First, as a joke... UPDATED 4x & BUMPED

[orig post 9.28 1032am]

Just throw it against the wall and see if it sticks.

That is what the liberals progressives communists have done this week with their proposals to modify our democracy.

North Carolina Democrat Governor Beverly Purdue suggested (See Lee Decovnick's AT article):

I think we ought to suspend, perhaps, elections for Congress for two years...

Of course, if there are still problems after those two years, maybe we'll need to make more modifications.

Obama's former Director of Obama's Office of Management and Budget, Peter Orszag, suggests in his The New Republic article, Too Much of a Good Thing - Why We Need Less Democracy:

So what to do? To solve the serious problems facing our country, we need to minimize the harm from legislative inertia by relying more on automatic policies and depoliticized commissions for certain policy decisions. In other words, radical as it sounds, we need to counter the gridlock of our political institutions by making them a bit less democratic.

Complaining about congress, Mr. Orszag? Puhlease. Get in line.

Gov. Purdue and Mr. Orszag are demonstrating the real Democrat Party agenda. AKA, the Communist Manifesto. Destroy America. Redistribute wealth to a new bourgeois. And build a Communist state in its ashes for the new proletariat.

It is a joke today.

It'll be a suggestion tomorrow.

And as the 2012 election rout nears, it'll be a negotiating point.

The only question left: will the Democrats be negotiating from a position of strength, or weakness?

UPDATED Noon

Moonbattery has a post on this subject. Read the comments.

And WeaselZippers. Good comments there too.

UPDATED 5:40pm

Audio at Daily Caller's post. Doesn't sound like she's joking...

UPDATED 7:10pm

The Minuteman

UPDATED 8:32PM and BUMPED

WSJ's James Taranto leads with these stories in his Best of the Web post, Democrats Against Democracy. He mostly quotes others, including Niles Gardiner at The Telegraph, Why Barack Obama Could Be America's Last Big Government President. Could Niles possibly be stating the reasons some Democrats want to suspend elections?

Obama’s declining presidency has become synonymous with the image of big government, from spiralling budget deficits and out of control federal spending to massive taxpayer funded bailouts and increasing regulations on businesses and healthcare.
---
The United States is undergoing one of the biggest political revolutions in its post-war history, and perhaps the most important since Ronald Reagan, with an emphatic rejection of the idea that government knows best when it comes to handling key domestic issues, especially relating to the economy. President Obama, whose administration has practically worshipped at the trough of big government, looks spectacularly out of touch with a clear majority of the American people. The highly interventionist liberal experiment of the last two and a half years has been a spectacular failure, with 14 million Americans out of work, sliding consumer confidence, collapsing house prices, and falling stock markets.

This is why Barack Obama could well end up being the last big government president of the United States, a nation that simply cannot afford the lavish excesses of an imperious presidency that drains the pay-checks of hard-working Americans with impunity and reckless abandon.

You can almost hear the English accent....

Beat'in Hippies

We had a company commander who would stop a meeting every time a helicopter flew over our base. Even in mid-sentence. He'd walk to the window, look up with envy in his eyes and mutter, "some people have the coolest jobs." This coming from a Vietnam Special Forces soldier who killed commies 24/7 for sport. The helicopter would pass and we'd go back to work.

We share his feeling as we watch this video of New York police pounding on the protesters-du-jour near Wall Street.



We tried to make out what they were protesting, but all we heard was

blah blah redistribution blah blah stop beating me blah blah.

We'll keep watching it and report back if we hear anything else.

UPDATED 9.29

Now that the video above is burned into our memory, we've been brainstorming possible soundtracks. Maybe something from Woodstock, perhaps?

A view from the other side (MSM) - found at IOTW:



Love the slo-mo analysis at the 4min mark, where you can clearly see the pepper spray come from the grassy knoll.

We're thinking Pink Floyd.

