Well it’s the first week of April.
It looks as though we might FINALLY be coming out of the not-too-bad- but-still-entirely-too-long-winter we’ve had.
No sooner does spring commence and we’re upon Tax Day.
All procrastinating on tax filing aside, another, I think bigger, question is when will we hit Tax Freedom Day?
This is the first day of the year when we have in theory earned enough income to fund our annual tax burden. Based on last year’s calculation, we Americans labored until April 17 before our earnings were our own.
With so much of our year gobbled up by laboring for a tax bill, the next question really has to be, are we getting our money’s worth?
To be fair, Tax Freedom Day is figured on all levels of government, and to be sure there is imperfection on all those levels.
But as we plummet as a nation at break-neck speed down the tubes to the really very undesirable place at which I’m sure Greece and Cyprus wish they had not crashed and burned into, a number of this week’s headlines demand noting when pondering whether we’re getting our money’s worth at the federal level.
Spring comes, temperatures rise, plants bloom and the U.S. goes further off track.
This week in Barack Obama history offered a plentitude of fodder for late night comedy writers, but sadly it provided tons more for U.S. taxpayers who foot the bill to shake their collective head and go, “Really?”
“Obama Names Himself ‘Scientist-in-Chief’” was an April 2 headline at the Weekly Standard.
From the piece:
“At a speech this morning at the White House to outline a new science initiative, President Barack Obama named himself "Scientist-in-Chief."
"I’m glad I’ve been promoted Scientist-in-Chief," Obama said to laughter at the White House. "Given my grades in physics, I’m not sure it’s deserving. But I hold science in proper esteem, so maybe that gives me a little credit."
Obama said he brought together a lot of smart people, which would help grow the economy.
Hmmmmm. Obama joking about his having had poor grades.
For someone who’s worked harder at nothing so much, and at the same time expended so many resources, to hide his background information, including college transcripts, this joke, in addition to being a fail, is in poor taste.
Love though how the article goes on after his pitiful joke to report that Obama said he brought together a lot of smart people, as though this was in contrast to he, himself.
Further, Obama said he brought together a lot of smart people to help grow the economy; clearly yet another leftward leaning shell game with his dismal leadership in this area during both his terms.
Then there’s:
“But I hold science in proper esteem, so maybe that gives me a little credit."
After the left skewered Sarah Palin for saying she could see Russia from her house, I demand to know where Katie Couric and her snotty liberal elitist excuse for journalism are now? Really, I want to know.
This not-ready-for-primetime yammer on the part of the president should at last render the fabricated illusion of his eloquence null and void. But it won’t.
Breitbart.com reported April 4 that jobless claims have hit a four-month high.
Also in the news this week, pick your outlet, poverty levels in the U.S. are the worst in 50 years.
How’s that hope and change thing working for you?
Actually, we needn’t wait for the immediate zinging of the flinging of the, “We inherited this mess,” recording from the Obama machine. In case you’ve missed all of the scare tactics they’ve employed of late, believe it or not it appears they’ve moved on and for them sequestration is the new George W. Bush.
Memo to Barack Obama as he “Air Force One’s” between Democrat fundraisers and another vacation: The whole redistribution of wealth thing is not only NOT working, it’s immoral. Oh, and while you were out, North Korea called. They’ve effectively declared war on us.
At one of those fancy fundraisers this week, the president called California’s Attorney General Kamala Harris, “the best looking attorney general,” ABC News, April 4, which is really only humorous because his wife was over in Burlington Vermont mistakenly telling CBS News she was a “busy single mother.”
Um, where are the cries about the war on women? This sexist, unprofessional and inappropriate remark should have drawn out the feminist legion. So far: crickets.
Mr. President, the Attorney General of California is somebody’s daughter. Don’t you have any better respect for women than that?
Barack Obama said in defense of his promotion of abortion that if either of his daughters got pregnant he wouldn’t want them punished with a baby. You read that right.
I don’t want my daughters punished with a Barack Obama.
Did you hear this one?
The President has proclaimed the month of April National Financial Capability Month.
What is National Financial Capability Month? It’s the federal government helping individuals and families make more accurate budgets.
From the April 1 Breitbart.com report:
“The proclamation reads "My Administration continues to encourage responsibility at all levels of our financial system by cracking down on deceptive practices and ensuring that consumers are informed of their rights."
This from the man who made history for being the first U.S. president to not pass a budget in his first term, whose budget in the last year of that term was voted down 97-0, not garnering one vote, even from his own party.
This as well from the man whose current budget will not only not balance in the next 10 years, it will add an additional $5 trillion to the national debt during that same time frame.
And this from the man who went on David Letterman during the 2012 campaign to yuk it up over Lord knows what, but when asked point blank what the figure of the national debt was, he didn’t know.
Numerous news outlets have reported about the sermon at the Easter Sunday service Obama attended with his family at St. John Episcopal Church in Washington.
During the sermon Rev. Dr. Luis Leon preached:
“The captains of the religious right are always calling us back, back, back. For blacks to be back in the back of the bus, for women to be back in the kitchen, for gays to be in the closet and for immigrants to be on their side of the border,” Leon said. “What you and I understand is that when Jesus says you can’t hang onto me, he says you know it’s not about the past, it’s not about the before, it’s not about the way things were but about the way things can be in the now.”
Happy Easter to you too.
And I’m sure after the Resurrection when Jesus said to Mary Magdalene, “Do not hold me,” he meant that conservatives were bigots for opposing Barack Obama’s ideology.
Now just as with Jeremiah Wright, is Obama responsible for what his preacher says to his congregation?
No, but I venture the assertion that much more pertinent questions are:
Why does the president keep showing up where such bias and hatred are preached? Or are preachers affected by having the president in the house and then simply preaching what they think he wants to hear? Are we really supposed to believe the president sat through 20 years of Wright’s rants and none of that rubbed off? He was there all that time because he DIDN’T espouse those same views? If we are to buy Obama’s claims he never heard Wright hollering the hateful things he did, then what does that say about his attendance at his church?
Oh, that’s right, the media deemed Wright a non-issue, yesterday’s news, can’t talk about that.
So how about then, what Barack and Michelle Obama did to this year’s White House Easter Egg Roll?
After first holding the treasured tradition hostage for the purpose of crying wolf on sequestration “White House warns Easter Egg Roll could be canceled” – cnn.com, March 19, the venerable custom honoring the highest Christian Holy Day was turned into an imposed commercial for Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move!” crusade (“First Lady Turns Easter Egg Roll Into White House ‘Fat Camp’” – cnsnews.com, March 28).
One of my children was used to fill the seats at Wells Fargo Arena when the Let’s Move circus came to town. The firsthand report was clear that it wasn’t a good use of time or resources.
Mike Huckabee played audio of the Obamas from the White House “Easter” event on his radio program this week.
Easter was not mentioned.
A vague reference to “sending a message upstairs” for good weather was however, as were some vacuous niceties before the first lady told the children in attendance, “kids, eat your vegetables, okay?”
Oh but hey, the Easter Bunny was there, and the event also included a “Yoga Garden.”
So really, this first week of April 2013 is no different than any other in that you can’t swing a bag of those bad Michelle Obama Happy Meal apples without hitting instances of gaffes and scandals from this administration.
No, we’re not getting our money’s worth.
And given the fact that this last shameful fiasco mentioned took place April 1, I’d like to say it was all a colossal April Fool’s Joke. The only thing is, the joke runs from January 20, 2009 to January 20, 2017, and it’s on us.
Photo Credit: Christopher Dilts for Obama for America via Flickr (CC-By-NC-SA 2.0)