Puterbac News Network and Political Discussion Thread

[bluetick]

..that's what she said

[Professor Tiger]

Nah. Last month hundreds of gang members followed their tweets and suddenly converged on one of the city beaches. The new police chief panicked and shut the beach down.

[TheBigMook]

It's never too hot for a gang bang.

[TheBigMook]

Mook had some good ideas re the food stamp issue but I'm not sure he wasn't being facetious.

Never. I was just trying to propose a last, concluding, ultimate solution.

[DooKSucks]

Record breaking heat here. And it's not like it's generally cool in NC.

This week has been brutal. The beginning of last week was brutal too, but last weekend was absolutely gorgeous. Sadly, we're stuck with the weekend being in the 100's too.

[puterbac]

The Half-Trillion Plan
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By Charles Krauthammer,

In my view, the Half-Trillion is best: It is clean, straightforward, yields real cuts, averts the current crisis and provides until year-end to negotiate a bigger deal. At the same time, it punctures President Obama’s thus far politically successful strategy of proposing nothing in public, nothing in writing, nothing with numbers, while leaking through a pliant press supposed offers of surpassing scope and reasonableness.

As part of this pose, Obama had threatened to veto any short-term debt-ceiling hike. Which has become Obama’s most vulnerable point. Is the catastrophe of default preferable to a deal that gives us, say, five months to negotiate something more significant — because it doesn’t get Obama through Election Day?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ ... story.html

[puterbac]

As debt talks continue, feds are hiring -- and never firing

By: Byron York | Chief Political Correspondent Follow Him @ByronYork | 07/20/11 8:27 AM

A new analysis of federal workforce data shows that even in this time of retrenchment and downsizing, the federal government almost never fires or lays off workers. In fact, in many corners of the federal government, it is virtually impossible for an employee to be fired. "Federal employees' job security is so great that workers in many agencies are more likely to die of natural causes than get laid off or fired," writes USA Today, which conducted the survey.

The paper reports the federal government "fired 0.55% of its workers in the budget year that ended September 30." For the private sector, the figure is about 3%. And for some parts of the federal workforce, the firing rate was even lower. For example, USA Today found that federal workers in the Washington, DC area have 99.74% job security. Some agencies, like the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Trade Commission, did not fire or lay off anyone in the last year.



Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/bel ... z1SZVQhNzx

[puterbac]

JEFF REEVES Archives | Email alerts

July 21, 2011, 12:01 a.m. EDT

Why we’ll have 10% unemployment soon

Commentary: 3 key sectors show just how weak job market is

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/why-we ... e_carousel

[puterbac]

Home Depot Co-Founder: Obama Is Choking Recovery

By JOHN MERLINE, INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY

Posted 07/20/2011 06:35 PM ET


Bernie Marcus co-founded Home Depot (HD) in 1978 and brought it public in 1981 as the U.S. was suffering from the worst recession and unemployment in 40 years. The company thrived, creating hundreds of thousands of jobs and redefining home improvement retailing.

But Marcus says Home Depot "would never have succeeded" if it launched today due to onerous regulation. He recently helped launch the Job Creators Alliance, a Dallas-based nonprofit of CEOs and entrepreneurs dedicated to preserving the free enterprise system. IBD recently spoke to him about jobs and the economy.

IBD: What's the single biggest impediment to job growth today?


Bernie Marcus: Red over rules. View Enlarged Image

Marcus: The U.S. government. Having built a small business into a big one, I can tell you that today the impediments that the government imposes are impossible to deal with. Home Depot would never have succeeded if we'd tried to start it today. Every day you see rules and regulations from a group of Washington bureaucrats who know nothing about running a business. And I mean every day. It's become stifling.

If you're a small businessman, the only way to deal with it is to work harder, put in more hours, and let people go. When you consider that something like 70% of the American people work for small businesses, you are talking about a big economic impact.

IBD: President Obama has promised to streamline and eliminate regulations. What's your take?

Marcus: His speeches are wonderful. His output is absolutely, incredibly bad. As he speaks about cutting out regulations, they are now producing thousands of pages of new ones. With just ObamaCare by itself, you have a 2,000 page bill that's probably going end up being 150,000 pages of regulations.

IBD: Washington has been consumed with debt talks. Is this the right focus now?

Marcus: They are all tied together. If we don't lower spending and if we don't deal with paying down the debt, we are going to have to raise taxes. Even brain-dead economists understand that when you raise taxes, you cost jobs.