And Rodney King? O'Donnell goes into the Rodney King beating in the 7min mark. Let us share our perspective on Rodney King:

We lived on Foothill Blvd about two miles from the beating.
He took his slow-speed LAPD chase through our neighborhood risking pedestrians, drivers and the officers.
He got his ass beat.
Rodney never led the police through our neighborhood after that.

How come Rodney King learns his lesson, but the hippies don't?

We blame the public schools.

Maybe The Doors?

The Two G's

Girls and Guns!

Photographer Lindsay McCrumb has a picture book coming out Saturday: Chicks With Guns.

Here is one of her pictures:

If that isn't All American, we don't know what is.

Read the Houston Culture Map review.

"Less than 12 months..."

Found at Ann Barnhardt's site:



Alessio Rastani:

In less than 12 months, my prediction is: the savings of millions of people is going to vanish. This is just the beginning.

Ann blames this on affirmative-action-staffed bureaucracies which were created to protect us from these risks. And she predicts:

It's over. There is no coming back from this. The only thing that can happen is a total and complete collapse of EVERYTHING we now know, and humanity starts from scratch. And if you think that this collapse is going to play out without one hell of a big hot war, you are sadly, sadly mistaken.
---
As much as you may not want to believe it, what this guy [Alessio Rastani] says is correct. This iteration of human civilization is approaching an end.

As you can see by our other posts, we are not ones to take a 'sky is falling' position on anything.

Our theme that Democrats in general and Obama specifically have communist inspirations has remained consistent. The mood and focus of our posts have remained consistent. Our readers' view of Ushanka.us has changed as the Democrats and our Dear Leader have steered this country hard left.

In short, our theme was meant as a joke, not a prediction.

Go to Ann's site and the sites she references, and critically analyze the facts for yourself. Maybe all will be well.

Perry

Found at SaysUncle:



Every GOP commercial for the next 14 months MUST include quotes from our Dear Leader.

It's going to be a great year (politics, not employment, economy or America's standing in the world). Buy stock in Orville Redenbacher, cause we'll be buying it by the truck load!

No Jobs For You!

AP:

The number of people applying for unemployment benefits fell last week, though the decline isn't enough to signal improvement in the job market.

Weekly applications dropped by 9,000 to a seasonally adjusted 423,000, the Labor Department said Thursday.

The four-week average, a less volatile figure, rose slightly for the fifth straight week to 421,000.

Give AP credit. Where everyone else sees shit, they see fertilizer.

Just more "unexpectedly" newspeak.

Our Dear Leader will be in our home town of Cincinnati today. He'll be inspecting a bridge, and will determine the only solution is $1.5T in new taxes on those who would reverse this unemployment trend if given some opportunity for growth

We've come a long way since Bill Clinton's "Bridge to the Future" rhetoric.

Nathan Hale

Hung 235 years ago today.

U/T: Publius at Big Government

Just Asking...

But did our Dear Leader think he saw his dead Mom out in the audience?

Our maybe he saw Frank Marshall Davis...

The Shootout

Ladies and Germs, Mr. Steve Lee:



Someday, we'll be able to educate socially re-engineer this violent American Australian fascination with guns. Someday.

Steve Lee's Best: I'll Give Up My Gun

The European Project

If you are an American and standing outside the bathroom, what are you inside the bathroom?

A European.

Europe has suffered many comments here on Ushanka.us. If WSJ's Bret Stephen's predictions today are true, we will opine at Europe's expense until our last breath.

Bret's Opinion article today: What Comes After 'Europe'?

He outlines three stages of post-war Europe: Hard Facts, Convenient Fictions, and Fraud, and predicts how the next 50 years will play out.

In short, the 'Hard Fact' phase was immediately after the war where the hard decisions were made by brave and strong men. (Lord Ismay is pictured above.) Setting up economies to build their respective countries into self-sustaining successes.

Bret doesn't note this in his article, but this stage was only 'European' in the sense that a bunch of neighboring countries each acted on their own behalf. They did this out of a shared history of suffering, but in the end each decided how their democracies and economies would be structured. In our simplistic view of European affairs, the moment these countries started sharing currencies, political affairs and defenses, the disaster was only a matter of time. Sovereignty must be primary in all affairs.

