Tragic turn to NC Democratic Party turmoil

We’ve had some fun with the scandal in the North Carolina Democratic Party leadership so far, but the latest update from the Daily Caller takes a turn for the tragic.  The man at the center of the scandal, former executive director Jay Parmley, had been accused of sexual harassment against a former male employee, which the party settled with a sealed agreement.  However, Parmley has also been accused by his former girlfriend of infecting her with HIV, and offering health insurance through the party afterward:

    Rebecca Burgin, a long-time former girlfriend of former North Carolina Democratic Party executive director Jay Parmley, told The Daily Caller that she believes Parmley infected her with HIV.

    Parmley resigned on April 15 amid sexual harassment allegations from a former young male staffer.

    Burgin, a 29-year-old Oklahoman, has shared her story with TheDC, including the revelation that Parmley’s lawyer offered her health coverage, paid for by the Democratic National Committee, to manage her illness. She ultimately declined that offer, fearing it would constitute insurance fraud. Parmley, she said, abandoned her a few months later.

    On April 13, TheDC first exposed allegations, leveled in December by former North Carolina Democratic Party communications staffer Adriadn Ortega, that Parmley showed him a picture of a penis, gave him unwanted shoulder rubs and made apparent sexual advances toward him. Ortega also alleged that Parmley discussed with him in detail his past sexual activity, including “solicit[ing] sex from gay websites.”

    Parmley’s ex-girlfriend Rebecca Burgin told TheDC that Parmley forever changed her life by making her HIV-positive. She’s worried, she said, that Parmley may have done to someone else what he did to her.

Be sure to read it all.  When she approached Parmley about her HIV-positive status, he told her he wanted out of the relationship.  Later, she hired an attorney who got the NC Democratic Party to offer her what was essentially family coverage on Parmley’s employment status.  However, Burgin eventually wondered whether that would be legal at all, since the relationship was over and the two no longer shared a household, and instead opted to pay for COBRA coverage herself.

This makes the scandal much more grim, and it couldn’t come at a worse time for North Carolina Democrats — and Barack Obama.  He’s due to speak in Chapel Hill today, but don’t expect him to discuss gay rights issues, even though Democrats are pushing against Amendment One:

    Two weeks from now, North Carolina will hold a public referendum on what could become one of the toughest anti-gay measures in the country: a far-reaching proposal to amend the state constitution to ban civil unions and domestic partnerships. But President Obama is not expected to touch the subject when he appears in Chapel Hill on Tuesday — even though it is roiling the electorate there.

    Instead, Obama will talk about college loans, his aides said, kicking off a two-day, three-state tour designed to energize the youth vote. His delicate sidestep of Amendment One, a ballot initiative to be decided May 8 that would recognize marriage between a man and a woman as the only legal domestic partnership in North Carolina, is seen by some as another sign that he is not fully committed to gay rights — an interpretation that could dampen the enthusiasm of the young voters he is trying to court.

    “It’s a little bit of a missed opportunity,” said Josh Orol, 20, a sophomore at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a leader of a campus movement to defeat Amendment One. “I didn’t expect him to talk at length about it. I know he has come out publicly against it. But I sort of hoped he would at least name-drop a little bit. It’s disappointing.”

I guess Obama is still evolving on same-sex marriage.  The tragic turn in the Parmley scandal won’t make it any easier. In the meantime, keep Rebecca Burgin in your prayers.

New residential home sales fall 7.1% in March; Update: USA Today predicts “subpar” economic growth this year

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The string of bad economic news to close out Q1 continued today with the Census/HUD announcement of new residential sales in March.  The seasonally-adjusted annual rate of sales fell 7.1% from February, although there are a few glimmers of good news in the decline:

    Sales of new single-family houses in March 2012 were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 328,000, according to estimates released jointly today by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. This is 7.1 percent (±20.7%)* below the revised February rate of 353,000, but is 7.5 percent (±19.6%)* above the March 2011 estimate of 305,000.

