Legal Tab for Lehman Bros. Bankruptcy: $1 Billion+

Just 19 or so months after filing for bankruptcy, the failed Lehman Bros. investment house has been hit with $730 million in attorneys' charges. And these are fees due the attorneys working for Lehman, not against.

It's estimated that the total legal tab for the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history may well top $1 billion.

It's not hard to figure out why: In one month, a single attorney charged $2,100 for limo services. Another $263,000 was billed for photocopies over a four-month period. Leaving a message came in at a mere $48.

At least one segment of the American economy--bankruptcy lawyers--seems to be making out like bandits in the Great Recession.

The SEC: Surfing Porn While Rome Burns

An inspector general has submitted a report to Congress highlighting senior staffers at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) surfing their work computers for porn while the economy and financial markets were crashing all around them.

They even got so desperate ingenious as to figure out ways (by using Google images, for instance) around the computer's firewall designed to block pornographic material.

The inspector conducted 33 probes of individuals, 16 of whom were senior staff earning as much as $222,418 a year.

A senior attorney, who agreed to resign when confronted, often spent eight hours downloading porn. Once his hard drive was full, he burned the material to DVDs and CDs.

An accountant who used Google images amassed a huge collection of porn on his hard drive despite the firewall. When discovered, he was slapped on the wrist and given a 14-day suspension (with pay? I wonder).

Interestingly, the number of violators grew from two to 16 from 2007 to mid-2008, just as the financial markets were collapsing.

At least the SEC wasn't asleep at the wheel. Instead, its staff was distracted by more pleasurable pursuits than cracking down on fraud.

Gee, Surprise! Majority Favors Health Care Repeal

A whopping 58 percent of Americans favors repeal of the recent health care (so-called) reform package, but at the same time 59 percent of those favoring repeal thinks the public option is essential and 51 percent of the same repealees wants to see Congress continue to work on reform efforts.

Most opposed to the health reform measure signed March 23 are those in the oh-so-healthy group of 18- to 34-year-olds.

The results were obtained from a survey taken April 6-10 by the Indiana University's Center for Health Policy and Professionalism Research in Indianapolis.

Overall, just 10 percent of Democrats favor repeal while 96 percent of Republicans and 56 percent of independents are in favor.

"Many have assumed that those advocating for repeal in polls wanted Congress to take no action on healthcare reform until the law was abolished. However, we find that 48 percent of Americans actually are supportive of Congress continuing to work on the healthcare system reforms as opposed to focusing on any other topic," notes Dr. Aaron Carroll, director of the center.

Translation: Most people still want Congress to come up with "free health care," courtesy of the deep pockets of Uncle Sam and of every voter other than themselves.

Tax Rates to Pay Off the National Debt

Here's what you and I would have to pay if the government decided to tax at the rates necessary to pay off the national debt:

Current Tax Rate (left)

New Rate Required (right)

10% 24.3%
15% 36.4%
25% 60.6%
28% 67.9%
33% 80.0%
35% 84.9%

Nuff said.

You Can't Kill It: EFCA Reintroduced in Congress

Despite the fact that there simply aren't enough votes in the Senate to end a filibuster on it, the Employee Forced Free Choice Act (EFCA) was reintroduced in both the House and the Senate on March 10.

The original corporate destroyers sponsors did the dirty work reintroductions: Representative George Miller of The People's Republic of California and Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa.

In case you've been in slumberland for a few years, the EFCA does away with organizing elections and forces unions on companies once more than 50 percent of their employees are forced to sign organizing cards. Then, it sics an arbitrator on the company to impose a collective bargaining agreement once the owners reject the outlandish demands of the union thugs bosses.

Might all be moot now anyway, what with Craig Becker on the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). Though he denied it during confirmation hearings, Becker believes the NLRB can simply impose EFCA-like provisions without congressional action.

One way or another, look for this monster to keep rearing its ugly head. (No, I wasn't referring to Becker, but....)