The 'Convenient Fictions' phase was a superior view of Europe in areas of diplomacy and productivity. Basically, all of Europe adopted France's snotty self-love in this phase and, as a result, took their eye off the ball. Bret:

All this did wonders, for a while, to mask European failures and puff up European pride. But there is always a danger in substituting grandiosity for achievement, mistaking pronouncements for facts, or, more generally, believing in your own nonsense.

The 'Fraud' phase is the acceptance of Greece into the Union when their self-created demise was evident and other overt deceptions. Bret assessment and predictions:

What is now happening in Europe isn't so much a crisis as it is an exposure: a Madoff-type event rather than a Lehman one. The shock is that it's a shock. Greece was never going to be bailed out and will, sooner or later, default. The banks holding Greek debt will, sooner or later, be recapitalized. The recapitalization will be borne by German taxpayers, and it will bring them—sooner rather than later—to the outer limit of their forbearance. The Chinese will not ride to the rescue: They know not to throw good money after bad.

And then Italy will go Greek. Europe's crisis will lap on U.S. shores, and America's economic woes will lap on Europe's—a two-way tsunami.

America will survive this because America is a state.
---
The riots of Athens will become those of Milan, Madrid and Marseilles. Parties of the fringe will gain greater sway. Border checkpoints will return. Currencies will be resurrected, then devalued. Countries will choose decay over reform. It's a long, likely parade of horribles.

Watching the events in Europe anger us. We are angered that the solutions are known, yet decades of pain - caused by leftist policies - must be felt by all before the solutions are accepted by... leftist politicians.

How many people must suffer economic stagnation and missed opportunities before people with zero history of success adopt proven strategies?

Bret suggests it will take 50 years before Europe is replaced by a collection of neighboring, sovereign states. That's good news, except for the current and next 1-2 generations.

Choice Media .TV

Great news, Comrades! There is now a site where you can go to get all the news on school choice efforts around the country.

Now this is Progress!

Be sure to bookmark Choice Media .TV and visit often to stay informed and to support these efforts.

It's for the children.

Smell Test UPDATED

Let's put our Dear Leader's statement today re: his $1.5T tax increase proposal to the smell test.

First, Obama:

This is not class warfare -- it's math. The money has to come from some place. If we're not willing to ask those who've done extraordinarily well to help America close the deficit... the math says everybody else has to do a whole lot more, we've got to put the entire burden on the middle class and the poor.

Now the smell test.

Karl Marx:

This is not class warfare -- it's math. The money has to come from some place. If we're not willing to ask those who've done extraordinarily well to help America close the deficit... the math says everybody else has to do a whole lot more, we've got to put the entire burden on the middle class and the poor.

Analysis:
1) the quote by Karl Marx is believable and is in line with his communist inspirations, and
2) the quote by Obama was said today, therefore
3) Obama is a bed-wetting, pinko commie SOB.

Stay tuned to Ushanka.us for more scientific analysis.

Related - this image is from The Art of E, found through The Looking Spoon.

UPDATED 9.22 9am

A rebuttal found at IOTW:

Monday Afternoon Cigar

A rainy day in Ohio. Perfect for a PG.

We're typing up our book reports for two North Korea books we just finished. The Aquariums of Pyongyang and Escape from North Korea explain the conditions in North Korean Gulags and peasant farms, and the incentives and risks of escaping the country.

Our biggest take-away is that these books tell of recent changes, as recent as 2008.

The key change - information is getting into North Korea from the outside. Specifically - the utopia bubble is broken. Kim Jung Il is a mortal and a loser. North Korea started the Korean war. Every other country on the planet is prospering.

Similar shame and regret Obama voters are feeling here in the states.

Roughly 50% of people to cross into China actually do so to get food and other items to bring back into North Korea. They risk imprisonment and death, yet expose themselves to those risks a 2nd time as they return to help their families. Or maybe they return for the free health care?