    The median sales price of new houses sold in March 2012 was $234,500; the average sales price was $291,200. The seasonally adjusted estimate of new houses for sale at the end of March was 144,000. This represents a supply of 5.3 months at the current sales rate.

The inventory number gives a little more reason for optimism.  After more than three years of declines in new-home construction, the light at the end of the tunnel is at least in sight.  An inventory of five to six months is reasonable and manageable, and will encourage more production — assuming demand rises.  Unfortunately, as more foreclosures get dumped into the market this year, demand for new homes will probably remain near the bottom as buyers look for deals.

Reuters takes the glass-half-full approach, in part because previous estimates for December, January, and February got revised upwards:

    New U.S. single-family home sales dropped in March to their lowest level in four months, but the reading still beat analysts’ expectations as the government said sales in prior months were higher than initially thought.

    The Commerce Department said on Tuesday sales slipped 7.1 percent to a seasonally adjusted 328,000-unit annual rate.

    Home sales in February were revised higher to 353,000 units, the fastest pace since November 2009, up from the previously reported 313,000 units.

Unfortunately, this comes in tandem with a poor report on resales in March, which fell 2.6% from February as well.  At least one-fifth of those sales were to investors, not families looking to own, which means that actual demand for ownership looks very soft indeed.  Recent jobs reports give no indication that demand will strengthen, either.  While the markets appear to be approaching a bottom — prices rose in resales in March, for instance — there is little indication that any rebound is in sight.

Update: Meanwhile, don’t expect anything better from the rest of the economy this year, USA Today warns:

    Rather than a breakout surge in economic growth, mainstream forecasters say, Americans should expect the U.S. economy to slog forward for another couple of years.

    The economy grew at a subpar annual rate of 1.7 percent last year, down from 3 percent the year before. The consensus forecast for this year now is for growth of 2 to 2.5 percent.

    The U.S. economy is expected to slow later this year, dragged down by slowing global growth, rising anxiety about the elections and the specter of gridlock in Washington over urgent tax, spending and debt deadlines. The Bush-era tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 and the payroll tax cut of the past two years expire at year’s end, when last year’s debt deal also will force across-the-board cuts in federal spending unless Congress and the president strike new deals, but there’s no consensus on that.

    A spate of recent indicators punctuated fears that the economy is stalling. March delivered only 120,000 new jobs, and the latest manufacturing and real estate data softened. Some economists say the economy’s strong six-month run through March might not be sustainable.

It actually wasn’t all that strong, either.  The annualized GDP growth rate for 2011Q4 only came to 3.0%, which isn’t weak but isn’t exactly strong.  From what we’re seeing in March, 2012Q1 is likely to finish well under that mark — but we’ll get our first look at that on Friday.

Pollmania: Obama leads Romney by seven nationally, by nine in New Hampshire

Second look at dog-eating?

That’s the biggest lead he’s had against Romney dating back to last August. Follow the link and scroll down and you’ll see that it’s independents who are driving it, flipping from a 45/39 split in favor of Mitt 10 days ago to a 45/43 in favor of O. Gallup reasons that a dip in gas prices must be behind it, but the dip we’re talking about here is roughly five cents in the national average. Hard to believe you’d see a poll effect this dramatic because of something as meager as that. I think what we’re looking at here is a very noisy poll.

Not sure about this one, though:

    The WMUR Granite State Poll shows Obama leading Romney 51 to 42 percent [in New Hampshire]. That’s close to the 10-point lead Obama had over Romney in December…

    The results are a dramatic flip from October, when Romney led Obama 50 to 42 percent. Smith said that shows the Democratic base is mobilizing…

    The poll shows a mixed picture in terms of the president’s approval rating in the Granite State. Fifty percent said they approved of the job Obama is doing, while 47 percent said they disapproved. The gap has shrunk a bit since February, when 51 percent said they approved and 43 percent disapproved.

