Weekend Edition

The fat one didn't slobber on the mic Thursday or Friday but I do want to comment on a claim he made earlier in the week. Rush spoke of how the ARRA (American Recovery Reinvestment Act) stimulus will create more than 300,000 construction jobs for illegal immigrants. This is the type of story that can evoke anger from many especially considering how many construction workers who are legal citizens are out of work. Here's some important info. Rush aka "Head Conductor of the Drive By Media Express" intentionally left out. 

The report he based this story on came from two conservative organizations, the CIS (Center for Immigration) and the Heritage Foundation. Two organizations that operate by the unspoken philosophy of, "when you've gotta blame it on something, blame it on the dirty Mexicans who steal OUR jobs." The CIS claims that 300K jobs would go to illegal immigrant based on their economic model that for every $1 billion spent on construction jobs, 19,584 jobs will be created.  CIS states that in the Senate's version of the bill, $104 billion would go to construction projects. Quick math shows you that $104 billion x 19,584 jobs=2.036 million jobs. CIS and the Pew Hispanic Center reported that approximately 15% of all construction workers are illegal immigrants. More quick math, 2.036 million jobs x .15 (Illegals)= 305,400 jobs for illegal immigrants while legal citizens in the construction field are out of work. Sounds like CIS and The Heritage Foundation have a whopper here except it's not accurate.

All together the White House, which if anything there estimates are going to be high, estimates that all together the ARRA will create or save 495,000 construction jobs. 495,000 x .15 (Illegal workers) =74,250 jobs. This isn't great for the out of work legal construction workers but it's definitely not 300K. The real problem isn't the 74,250 or 305,400 figures, it's the E-Verify system and who gets the government contracts for the construction jobs. E-Verify is an electronic verification system operated by Homeland Security and the Social Security Administration used to verify the legal work status of employees. It's a free and voluntary system that has many flaws and inaccuracies. The Senate version of the ARRA bill didn't require that  E-Verify was used but the House version did. The US Chamber of Commerce and the Associated Builders and Contractors are urging the Obama administration to not use the E-Verify system. As a result the Obama administration has pushed back their decision to May 21st. 

The bottom line is there isn't really anyway to estimate how many illegal immigrants will get construction jobs because of the ARRA but it's safe to say it won't be anything close the 300K figure C-cups claimed.

Only had about three minutes to listen to Fatty Arbuckle Jr. today but he was harping on President Obama and the lack of jobs for those out of work. The fat one said Obama was supposed to work miracles and people are waiting on his stimulus package to kick in. Chill-out C cups he's only been president for 50 days and the $787 billion stimulus package was only signed into law on Feb. 17th or 22 days ago. The stimulus package will kick in but it does take time, to simplify things for Rush so he can relate how long it takes different events occur, here's a short list for the duration of some events he might be familar with:

1. Curing, the initial process in making cigars can take 45 days.

2. The inpatient treatment he checked into for his Oxycontin addiction was 30 days.

3. His first marriage lasted 4 months, approx. 120 days

4. The divorce proceedings for his second marriage lasted 6 months 

So I think 22 days to turn the economy is a little rash.

Tuesday March 10th

Only listened to Rush for about a total of four minutes today but what I did hear he played clips of Warren Buffet talking about the economy. This got me to think about a troubling thing Rush will do when talking about the economy. He likes to play clips or quote great business minds about our current economic condition. He will never make the very important distinction of micro vs macroeconomics. Most of us understand and can follow microeconomics, this is how individuals, families or businesses manage their finances. Microeconomics in a nutshell is: keep your expenses below your revenue. If you ever thought you were spending more money than you should or had to cut-back on expenses them you were practicing microeconomics. 