We're Going To Be Famous! UPDATED 7x & BUMPED

[orig post 9.13 8:32pm]

Does our hair look ok? How our my furry hat? Anything in our teeth?

FINALLY - we here at Ushanka.us are going to get the attention we've been craving!

Drudge:

Yes, we've had two IRS audits since we started selling our Commie Obama hats, but that left us feeling hollow and unfulfilled.

Maybe this new initiative to seek out criticism of our Dear Leader will prove more rewarding.

Less than three years ago people were getting free kitchens and houses, and we were led to believe some of that Obama-stash was headed our way to fill our gas tank or cover our car insurance.

Now some of that commie love is coming our way!

What will we do with all our fame? Will we replenish our Commie Obama hat stash when it sells out? Winter is coming, and utilities are going up with the recent coal plant shutdowns. You thinking what we're thinking? Yes! The Ushanka hat will now become the symbol of Obama's America, just as it was for Lenin's and Stalin's Soviet Union or Mao's People's Republic of China.

Where commies squat, the hat follows!

We'll let you know when we are contacted by the Czar of winter headwear. The Commissar of Ushankas. The Main Directorate of the warm and furry hat.

Soon the lines will reach down the block and around the corner. Beat the crowd - buy yours today!

UPDATE 9.14 6am

First it was an email address: Flag@WhiteHouse.gov.

Now it is a website where they rotate images of demons such as Rick Perry and Glenn Beck. Stalin would have LOVED this.

And an easy screen to report your friends the rich attacks:

The categories for attacks on our Dear Leader can be: TV Interview, Public Statement, Forwarded Email, Rumor, TV Ad, Video Ad, Radio Ad, Robocall and Website/Blog.

The last option is the one you should select when reporting us. This will forward our case to homeland security who will disable our domain and who will send a van to pick us up and take us to the train station.

Flag@WhiteHouse.gov was very early in our Dear Leader's reign, and it was disabled within a week. Think they've had some more time to think this through?

Our research (see books to left) tells us this: Commies are in-effective at business and running a government, but thrive in an environment where internal enemies are around every corner. And those efficiencies carry over to their remediation: trains, camps, gun confiscation and fear.

ReasonTV video in response to Flag@WhiteHouse.gov:



Anyone still want to suggest our comparisons of today's Democrat Party to Soviet Union leaders isn't warranted? Unlike Krugman at the NYT and other close-minded libs, oiur comments are open.

UPDATE 9.14 9:50am

Our fellow right-wing-conspiracy bloggers are on the counterattackwatch:

NicDeb is tracking unintended twitter messages!

Michelle Malkin shows this is the third creepy effort by Obama.

IOTW - Heh.

Ann Barnhardt is begging everyone to turn her in. Here she is wearing our COMMIE OBAMA hat. Is there anybody now who doesn't get the joke??

More to follow....

UPDATE 9.14 2pm

Moonbattery's post, with selected Twitter comments!

The Twitter feed:

Someone's lying about the president on TV right now. Wait. That IS the president!

I'd like to report the US Senate for not passing a budget for 800+ days.

Gibson Guitars are 100% American made..have DOJ raid them..oops u did that already

People are calling our President the Fresh Prince of Bill Ayers, that's not allowed is it?

Pssst, #attackwatch , I think someone is trying to subvert the United States by usurping our Constitution! Any suggestions? Ken-ya help me?

There's a new Twitter account making President Obama look like a creepy, authoritarian nut job

People keep saying Obama is a Keynesian, even though he was totally born in Hawaii!

I'm still using incandescent light bulbs !

Dear #Attackwatch: Stalin and Lenin called, they want their idea back!

Times like this, we wish we had a Twitter account.

And the first video is out. Found through NiceDeb:



Washington Post Blog: Attack Watch, new Obama campaign site to ‘fight smears,’ becomes laughing stock of the Internet.

It’s safe to say that in its 24 hours of existence, Attack Watch has already backfired in drumming up support for Obama 2012. This tweet summed it up: “Wow, not only are Obama & Co. incredibly thin-skinned, they're paranoid.”