I don’t understand the “Democratic base is mobilizing” logic when it comes to polls. Their base would have answered this question the same way in October as they’re answering now. It’s more likely that Romney’s numbers have shrunk because, thanks to six months of a bitter GOP primary, indies know him better now than they did then and some don’t like what they see. That’s not a disaster — conservative Super PACs will begin the attack ad carpet-bombing campaign against O soon enough — but surely no one’s thrilled to see Mitt start the general election this far back in his own backyard. Nominating a “Massachusetts moderate” was supposed to help Republicans put northeastern states in play, states like New Hampshire and … er, realistically I guess that’s it.

I have a powerful eeyorish urge to go curl up in the fetal position so I’m going to go do that now. Here’s something to entertain yourself with, though — a new election model from WaPo that purports to predict the likelihood of an Obama victory or defeat based on two simple indicators, economic growth over the first three quarters of this year and his approval rating in June. In order to knock his chances of reelection below 50 percent, you need zero percent growth and a job approval of 45 percent. Possible, but not likely.

Open thread: Romney’s victory speech and Gingrich’s last stand; Update: Romney wins Delaware

1. Ed’s right, of course, that tonight is an anticlimax but there are still two good reasons to turn on cable news at 8 p.m. One is the Romney coronation. Excerpts from his prepared remarks:
2.     Four years ago Barack Obama dazzled us in front of Greek columns with sweeping promises of hope and change. But after we came down to earth, after the celebration and parades, what do we have to show for three and a half years of President Obama?
3.     Is it easier to make ends meet? Is it easier to sell your home or buy a new one? Have you saved what you needed for retirement? Are you making more in your job? Do you have a better chance to get a better job? Do you pay less at the pump?
4.     If the answer were “yes” to those questions, then President Obama would be running for re-election based on his achievements…and rightly so. But because he has failed, he will run a campaign of diversions, distractions, and distortions. That kind of campaign may have worked at another place and in a different time. But not here and not now. It’s still about the economy …and we’re not stupid.
5. Two is the fittingly surreal saga of whether Newt will signal an end to his campaign. Last night he told NBC, “I think we need to take a deep look at what we are doing,” and hinted that he might be done if he loses badly in Delaware, where he’s been campaigning lately. A source elaborated on that for NRO this morning, insisting that he’d have to finish at least a close second to Romney there to keep going. Then came the tamp-down from “campaign insiders,” who told Byron York that Newt won’t quit tonight no matter what happens.
6.     Team Gingrich sees three possible scenarios. The first scenario is that Gingrich wins Delaware. “That’s a signal to conservatives and Tea Partiers and grassroots activists that there still is a conservative they can send to Tampa,” says the Gingrich aide. “And it sends the message to Romney that it’s not time to turn to the general election.” No one knows whether the winning scenario is at all plausible; there has been no polling of Delaware, with its tiny Republican population and 17 delegates.
7.     Next comes the middle-road scenario in which Gingrich narrowly loses Delaware. “That’s where we do well enough that it demonstrates there’s a chink in Romney’s armor,” the aide says. When asked what “well enough” means, the aide answered, “Within a couple of points — a close loss.”
8.     The worst-case scenario is that Gingrich loses big in Delaware.
9. If they lose, says the source, they’ll “reassess” things but Gingrich will continue on to North Carolina to try to pick up another southern state. I really hope he pulls it off tonight in Delaware, just because I’m itching to watch a victory speech from bizarroland in which Newt boldly proclaims “game on” in the primary while literally everyone else in the GOP is pivoting to Obama. It’ll be an instant classic. A little taste from his chat with reporters this afternoon: “I think it’s a very substantial mistake for Governor Romney to be pretending these primaries aren’t occurring, and for him to be having ‘a general-election speech’ tonight in New Hampshire. He’s the front-runner, but he’s not the nominee, and I think it’s a little insulting to the people of these states.” C’mon, Dover tea partiers: If you made it to the polls for Christine O’Donnell, you can make it there to guarantee one last Gingrichian stemwinder. And even if not, I think Newt will probably find enough encouragement in PPP’s poll showing him within 10 of Romney in Texas to plow ahead anyway. My hunch is that he wants one more big win, one more right hook to Romney’s jaw, before succumbing.

