State of the Union - we wait with trepidation

George Rebane

NPR woke us up this morning with another cheery report of California’s progress in education and unfunded public employees’ pension liabilitities.  We are now told that latest testing shows three out of four fourth graders are reading below grade level.  And the solution to that is, …, wait for it, more of the same.  We need to increase school funding to enable the same districts with the same curriculum and administrative mavens to have the same unionized teachers do the same ol’ same ol’ while expecting better results.

And in city halls like Sacramento’s there is now the possibility of serious gnashing of teeth and rending of garment – just kidding, they don’t give a big rat’s ass.  It seems that CalPERS has just told Sacramento that its unfunded liabilities are now over $1,000,000,000.   The double dummies who have run town hall for the last ten plus years paid no never mind to the increase in pension benefits they installed after the turn of the century, and instead decided to do nothing on the revenue side of funding such pensions.  I’d love to see some of the memos that went back and forth between CalPERS and Sacramento discussing the need for additional revenues and the decision to just forget about it.

Oh yes, the same stuff is going on with teachers’ pensions according to the latest from CalSTRS.  Basically, here the unfunded liabilities tote up to over $71B with current annual payments required at $4.5B/yr and growing thereafter.  The solution announced by the Senate Democrats ignores this and instead proposes to spend an additional $200M annually to start early education for 4-year-olds.  Now anyone who has informed themselves even a smidgeon on pre-kindergarten government education programs knows that there is no evidence over the years for any lasting benefit from such programs.  (In fact the bigger picture of government training and education programs over the decades demonstrates that they have been TOTALLY ineffective.  The only good training the government provides is in its military.)

Then as we look at the ways how municipalities will solve these problems, can everyone spell ‘Chapter 9’?  Cause more of it’s a’comin’.

So here we are, waiting for our president to lay out the tenets of his redeclared class war tonight, telling us how he will dash and weave through the intricacies of a recalcitrant Congress and a bureaucratic labyrinth, with handfuls of executive orders to stamp out income inequalities and dispense social justice near and far.  According to polls, at least half the country believes Obama to operate somewhere between incompetent and rogue.  The other half will no doubt look with continued hope for more of the much promised change.  The watchword will be ‘inequality’, and the plan of action calls for it to be stamped out once and for all.

After the Soviet and Chinese solutions to egalitarianism became apparent, Kurt Vonnegut wrote about it in a chilling short story – ‘Harrison Bergeron’ (1961) - that was also made into a TV special now lost in the mists of time.  In today’s WSJ Bret Stephens pens a Vonnegut inspired column that contemplates how we could progress toward such a future, given the cadre of entrenched progressives among Washington’s electeds and that completely dominate its bureaucracies.  Tonight we will hear Obama’s attempt to marshal them all to action.  Trepidation, you again abide in our midst.  

Comments

[fish]

I think that Zero Hedge has a preview of this evenings offering from the "Progressive in Chief".

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-01-28/real-state-union-just-889-words

[Russ Steele]

The SOTU is being characterized as “a disturbance in the farce.”

Heh!

[Walt]

I am swimming back across the river Styx. ( I must have short changed the boatman) What passes for "health care" these days really didn't help.
This flu is a real doozy.
Maybe what "O" spews forth will finish me off..

[Walt]

The " State of denial" is about to start.
Good thing I kept the bucket handy.

[Russ Steele]

Watching the SOTU, and would be really be excited if more of his bullshit was true. It is not. For example the US's CO2 emission are down, but failed to mention the cause was due to the economy being in the tank, and private development of natural gas which he took credit for. The government had slowed the development of tracking in federal lands. He does not deserve any credit for CO2 reductions.

If women deserve equal pay for equal work, how come Obama is not paying women working in the White House the same pay as the men? Hypocrite!!

And there is more!

[Russ Steele]

opps should be "fracking" not auto correct tracking.

[Bonnie McGuire]

I'm watching the President speak. Same old rhetoric from a robot who doesn't know, nor hasn't experienced what he's talking about. And he's getting lots of applause from the house full of fellow robots. Just think how things would improve if these hypocrite "servants of the people" cut way back on their salaries, benefits and retirements. What would happen if people were continually shown how much they make creating tax burdens on people in the private sector to support their life style. Prophetically, their ill gained wealth will eventually testify against them. History has a way of repeating because human nature rarely changes. Watching the commander in chief talk and looking at the military men's faces in the audience I'm reminded of Benghazi and how they must feel about having to watch their back too. Sorry, but everything he says is contrary to what he, and his majority democrat party have done to America by destroying its values and economic base.