The Constitution Under Obama = Non-Existent

This graphic pretty much sums up how dictators rule as president:

Penalty? Obamacare Encourages Un-Insurance

Obamacare turns out to be a big "whoop-de-doo" for the nation's larger/largest employers, who are threatened with fines for not providing insurance for their employees, while small businesses are lured into providing insurance through subsidies.

In a nutshell, Obamacare offers up penalties for companies with 50 or more employees but subsidies for those with fewer.

However, if you examine the penalties, these larger employers could reap a windfall in profits by dropping insurance and throwing their employees on the mercy of government subsidies and their own pocketbooks to buy their own insurance.

First, off penalties don't kick in until a) one employee qualifies for a government subsidy to buy insurance and b) you toss out the first 30 employees, who are "penalty-free." Thus, say a company has 130 employees, the employer drops his health plan, and thereafter one or more employees qualify for a government subsidy. The employer will now be on the hook for a $750 fine for 100 employees (total workforce minus the 30-person threshold). Divided by 12 months, this comes out to $6,250 a month ($750 times 100 divided by 12).

Compare that to what he previously paid on insurance. Let's say the average employer portion of the health insurance tab each month was $250 (which seems low). That works out to $32,500 a month (130 employees times $250). This employer is now saving $26,250 a month by dropping his health plan. Even if he splits this with his employers in the form of a raise, he's still left with a tidy profit of $13,250 a month for complying with Obamacare mandates. That's a nice $159,000 a year he didn't have before.

Obamacare, don't you love it?

Let's face it--the whole point of the carrot-stick approach of Obamacare is to throw the nation's health insurance business into chaos, so the Obamacrats can come back and say: "See. We need Medicare for all."

By the dawn of the next decade, we can thus post signs, "Welcome to the Banana Republic of America." And then we can stand in line for health care we'll never get--but the politicians and fat cats will.

Even If You're Not Unionized, You Are Now

As if the health care takeover by the Obamacrats weren't enough to bankrupt the nation, the Department of Labor (DOL)--under Obamaic tutelage--is now forcing all companies vying for a government contract to treat their employees as if they were unionized--or not get the contract.

Which means, most likely, that only union companies will get contracts henceforth.

The DOL already dictates hourly pay for those under government contract using the principle of the "prevailing wage" in the industry and area where the work is being done. Of course, this is just shorthand for paying union wages.

On top of this, new criteria will now be applied to contract-seeking companies in the areas of paid days off, health care and other benefits.

The prevailing wage ploy already costs the nation about $10 billion a year extra that it wouldn't have to pay were true competitive bidding allowed.

Things on the labor front will now only get worse, even as health care gets scarcer and scarcer once the government realizes it can't pay its share (which it already knows from running Medicare, but the latest ruse is meant to cover that up until at least the end of Obama's hoped-for ((we hope not)) second term).

Welcome to the Endless Recession.

First GM and Chrysler (and California), Now USPS

First, our nation's glorious unions with their insatiable greed took down General Motors and Chrysler and forced them into becoming wards of the state (to say nothing of what they've done and continue to do to the State of California, which is essentially bankrupt), and now the United States Postal Service is about to go under as well.

Ending Saturday service is just a charade. Sure, it may save some operating costs, but the biggest problem with the USPS (and California and GM and Chrysler) is its unfunded, sky-high pension promises--all made to quell a restive union begging for ever-more handouts to justify collecting union dues and squandering them on political and personal power plays.

Here's a nice summary encapsualization of everything from the Las Vegas Review-Journal:

About half of the Postal Service’s 600,000 workers are eligible to retire in the next 10 years. They can’t be laid off, their growing salaries can’t be scaled back, and their pensions and health care subsidies are essentially a property right. Although new union contracts will be negotiated this year and next, Mr. Potter freely admits that next to nothing can be done to control Postal Service personnel costs.

Unions have hijacked the airline industry, sent automakers into a ditch and all but bankrupted states and local governments. Now they’re hastening the demise of this country’s mail service.