• Here’s his new video message aimed squarely at Santorum voters in North Carolina. Speaking of which, how much longer until Team Sweater Vest climbs aboard Romney’s “Anybody But Obama” Express? According to CNN, a meeting’s likely to happen early next month to discuss the role “social conservatives, tea party activists and blue collar Republicans will play in the campaign and in the Romney administration.”

The Ed Morrissey Show: Andrew Malcolm, Katie Pavlich

Today on The Ed Morrissey Show (3 pm ET), my friend Andrew Malcolm joins us as always on today’s TEMS at 3 pm ET! The Prince of Twitter and I will discuss the intersection of media and politics — including the latest on the Pulitzers, and all of the hot political stories of the day. The last twenty minutes will be our Lightning Round, where our Chatizens ask the questions and we provide the pithy answers, so be sure to register for your free Ustream account today to participate.

In bonus minutes, we welcome back my Townhall colleague Katie Pavlich, who will introduce her new book Fast and Furious: Barack Obama’s Bloodiest Scandal and the Shameless Cover-Up, which comes out today.  Don’t miss it!

The Ed Morrissey Show and its dynamic chatroom can be seen on the permanent TEMS page — be sure to join us, and don’t forget to keep up with the debate on my Facebook page, too.

Marizela Perez has been missing for a year.

Marizela’s case has a connection here at Hot Air, as she is the cousin of the Boss Emeritus, Michelle Malkin. Michelle is trying to spread the word through Facebook and Q13Fox/KCPQ in Seattle. We want to encourage prayers for Marizela’s family, and also try to reach anyone in the area who knows where Marizela might be and ask them to contact the police.

The search has its own website now, Find Marizela, for the latest in the efforts to bring Marizela home. There is also a fund for the family to keep the search efforts going. Be sure to check there and at Michelle’s site for further developments, and keep the family in your prayers.

America’s Most Wanted is now on the case, too.

Michelle has a new update on the case on the one-year anniversary:

Exactly one year ago today, my 18-year-old cousin Marizela (known affectionately to her family and friends as “Emem” or “Mei”) Perez disappeared from the University of Washington campus in Seattle.

She is still missing.

Those words form on the computer screen with disembodied disbelief. But my heart is screaming:

SHE IS STILL MISSING. WHY, DEAR GOD, WHY?!!!!!

The not-knowing is every parent’s worst nightmare. It brought normal life to a standstill for Marizela’s parents, Edgar and Jasmin. And yet, they have to keep living and working and praying for their only daughter. Because that is what they must do. Their strength and dignity through all the suffering has been an inspiration to me.

There have been no new developments in Emem’s case. No word from the police or the medical examiner’s office. No activity on her bank accounts or social media accounts.

And no response from the Google legal department to our request for help in January.

http://hotair.com/archives/2012/04/17/the-ed-morrissey-show-andrew-malcolm-katie-pavlich/

Ann Romney: Seamus the Dog “loved” trips atop the car

Mitt Romney has a sensitive side, after all — and that side of him has felt most wounded by attacks on his one-time, long-ago treatment of Seamus the Dog, the Romney family’s former pet. At least, that’s what he recently told Diane Sawyer in an exclusive interview.

The Seamus story was first unearthed in 2007 by a reporter at The Boston Globe assigned to write a piece about Romney for a biographical series the newspaper published. By now, almost everyone knows the tale because, as Chris Cillizza put it, “Seamus is the dog who won’t die — politically, at least.” In 1983, the Romney family loaded up the family station wagon to drive from Boston to Ontario, strapping Seamus’ dog carrier — with Seamus inside — to the roof of the car. At some point on the trip, though, Seamus became ill (“he really had the runs” is how Ann Romney put it). Evidence of his sickness dripped down the window until the oldest Romney boy, Tagg, noticed it and yelled, “Dad! Gross!” Romney pulled into a nearby gas station, hosed down Seamus and the car, reinstated the dog in his carrier and strapped the carrier to the roof once more. In other words, he kept calm and carried on …

Plenty of Romney opponents have painted the episode as illustrative of Romney’s allegedly uncaring attitude — not just toward dogs, but toward everything. They’ve cited the Seamus story as evidence of Romney’s “otherness,” yet another way he’s out of touch with ordinary Americans.

