A Strong Case against Health Care "Reform"

By Gerard Lameiro

It Means Higher Taxes and Additional New Taxes. Yes, a new entitlement program for all Americans will cost lots of money. Higher taxes and totally new taxes will be needed. Already proposed tax increases include the extension of a 2.9% Medicare payroll tax to interest, dividends, capital gains, annuities, royalties, and rents for some tax payers. An additional 0.9% payroll tax has also been proposed. Forcing every American to purchase health care insurance (possibly at a higher cost) is also an implicit tax.

It Means Fewer Jobs. Yes, taxes and jobs are closely correlated. With higher taxes pulling dollars out of the private sector to pay for health care, comes declining investment dollars for new businesses and new jobs. Government spending for health care has a much lower economic multiplier than private sector dollars spent for health care. Overall new job creation will be lower under government-controlled health care. [more...]

Dallas Fed Chief Calls for Breakup of 'Too Big to Fail' Banks

By Tim Connolly

Dallas Federal Reserve Bank President Richard Fisher is calling for the breakup of banks too big to fail; and at Winning Strategies, we believe this is an idea whose time has come.

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas President Richard Fisher traveled to New York to trumpet a message he's told Texas audiences before: Banks that are too big to fail are too big to exist in the first place. Speaking Wednesday at the Council on Foreign Relations, Fisher said big, systemically important banks should be dismantled before regulators have to deal with another crisis like the one that nearly brought down Wall Street and the rest of the U.S. financial system in late 2008. "The dangers posed by too-big-to-fail banks are too great," he said. Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and others have said Congress should pass a law giving regulators "resolution authority" to close down failing financial companies. But Fisher, acknowledging that his views might be "slightly radical," called for an international agreement to break giant banks into more manageable pieces. [more…]

Foreign Demand for U.S. Treasury Securities Take $53 Billion Record Fall in December

...is this the Canary in the Gold Mine for U.S. Debt Demand?

By Tim Connolly

CNBC reported that per U.S. Treasury data, foreign demand for U.S. Treasury securities fell by the largest amount on record in December with China reducing its holdings by $34.2 billion.

The reductions in holdings, if they continue, could force the government to make higher interest payments at a time that it is running record federal deficits. This could be the leading indicator of a precipitous drop in demand for U.S. debt, and absolutely reinforces the need to FREEZE THE BUDGET NOW!

Per CNBC, The Treasury Department reported that foreign holdings of U.S. Treasury securities fell by $53 billion in December, surpassing the previous record of a $44.5 billion drop in April 2009. The big drop in China's holdings meant that it lost the top spot in terms of foreign ownership of U.S. Treasuries, dropping to second place behind Japan.

Japan also reduced its holdings of U.S. Treasuries, cutting them by $11.5 billion to $768.8 billion in December, but that amount was still more than China's December total of $755.4 billion. The $53 billion decline in holdings of Treasury securities came primarily from a drop in official government holdings, which fell by $52.3 billion. The holdings of foreign private investors fell by $700 million during the month of December. [more…]

True Health Care "Reform" Requires Free Market Solutions

By Dr. Gerard Francis Lameiro, Ph.D.

Health Care "Reform" continues high in the news this week with President Obama’s upcoming Health Care Summit. What’s important to realize is true health care reform requires free market solutions. More government controls, regulations, mandates, and subsidies will only create more inefficiencies, higher costs for health care, higher costs for health care insurance, lower incentives for medical innovations, lower quality, and eventually, rationing of health care services. Individuals will also find their economic and personal freedom restricted further. It’s true our health care system is broken and needs to be fixed. But, government is the problem, not the solution. Government tax policies as well as regulations and subsidies currently are blocking the health care market from functioning effectively. Giving consumers greater choices through competition (among both medical providers and health care insurers) will spur innovation, encourage price reductions, and improve the quality of health care. [more…]

America: A Big Fat Greek Tragedy

By Wayne Allyn Root, 2008 Libertarian Vice Presidential Nominee

Greece is the insolvent, bankrupt country that threatens to bring down the entire EU (European Union) with its exploding and toxic national debt. But it's just one of the PIGS (Portugal, Italy, Greece and Spain). The EU is damned if they do, damned if they don't. If they choose to bail out Greece in order to save the union, soon they'll have much bigger bankrupt nations to deal with (Portugal and Spain are next in a long Conga line). There isn't enough money in all the world to bail out all of them. The EU is in big trouble.

But the real problem is that Greece isn't the worst Greek tragedy on the horizon. Greece is only "the canary in the coal mine." The United States is one big fat Greek tragedy. We are Greece-SQUARED. All the same problems that plague Greece, plague this country - huge national deficits and debt; high unemployment; gigantic entitlement programs; too many government employees; not enough tax revenues coming in; endless bailouts and stimulus; and pension and healthcare systems (Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid) that threaten to eat every dollar of the budget. Just the interest on our national debt is enough to destroy our economy. It's all a Greek tragedy.

America is Greece- except on a much grander scale. Our economic collapse is still a year or two down the road. Obama is laughing, celebrating, dancing and handing out gifts (stimulus, bailouts, entitlements, corporate welfare) at a big fat Greek wedding… oblivious to the coming economic Armageddon… oblivious to the madness of his plan - to triple down on spending to save us from insolvency. [more…]

Government Wastes 53 Cents of Every Dollar Spent?

By Tim Connolly

New Washington Post Poll Says Americans Now Believe Government Wastes 53 Cents of Every Dollar Spent - Can This Voter Discontent Spur a Bipartisan Compromise on Deficit Reduction, Healthcare and Tort Reform on the Table in Washington?

Can Senator Judd Gregg broker a compromise in healthcare and deficit reduction with the Obama administration and Senate Democrats? Politico reports a very interesting scenario that could attract Senate Republican support. Senator Judd Gregg has chaired the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pension Committee as well as the Budget Committee. He remains the ranking Republican on Budget and, as such, is most preoccupied with the burgeoning federal debt. Gregg has repeatedly pressed Democrats to apply the nearly $500 billion in Medicare-related savings in the House and Senate health care bills toward deficit reduction. One option for Obama would be to split the dollars, keeping half to expand health coverage and half to address the long-term solvency of the existing Medicare trust fund. [more from Tim…] [Read the Politico article here…]

Lessons Obama Should Have Learned From the Super Bowl

By Wayne Allyn Root

I am probably the only politician in America whose day job is Las Vegas oddsmaker. I’ve learned many valuable lessons from sports and sports betting. On Sunday I made a fortune for thousands of my clients by picking the New Orleans Saints’ Super Bowl upset. Obama, Reid and Pelosi might snicker, but they obviously don’t understand the difference between Vegas and Washington D.C. You know what it is? In Vegas, the drunks gamble with their own money. Maybe we need a politician in D.C. who understands the psychology of winning; who understands the motivation of risk versus reward; who has the guts to take gambles; and the courage to back his convictions with his own money, instead of the taxpayers’ money. Here are the lessons Obama should have learned from yesterday’s Super Bowl [Go Here to Wayne's lessons…]