[Russ Steele]

Mother Nature spoke with authority. As soon as Obama mentioned ‘climate change’ it started snowing on Capitol Hill.

[Russ Steele]

Zerohedge has a good SOTU Post Mortem

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-01-28/less-hoping-dreaming-more-believing-state-union-post-mortem

[Russ Steele]

Obama might want to clean up is own nest before attacking attacking others. A woman deserves equal pay for equal work." However, as the president made his demand, women who work at the White House continue to make less money than their male counter-parts. According to the D.C. based American Enterprise Institute, female White House staffers are paid less than 87 cents for every dollar paid to men who work at the White House. This is a significant gender wage gap of more than 13 percent AEI notes. Hypocrite!!

[George Rebane]

The SOTU speech ranged between the inane and the insane. Among the inanities was Obama's hell bent for leather, 'Damn the torpedos!' promise to continue subsidizing economically infeasible and technically immature/impossible alternative energy programs. The Keystone pipeline is the greatest casualty here that impacts long term energy costs for us all.

Among the insane statements he made was 'Climate change is a fact!' Well, of course it is, but what the Chief Executive Liar meant to leave you with is that 'Controllable AGW is a fact', and that apparently even he cannot say anymore. So he counts on some lame brain cells between our ears to do that translation for him. Remember, the AGW debate cannot be raised in public; no defender of AGW will get on a public stage and debate against the overwhelming evidence that we are in the midst of a globally epic swindle.

Politicians worldwide are quietly abandoning their renewable energy investments after having seen the gigantic failures of such programs wherever they have been pursued. On the eve of the SOTU speech, the latest comes from the European Union as it quietly seeks to slow its renewable energy push. Stratfor reports -

With the European Union battling a crippling economic crisis, Europe's high energy and electricity costs have become politically and financially untenable and have sapped support for costly, environmentally friendly policies in many member countries. Reflecting this situation, the European Commission in mid-January unveiled its new energy and environment strategy through 2030, which softened Brussels' longstanding push for the development of renewable energy sources while maintaining binding targets for carbon emissions. However, the impact of this particular EU policy change will be limited, particularly compared with the broader trends that govern energy markets in Europe.

More here -
http://www.stratfor.com/analysis/european-union-slows-its-renewable-energy-push

[Ben Emery]

A look at the real state of the nation, until we deal with the corruption issue we will never have a government that represents or reflects the people of the United States of America.

"Legendary broadcaster Bill Moyers joins us to discuss his latest investigation, which explores how the influence of large, untraceable political donations known as "dark money" have become the greatest threat to democracy in the United States. In "State of Conflict: North Carolina," Moyers and his team explore how wealthy right-wing donors are greatly influencing state politics. "This is more than North Carolina," Moyers says. "It’s a harbinger of how organized money is the greatest threat to democracy because it unbalances the equilibrium. Democracy is supposed to check the excesses of private power and private greed, and if money disestablishes that equilibrium, we’re in trouble." Moyers, the host of "Moyers & Company," also talks about the long fight to secure voting rights. Fifty years ago, he was serving in President Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration at the time of the "Freedom Summer" campaign in 1964 and the formation of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party. Moyers has won more than 30 Emmy Awards. He also was a founding organizer of the Peace Corps, served as press secretary for President Lyndon Johnson, and was a publisher of Newsday and senior correspondent for CBS News."

http://www.democracynow.org/2014/1/27/bill_moyers_on_dark_money_the

[fish]

Mr. Emery....your homework assignment.....?

[Walt]

Paroozing the web today, one word kept reappearing in story after story, and in the comment threads. " Dictator" seems to be the word of the day.

[fish]

Ben,

A list of 14 points that you posit makes one a FASCIST/CORPORATIST/AUTHORITARIAN. A search feature on this blog. Repeated accusations of the aforementioned character traits.

Should I be expecting documentation of your charges any time soon?