UPDATE 9.14 5pm

Video from HotAir story. AllahPundit predicts Attack Watch will disappear later today. We hope not - we haven't begun to pile on!



Interestingly - AllahPundit scolded us (not us personally, but like-minded bloggers) back in May 2009 that we were extreme to use the word "Socialist" when describing the Democrats. We seldom read HotAir due to its squishy nature, so we're not sure if AllahPundit has since started paying attention.

UPDATED 9.15 10am

Had to add these new twitter gems:

I'd like to report my neighbour - Bob, for surreptitiously scraping the Obama sticker off the bumper of his Prius.

Dear #attackwatch my neighbor won't give me all her money even though she makes more than me. Look into this please.

Caught my toddler water-boarding one of his toys in the dog bowl.

New Timex #attackwatch...takes a lickin but keeps on snitchin!!!

My neighbor works hard, takes care of himself, and pays his bills on time. He's definitely an enemy of the state.

It's ironic that #attackwatch has only given Conservatives one more thing to point to as evidence of Obama's Marxist totalitarian mindset.

Our thanks to Jim Messina, the idea man behind AttackWatch. He has shown us that we are not alone in our disgust of the Dear Leader and his policies.

UPDATED 9.16 10am

This is what was missing. AttackWatch is now officially a punchline.



U/T: IOTW

UPDATED 9.18 8:30am

Friday's WSJ: Obama's Twitter Disaster

In 2008, reporters gushed about the Obama campaign's brilliant use of the Internet and social media. In the run-up to 2012, a high-profile effort by the re-election campaign to counter critics has become an online bulletin board for jokes at President Obama's expense.
---
A user identified as Jon G. announced: "There's a new Twitter account making President Obama look like a creepy, authoritarian nutjob: @AttackWatch." Another user identifying himself as Matt Cover tweeted, "Someone told me the stimulus didn't keep unemployment below 8%. That's not true, is it?"

UPDATED 9.19 7pm

Through Radio Patriot - we find AttackWatch.net! "When .com and .org just aren't enough."

Erections Have Consequences

We cannot believe we are the first to say this!

Are our fellow right-wingers asleep at the switch??

Call us party poppers, but we're not going to do much celebrating. Yes, we're happy to see Republicans win. Yes, we're glad to see others blaming these two Democrat losses on our Dear Leader. But no, we don't believe there is anything to read into this.

Congrats to Congressman Bob Turner (NY) and Senator Mark Amodei (NV).

Congrats to our fellow tea partiers.

You've all had your day to celebrate. Now get back to work. November 2012 is approaching fast.

Great Jabs, but...

...we are officially calling Newt Gingrich unqualified for our 2012 primary vote.

Prof. Jacobson posts today: Newt Rising?

Newt Gingrich has had some stellar appearances at the recent GOP debates. He firmly grasps the priorities of the tea party and of the electorate in general. Here are two clips that the professor posted:





Good stuff, eh? We hope Speaker Gingrich continues to frame the issues of today as he did in these clips above. It is good for everyone.

BUT

The man has a history of grasping the issues, then drifting into some touchy-feeling legacy-enhancing moral fog. Thus becoming ineffective with no moral core.

In other words, he became bipartisan when being partisan was unpopular. A great guy and worthy of the presidency in a world without fringe tea partiers and multi-trillion dollar deficits, but not the right guy for 2012.

Our Gingrich post from May when his campaign office was in disarray.

Our list of qualified 2012 primary candidates - Updated with this post.

We Remember

U/T: wmjsarah

Relive that day through Maj. Heather Penny, a fighter pilot who responded to the attacks. Be sure to hear her explain the order to ram a hijacked airliner - 20:00 mark.

U/T: Ann Barnhardt

Found at Conservative Blogs Central through IOTW:

WARNING: GRAPHIC IMAGES. People falling from towers. Only watch to remember the evil that exists in Islam, and to refocus on our fight ahead.



Also found t Conservative Blogs Central - the Budweiser 9/11 tribute commercial. It only aired once.