But in the interview with Sawyer, Romney not only said he has been most wounded by attacks that include a mention of Seamus. Ann Romney also said Seamus “loved” trips atop the car.

“The dog loved it,” Ann Romney said. “He would see that crate and, you know, he would, like, go crazy because he was going with us on vacation.  It was to me a kinder thing to bring him along than to leave him in the kennel for two weeks.”

We’ll never know whether Ann Romney is right because, you see, dogs aren’t people and are unable to express themselves by more than an occasional bark or growl. It’s not, after all, as though Seamus himself told this story to The Boston Globe reporter five years ago, bravely speaking out after enduring a horrendous ordeal. No, one of the Romney sons revealed the story — and not in an attempt to injure his father’s chances at the presidency, but in an attempt to give voters a peek at the family dynamic.

The story of Romney and his dog is even more of an irrelevant distraction from the principal issues of the campaign than Hilary Rosen’s recent comments about stay-at-home Ann — but addressing the distractions isn’t stupid. All the little, insignificant issues add up to an understanding of the principles and priorities of the presidential candidates and of voters.

The Seamus story tells us less about Mitt Romney — it really doesn’t reveal anything new, as we already knew he’s a pragmatic person — than it does about us. When did animals become equivalent to people in the eyes of the American public, such that we couldn’t fathom treating our pets in any way other than the manner in which we treat our children? I appreciate that Romney gave priority seating to his children, that he clearly thinks human beings should take precedence over animals. That he’s wounded by the attacks tells us he cared about the dog — pets have a way of wriggling into our hearts, after all — but that he did what he did in 1983 tells us his focus was where it should have been, on ensuring a safe, comfortable drive for his family.

http://hotair.com/archives/2012/04/17/ann-romney-seamus-the-dog-loved-trips-atop-the-car/

Walker up 5-12 points in PPP/DKos poll

The Government Accountability Board will meet at 9 am tomorrow to set the ballot for all six recall elections (for governor, lieutenant governor and four state Senate seats). The staff has recommended that the Board reject the Democrat Party of Wisconsin’s attempt to toss the 6 “protest candidates” the Republican Party of Wisconsin recruited to run as “Democrats” to ensure all 6 recall elections have a May 8 primary and a June 5 general election. From the GAB staff’s analysis (notably completed before the GAB received the RPW response):

Based upon the public statements of the RPW and the protest candidates, as well as literature they have distributed, there is no material dispute regarding the facts related to the challenges, or that the intent of the RPW and the protest candidates is to require all recall elections to take place on June 5, 2012, presumably to benefit the campaigns of the Republican incumbents. The legal dispute is whether Wisconsin Statutes prohibit or penalize such tactics by disqualifying those candidates from having their names included on the election ballot.

In general, Wisconsin election laws do not require an individual to be a member of a political party to seek that party’s nomination in a primary election. The law also does not permit the Board to inquire into the motivations for an individual’s candidacy for office, an exercise which would inevitably lead to the Board, as a government agency, making subjective judements regarding the legitimacy of political candidacies, which would implicate the most protected forms of First Amendments rights of freedom of speech and association. Depending upon one’s political perspective, the statements and actions of the protest candidates may be viewed as justified, clever, micshievous, or misleading. But Board staff cannot determine that they are illegal. They are products of political calculation and decision-making, and as such they can be rewarded or rejected during the course of the campaigns and elections. The purpose of elections is for voters to pass judgement on the ideas and positions of the candidates as they are debated in the crucible of the campaign.

As further outlined below, Board staff concludes that Wisconsin law does not permit the Board to deny ballot access to the protest candidates.

