years, history proved him thoroughly wrong. It will take even less time than that for history to disprove Hussein.

[Warph]

Obama and the Pirates

By Peter Ferrara on 2.13.13 @ 6:07AM

The latest proof that President Obama is a freebooting Marxist.

Everything in this column will be established by logical proof, as in geometry. There will be no name calling, or mere assertion.

You probably heard again last night that President Obama still thinks "the rich," a crass term implying low class social envy, do not pay their "fair share." He has been barnstorming America saying precisely that for his more than four years in office now. But the indisputable facts from official government sources say otherwise.

Internal Revenue Service (IRS) data, compiled from income tax returns, as reported by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) shows that in 2009 the top 1% of income earners paid 39% of all federal income taxes. That was three times their share of national income at 13%. It was also more than double the 17.6% of federal individual income taxes paid by the top 1% when President Reagan entered office in 1981, and all the historic tax rate cutting began.

Yet, the IRS data also shows that in 2009 the middle class, as represented by the middle 20% of income earners, paid just 2.7% of all federal income taxes as a group on net, while earning 15% of the national income. As a result, the top 1% paid almost 15 times as much in federal income taxes as the entire middle 20%, even though the middle 20% earned more income.

And this was before all the tax rate increases on "the rich" at the beginning of this year. With the expiration of the Bush tax cuts only for "the rich," and the Obamacare tax increases going into effect, top federal income tax rates on the rich rose nearly 20%, the tax rate on capital gains rose nearly 60%, the tax rate on dividends rose nearly 60%, the Medicare payroll tax rate rose 62%, and the death tax was permanently restored.

Moreover, the bottom 40% of income earners as a group on net, instead of paying some taxes to support government programs, services and benefits, were paid cash by the IRS in 2009 equal to 10% of all federal income taxes that year.

The official IRS data also shows that in 2009 the top 20% of income earners, which included those earning more than $74,000, paid 94% of federal individual income taxes. That was 85% more than the share of national income they earned, almost double. The selfish bastards in that top 20% earned just over half of all the income in the country at 51%. Is it fair that they earn so much more than the bottom 20%, which earned almost nothing? Well, I guess that's what happens when the top 20% includes nearly 6 times as many full time workers as the bottom 20%.


Marxist Principles
Any normal American would say that such an income tax system is more than fair, or that "the rich" actually pay more than their fair share. So what is wrong with President Obama? Why does he keep saying that the rich do not pay their fair share? Is he ignorant? Wouldn't somebody in his Administration tell him that his own Administration's data show otherwise?

President Obama's belief that "the rich" still do not pay their fair share can only be explained on the basis of Marxist principles. To a Marxist, the top 1% earning anything more than the middle class is not fair, no matter how they earned it, fairly or not. So "the rich" are not paying their fair share as long as they are left with more than they "need," as in a true communist system. This is the only logical explanation of Obama's rhetoric, and it is fully consistent with Obama's entire background, and his own published writings.

Notice that Obama kept saying that "the rich" don't need the Bush tax cuts. That rhetoric follows the most basic Marxist principle, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need."

For anyone who insists that Obama is only a liberal, and not a Marxist, what is your explanation of why Obama persists in saying that "the rich" do not pay their fair share, in the face of the overwhelming official data to the contrary? Are you saying he is stupid? The best that can be said for Obama is that anyone who thinks we should increase federal income taxes on "the rich" still more is maybe a pirate rather than a Marxist. Perhaps the Obama logo should be replaced by a skull and crossbones, with a tricorner pirate hat on top.


Bad Karma for the Middle Class, Working People, and the Poor:
Good tax policy is guided by what is necessary to maximize economic growth, not by what individual taxpayers may "need." The middle class, working people and the poor benefit far more from economic growth than they ever could hope to from redistribution. That is proved by the entire 20th century, where the standard of living of American workers increased by more than 7 times, through sustained, rapid economic growth.

Workers could never have gained by 7 times by pirating still more from "the rich." Raising all tax rates on savings and investment, as under President Obama's tax policy, to increase government benefits for those not working, is a perfect formula for plummeting not increasing living standards. Savings and investment to create new businesses, or expand existing businesses, is the foundation for the creation of jobs. It is also the foundation for increasing wages and incomes for the middle class, working people, and the poor.

New capital equipment financed by new savings and investment increases the productivity of workers. Workers are far more productive with computerized, mechanized, steam shovels, for example, than with mere hand shovels. That increased productivity provides the funds to pay workers more. The increased demand for labor resulting from that increased savings and investment also bids up the wages of working people to the level of their productivity. This just shows that under capitalism, capital and labor are complementary, not adversarial, exactly contrary to the misunderstanding of Marxists.

Increasing marginal tax rates on savings and investment, however, will mean less of it, not more. The result will be fewer jobs, and lower wages, which is just what we have experienced so far under President Obama. During Obama's first term, unemployment was over 8% and above for the longest period since the Great Depression, and that only begins to illustrate the Obama unemployment crisis. Moreover, despite all of Obama's rhetoric championing the middle class, median household incomes declined by 7.3% (a month's worth of wages) during his first term, even faster after the recession supposedly ended in 2009.