UPDATE 9.11 9am

Mark Steyn has a good rant posted at NRO: Let's Roll Over

UPDATE 9.13 8am

Go to LawDog for some perspective.

Greece

Ann Barnhardt predicts immediate collapse despite the MSM-echo'ed assurances.

This paragraph is telling. From WSJ: Default and Dissent Threaten Greece.

The giant public-sector slimming—as many as 120,000 public workers could be eliminated—that Greece is contemplating threatens to upend decades of cozy ties between the ruling Socialist party and those workers, who have long formed a key constituency.

That timeless lesson: Even the most loyal defenders of socialism get it in the end.

Just ask Sergey Kirov.

The unions, and weak government decision-makers, have led to this in Greece. They are on track to duplicating these problems here.

It will be interesting to watch what happens to the price of gold this week.

21 & 1

Twenty One is the number of tax increases Obama has already signed into law so far.

One is the number of taxes King George III signed into law that sparked a revolution.

But who's counting?

U/T: Moonbattery

Quote of the Day

From Robb at Sharp as a Marble, re: the IHOP shooting in Carson Nevada this past Tuesday:

The IHOP shooting today will have been done with a fully automatic AK74 Assault Weapon purchased at a gun show without a background check by a mentally unstable, Tea Party right wing racist driven to this act by the ravings of Sarah Palin.

There. I’ve done all the hard work so the MSM doesn’t have to.

U/T: SaysUncle

Socialist

The absolute best, and most rhythmic, attempt to cloud the differences between us and Obama. Fun, but still a big FAIL.



Obama's only chance in 2012 is racial unrest, class-envy, and distortions like this guy above.

We think his campaign would have been easier for him if he had just pushed for policies that have a history of success.

Newsweek cover from February 2009:

Liberalism vs. Jobs UPDATED 3X and BUMPED

[original post 9.2 10am]

Liberalism vs. Jobs - You have to pick one.

Thesaurus - Unexpected: abrupt, accidental, amazing, astonishing, chance, electrifying, eye-opening, fortuitous, from left field, impetuous, impulsive, instantaneous, not bargained for, not in the cards, out of the blue, payback, prodigious, staggering, startling, stunning, sudden, swift, unanticipated, unforeseen, unheralded, unlooked-for, unpredictable, unpredicted, wonderful, aberrant, anomalistic, anomalous, atypical, bizarre, curious, deviant, deviate, deviating, divergent, eccentric, exceptional, extraordinary, fantastic, funny, grody, gross, heteroclite, heterodox, heteromorphic, irregular, odd, off-base, off-color, out of line, peculiar, preternatural, queer, screwy, spastic, strange, uncommon, unnatural, unorthodox, unusual, weird.

Today's completely unexpected news on 'job growth' in our second 'summer of recovery' - NYT:

Job Growth at Halt in U.S.; Worst Showing in 11 Months

Obama The economy failed to add new jobs in August, the first time there has been no increase in net jobs in the United States in 11 months.

The flat performance in the job market was down sharply from a revised 85,000 gain of jobs in July, the Labor Department said Friday, and was far below a consensus forecast by economists of 60,000 new jobs. The unemployment rate stayed constant at 9.1 percent in August.

Yes, we disagree with the NYT that the economy is to blame for today's unemployment rate.

Unemployment started its climb the moment Obama won election.

Was it uncertainty of the coming policies that caused this, as most say?

Or was it the certainty that Obama's policies would be destructive that led to layoffs and belt-tightening?

Does it matter?

Today's Bourgeois news - WSJ:

Amazon Offers California-Jobs Plan in Exchange for Sales-Tax Reprieve

Amazon.com Inc. has put forward a plan that would create thousands of jobs in California in exchange for a reprieve from the state's new Internet sales tax law...

Obama is giving a speech next week during the GOP debate. during a football game.

He announced this speech last month between golf outings while on vacation.

'Focused like a laser on jobs' since 2009, he shows great restraint in not rushing into such an important speech. This speech will go down in history as one of his biggest - up there with his March 2008 Race Speech and his July 2008 Berlin speech.

