[mattduke]

I didn't know computers could be made to run so slowly, but interesting nonetheless. Also interesting is the clear demarcation between Georgia and South Carolina.

http://www.uscourts.gov/News/NewsReleas ... apita.aspx

[Ludi]

Really interesting map! Thanks for the link.

[Vogelzang]

Vote Republican!

A typical Democrat.



Obamanomics is why there is no recovery
Examiner Editorial
August 13, 2010

How many more months must Americans endure near-double-digit unemployment, little or no new-job creation, economic stagnation, a topsy-turvy stock market, and sagging consumer confidence before Washington politicians concede the "summer of recovery" is mostly a mirage?

They've spent nearly $8 trillion since 2007, including nearly $2 trillion on economic stimulus programs and an equal amount for the Troubled Asset Relief Program and similar bailouts. They've effectively nationalized Fortune 500 corporations, taken over the health care sector, and set the regulatory stage for more bailouts and takeovers, but the needle is still stuck. Worse, recovery isn't likely for many months ahead because those same politicians are planning more of the same failing policies.

Consider that entrepreneurial small businesses are the job-creation machine of a free-enterprise economy. But these firms are about to get smacked with significant tax rate increases that will keep most of them struggling just to survive. President Obama, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will let the Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 expire as scheduled Jan. 1, 2011. The current 33 percent tax rate on individuals will go to 36 percent, and the current 35 percent rate will increase to 39.5 percent. Those are individual rates, but the majority of small-business profits are taxed as income to individuals.

According to Internal Revenue Service data,30 million tax returns reporting small-business income were filed in 2008, showing net business profits of $631 billion. Americans for Tax Reform pointed out Friday that "large chunk of this net profit -$457 billion - faced taxation in households making more than $200,000 per year. A majority of small business profits will face a tax rate hike under the Obama-Pelosi-Reid plan." So, those millions of small-businesses will soon have even less money to invest in expanding existing product lines or services, as well as job-creating new ventures.

As for the big corporations that are hoarding billions of dollars that would otherwise be flowing into new investments and fueling renewed economic growth, there is no mystery why they are putting off making such decisions. Who can blame them after seeing the nationalization of General Motors and Chrysler, or the moratoria under which hundreds of large and small energy firms were forced to stop drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and on land in places like Wyoming?

Also, an explosion of new anti-business regulations to further hobble the economy is coming soon, thanks to Obama-Reid-Pelosi policies. As ATR's Grover Norquist told The Examiner, "You don't know what the law will be next month, or if you will even be allowed to own your business. The only thing you can be sure of is they will raise your taxes. You would be a fool now to go out and hire somebody new."

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opini ... z0xNuftB66

[Vogelzang]

The Green Jobs Scam - and Confusion
By IAIN MURRAY
Special to the Examiner

With the massive $787-billion stimulus bill including provisions to encourage the creation of "green jobs," Americans deserve an honest appraisal of how such green jobs will work. So far, they aren't getting it.

In fact, a recent statement by Al Gore shows just how much Americans are being misled on this issue. Green jobs are a shell game, and we're falling for it. In the Financial Times, on February 17, Gore, in an op ed co-authored with United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, asserts that, "In the US, there are now more jobs in the wind industry than in the entire coal industry."

But as Roger Pielke Jr of the University of Colorado points out, there is something wrong there. In November 2008, the coal industry generated 155 million megawatt-hours of electricity, while wind generated only 1.3 million megawatt-hours. If wind really does employ more people than coal, it is doing so at a huge cost to American efficiency, productivity, and competitiveness.

Of course, the wind industry does not employ more people. Gore and Ban were flat out wrong in their assertion, which should make one question any assertions in Gore's An Inconvenient Truth, or any U.N. document, for that matter.

As the Christian Science Monitor found out, the figure comes from an apples-and-oranges comparison. An environmentalist blog had reported that the wind industry employed 85,000 people and the coal industry just 81,000.

