Obama: The Carbon Tax Hero

Is a Carbon Tax a Done Deal for the US?
By Marin Katusa, Casey Research

We know Obamarama is going to tax the rich, but I bet many didn’t think he would weasel in the carbon tax as quickly as he is going to now.  A Romney win would have been bullish for coal producers in the US – but Romney lost, and now so has coal, at least in the near term.  The biggest winner from Obamarama?  Natural gas.

Exxon Mobil Corp (XOM) is now supporting Obama in bringing a carbon tax to the US.

Why would Exxon – and other big energy companies – join forces to bring on the carbon tax?

The answer is simple: profits.

Exxon has made significant purchases, buying unconventional North American gas companies.  For example, it recent bought Canadian firm Celtic Exploration for over C$2.5 billion.  Let’s not forget that a couple of years back, Exxon bought out XTO Energy for over US$30 billion. Continue reading

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Grateful People Are Happy People

Searching for ordinary ideals of Americana is like looking for consistency in the Internal Revenue Service’s tax code.  It’s virtually nonexistent.  The stimulating conviction of one American vastly differs from that of another.

One may celebrate adventures in mysticisms.  Another may find inspiration from the bleacher seats of a college football game.  While a third struggles to free himself of the orthodox hobgoblins that suffocate his soul.

In the more reputable papers, the story of the national struggle is told with feeble symmetry.  The news seems to be reported from the position that the two party political system filters out any ideas to the contrary.  We’re told a Marxian tale of the evil rich exploiting the noble poor.  Even worse, we’re led to believe that buffoons like Ben Bernanke know exactly what the heck they’re doing.

We find this ongoing codswallop to be woefully different from the America we see and experience when we step out our front door each morning.  Moreover, we find the abundance of thought polluting newspeak and commonsense destroying political correctness to be insulting and intolerable. Continue reading

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Jump!

“If we right away say 98 percent of Americans are not going to see their taxes go up – 97 percent of small businesses are not going to see their taxes go up,” said President Obama on Wednesday.  “If we get that in place, we’re actually removing half of the fiscal cliff.”

We are…really?  Just like that?

We’re certain there have been worse presidents.  Surely, there have been dumber presidents.  But has there ever been a president that was so doggone funny?

Not in living memory, if ever, that we can think of.

The critical thing about the fiscal cliff that President Obama is unwilling to mention is that the current debate is just the jumping off point.  The fall into the abyss will be long and painful.  Moreover, it’s unavoidable.

Austerity, in the form of higher taxes and spending cuts, is coming.  It will either be voluntarily achieved through government policy or it will be forced upon the country by markets.  Given Congresses inability to understand the problem, it will likely be up to the markets to force real change upon the country’s finances. Continue reading

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The Temporary Madness of an Ugly Mathematics World

There are obvious contradictions in government finance that are both shocking and absurd.  There are opposing forces colliding before us with consequences hardly a soul can escape.  To sum up the plot, there’s the soft delusion of prosperity through public spending running up against the hard reality of arithmetic.

The climax, and its brutal impartiality, is still a scene or two away.  But once the inflection point is reached chaos and disorder will follow.  This is the unfavorable place inhabitants of western nations find themselves these days.

“Beauty is the first test: there is no permanent place in this world for ugly mathematics,” wrote British number theorist Godfrey Hardy in 1941.  When making this observation, Hardy didn’t likely have a fiat money world in mind…where the government borrows money created by the central bank to pay for things the economy can’t afford.

If Hardy could’ve taken a gander at the mammoth gap between government revenues and obligations, circa 2012, we guess he’d have concluded the Treasury is engaged in a serious case of ugly mathematics. Continue reading

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