Note – this article has been ‘stickied” to the top of the front page. Newer posts from today 6/25/2009 appear below.

While we’ve all been preoccupied with the looming healthcare reform legislation, the push for a national energy tax in the form of “cap and trade” has been steadily advancing. The latest word as of this writing is that it may be voted on in the house as early as this Friday, June 26 2009.

H.R. 2464: American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, otherwise known as the “cap and trade” bill, will further harm an already deeply troubled economy in the form of higher energy prices (gasoline, electricity, natural gas, etc…), higher prices across the board for goods and services, higher unemployment due to the increased economic burden on businesses large and small. This increased burden will undoubtedly cause businesses already on the edge to fail, and others to simply close up shop and relocate to more business-friendly parts of the world like India, Ireland and China.

The job loss estimates are in the millions. The estimated direct costs to Americans, working or not, range anywhere from $1000 to $3000+ per year per household.

The Tax Foundation has provided a Household Cap And Trade Burden Calculator to help you determine how much Cap and Trade might cost you and your family on a yearly basis

Here’s Barack Obama in his own words describing how ‘cap and trade’ will cause electric rates to ‘necessarily skyrocket’:

From heritage.org: Cap-and-Tax is a Jobs Destroyer:

Many Americans find the debate in Washington over adopting a cap-and-trade program to reduce carbon dioxide a bit confusing. It works like this: Policymakers set a cap on the amount of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that can be omitted into the atmosphere. Each power plant, factory, refinery, and other regulated entity will be allocated allowances (rights to emit) six greenhouse gases. However, only a certain percentage of the allowances will be allocated to these entities. The remaining percentage will be auctioned off or distributed to other emitting entities. Most emitters will need to purchase at least some allowances at auction. Emitters who reduce their emissions below their annual allotment can sell their excess allowances to those who do not–the trade part of cap-and-trade. Over time, the cap would be ratcheted down, requiring greater cuts in emissions

Put simply, it’s a tax on energy consumption. In fact, it would act as a huge tax. If enacted, cap-and-trade will be one of the government’s largest revenue sources within the next decade. Since 85 percent of our energy demand is met through fossil fuels, increasing the costs of energy will have significant economic consequences.

From republicanleader.house.gov:

Speaker Pelosi’s national energy tax is a massive job-killer.  According to a National Black Chamber of Commerce study, the devastating plan will cost 2.5 million American jobs thanks to the higher energy costs it will force consumers, small businesses, and other employers to pay.  The impact will be felt from coast to coast – literally.  The following chart shows the projected job loss in every single region, with especially large job losses in areas of the country already hit hard by the recession:

It is time to pick up the phone and tell your congressman in no uncertain terms to vote NO on HR 2464 !

To find your representative, go here and enter your zip code +4

Here is a complete list of congressmen/women along with their Washington, DC phone numbers. The area code for all is 202 .

Here are some tips for communicating with congress.

Further reading:

Heritage.org: CBO Grossly Underestimates Costs of Cap and Trade

NBCC Study Finds Waxman-Markey Reduces GDP by $350 Billion: New study finds Waxman-Markey could cost 2.5 million U.S. jobs by 2030 and reduce earnings

NRO: Cap and Trade vs. the American Dream

Weekly Standard: Fuzzy Math – According to an MIT study, cap and trade could cost the average household more than $3,900 per year.

Tax Foundation: Who Pays for Climate Policy? New Estimates of the Household Burden and Economic Impact of a U.S. Cap-and-Trade System

-Cnation

First, the chart. Yes, that chart..

The Obama Deficit

In case you just got off a slow boat from china, the gray graph on the left represent the Bush deficit from 2000 – 2008. The pink bars on the right represent the Obama deficit from ’09 to ’19, while the red bard represent the Congressional Budget Office’s projections for the same time period.