Macroeconomics is a completely different beast. I had a great Economics professor who summed up the difference in micro. vs. macro. He said that if you polled 10 economists you would get agreement by 10 out of 10 for micro principles but for macro out of the same 10 economists you would get 12 different opinions. Without boring everybody there are different macro schools of thought that can work: classical, Keynesian, monetarism, fiscal and monetary policy. But to have guys like the usual suspects of Buffet, Jack Welch, Jim Cramer etc. telling everybody what's going to work or not work is a little ridiculous. I would take there advice on acquisitions and mergers, portfolio management, how to build a business but quite frankly they are ill-equipped to talk as if they are experts on macroeconomics issues. 

But what do you expect from the leading member of the drive by media?

Dreck from Monday's show

Here goes for Monday, March 9th:

1) Limboner mentioned President Obama's reversal of stell cell research funding quickly on his way to a commercial. He mentioned that the difference in this and President Bush's stance on stem-cell research was that Obama's plan could come from taxpayer money. Well, ladies and gentlemen (this is me speaking now) diseases/conditions like: leukemia, Parkinson's disease, spinal cord injuries, ALS, multiple sclerosis and forms of cancer don't determine whether or not they strike based on how much or if you do pay taxes. The above mentioned afflictions affect all taxpayers whether you have to pay the hundreds of thousands of dollars for treatments out of pocket because of lack of insurance or your insurance premiums go up because of your insurance company paying for treatment for others who share your insurance or people who qualify for public assistance for treatment, that also comes back to taxpayers.

2) C-Cups got on the topic of Jim Cramer and how he thinks our current financial crisis is being affected by the hysteria in the media. Rush asserted that this is just another example of the drive-by media. Rush has tethered himself the phrase "drive by media" for years. I looked up two different definitions of drive by media and here's what I found:

Wikipedia - Drive by media/media bias- pervasive or widespread bias

Urban Dictionary - Drive by media- sensational, scandal seeking and agenda coverage.

Well, by those definitions, even if you split the difference they sound like every Limbaugh broadcast.

3) There was a story about President Obama wanting to set the record straight w/The New York Times about a comment he had on socialism. The High Waister said, "Only he (Obama) can get away with that. If I tried that people would go crazy."

Doesn't this kind of fly in the face of his "awe shucks, I'm not the mouthpiece or leader of the Republican Party. I'm just a guy saying what I believe in and standing up for my principles." 

He is comparing himself with being misunderstood or misquoted with that of the President of the United States. Wow, I think only thing bigger than Rush's ego might be his girdle.

4) Towards the end of the show, Rush told a female caller that the Left when it was found out that Pilot Sullenberger was a Republican put up signs about him being a goose killer. This just smelled as wrong as the top of his control top hose after a round of golf in hot/humid Florida before an OxyContin drop-off in the Denny's parking lot. I couldn't find anything to support this but what I did find was pretty funny:

-There is a bar in New York that serves a drink called "The Sulley." The drink has two

  shots of Grey Goose and a splash of water.

-There was a spoof story (ala The Onion) about Sulley being brought up on charges

  on killing geese but it was clearly a harmless joke.

-Finally there was one quack (yes, pun absolutely intended) who was defend the birds

 and not the "precious, shiny airplanes." This person was clearly nuts or it was a 

 horrible attempt at humor.

But you know what, none of there opinions were directed at Sulley because he was found out to be a Republican like Rush asserted.

 

Dreck from Friday March 6th

Radio's most infamous fat-ass drug addict spewed some more dreck on his Friday show. 

1) Quick note: On his challenge to President Obama to come down to his studio in Florida and have a debate with him. It reminds me of an old saying, " When you wrestle a pig, two things will happen. 1) you will get dirty and 2) the pig will get happy."

2) Fatty Arbuckle Jr. was speaking once again about the Democrats plan to fix the economy. He continues to assert that it will not work. I would totally agree with him if his plan or the fiscal conservative plan worked. It was a complete disaster the last eight years. If fiscal conservatism version Bush 2000-2008 worked we wouldn't be in this position. The fundamentals of supply side-laissez faire-trickle-down economics isn't working for our new generation. Like I said in a previous post, the initial push by Reagan in his presidency of self sufficiency, patriotism, pride of craftsmanship/workmanship has been replaced by blatant greed and individualism.