And increasing benefits for not working only pays people more for not working and not contributing to the economy. All of this will only get worse in Obama's unearned second term. The long-term result will be economic stagnation, not rapidly increasing living standards, as in all the countries that Obama admires and wants America to follow.

The American people used to know all of this, which is why they never voted for redistribution over economic growth in the past, whenever they were given a well-articulated choice.


The Mentally Feeble Left:
The Left's big counterargument to these demonstrated facts is that they only cover the federal income tax. They don't count the Social Security and Medicare payroll tax, which all working people pay of at all income levels, and which the rich do not pay on all of their income, like most workers.

But it is the federal income tax that President Obama has been arguing should be increased because the rich don't pay their fair share, not payroll taxes. So it is reasonable and relevant to look at what share of federal income taxes "the rich" are already paying.

Moreover, the Left is again grievously in error in thinking the maximum taxable income for the Social Security payroll tax of $113,700 is a loophole for the rich. Social Security benefits are calculated based on the worker's income history. Only the income on which the worker paid taxes is counted.

So the limit is not an unfair loophole. Workers don't pay taxes on income above the limit, but they don't get benefits for that income either. That is because Social Security is a contributory program that only replaces a floor of wage income in retirement. Once your retirement income is above that floor, there is no good reason to force taxpayers to pay more for higher benefits. That is especially because Social Security pays such poor, below market returns on tax payments into the program, actually negative real returns for higher income workers. So why force a worker to pay more for a negative real rate of return. It doesn't help to close the long run Social Security deficit, because more benefits would be owed in the future in return.

But let's humor the little communists, and look at the relative shares paid for all federal taxes. Again according to official IRS data, in 2009 the top 1% paid over 22% of all federal taxes, while earning 13% of the income. That is down under Obama from the nearly 27% of all federal taxes paid by the top 1% achieved by Reaganomics in 2007.

President Obama also continues to promote the illiterate false narrative that the rich pay lower tax rates than the middle class, along with his trained seal sidekick Warren Buffett. But the IRS again reports that in 2009 the top 20% paid nearly 70% of all federal taxes, while earning 50% of the income. The middle 20%, the true middle class, paid 9% of federal taxes, compared to their 15% share of income. The top 1% alone paid well over twice the total federal taxes as the entire middle 20%, while earning less in income. The bottom 20% paid 0.3% of all federal taxes.


America's Marxist Party:
But it is not just Barack Obama. It is the entire Democrat party that has been taken over by Marxists.

Obama represents the heart and soul of the Democrats, whose enthusiasts wear Che Guevara T-shirts sold at their major gatherings. Look at Nancy Pelosi, just as zanily ultraleft as Obama, reelected as Democrat House leader, right after the voters punished House Democrats with a New Deal size 63-seat loss in 2010. Pelosi makes Sarah Palin look like a rocket scientist when she tells us that unemployment insurance benefits are one of the most effective pro-growth policies possible. Why not put everyone on permanent unemployment benefits then? What a tragedy it is then when someone gets a job and gets off unemployment benefits.

The reelection of Pelosi to this post was considered by the Democrats to be fair punishment of the stupid voters who made the grievous mistake in 2010 in voting to restore the Republicans to the House majority. Punishment it was.

Or listen to Minnesota Democrat Congressman Keith Ellison talk about how fair it is for 63% of the income of professional golfer Phil Mickelson to be seized in taxes. Ellison already campaigns in a tricorner pirate hat. Or listen to openly communist Democrat Congressman Alan Grayson from Orlando.

This and more is what your friends and neighbors are contributing to and voting for when they support the Democrat party. They are effectively engaged in a personal assault on you and your family, or at least on your freedom and prosperity, in attempting to turn this most prosperous and successful country in world history into just another banana republic.

[Warph]

             


                 Obama, Rubio, and Paul

By: John Hayward
2/13/2013 12:30 AM


The speeches given by President Barack Obama, Senator Marco Rubio, and Senator Rand Paul (delivering the Tea Party response) had some important contrasts in both style and substance. Obama remains the most polished speaker of the three, but he's also incredibly boring, at least for anyone who remembers him giving the same speech over and over again, both at State of the Union addresses and on the stump. The thrust of Obama's speech is that he's going to double down on everything that already failed, from Solyndra boondoggles to, amazingly enough, the same sort of risky subprime loans that created the 2008 financial crisis. That was actually the only interesting part of Obama's speech. The parts where he claimed to have slashed spending, fixed the deficit, and created a zillion jobs were garden-variety crazy, but the return of the subprime mortgage is dangerous, and therefore intriguing.

All of Obama's practiced cadences, false arguments, "those who say" straw men, and hollow promises remain largely unchanged, as does the rhetoric he uses to deliver them. We got a new variation on "evil rich guys are making big profits and robbing you blind" every few minutes. If he'd dragged out his old whine about corporate jets and job-killing ATM machines, it would have been a perfect time capsule of his first term. Shades of his previous call for a "Sputnik moment," he even mentioned the Space Race! (As a metaphor for Big Government "investment," of course – he killed the actual space program.) Barack Obama is like a "Jurassic Park" DNA reincarnation of himself.