Union Approval Rating Plunges to 25-Year Low

You can dot the i's and cross the t's when viewing this graph showing poll results of public approval of unions, which has now hit a 25-year low, but think EFCA, Big Three, Congress and Barack Obama when doing so:

Dems Hope to 'Unionize' All Federal Contracts

If they can't get enough votes to pass the egregious Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), left-ish Democrats can get the White House and Department of Labor (DOL) to rig the rules so only union contractors get fed jobs.

The vehicle for this would replace the current institution of the prevailing wage, whereby the DOL dictates what wages must be paid for each contract, adjusted for the cost of living in the location of the work. However, this is evidently not enough for the left and its cronies in the unions. Now they want a "living" wage (presumably much higher than a prevailing wage), along with health and other benefits, sick days, and ad nauseum.

Here's a good explanation from what's called the EFCA Blog:

Labor and the White House are reportedly contemplating new rules – which have not yet been made public – to give unionized employers an advantage. Called the 'High Road Contracting Policy,' it would require the DOL (and all federal agencies) to create new bureaucracies to assess the labor-friendliness of bidding contractors. 'Prevailing wage' would be supplemented with standards of a 'living' wage, health insurance, employer-paid retirement benefits, paid sick days, and possibly more. Agency officials would give a subjective preference to contractors providing these higher levels of compensation. Applying these standards to those of area union contracts would instantly benefit union contractors.

Democracy in action.

Illinois Worst When It Comes to Raiding Pensions

Illinois (and I'm sure California is neck and neck) has been rated the worst state in managing (read: looting) its public employee pension trust funds--to the tune of $54 billion (which pales in comparison to the Feds' $1 trillion, reported here yesterday).

At least Ahnold in California attempted to convert public employees to 401(k)s like the rest of us, but for that he was lynched politically by the unions. Since that time in 2005, the trust funds must've rung up another $10 billion or so in unfunded liabilities, but do you think the unions care that the voters are going to have to pay for this with higher taxes? Nah....

Dems Continue to Loot Trust, Retirement Funds

In a startling post yesterday, it was revealed that Congress since 1983 has raided every penny--$2.5 trillion's worth--earmarked for the Social Security Trust Fund. Meaning that, starting in 2016 when Social Security taxes won't be enough to pay for those already drawing on their retirement, Congress will have to raise taxes, borrow more money, lower benefits, or end the program.

Worse, the Social Security Act grants Congress sole discretion to revise or cancel the program at any time, while the Supreme Court has ruled that no one is entitled to Social Security benefits.

Now catch this juicy bit of news.

Congress has likewise screwed federal government workers and military personnel out of their pension funds to the tune of $1 trillion. In the first three months of fiscal 2010, Congress looted $65 billion from these retirement trust funds while taking every penny of Social Security receipts as well. In all, in that one quarter the U.S. government looted or borrowed $400 billion.

All this, of course, is in the name of buying votes to stay in office.

Think you can retire? Think again. Uncle Sam wants you to die on the job.

Really.

EFCA by Stealth or Fiat?

In one of the few votes being taken this week in the U.S. Senate (due to inclement weather), Craig Becker was filibustered out of a chance to be voted into office with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), though I'm sure the cloture vote will be taken again, maybe many times.

Once ensconced at the NLRB, Becker hopes to issue diktats to implement the provisions of the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), bypassing both Congress (where there aren't enough votes) and the Constitution (where it says you need Congress to vote).

Anyway, it all may be moot since rumor has it that the Dems have slipped EFCA language into the looming "jobs bill," which is probably not even a jobs bill but a bunch of pork for the cronies back home.

Anyway, I thought this cartoon pretty well summed up the consequences of EFCA and "card check."

Reward for Getting It Wrong: More $$$ for AHRQ

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), America's equivalent of the draconian National Institute for Clinical Health (NICE) in Great Britain, saw its budget increased multifold by the Obama stimulus plan--with a cool $1 billion in funding. Now, after getting the data wrong on women under 50 not needing mammograms, the agency is being rewarded with another increase of $640 million.