If  you closely follow the issues the follow statistics may be repetitive but you need to be reminded that money isn't trickling down.

- The richest 1% hold 38% of all the private wealth while the bottom 90% holds all the debt.

- The top 10% possess 80% of all financial assets while the bottom 90% only holds 20% of the

   assets.

- The average CEO salary from 1980 was roughly 25 times the average salary of an employee in

   that company.

- Today the average CEO roughly earns 350 times the average salary of the average employee.

This type of economic model isn't entirely to blame but has to be at the top of the list of reasons why we are in our current economic state. 

2) C Cups spoke more about in to how the Democrats plan will not work, ramping up the fear by re-stating one of the current talking points of the extreme right. "There will be soup lines before you know it just like the Great Depression." However in the Great Depression two things occurred/didn't occur that is much different from what is happening today. 

1) During the Great Depression the unemployment rate was almost 25%

    Our employment rate isn't great right now but it's much closer to the natural rate of 4% it 

    needs to be even in good economy than the 25% it was during the Great Depression.

2) During the Great Depression the federal government did NOTHING to infuse capital into            the banking systems.

     The banks were on their own without any help from the government which is exactly why

     the Fed is trying to capitalize the banking system to prevent mistakes from the past.

If the government did absolutely nothing as some fiscal conservatives say we should do, the market would eventually correct itself  but there probably would be unemployment closer to 25% than 4% and there would be a run on the banks. The market would get through it but so much damage would be done in the interim this country would be unrecognizable. 

Thursday, March 5th

Today's quick observations from the FIB Radio Network (Fallacies In Broadcasting)

The fat-ass drug addict was talking about the academic-types hanging around Obama and influencing his economic and public policies. He went on about how students and teachers in business schools are liberals and are taking their liberal lessons learned from business school to make those lessons into public policy.

Now, now Johnny OxyContin. I am currently in an MBA program (Master's in Business Administration) and can tell you that business schools aren't teaching liberal philosophies. The teachings are pretty neutral and if anything lean a little to the right. The student body is pretty even with liberal and conservative views but my guess would be after they are done and focussed primarily on making as much scratch as possible will probably be a little more fiscally conservative. When you get into Corporate Finance classes the theme is very cut and dry with the overwhelming focus on profitability with employees being considered a liability. 

The faculty has a more libertarian slant and if anything is more conservative. There are some professors who are more blatantly conservative than blatantly liberal. Rush complained about the Harvard Wharton Business school types being liberal. Wrong Limboner! We have a professor who actually writes the textbooks for Accounting and Corporate Governance for Harvard and he's very openly conservative and has no qualms about ripping Al Gore in class for pretty much being a liberal. 

Looks like Jabba the Putz is wrong again.

Wed. March 4th

Observations from the FIB Radio Network (Fallacies In Broadcasting) 

1)The fat-ass drug addict today defended himself by wanting Obama to fail. Remember back when the left was wanting to get our troops out of Iraq and Limboner was beating the drum that those who don't want to see this country succeed are unpatriotic? Lim-Pot, I'd like to introduce you to this Kettle.

2) Mr. Control Top Hose went on a rant about the Banking and Automobile industry being bailed out by the government and the governments new vested interest in companies from these industries. He made a reference to socialism (shocker) because the government will be controlling the "means of production." This is partially correct with his assertion that in Socialism the government have control of the means/factors of production. However, he neglected to mention how it really works for truly socialist countries. The three means/factors of production controlled by the government and not accessible to the people/labor of a country are: 1) Capital-this could be money, equipment or anything needed to make/produce a good or service. 2) Land- in socialism the government controls all land and it isn't accessible for purchase by the people/labor of a country. 3) Labor-once again in socialism the government controls the labor of a country. So, if a country is truly socialist, the people of that country wouldn't have access to capital, land or labor to have a business.

I'm not surprised that the Cuban smoking High Waister doesn't know this because after all he flunked out college after two semesters.