IBD: If you could sit down with Obama and talk to him about job creation, what would you say?

Marcus: I'm not sure Obama would understand anything that I'd say, because he's never really worked a day outside the political or legal area. He doesn't know how to make a payroll, he doesn't understand the problems businesses face. I would try to explain that the plight of the busi nessman is very reactive to Washington. As Washington piles on regulations and mandates, the impact is tremendous. I don't think he's a bad guy. I just think he has no knowledge of this.

IBD: Why don't more businesses speak out?

Marcus: They are frightened to death — frightened that they will have the IRS or SEC on them. In my 50 years in business, I have never seen executives of major companies who were more intimidated by an administration.

IBD: What's your message to the business community?

Marcus: It's time to stand up and fight. These people in Washington are out there making your life difficult, and many of you won't survive. Why aren't you doing something about it? The free enterprise system made this country what it is today, and we've got to keep it alive. We are on the edge of the abyss.

At the Job Creators Alliance, we're trying to recruit people who are willing to step up and say: " I've had it. There's no one representing me. I want to be out there and fight."

[Toemeesleather]

You'd think all this record heat would spurn a category 5 or two.




....least that's what we were told in '05.

[bluetick]

LOL @ HD chief singing the blues

Jan 2009 HD share price: 21.00
July 2011 HD share price: 36.71

Home Depot Raised 2010 Outlook, Predicts Growth for 2011
by Melly Alazracki, AOL Money & News 12/08.2010

Home Depot (HD) raised it's 2010 outlook and expects both sales and profits to rise next year with the addition of news stores, the company said in a statement. The nation's biggest home improvement retailer expects sales to rise approximately 2.3% to $67.72 billion for the current year, up from a previously projected 2.2% gain, and slightly better than analysts' estimates. The company also foresees earnings per share from continuing operations increasing by approximately 27% to $1.97 for the year.

In 2011, Home Depot expects sales to grow between 2% and 2.5% and expects operating margin improvement of approximately 30 to 40 percentage points. The company predicts earnings per share from continuing operations growth before share repurchases in the 7% to 9% range, and after share repurchases in the 11-13% range, or between $2.19 and $2.23 a share. Home Depot is planning to use extra cash to make about $2.5 billion in share repurchases.

[bluetick]

The S&P 500 is up 80% from January 2009. You would think these CEOs rolled up their sleeves and joined their workers on the assembly lines by the way some of them talk. Truth is they've found a way to do more with less - more production means more hours for those anxious to hold their job, with less off-time and benefits. It's pre-2007 without so many of those pesky dependants on the work rolls.

So now we're being introduced to a whole new kind of collective bargaining. CEOs will bargain jobs to the nation for turning oprama out of office. It's not a threat - well, maybe it is - but it's more of an inducement. Change the administration, they're saying, and we'll "get off the sidelines" and start hiring again. It'll be good for the 9.2 at home, and it'll be good for those who've shouldered the load after the layoffs. And it will end all of the (heh)fear and uncertainty that this so-called president has wrought on American business...regardless what the numbers say.

[Toemeesleather]

Hope + change + $800 gazillion = 9.2%

[bluetick]

What a joke. Just look at the questions that "reporter" posed to the Home Depot CEO.

How about something along the lines of: "Mr. Marcus, by all accounts HD is doing boffo business and you are repurchasing shares of your company as fast as you can... you're REALLY not pissing your pants in fear of oprama, are you?

In fact, you seem to want to pee on my leg and tell me it's raining.."

[Toemeesleather]

In fact, you seem to want to pee on my leg and tell me it's raining.."



"...shovel ready didn't turn out to be shovel-ready..."

[Toemeesleather]

From this past February...


Home Depot has announced it will hire more than 60,000 seasonal workers to help with its busy spring season.

[Hacksaw]

Home Depot is making enough money. Bluetick said so.

[bluetick]

Home Depot is making enough money. Bluetick said so.

LOL Amazing.

Seriously, can't they trot some CEO out there who's company is in the shitter? How can somebody cry about fear and paralysis publicly when they're financials are the toast of Wall Street?

It doesn't seem honest somehow

[bluetick]

From this past February...


Home Depot has announced it will hire more than 60,000 seasonal workers to help with its busy spring season.

Could be a jingle..

"More seasonal workers...less of the other kind...means more savings...that's the new Home Depot."

[Dr. Strangelove]

Islamists with several terrorist attacks in Oslo. Car bomb kills at least 7. Another 4 killed by a gunman at a youth camp