The Board staff went on to explain that neither the existence of an entry line for a political party on the Campaign Registration Statement form nor the existence of same on the Declaration of Candidacy form is required by state statute. Indeed, the staff concluded that portion of the memo thusly:

As stated above, nominees who claim to represent a political party are determined by the candidates and their supporters, not by party officials or government filing officers. Candidates seeking to participate in a primary of one of the parties are not required to prove that they are members of that party or that they have the support of party members or leadership. A candidate may certainly, without interference from the government, be nominated and campaign as a candidate of a party while disavowing any of hte official or stated positions of the party, or may change their stated positions between the time of circulating nomination papers and the election, or even after their election. For these reasons, Board staff believes that the protest candidates have substantially complied with the requirement to complete and file a declaration of candidacy, and the Board does not have the authority to look beyond the document to judge the political motivation or strategy of a candidacy.

Further, the staff held that the nomination papers do not include any requirement that the candidate claim to “have or demonstrate any formal tie to or membership in the political party” listed on the paper, that neither the circulators nor the signers are required to agree with the positions or principles of the named political party, and that no evidence was presented of any individual signer of the nomination papers were “misled” into signing the nomination papers of the protest candidates, much less a sufficient number to knock any of them off the ballot.

Related to that, semi-pro union protestor Arthur Kohl-Riggs will (likely) appear on the Republican governor primary ballot against Scott Walker as he gathered enough nomination signatures. In a normal partisan primary election, participating in the Republican governor primary would prohibit one from voting for Democrats elsewhere on the primary ballot. While that is still true in the governor recall primary cycle (e.g., one cannot vote for both Scott Walker and Kathleen Falk), GAB spokesman Reid Magney has confirmed that since these recall elections are separate entities, one can vote in the Republican governor recall primary and in the Democratic lieutenant governor recall primary and (if in one of the 4 Senate districts where there is a recall), that Democratic recall primary.

One more item of note – a Public Policy Polling poll for DailyKos has Walker upby between 5 percentage points (against Milwaukee mayor Tom Barrett), 7 points (against former Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk) and 12 points (against state Senator Kathleen Vinehout) among likely voters, reaching at least 50% against all 4 Democrats. In the same poll, Lieutenant Governor Rebecca Kleefisch is up 46%-40% on Professional Fire Fighters of Wisconsin president Mahlon Mitchell. The partisan split of that poll was 37% independent, 32% Republican and 31% Democrat, which roughly mirrors recent Rasmussen Reports likely-voter partisan splits in Wisconsin.

http://hotair.com/archives/2012/04/17/walker-up-5-12-points-in-pppdkos-poll/

Dodd-Frank costs US financial sector 24 million man-hours per year for compliance

And that’s just the start.  The House Financial Services Committee will roll out a report today showing that less than half of the required rule-making for the Dodd-Frank bill passed two years ago has been completed, but just the first 46% already comprises more than 5300 pages of rules:

Texas Republican Rep. Randy Neugebauer, the chairman of the committee’s subcommittee on oversight and investigations, told The Daily Caller that means that instead of hiring people to handle small business loans, banks will be hiring staff to comply with the new government regulations, ultimately having a negative impact on job creation.

“For example, let’s just get it down to the community banker — the person that loans money to most of the small businesses in our country,” Neugebauer said in a phone interview. “We’ve had a few community bankers come in here and say, ‘you know, they’re hiring a lot more compliance officer than they are loan officers.’ That is increasing the cost of banking and, ultimately, they have to charge higher interest rates and higher fees.”

“The other thing that it impacts for our small businesses is because of some of the new rules and regulations, there’s a great deal of uncertainty about certain types of financial activity that some of these entities can engage in,” Neugebauer added. “I think that as these rules come out, what we’re trying to ascertain, and our committee has had a number of hearings on, is what the unintended consequences of some of these rules and regulations, but more importantly, just the sheer volume of them.”