If jobs are the subject, we know one thing: If he wants to add jobs, he'll embrace conservatism. If he wants to continue on this path of >9% unemployment, he must continue to embrace liberalism, progressivism, socialism, communism.

Check back next week for our response to his speech.

UPDATED 10 minutes later....

Here is a third related story - NYT:

U.S. Is Set to Sue a Dozen Big Banks Over Mortgages

The federal agency that oversees the mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is set to file suits against more than a dozen big banks, accusing them of misrepresenting the quality of mortgage securities they assembled and sold at the height of the housing bubble, and seeking billions of dollars in compensation.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency suits, which are expected to be filed in the coming days in federal court, are aimed at Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and Deutsche Bank, among others, according to three individuals briefed on the matter.

Questions:

1) Will these lawsuits result in more jobs at the targeted banks, or less?

2) Do these lawsuits reflect conservative values, or liberal, progressive, or communist values?

3) Would Karl Marx approve of these lawsuits?

4) Would these lawsuits, and threats of similar government lawsuits, qualify as reasons for uncertainty in the private sector?

5) Does Obama have input on these lawsuits and others generated within government agencies, or are these agencies acting independently of Obama?

Instead of asking these questions, we might as well be pissing into the wind....

UPDATED & BUMPED 9.8 10am

Obama's Jobs Campaign Speech is tonight, so bumping this relevant post.

this was good for laugh - seen at Yahoo's Market page just now:

UPDATED 9.9 8am

Found at IOTW:

Another Obama Top Ten List

Michael J. Boskin, Stanford Economics Professor, writes in today's WSJ: The Obama Presidency by the Numbers.

President Obama constantly reminds us, with some justification, that he was dealt a difficult hand. But the evidence is overwhelming that he played it poorly. His big government spending, debt and regulation fix has clearly failed. Relative to previous recoveries from deep recessions, the results are disastrous. A considerable fraction of current joblessness, lower living standards, dependency on government and destroyed savings is the result. Worse, his debt explosion will be a drag on economic growth for years to come.

Prof. Boskin's "Records Set on Obama's Watch:"

1) US sovereign debt downgrade: first in American history,

2) Federal spending (25% GDP): highest since World War II,

3) Budget deficit (10% of GDP): highest since World War II,

4) Federal debt (67% of GDP): highest since just after World War II,

5) Employment (58.1% of population working): lowest since 1983,

6) Long-term unemployment (45.9% of total): highest since 1930's,

7) Increase in nonfarm payroll employment (0.5%) since recovery began 26 months ago: slowest job growth 26 months after a severe recession since World War II,

8) Home-ownership rate (59.7%): lowest since 1965,

9) Percentage of taxpayers paying income tax (49%): lowest in modern era,

10) Government dependency (47%), defined as the percentage of persons receiving one or more federal benefit payments: highest in American history.

Obama, and the liberalism/progressivism/communism that he represents, have all be disgraced and discredited.

It is his first time. But for the sickness that is the Left, this is just history repeating itself in a very short, 2.5 year window.

Herman Cain

Unique and welcome change to the typical campaign commercial.



U/T: Moonbattery

An Obama Compromise

We keep hearing our Dear Leader tell us those rascally Republicans won't compromise. Here is an example of Compromise Obama expects.

FoxNews: Sources: Obama Administration to Drop Troop Levels in Iraq to 3,000

Currently, about 45,000 U.S. troops are stationed in Iraq. The generals on the ground had requested that the number of troops remaining in Iraq at the end of the year reach about 27,000. But, there was major pushback about "the cost and the political optics" of that decision that the number was then reduced to 10,000.

Current strength: 45,000.
Suggested (Generals): 27,000.
Suggested (Liberals): 10,000.
Obama Compromise: 3,000.

We're sure this won't put our soldiers in harms way, or threaten Iraq's security. Nah.

