Welcome to Compleat Advocate

Obama administration pummeled companies such as Deere, Caterpillar, Verizon and AT&T for speaking out about the cost implications and financial burdens of Obamacare -- and then cheered from the sidelines while Democratic Rep. Henry Waxman attempted to haul the firms up for a congressional witch-hunt inquisition.

Obama administration seized Gibson Guitars' instruments

Obama administration has threatened whistleblowers who exposed bloody corruption and incompetence behind the Operation Fast and Furious gun-walking racket.

Obama administration has clamped down on mainstream media reporters, too.

The Pleasanton (CA) Weekly was bullied by the White House press shop over a benign article that irked the administration because it made Michelle Obama look snooty.

The San Francisco Chronicle was punished by the White House because a print pool reporter used a cellphone to record video of protesters at an Obama Bay Area fundraiser.

A WFAA-TV Texas reporter was dressed down by the president for having the audacity to interrupt.

The Boston Herald was spanked by the White House for running a front-page op-ed by GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

Source:
Michelle Malkin, "Our White House Bully Problem", TownHall.com, Sept 28, 2011 -- http://townhall.com/columnists/michellemalkin...ly_problem

Here's excerpt:


On Tuesday, Detroit News reporter Daniel Howes reported that White House officials leaned on Ford Motor Company to yank a popular TV and Internet ad critical of competitors who took federal bailout money. According to Howes, "Ford pulled the ad after individuals inside the White House" questioned the firm's CEO Alan Mulally (who had earlier supported the bailout despite his company's refusal to participate). Howes concluded: "You're not allowed, in Obama's America, to disparage the Auto bailout, or -- indirectly -- Obama. Especially during the election cycle."

Both Ford and the White House officially deny any political pressure received or applied. But White House press flack Dan Pfeiffer refused to answer when I asked him whether anyone at the White House had ever contacted anyone at Ford to complain about the bailout ad. Ford's social media director told me he personally "had no knowledge" of any contacts. While he disputed the gist of Howes' report, the Ford official would not call for a correction or retraction.

Chris McDaniel, the real-life Ford customer who starred in the offending ad, told BigGovernment.com editor Larry O'Connor that he was exasperated when he heard about the Ford fiasco: "Now we have the federal government butting their nose into this TV ad. Another example of them getting involved in things they have no business getting involved in. Where is the free speech of American citizens?"

Source:
Michelle Malkin, "Our White House Bully Problem", TownHall.com, Sept 28, 2011 -- http://townhall.com/columnists/michellemalkin...ly_problem

Here's excerpt:


Our own more recent housing boom and bust began when local politicians in various places began severely restricting the building of houses, in the name of "open space," "smart growth" or whatever other political slogans were in vogue.

As housing prices skyrocketed in such places as coastal California, both renters and home buyers in these particular places often had to pay half their monthly income just to put a roof over their heads. This in turn led to Washington politicians declaring a need for nationwide laws and policies to create "affordable housing," even though people in most of the country were paying a lower share of their income for housing than in previous years.

This political crusade for "affordable housing" was at the heart of laws, regulations and even threats from the Department of Justice, against mortgage lenders who failed to lend to as many low-income and minority borrowers as the politicians wanted them to.

Regardless of the additional problems that occurred as these mortgages were bought by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, or were later bundled into securities sold by Wall Street, the fundamental problem was that many people simply stopped making their mortgage payments -- as was perfectly predictable when lending standards were forced down by the government.

The politicians and bureaucrats who forced lenders to lower their standards had limited goals in mind -- namely affordable housing and more minority home ownership. But the repercussions when the housing markets collapsed spread all across the American economy and led to financial crises overseas, where financial securities based on American mortgages were widely sold.

Source:
Thomas Sowell (author of The Housing Boom and Bust), "Politics vs. Economics", TownHall.com, Sept 28, 2011 -- http://townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/2..._economics

Here's excerpt:


At one time, many state banking laws forbade a bank from having multiple branches. The goal was limited and local -- namely, to prevent big, nationally known banks from setting up branches that many locally owned banks could not successfully compete against.

But, limited and local as such state banking laws were, their impact was both national and catastrophic, when thousands of American banks failed during the Great Depression of the 1930s. The vast majority of the banks that failed were in states that had laws against branch banking.

Why? Because, when there is a single bank in a single place, the fate of both its depositors and its borrowers depends on what happens there. If it is a wheat-growing region, a drop in the price of wheat means people deposit less money in the bank at the same time when more borrowers are unable to repay their loans.

Banks caught in that kind of crossfire went under on a scale that shrank the total amount of credit in the country and helped plunge the national economy into depression. In Canada, where banks were free to have branches all across the country, not one bank failed during the same years when thousands of American banks failed -- and Canada did not yet have deposit insurance until 1967.

A Canadian bank with branches in all sorts of places across the country -- with all sorts of different industry, commerce and agriculture -- had their risks spread, instead of being concentrated, as in the United States. Problems in a place where one branch was located would not collapse the whole bank.

Source:
Thomas Sowell (a senior fellow at the Hoover Institute), "Politics vs. Economics", TownHall.com, Sept 28, 2011 -- http://townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/2..._economics

That was from Daniel Bongino's campaign website. He's running for GOP nomination for U.S. Senate. He used it as an example of how Obamacare-type system can't be assumed to result in better health care:

The ongoing debate over America’s health-care system is, at its core, two distinct issues, insurance coverage and health-care. One can have insurance and be denied access to health-care and conversely, one can receive adequate health-care and not be insured. This is clearly illustrated by our current Medicaid system which claims to insure Americans but provides either inadequate or non-existent care. A number of rigorous academic studies have clearly shown that health-care outcomes for Medicaid recipients are significantly worse than for those with private insurance and even those with no insurance at all. A recent report by The Heartland Institute documented a University of Virginia study of surgical outcomes for Medicaid patients and found that they were an astonishing 97% more likely to die than patients with private insurance and 13% more likely to die than those with no insurance at all. This gross disparity in the level of care should trouble those in power, but sadly it has not. Condemning the less fortunate among us to a failed system, guaranteed to provide inadequate health outcomes, rather than providing a temporary safety net is neither charitable nor a model for emulating as some career politicians have suggested. I fully support the block granting of Medicaid funds to the States as was done for welfare reform, in bi-partisan fashion, under President Clinton and a Republican Congress in 1995. Block granting would immediately create 50 distinct laboratories of innovation, with the States free to experiment with new, more efficient methods for delivering real health-care to those in need.

Posted this explanation at America's Party website, on thread which highlighted a cartoon showing voters' view of the presidential 'horse race':

The front page of today's Boston Herald has only two headlines, each taking up one side of the page. On the left is a story about baseball pennant race. On the right is one about GOP presidential candidates. Both use the same kind of language:

* WILD RIDE! | Sox rebound with crucial 7-4 victory over Yanks

* Perry's stumbles revive Romney | MITT'S SECOND CHANCE | Bay State pol regains momentum

There's even a similarity in the photos used with each story. There's a Red Sox player pointing strait ahead; and there's Mitt Romney pointing or wagging or something

http://www.americaspartynews.com/talk/forums/...?tid=21981

part 2 of the interview is at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-v9Xk1Rq4n4&am...rofilepage