The committee has rolled out a “burden tracker” to explain the costs of Dodd-Frank compliance, and will have a video out later today with more information.  Rep. Randy Neugebauer put the burden into perspective:

“This online resource will help the public better understand how the cumulative weight of these new rules – layered upon existing outdated, unnecessary and duplicative red tape – hurts small businesses and financial institutions.  They have to spend increasing amounts of time and money dealing with all this red tape instead of engaging in the activities that grow our economy and create jobs,” said Committee Chairman Spencer Bachus.

Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Chairman Randy Neugebauer noted that it will take businesses more time to comply with Dodd-Frank rules than it took to build the Panama Canal.

“It will take over 24  million man hours to comply with Dodd-Frank rules per year.  It took only 20 million to build the Panama Canal,” said Rep. Neugebauer.  “Banks and credit unions, retirement funds and other financial institutions will be forced to spend a large portion of their budgets trying to comply with Dodd-Frank rules rather than lending to small businesses and American consumers and investing in our economy.  While the promised benefits of Dodd-Frank are still illusory, the costs are beginning to become crystal clear.”

The financial markets require regulatory oversight in order to prevent fraud and theft, but that regulatory burden needs to be just heavy enough to get the job done without itself becoming an insurmountable obstacle.  Furthermore, the investor class at which this is aimed has to have a stable regulatory environment in order to price risk for future investment.  We are almost two years after the passage of Dodd-Frank, and the regulation hasn’t even been halfway completed.  Under those circumstances, it’s no big surprise that investors are reluctant to put capital to work in the US economy, and that growth has been stunted as a result.

One might think that an administration with so much on the line in this economy would have put a higher premium on developing such regulations — and overall fiscal and economic policies, for that matter.  In my column for The Week, I write about how the Buffett Rule fight shows the intellectual bankruptcy of this White House, and how they are desperate to change the subject:

In this case, though, the failure of the Buffett Rule bill puts the Obama administration in a tough spot, especially after the stunt vote on Obama’s budget. The problem? Team Obama has nothing else to offer on the budget or the economy. In fact, President Obama has spoken of nearly nothing else but the Buffett Rule for the last eight months, since the launch in September of his “fairness” campaign. The White House has sold this proposal as a panacea for nearly all of the nation’s financial ills. The White House spins this surtax as a debt and deficit stabilizer “for the next decade” (September), as well as a strategy for economic growth (in his most recent Saturday address), and finally both, as David Axelrod argued on Fox News Sunday.

Wow! The Buffett Rule must provide an amazing amount of revenue — or so one would think listening to this hype. But it would actually raise just $31 billion to $47 billion … over ten years. Compare that to Obama’s own proposal for the FY2013 budget, which had a projected deficit of more than $900 billion, and ask how $47 billion “stabilizes” the annual deficit, let alone the national debt. As for economic growth, Obama’s 2009 Cash for Clunkers spent more than $3 billion in three weeks and didn’t do anything more than move demand from a future month forward. The American economy will generate more than $14 trillion in this year; even the higher-end number of $4.7 billion would amount to a tiny sliver of the economy, hardly enough to create a hiccup in growth — even if one believes that taking capital away from investors and putting it into the hands of government amounts to a growth strategy. …

The U.S. faces significant economic and fiscal problems, joblessness among them. We do need to stabilize our national debt, which has grown by more than $4.4 trillion in the three years since Obama signed the FY2009 omnibus budget bill two months after taking office ($11.066 trillion to $15.539 trillion at the end of last March), after the Democratic-controlled Congress refused to pass a budget for Bush to sign the previous September, as required. We need tax reform to simplify and broaden the tax base and get more revenue through growth, and we need rapid job creation to fuel that revenue increase.

Instead, though, the Obama administration has spent eight months and uncounted hours of presidential stump time demanding a tax tweak that would solve only 0.45 percent of the annual deficit crisis, provide no growth opportunity at all, and do nothing to create jobs. The Treasury Secretary can only point to three-year-old crisis management as a defense of the administration’s economic policies. No one in the White House has a plan to solve the larger problems, and as this weekend shows, they don’t even want to talk about the larger problems anymore. All they want to discuss is how unfair life is, reminisce about the good ol’ days of 2009, and point out to anyone listening that Mitt Romney is really, really rich.