He is the Commander in Chief and it is his right to make this call. We know how bitter he is having been exposed as a fraud. Of course, he is the one who did the exposing with every decision so far. And this is his way to respond to the new criticisms.

Angry? Yes! But we are only surprised it took this long. We're on the record as praising Obama's continuation of the War on Terror - something we seriously did not expect in 2009.

The Girl with an Oar

Part of a racier Re-Stalinization era that Putin is kicking off:



It is only a matter of time before we see the Girl with a Hammer and Sickle. Maybe in the 2012 campaign, perhaps?

Gun Ads

We found this article at Creative Pro on the 1960's gun culture. Specifically, gun advertisements from that wacky time.

Clearly, advertising works.

We were born in that decade and these images, while we do not remember them, were obviously seared into our mind and drive our behavior today.

Most may think of the 60's as the hippie era. Most are wrong.

Monday Afternoon Cigar

A rare treat today to celebrate Labor Day: A Paul Garmirian, or "PG".

AKA, the President's Cigar, as this was the cigar of choice for Bush Sr, Clinton (and Lewinsky?), and Bush Jr as they held office. It may go further back too.

Labor Day - UPDATED

What did we do?

We worked. No breaks. No telling our co-workers how hard we work. Just. Plain. Work.

What did the "Labor Leader" Hoffa say today at a Detroit rally?

Drudge: President Obama, this is your army. We are ready to march. Let's take these son of bitches out '...

Classy. Civil. Vacuous.

Not sure if they held the rally in one of the neighborhoods that has been bulldozed in that city with 40 years of Democrat leadership.

CBS quotes our Dear Leader's new line:

Times are tough "but we're tougher"

That doesn't tell the 1 in 5 working-age Americans who are not working today how we're 'coming back from the brink'.

Michelle Malkin has a Top Ten post of videos and images of union thugs doing what they do best. Michelle must be getting lazy - there are plenty to choose from. Why not a top 100??

Nobody who wants to work should be out of work. Nor, should anyone go without a cool refreshing Leninade to celebrate Labor! Buy a 12-pack at our hat store!

Workers of the World, Unite!

UPDATED 5pm

Vice President Biden to Labor today:

[Drudge] You Are The Only Folks Keeping The Barbarians From the Gates

Win the House back in 2010. Check.

Now, to the Gates!

Fair and Balanced

We are Fair and Balanced here at Ushanka.us.

To bring an opposing view to our right-wing bias that will counter the past 5 years of Ushanka.us posts, let us introduce Obama 2012 voter, MsMaxy47 from back in May (LANGUAGE WARNING):



And her followup video from yesterday:



The DNC campaign slogan for 2012 won't be "Hope and Change."

It'll be "More Free Stuff."

Guarantee it.

U/T: Moonbattery.

Images pulled long ago from one or two of our favorite blogs. Our apologies for not remembering their source(s).

The Place To Be

If you ever see a few days go by without a post here at Ushanka.us, this is where we'll likely be.

From Calgary Herald through IOTW, Former cargo vessel hosts N. Korea's first 'luxury' cruise.

North Korea may not sound like the ideal tourist destination, but the secretive state has branched into the more luxurious end of the holiday market with its first cruise.

The venture's first 130 passengers arrived at the resort of Mount Kumgang Thursday, just north of the South Korean border, after sailing from the northeastern port city of Rajin. Their mode of transport is a far cry from the glamorous cruise liners that ply the Mediterranean and the Caribbean. The aging 9,700ton cruise ship was formerly used to transport cargo from North Korea to Japan.

The reason for branching out into the evils of capitalism, with our correction:

Increasingly squeezed by international sanctions domestic communist policies, North Korea, which has an estimated six million people at risk of starvation, has been stepping up attempts to woo foreign capital and tourists from overseas.

Did you know Stalin offered free cruises aboard similar cargo ships? It's true.

The cruises were paid for Dalstroy and took the lucky passengers to Magadan, the first stop on the way to Kolyma:



Pics from Calgary Herald. Yes - that second picture is a lavish one-course feast severed on the Good Ship Commie.

U/T: BFH