congress

March 18, 2010 - The economy is terrible. Even with the supposed recovery that elected officials keep talking about, there is little evidence of new jobs. This combined with other monumental issues that include healthcare reform, border control and talk of global warming are putting fire in the blood of average citizens. Citizens who have never seriously thought about running for public office. Citizens who have little or nothing in the way of campaign funds but who have the heart to believe that they can make a difference. Citizens who are fed up with the idea that Washington should be legislating everything from which doctor you use to how much sugar you should consume. People are angry and it is beginning to show. Dave Corsi is one of them.

If you have never heard of Dave Corsi, you can be forgiven. He is running for Congress on the Republican ticket for the New Jersey's 12^th District. He says that he leans more towards Libertarian views. In most years, he wouldn't stand a chance. There are certain states in which conservatives have been hunted to near extinction. New Jersey is one of them. But within the past few months and against all odds the state did elect a Republican governor. Like I said before. People are angry.

Corsi is the underdog in his race. In his own words, "I'm not the favorite son." He doesn't have the big funding of some of his rivals but he's running a grassroots campaign that he can be proud of.

March 3, 2010 - Tomorrow morning, the latest job numbers are due to be released by the federal government. They are expected to be bleak and the White House is now in full-on finger pointing mode. But they aren't pointing the finger where you might think. They're not blaming those pesky Republicans or tea baggers. They're not singling out individual members of Congress that they consider to be obstructionist. No, they are blaming the weather; specifically the snow fall that has blanketed much of the country. Who would have thought that with global warming being such a big problem that snow could possibly result in an additional 100,000 or so job losses? Maybe we should track down Al Gore to explain how this all works!

All kidding aside, the White House is running as fast as it can to distance itself from the latest job numbers and they are blaming the weather. Larry Summers, an economic advisor to the President told CNBC that, "The blizzards that affected much of the country during the last month are likely to distort the statistics."

February 22, 2010 - Every ten years, the Constitution mandates a federal Census. The data collected in the Census is used by the federal government to allocate resources to the states and to change the make-up of Congress. States that gain a lot of new residents will gain congressional seats and those that lose a lot of residents will lose seats. But what would happen if conservatives in liberal leaning states said that they didn't want to be counted in the Census? Could a targeted effort shift the House of Representatives to the right and actually reduce the size of the US Government?

This month, the US Census Bureau kicked off a massive - some would say stupid - advertising campaign with a Super Bowl Commercial. The campaign continues with advertising in print and even during the Olympic Games with nonsensical commercials that make a rather lame attempt at being comedic as they spend millions of tax dollars for air time and production. They are also running a bevy of radio ads. The goal is to have everyone fill out a Census form; something that we are all required to do by law.

This morning, President Obama stood before the cameras and announced that the most recent unemployment numbers released show that the economy is improving. According to those numbers, the unemployment rate dipped to 9.7%; down from 10% last month. But at the same time these numbers were released the government also said that there were fewer people employed in January than there were in December. So how is it possible that with fewer people working that the unemployment rate is also down? The answer is that it isn't possible unless the government tinkers with the numbers. And that is exactly what they are doing.

Who says you can't have your cake and eat it too? Someone needs to tell that to the number crunchers at the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). They have found a way to take people off the rolls of the unemployed, even though they are not working. At least, that is what they want you to think. And it is especially what the President and members of Congress want you to believe.

When the BLS compiles unemployment numbers, it adds new claims for unemployment. At the same time, it subtracts discouraged workers. A discouraged worker is someone who wants to work but who has not been able to find a job and who has given up looking. According to the BLS's own numbers, when you include discouraged workers in the unemployment numbers, current unemployment numbers are above 18%. But even that doesn't tell the entire story.