Dinner with Obama … A Parable

Once upon a time, I was invited to the White House for a private dinner with the President. I am a respected businessman, with a factory that produces memory chips for computers and portable electronics. There was some talk that my industry was being scrutinized by the Obama Administration, but I paid it no mind. I live in a free country. There’s nothing that the government can do to me if I’ve broken no laws. My wealth was earned honestly, and an invitation to dinner with an American President is an honor.

I checked my coat, was greeted by the Chief of Staff, and joined the President in a yellow dining room. We sat across from each other at a table draped in white linen. The Great Seal was embossed on the china. Uniformed staff served our dinner.

The meal was served, and I was startled when my waiter suddenly reached out, plucked a dinner roll off my plate, and began nibbling it as he walked back to the kitchen.

“Sorry about that,” said the President. “Andrew is very hungry.”

“I don’t appreciate…” I began. But as I looked into the calm brown eyes across from me, I felt immediately guilty and petty. It was just a dinner roll. “Of course,” I concluded, and reached for my glass. Before I could touch the glass, however, another waiter reached forward, took the glass away and swallowed the wine in a single gulp.

“And his brother Eric is very thirsty.” said the President.

I didn’t say anything. The President is testing my compassion, I thought. I will play along. I don’t want to seem unkind.

Suddenly, my plate was whisked away before I had tasted a bite.

“Eric’s children are also quite hungry.” Then, with a lurch, I crashed to the floor. My chair had been pulled out from under me. I stood, brushing myself off angrily, and watched as it was carried from the room.

“And their grandmother can’t stand for long.”

I excused myself, smiling outwardly, but inside feeling like a fool. Obviously I had been invited to the White House to be sport for some game. I reached for my coat, to find that it had been taken. I turned back to the President.

“Their grandfather doesn’t like the cold.”

I wanted to shout- – - That was my coat!  But again, I looked at the placid smiling face of my host and decided I was being a poor sport. I spread my hands helplessly and chuckled. Then I felt my hip pocket and realized my wallet was gone. I excused myself and walked to a phone on an elegant side table. I learned shortly that my credit cards had been maxed out, my bank accounts emptied, my retirement and equity portfolios had vanished, and my wife had been thrown out of our home. Apparently, the waiters and their families were moving in. The President hadn’t moved or spoken as I learned all this, but finally I lowered the phone into its cradle and turned to face him.

“Andrew’s whole family has made bad financial decisions. They haven’t planned for retirement, and they need a house. They recently defaulted on a subprime mortgage.  They need your house more than you do.”

My hands were shaking. I felt faint. I stumbled back to the table and knelt on the floor. The President cheerfully cut his meat, ate his steak and drank his wine. I lowered my eyes and stared at the small grey circles on the tablecloth that were water drops.

“By the way,” the President added, “I have just signed an Executive Order nationalizing your factories. I’m firing you as head of your business. I’ll be operating the firm now for the benefit of all mankind. There’s a whole bunch of Erics and Andrews out there and they can’t come to you for jobs groveling like beggars.”

I looked up. The President dropped his spoon into the empty ramekin which had been his creme brulee. He drained the last drops of his wine. As the table was cleared, he lit a cigarette and leaned back in his chair. He stared at me. I clung to the edge of the table as if were a ledge and I were a man hanging over an abyss. I thought of the years behind me, of the life I had lived. The life I had earned with a lifetime of work, risk and struggle. Why was I punished? How had I allowed it to be taken? What game had I played and lost? I looked across the table and noticed with some surprise that there was no game board between us.

What had I done wrong?

As if answering my unspoken thought, the President suddenly cocked his head, locked his empty eyes to mine, and bared a million teeth, chuckling wryly as he folded his hands.

“You should have stopped me at the dinner roll,” he said.

In an episode of the Sopranos titled “Bust Out” Tony and the boys move in to bust out Davey’s sporting goods store since Davey has a large gambling debt. They move in take what they want and destroy the store by basically stealing everything that is not bolted down.

This is a stunning analogy as to what is happening today with Obama running roughshod over the liberties we as Americans have taken for granted. The time is now to wake up and stop this dismantling of the American experiment.

When governments fear the people there is liberty. When the people fear the government there is tyranny.

Thomas Jefferson

The government in its current state appears to not fear us. Have we become We The Sheeple?

Williams predicted that about $500 billion of the total $787 billion stimulus would be channeled into the traditional procurement network for government contracts, while the rest will be spent directly by the government or outside the corporate network.

“The rule of thumb typically is that of the about $500 billion worth of money that’s going to run through the procurement process, somewhere between 5% and 10% of that usually finds it way into potential problems,” Williams said. “That’s sort of the benchmark that I use.”

Companies will face increased pressure to try to stem the tide, and need to be prepared to safeguard data as well as the cash, according to Williams.

Williams said this week that the money flowing from the current stimulus package is particularly vulnerable to fraud because almost all movement of money is now done electronically.

“We’re telling our clients to be very careful and to make sure their firms are resilient in terms of dealing with the potential opportunities for fraud and waste,” Williams said.

That means keeping an eye out for the traditional scams such as billing for services not performed. But it also means firms must become even more diligent about electronic records and network security.

“It becomes ever more important that firms remain diligent about their data,” Williams said.

via Stimulus fraud could hit $50 billion – MarketWatch.

Democrats want to push administration on US corporate pay strategies

* Jim Kuhnhenn, Associated Press Writer

* On Thursday June 11, 2009, 11:28 am EDT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Obama administration is taking a half-step toward taming U.S. executive pay. Some lawmakers prefer a fuller stride.