In 2008, the Bush deficit was just over $400 billion, and the left was absolutely rabid in their attacks on Bush for his ‘out of control spending’. Yet, Barack Obama has quadrupled the deficit in just a few short months, to the tune if 1.85 TRILLION dollars, and the left is somehow fine with it.

Well, I’m not, and neither should you be.

Obama’s deficit does include the failed (as of this writing) Stimulus and TARP programs but does not include healthcare reform, estimated to add at minimum another trillion dollars to the federal budget over the next ten years.

The misuse of TARP funds alone should have every single one of us demanding the discontinuation of the TARP program; both it and the equally failed stimulus program can still be stopped.

In an article at heritage.org, Senator Mike Johanns of Nebraska has this to say about TARP:

TARP has become a license for government to experiment with private business. How do you think the original TARP vote would have gone back in September if members knew then what they know now? Remember, TARP was first presented as a toxic asset purchasing program to revive financial markets and to get credit flowing to consumers. That is what Congress approved. That’s all Congress approved. Then it became a blank check for failing banks; and the struggling insurance giant AIG; and the floundering housing market.

Despite a December vote by Congress that rejected a bailout of the auto industry, TARP is now being used to bankroll the auto industry. How could anyone have predicted that an original plan to buy up toxic assets would be warped and twisted into the revolving slush fund it is today? People would have looked at me in disbelief if I had said – just a few months ago – that TARP funds would be used to buy General Motors. All this is happening without Congressional approval.

Or, how about this from Judicial Watch:

A few months ago TARP Inspector General Neil Barofsky published a scathing report revealing that the financial bailout has little oversight, is severely mismanaged and “inherently vulnerable to fraud, waste and abuse.” That preliminary probe led to at least 20 criminal investigations—for securities fraud, tax law violations and mortgage modification fraud—and Barofsky predicted the risk would only grow.

Now the Obama Administration is blocking Barofsky, a former federal prosecutor in New York, from further investigating what he has determined to be a troubling experiment of U.S. tax dollars. The president’s Treasury Secretary delayed at least one recent inquiry and has evidently determined that the agency (Treasury Department) Barofsky is charged with watching has legal authority over his office, which clearly threatens its independence.

The most transparent administration ever.

This president is a disgrace; his reckless fiscal policies will – by incompetence or by design, you make the call – bring our country to a state of ruin that we may never be able to undo.

People are waking up though. Congress is choking on the real-life costs and implications of this insane healthcare reform scam that O is trying to shove down our throats in that Obama Rush we all know so well. People are pissed and senators and congressmen alike are starting to see their job security slipping away. More encouraging though, just today I spoke with a staunch Obama supporter who now acknowledges and understands – at least to a degree – what this administration’s real agenda is. Two major factors in this person’s ‘awakening’, aside from the obvious problems of the deficit, rapidly rising unemployment, ACORN, and Obama’s brazen doubletalk on practically every single issue he confronts, were

1. a burgeoning knowledge of the cloward-piven strategy which, when overlaid on this administration’s actions to date and stated goals, pulls back the curtain like nothing else, and
2. this simple speech by Ronald Reagan, which I’ll post again now because it’s -just- -that- -good- and applies to the current situation perfectly. Perfectly.

Also today, Obama’s Rasmussen approval numbers dipped into negative territory for the first time ever.

Obama Approval Index Goes Negative For The First Time

While this hardly makes Obama toxic, the more negatives he can generate – and he will generate the negatives because he simply can’t hide who he really is from the masses for very much longer – the less chance he will have of ramming destructive policy after destructive policy through, and the less chance he will have of imposing his radical socialist agenda on, and thereby destroying,  the greatest country in the world.

God bless America, and save us from this president.

-Cnation

The story is starting to gain traction and credibility. Gateway Pundit has been all over this, and his most recent post provides a good launching point to a growing body of evidence.

