A Message from Mothers Against Debt (MAD): From Transparency Czarina Amy Oliver,
This what we have done to our children with our reckless spending and massive national debt. Sadly this video is already out of date. Since this video was made, our national debt has climbed another $1700.
Please share this wonderful, but frightening video with as many people as you know. It’s about time we start talking about the massive amount of crippling debt we are enslaving our children and grandchildren with.
Don’t Be Like California (Or Greece): Writing about the fairly frightening similarities between Greece and California over at Reason Online, Tim Cavanaugh asks, “What do Europe’s most bankrupt nation-state and America’s most bankrupt united state have in common, aside from being bankrupt?”
Good question. Cavanaugh continues:
…it turns out that Greece, that sun-drenched paradise on the Aegean, and California, that sun-warmed El Dorado on the Pacific, are the worst places to do business in their respective economic zones.”
So how did California come to resemble a fiscally-wrecked European social-welfare state that needs a massive bailout? Independence Institute Senior Fellow Barry Poulson gave a heads up last year in the Denver Post
:
The Golden State’s GANN Amendment, a precursor of TABOR, limited the growth of state revenue and spending to the sum of inflation and population growth. In the late 1980s, the California legislature abandoned the GANN Amendment. As a result, state spending in California increased more rapidly than personal income and taxes were increased to one of the highest levels in the country. Business investment and jobs left the state for other states with better tax climates.
The moral of the story is of course, don’t be like California.
RSVP’s Welcome for the 8th Annual ATF Party! Registration for the most politically incorrect event of the year is now open – this year’s Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms party! The event is set for Saturday, July 17th at the swank Kiowa Creek Sporting Club. This year’s guest speaker is the brilliant and always straight shooting editor-in-chief at Reason Magazine, Nick Gillespie. Come on out and drink, smoke, and shoot with us… while it’s still legal! RSVP here online or call us at 303.279.6536.
What Fresh Obama Care Hell Is This? So here’s a nasty little surprise from deep in the bowels of Obama Care:
Section 9006 of the health care bill — just a few lines buried in the 2,409-page document — mandates that beginning in 2012 all companies will have to issue 1099 tax forms not just to contract workers but to any individual or corporation from which they buy more than $600 in goods or services in a tax year. The stealth change radically alters the nature of 1099s and means businesses will have to issue millions of new tax documents each year.
It’s things like this that help explain Nancy Pelosi’s motivation when she said, “But we have to pass the bill so you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of the controversy.” Look for more unbelievably bad tidbits to emerge now that the “fog of controversy” has been lifted from the Obama Care bill.
Free People, Free Markets – the Tuesday Night edition: Many of you asked for a Principles of Liberty course to take place on a weeknight, instead of on Saturdays. You also asked that we hold the class somewhere in the south metro area, instead of here at the Independence Institute offices in Golden. Well, you’re in luck! The Spring Free People, Free Markets classes will be held on 5 consecutive Tuesdays at 6:30pm, starting May 18th, down in the Denver Tech Center. Classes will be at the Colorado Contractors Association building at the intersection of I-25 and Arapahoe Road (map). For more information, click here for the official class flyer.
Again, that’s five consecutive Tuesdays, May 18th to June 15th from 6:30 to 9:30 in the Denver Tech Center. Call us at 303.279.6536 to RSVP!
Must See TV: A higher education marks an important chapter in one’s life, but what happens when this chapter is being distorted by a demonstrable lack of intellectual diversity and debate? Author Robert Maranto joins me to discuss a number of the problems, the scope, and reforms for higher education that are in his new book The Politically Correct University. Jessica Peck-Cory of Independence Institute steps up to discuss some of the issues surrounding the civic direction of CU at Boulder. Don’t miss this important discussion on the issues of higher ed this Friday night at 8:30PM on KBDI Channel 12; repeated the following Tuesday evening at 5PM.
Must hear podcast: Is there anything that reasonably can be done to change the overwhelming Left-leaning bias of faculties at American colleges? Lead editor of the new insightful volume The Politically Correct University, University of Arkansas Department of Education Reform professor Bob Maranto discusses the problem and possible solutions with Education Policy Center analyst Ben DeGrow.
Perspective: In this week’s op-ed, health care policy analyst Brian Schwartz questions your “compassionate” politics. Brian wonders when it became compassionate to take other people’s money away and give it to charity, rather than your own. Forced charity is not really charity.
Until next week…
Straight on
Jon Caldara
Tags: ATF Party, Economics, epic fail obama, I2I, Jon Caldara, News, obamacare, Politics
Conservative Libertarian Outpost 
May 17, 2010 at 08:01
California and Greece, a good comparison in economic “malpractice” — in California the politicos have been driving business out of the state… We’ll see what comes next…
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May 17, 2010 at 14:09
It seems as if people will never learn PanAm. Repeatedly doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome is one definition of insanity.
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