Ironically, Dodd-Frank is still one of their few talking points on the economy.  Don’t expect that to last long.

http://hotair.com/archives/2012/04/17/dodd-frank-costs-us-financial-sector-24-million-man-hours-per-year-for-compliance/

Loonie Follows Aussie in Advance

The Canadian dollar jumped yesterday and so far has kept its gains today as stocks and commodities advanced on speculation that the Federal Reserve will maintain its interest rates record low for prolonged time.

The Canadian dollar followed the Australian dollar that jumped on very good employment data, dragging commodities and commodity-related assets along. Signs that the Fed is going to maintain its stimulating monetary policy are also good for riskier currencies. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index rose 1.4 percent. The S&P/TSX Composite Index added as much as 1.6 percent.

The Bank of Canada will hold a monetary policy meeting next week. It’s expected to maintain the key overnight rate at 1 percent as it was doing since September 2010. Canada was the first among developed nations to raise its interest rates and some analysts say that it may raise the rates again. Others point out that Canada’s monetary policy is tied to that of the United States and the Fed isn’t going to raise its lending rates anytime soon.

USD/CAD slumped from 1.0037 to 0.9942 yesterday and stayed near that level today, while EUR/CAD traded at about 1.3113 as of 1:32 GMT today, following the drop from 1.3156 to 1.3109 yesterday. CAD/JPY jumped from 80.51 to 81.30 on the previous trading session and rose to 81.45 on today’s session.

Australia’s Employment Shows Huge Growth, AUD Surges

The Australian dollar jumped today as employment in Australia demonstrated surprisingly huge growth that was about seven times above forecasts, causing speculation that the nation’s central bank will refrain from an interest rate cut.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics reported that the seasonally adjusted number of employed persons rose by 44,000 in March from February. That’s compared to the much smaller figure of 6,400 predicted by analysts. Australian employment decreased by 15,400 jobs in February. The unemployment rate also provided a pleasant surprise, staying at 5.2 percent, while an increase to 5.3 percent was expected.

The encouraging employment data caused economists speculate that the Reserve Bank of Australia may refrain from cutting interest rates as the nation’s economy looks robust enough and doesn’t need stimulus. On the other hand, the economic slowdown in other parts of the world may still outweigh positive domestic fundamentals. Analysts await for the minutes of the RBA meeting that may give hints about the bank’s intentions regarding the monetary policy.

AUD/USD jumped from 1.0298 to 1.0434 and AUD/JPY climbed from 83.26 to 84.39 as of 23:42 GMT today.EUR/AUD slumped from 1.2724 to 1.2635, reaching 1.2609 intraday — the lowest price since March 21.

Euro Rises In Spite of New Concerns

Euro is gaining today, even though concerns remain about Spain and other countries in the eurozone with high amounts of sovereign debt. Continued worries about the eurozone are not enough to keep the euro down as Forex traders show disappointment with US dollar policy.

Recently, gains for the US economy have led some Forex traders to speculate that the Federal Reserve would move up its timetable for interest rate hikes. This speculation, along with concerns about the eurozone, have kept the euro somewhat weak against the greenback. Now, though, with Fed officials squashing hopes of a hike, the euro is getting a boost.

Even though Spanish bond yields are up again, there are concerns about a eurozone recession, and there is a great deal of uncertainty as to whether or not the eurozone is really capable of staving off a full-blown crisis, there is enough risk appetite right now to support the euro. Additionally, with the euro’s better yield, and no expectation of an interest rate hike for the greenback, it isn’t a surprise that the euro is being preferred right now.

At 14:53 GMT EUR/USD is higher at 1.3174, up from the open at 1.3110. EUR/GBP is up to 0.8257 from the open at 0.8242. EUR/JPY is higher at 106.6350, up from the open at 106.0250.