Gateway Pundit: Hope & Change– Car Czar Behind Chrysler Closings Married to Former Dem Party Leader

Michelle Malkin is also starting to move on this, and addresses the mainstream media’s reluctance to, you know, do their job…

Michelle Malkin: Dealergate and the MSM

Stay tuned…

-Cnation

Scroll for most recent updates

This is a must-read from Gateway Pundit. It appears that of all the Chrysler dealers that are being closed down by the UAW/Obama-owned Chrysler corporation, all but one were donors to either the GOP or to Obama’s rivals (Hilary Clinton/John McCain, etc…) in the presidential primaries and election.

The implications here are staggering. Keep in mind though, we need to know the political affiliation and donor status of those dealers that remained open or who have been given the dealerships taken from others in order to come to a more informed conclusion, but on the surface, it does not look good.

There are several links and at least one video from the gatewaypundit article, please take a few moments to read/view it all.

Gateway Pundit: Hope, Change & Marxism: Did Obama Target GOP Donors In Chrysler Dealer Closings?

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Update 1, 5/27 @ 12:52am est:
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The decision to close Chrysler dealers may have come from Obama’s ‘automotive task force’, not Chrysler execs; more on the possibility of dealer selection being politically motivated.

Reuters: Plan to ax dealers not Chrysler’s decision -lawyer

Gateway Pundit: Big Dem Donor Group allowed to keep all 6 Chrysler dealerships open…. Local competitors eliminated by Obama’s task force

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Update 2, 5/27 @ 8:51am est:
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Gateway Pundit: More On Chrysler Closings– Did Team Obama Target Counties They Lost?

Hotair.com is also reporting on this: Hmmm: Chrysler dealers shut down in Obama bankruptcy are mostly Republican?

It bears repeating though, while this all looks bad on the surface, nothing has been proven yet and it may turn out to be nothing but coincidence.

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Update 3, 5/27 @ 12:29pm est:
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Gateway Pundit: Even GOP Congressman Loses Chrysler Dealership …Plus Peoria GOP Supporter Losing “5 Star” Business

Thomas Lamb:Is There a Mopargate on the Horizon?

Michelle Malkin: A look at the protected Chrysler dealerships

-Cnation

This is absolutely astounding -  Obama warning us about the dangers that lie ahead from an unsustainable deficit as though he didn’t have a direct hand in creating it…

From the LA Times:

What I’d like to do is just shift off — pivot off your question to talk about this issue of debt and deficits one more time.  During a recession of this severity it is important, as I explained, for the government to step in and fill the hole in demand that was created by consumers and by businesses, to get the economy kick-started.

But the long-term deficit and debt that we have accumulated is unsustainable.  We can’t keep on just borrowing from China, or borrowing from other countries — (applause) — because part of it is, we have to pay for — we have to pay interest on that debt. And that means that we’re mortgaging our children’s future with more and more debt, but what’s also true is that at some point they’re just going to get tired of buying our debt.

And when that happens, we will really have to raise interest rates to be able to borrow, and that will raise interest rates for everybody — on your auto loan, on your mortgage, on — so it will have a dampening effect on the economy.

So we are going to have to deal with our long-term debt.  As I said before, the biggest thing that we can do on that front is to deal with entitlements.  We are going through the budget, line by line, page by page, rooting out waste and abuse. more……

This is a man who knows he has over half the country fully duped.

What he is doing here is preemptively addressing what conservatives, economists, and the CBO have been trying to tell everyone for the last several months, that the reckless Obama budget, in concert with the ‘stimulus’ package and the financial black hole of TARP spending, is on track to cause tremendous damage to our economy by ‘stimulating’ inflation, interest rates, and necessary, massive tax increases across the board.

Just a recap:

The deficit under George W Bush: 400 billion
The deficit under Obama – 1.85 trillion (that’s one thousand eight hundred fifty billion)(!)

Here’s a chart comparing past and projected federal budget deficits:

The Obama Deficit

It’s things like this that make one wonder if “Barack” is Kenyan for “large brass balls”….

Gateway Pundit has more

…..

-Cnation