But the wind industry figure represented jobs as "varied as turbine component manufacturing, construction and installation of wind turbines, wind turbine operations and maintenance, legal and marketing services, and more," while the coal industry figure represented just coal miners.

Comparing apples to apples, the coal industry probably employs over 1.4 million people-and those workers are still over seven times as productive as the wind energy workers.

Moreover, when considering how much of the current boom in renewable energy is fueled by subsidies, it becomes clear that a large number of those wind industry jobs are temporary-engaged in the manufacture of parts for and construction of new wind farms. Meanwhile, we have seemingly called a halt to the construction of new coal-fired power plants, just when the nation is facing a likely power generation shortage.

This problem is highlighted in a report from, of all people, The Sierra Club and the Teamsters union (among others). "High Road or Low Road?" reveals that, "low pay is not uncommon" in green industries, that "wage rates at many wind and solar manufacturing facilities are below the national average," and suggests that wages for workers employed in the "green building" industry are also far lower than those of union members in other sectors. Their proposed solution is to unionize these
industries, but remember just how unproductive they are even at these low wages. Replacing a coal job with a "green job" is likely to be a net loss to the economy, meaning further unemployment down the chain.

Other nations have already started down this road. The German government found that green jobs could only benefit the economy as long as the country remained a net exporter of green technology. The finding in "High Road or Low Road?" that "some U.S. wind and solar manufacturers have already begun to offshore production of components destined for U.S. markets to low-wage havens such as China and Mexico" should therefore be sobering for green jobs proponents.

A forthcoming study from Dr Gabriel Calzada of the Instituto Juan de Mariana in Spain reveals an even greater problem. For every green job created in Spain, 3.9 jobs have been lost as a result throughout the economy. The author calls them "subprime jobs," with good reason.

When America is in recession, the last thing we can afford to do is destroy more jobs than we create in the name of "stimulus." The American people deserve to hear the truth about "green jobs." Unfortunately, as long as Al Gore and his allies continue to have the loudest bullhorns, they won't.

Iain Murray is Director of Projects and Analysis and Senior Fellow in Energy, Science and Technology at the Competitive Enterprise Institute and author of The Really Inconvenient Truths, from Regnery publishing.


Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opini ... z14yTtqZFo

[Crazy_Dad]

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/ne ... how_page=0

Crikey!

[Denny]

It makes you wondr if its due to legal differences or economic differences but Texas stands out as having quite few.

There is an unbroken red line starting at Michigan and heading south through Indiana and Ohio, right down through Floirida, looking like the path of a large hurricane.

[Pops]

Ouch! almost 10 out of 1,000 in my old home county in CA.

...
I think TX has more restrictions on banks, so not so many bad mortgages, not sure.

...
When did the bankruptcy laws change? I'd bet 06. I wonder how many more BKs there would be if the banks hadn't purchased new laws to protect themselves?

[Outcast_Searcher]

Vote Republican!

I'm a libertarian. I criticize both left and right, issue by issue, so don't assume I'm some lefty nitwit (moderate nitwit is more accurate).

The GOP is bankrupting us by spending too much on the military and always wanting more of that, and ALWAYS espousing tax cuts while denying that they make the deficits much worse, especially in the short run.

The far left always wants more social programs and to raise taxes, and is unwilling to admit there are negative consequences to growth and to freedom and to property rights in doing that (or feel that their agenda overrides all other concerns).

Both sides are insane. Neither approach works. Neither side is willing to make meaningful compromise. Both sides' constituencies are unwilling to face reality and accept less government.

So, go ahead. I'm all ears. Tell me how the GOP is going to magically fix this mess. (And by the way, I voted GOP this time due to the recent insanity on the left and the SPIRIT of the tea party economic argument in its pure form -- I just have no confidence it will make a real difference).

[Pops]

Ignore vol, "vote 'pub" is about the extent of his literary ability, It's probably Vote Dem at some other site...

Or wherever he goes when we ban him for trolling.