AHRQ is tasked with comparing medical treatments and coming up with the best (i.e., cheapest) method that works (sometimes and maybe even just partially, but it looks good on paper) for each disease and condition. This is called comparative effectiveness research (CER). CER lay behind the data given the United States Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF), which then issued a fiat that no woman under 50 be given a mammogram.

Of course, this was immediately denounced by every field-operative medical professional on the face of the earth, and the Obama administration just shrugged off the ban as being based on the "best available science."

One wonders which dictionary they used for the definition of "best."

Meanwhile, over at the National Institutes of Health (another government agency), Director Francis Collins, who helped mapped the human genome, worries that AHRQ has it all backwards, saying that the AHRQ and its CER approach wrongfully consider "everybody equivalent, which we know they are not."

In other words, "one size fits all" doesn't work in medicine, but it's a NICE solution for an agency charged with bending the health care curve through "scientific"-based evidence for rationing and denial of service.

A death panel, are ye, AHRQ?

London's Heathrow Implements Body Scanners

Anybody traveling out of Heathrow Airport in London will now be subject to screening by a body scanner (see image of results).

The new screening equipment was installed after the Amsterdam-to-Detroit bombing attempt by a Nigerian national, who slipped through security with body bombs.

"Given the current security threat level, the government believes it essential to start introducing scanners immediately," said Transport Secretary Andrew Adonis.

Britain raised its terrorism threat level to "severe," the second-highest level, on January 22, days before London was due to host two international conferences on Yemen and Afghanistan. The conferences took place last week without any security incident.

What are the odds the sexiest women are routinely--but invariably--body scanned?

SEIU Voters for Scott Brown

Here's an interesting photo (courtesy of Michelle Malkin) of SEIU members flouting the will of Union Czar Andy Stern in yesterday's Massachusetts vote for U.S. Senator:

WHO Flu Pandemic a Colossal Hoax

The question remains, "Who paid off the World Health Organization and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to push a influenza pandemic hoax on the world?"

It's not that there weren't enough warning signs that the pandemic declaration was at best overstated and at worst a downright fraud.

First, ABC did an investigative piece on the evidence and discovered that only a very small percentage of so-called swine flu victims even had any sort of flu. Most had the sniffles. That story went largely unreported by the Obamaniacal liberal media.

Now, buried in the CDC's FluView is the faint admission: "The proportion of deaths attributed to pneumonia and influenza was below the epidemic threshold."

Hats off to Poland for refusing to buy into the hoax and enrich Big Pharma by stockpiling vaccines that could still end up producing horrendous side effects down the road.

As it turns out, because those exposed to the swine flu develop an immunity to the seasonal flu, flu deaths worldwide will be lower this season than before H1N1 was declared a worldwide threat.

As health and science journalist Michael Fumento has written:

The media are finally beginning to admit that the World Health Organization's "pandemic" -- made possible, as I've argued before, only by completely redefining the definition for political reasons -- is the mildest ever. Several European countries have cut back their vaccine orders, and the chairman of the influential health committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, who is an epidemiologist, has asked the body to investigate what he calls the WHO's "false pandemic" and "one of the greatest medicine scandals of the century."

Health Care Reform=Mandates and New Taxes

Happy New Year, or should I say welcome to the year of many new taxes?

Let's start with so-called health care reform. Whether or not the final, reconciled House-Senate bill includes a tax on so-called "Cadillac health plans" or a tax on so-called "wealthy individuals" (who make $250K or more, which is hardly wealthy), the Medicare portion of your Social Security taxes is set to leap. If you work for yourself, the Medicare portion goes to 3.8 percent (up from 2.9); if you employ others, your employer share of Medicare taxes rises to 2.45 percent from 1.35.

Starting in 2014, if you don't have a qualifying health insurance plan (the individual mandate that candidate Obama opposed but now embraces as president), you will be assessed a fine of up to $1,485.

Now, here's a real job killer: If you own a company that doesn't offer health insurance, and if even one of your employees qualifies for a government health care subsidy, you'll have to pay a $750 assessment to the government for every worker on your payroll.

And this is just the beginning. Blogger Wintery Knight has more details.