The man who has no plan assured us that deficit reduction is not an economic plan. He started by claiming, with false modesty, that he doesn't think the government is the solution to every problem... then spent an hour listing all the problems it can solve, at fantastic expense. And his trillions in new spending programs supposedly won't increase the deficit a dime, which means he'd pay for them entirely with tax hikes and spending offsets... but the government doesn't do budgets any more, and no one can seriously believe he'd cut any of this bloated government to pay for the new stuff, especially since he spent much of the evening insisting that every dollar he's currently spending is absolutely vital to the survival of the hopelessly dependent middle class. He wants to dump millions of low-skilled, freshly legalized immigrant workers into his moribund economy... and then raise the minimum wage, killing off the jobs they would need. There's no way to make sense of everything he threw out there, except to remember that it's basically the same

Rubio was nervous, leading to the infamous water-bottle sip that liberals are already fixating on as the end of his presidential hopes. That's nonsense, although in the short term it will hurt him more than his admirers probably want to admit. Didn't we all just receive a stunning lesson on the superficiality of this electorate? But Rubio has a great sense of humor, and was joshing about the water bottle within minutes of the speech. Laughter is strong armor against such moments. But let the incident serve as a reminder that Republicans can't keep skimping on the little details. You'd think they needed no further lessons in that, either.

It should be noted that Rubio doubtless saw himself racing a much tougher timetable than Obama for his speech. The President in general, and this one in particular, doesn't have to worry about going overtime. He's got a big crowd feeding him encouragement. He can compose himself during applause breaks. I don't know why the SOTU has to be given in an isolated room, with an unblinking camera as the speaker's only visible audience. Maybe they should break tradition and do it with a live audience next time.

Leave the jitters aside, and Rubio delivered a masterful speech, as did Rand Paul. They hit on some common themes, including immigration reform (with Paul discussing the pathway to citizenship in more general terms) and school choice. Both of them seized upon Obama's poll-tested but meaningless line about government not being the solution to all problems, and infused it with Ronald Reagan's wisdom that government is the cause of many problems. In fact, Paul quoted Reagan directly on the point. That's a huge difference with Obama's vision of consistently helpful government, which might not be able to handle everything, but it can sure take care of the really expensive stuff.

Rubio covered this theme with gentle Reaganesque good humor; Paul used a lively sarcasm that might connect well with a 2013 public that has come to value such acid wit as a sign of confidence. In fact, Paul's approach tracks more closely with that of Obama, who conceals a good bit of sarcasm between the layers of freeze-dried soaring rhetoric in his addresses. How else to describe Obama's constant insinuation that his opponents must want a befouled environment, impoverished Americans rooked by greedy corporate predators, and dead children? As Rubio put it, "When we point out that no matter how many job-killing laws we pass, our government can't control the weather – he accuses us of wanting dirty water and dirty air."

Both Rubio and Paul spoke of a balanced budget amendment, with Paul making more specific demands, including the "Penny Plan" to eliminate the deficit in six or seven years by cutting a penny out of each dollar the government spends. That's going to sound very reasonable to voters; it's tough for Big Government acolytes like Obama to insist that no, government needs every last penny it spends, and then some. (Along those lines, Paul even slipped in a crack about the "free phones" that made big news today, due to outrageous levels of fraud in the program.) Rubio also talked about fiscal restraint, but placed great emphasis on resolving the deficit through growth.

Paul was tough on Republicans, too, bemoaning the lack of ready allies from either side of the aisle in his quest to cut spending, and laying a share blame at the feet of Republicans for their role in accumulating the national debt. That might make some of his GOP colleagues grumble – old political hands sometimes wonder if anyone ever really got anywhere by running against his own party, and the Democrats are perfectly angelic in Barack Obama's view. But it's also (a) true, and (b) the sort of no-nonsense concession that resonates with voters who are tired of partisan games. Which, to hear the voters talk, is just about all of them.

Paul dug deep into history, expounding on our Constitutional history and name-checking Montesquieu. Rubio was the guy next door, telling the President, "I don't oppose your plans because I want to protect the rich. I oppose your plans because I want to protect your neighbors." There is much to be said for both approaches, as they tend to reach different groups of people. Rubio is approachable and inspiring, while also taking care of the fine points – he reminded viewers that Big Government policies caused the subprime mortgage crisis, and that Obama insisted on the sequestration cuts he now rails against.

Paul is tough and erudite, but he can also rise to poetry: "We will begin to thrive again when we begin to believe in ourselves again, when we regain our respect for our founding documents, when we balance our budget, when we understand that capitalism and free markets and free individuals are what creates our nation's prosperity." It's nice to hear someone talk about capitalism as the blessing it is. After a long night watching all three speeches, I can say with confidence that I live the America Marco Rubio cherishes and Rand Paul defends, not the one Barack Obama wants to finish transforming.