Democrats on the House Financial Services Committee said Thursday the administration’s efforts to hector the private sector into reining in executive pay might not go far enough.

The administration contends that excessive compensation contributed to the U.S. financial crisis, but rejects direct intervention in corporate pay decisions.

Instead, the administration plans to seek legislation that would try to rein in compensation at publicly traded companies through nonbinding shareholder votes and less management influence on pay decisions.

“I do differ with the administration in that hope springs eternal and their position seems to be that if we strengthen the compensation committees we will do better,” said the committee chairman, Rep. Barney Frank, a Democrat.

Rep. Brad Sherman, a Democrat, said that instead of giving shareholders a nonbinding voice on pay, their votes should be binding on boards of directors.

Democrats and administration officials agreed that companies across the private sector need to adjust compensation practices to avoid damaging the economy.

Gene Sperling, a counselor to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, said administration guidelines call on all publicly held companies to link compensation to long-term performance, not short-term gains.

“We believe that compensation practices must be better aligned with long-term value and prudent risk management at all firms, and not just for the financial services industry,” Sperling said.

The committee also heard from officials from the Federal Reserve and the Securities and Exchange Commission.

While the administration has approached the issue with caution, a top Republican said the plans amounted to “incessant government intervention.”

“The president cannot continue his heavy-handed meddling in the private sector and expect it to function, much less flourish,” said Rep. Tom Price, chairman of the Republican Study Committee.

Alabama Rep. Spencer Bachus, the top Republican on the committee, added: “We need to get government out of businesses.”

The administration has drawn a sharp line between the overall corporate world and those institutions that have tapped the government’s $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program.

On Wednesday, it set pay limits on companies that receive TARP assistance, with the toughest restrictions aimed at seven recipients of “exceptional assistance.” They are Citigroup Inc., Bank of America Corp., General Motors Corp., Chrysler LLC, American International Group Inc., GMAC LLC and Chrysler Financial.

The regulations limit top executives of companies that receive TARP funds to bonuses of no more than one-third of their annual salaries.

The administration named Kenneth Feinberg, a lawyer who oversaw payments to families of Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attack victims, as a “special master” with power to reject pay plans he deems excessive at the seven companies with the biggest injections of public money. Feinberg also would have authority to review compensation for the top 100 salaried employees at those companies.

via US government seeks to rein in executive pay – Yahoo! Finance.

Is it simply whether a tax bill goes up from one year to the next? Or could it be a tax increase even if Florida lawmakers spend the same amount of property taxes on schools next year as they spent this year?

The outcome of that debate could determine how lawmakers plug a $1 billion hole in the state’s K-12 education budget. It also could affect whether the South Water Management District can afford to buy U.S. Sugar land, and the size of city and county tax bills.

On average, property tax bills would remain about the same if state lawmakers collect the $9 billion in property taxes they did this year for schools. But to do that, they’d have to increase the property tax rate by 12 percent or more to make up for a precipitous drop in home values during the past year.

via Definition of property tax increase could affect schools, U.S. Sugar deal.

Quinn stressed tax relief Tuesday as he prepared a budget proposal likely to include politically risky increases in income taxes, cigarette taxes and license plate fees. His newest twist is the idea of lifting the state sales tax for back-to-school shopping.

The Chicago Democrat emphasized his proposal also will include deep cuts as he tries to erase an $11.5 billion budget deficit.

“This is a very bold plan. It’s never been tried before in Illinois,” he told reporters in Chicago before leaving for the capital city. “I want to say to the people of Illinois, we’re going to pay our bills.”

via Illinois Tax Increase: Quinn Weighing Nearly Two-Dollar-A-Pack Cigarette Tax, Sales Tax Holiday.

* Raises taxes by $900 billion over five years and a projected $3.3 trillion over ten years;

* Translates into a tax increase of $2,641 per household annually over the next decade;

* Includes 22 reserve funds that could be used to raise taxes by hundreds of billions more;

* Increases discretionary spending by nearly 9 percent in FY 2008 and does not terminate a single program;

* Completely ignores the impending tsunami of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid costs;

via The Senate Budget: A $2,641 Per Household Tax Increase and No Entitlement Reforms.

Tobacco companies and public health advocates, longtime foes in the nicotine battles, are trying to turn the situation to their advantage. The major cigarette makers raised prices a couple of weeks ago, partly to offset any drop in profits once the per-pack tax climbs from 39 cents to $1.01.

Medical groups see a tax increase right in the middle of a recession as a great incentive to help persuade smokers to quit.

Tobacco taxes are soaring to finance a major expansion of health insurance for children. President Barack Obama signed that health initiative soon after taking office.

Other tobacco products, from cigars to pipes and smokeless, will see similarly large tax increases, too. For example, the tax on chewing tobacco will go up from 19.5 cents per pound to 50 cents. The total expected to be raised over the 4 1/2 year-long health insurance expansion is nearly $33 billion.

via The Associated Press: Smoke break gets more expensive with tax boost.

The two-tier tax plan would bring in $4 billion annually, in part by hiking income taxes a stunning 31 percent for all New Yorkers making more than $500,000 a year, the sources said.

A second, slightly lower tier would increase incomes taxes by 14.5 percent for singles earning $250,000 to $500,000 annually and for married and joint filers earning $300,000 to $500,000.

Taxpayers now hit the current top rate of 6.85 percent when their incomes reach $65,000. The Paterson plan would tax top-tier earners at 8.97 percent and second-tier earners at 7.85 percent.

via GOV CLINCHES DEAL ON HUGE TAX HIKES – New York Post.