Jane Chastain : Politically Direct

Who will be the “ideal” Mitt Romney running mate?  Will it be a tea party favorite,  someone from a swing state, someone who will offer either gender or racial diversity or both?  You can forget all that.    It has already been decided by . . . Barack Obama.

The president has made it clear that he is running, not against Mitt Romney, but against Paul Ryan’s budget, which Mr. Romney has embraced.  Obama and his minions are making the case that  if Mr. Romney is smart he will do his best to distance himself from Ryan’s “heartless” approach.  Furthermore, they warn that Romney’s biggest mistake would be to make the chairman of the House Budget Committee his running mate.

As in Hamlet, methinks they do protest too much!  What they really fear, is a Romney – Ryan ticket.  It would be the Democrats’ worst nightmare! Read the rest of this entry »

President Obama is trying to shore up the youth vote, one of his most reliable voting blocs in the 2008 election.   He is visiting colleges campuses in swing states and appeared with late night comedy host Jimmy Fallon in the wee hours Wednesday.

There isn’t as much laughter now from the college set and just being a cool dude who loves basketball isn’t going to be enough to impress the 18-29 crowd this time around.  Many of those voters have grown too weary looking for work to be swayed by his youthful appearance or empty promises about “hope and change” because most have neither. Read the rest of this entry »

There are certain words that most people consider unacceptable in polite conversation.  Most of them have four letters.  Thus they are commonly referred to as four-letter words.

Monday night, in the GOP presidential debate in South Carolina, Newt Gingrich used one of those four-letter words.  He did not get bleeped.  In fact, he got a standing ovation after using it again and again and again.  The word was W-O-R-K.

Over the years, the left has demonized those of us who would dare use this word in a polite discussion of poverty and welfare, so much so that most people simply have eliminated it from their vocabulary.   Read the rest of this entry »

“U.S. files for Chapter 11!”

That should be the headline the day after the new president takes over next January.  Chapter 11 is not bankruptcy, per se,  it is a chance to reorganize.

When a business is unable to service its debt or pay its creditors, the business or its creditors can file with a federal bankruptcy court for protection while this reorganization takes place.   During this process, all existing contracts may be cancelled and assets are sold in an attempt to put the company on the road to recovery.   This week, we learned that the U.S. debt is now equal to the size of the entire U.S. economy.   Read the rest of this entry »

Ronald Reagan correctly stated that the nine most terrifying words in the English language are “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”

The very last thing we need is a new government agency micromanaging the financial decisions of banks, businesses and individuals. We already have seven powerful entities tasked with the oversight of the banking, lending and investment industries.

We have the Federal Reserve. We have the Comptroller of the Currency. We have the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. We have the Securities and Exchange Commission. We have the Commodities Futures Trading Commission. We have the National Credit Union Administration and the Federal Housing Finance Agency. They have done such a wonderful job. Just look at the mess we’re in!

Now, the Obama Administration and the Democrats have given us a new, onerous, unaccountable regulatory agency with virtually unlimited power to control all of our money that isn’t hidden under a rock somewhere. It’s called the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. If you are the least bit familiar with Washington, the name alone is enough to leave you shaking in your boots. Read the rest of this entry »