Some Lessons

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pie-chart

Sequestration:  Originally a legal term referring generally to the act of valuable property being taken into custody by an agent of the court and locked away for safekeeping, usually to prevent the property from being disposed of or abused before a dispute over its ownership can be resolved.          from auburn.edu glossary of political terms

As I see it, valuable property, in ever-increasing amounts, is being taken into custody by the State, but not for safekeeping.  Through debt, the valuable property of our children and grandchildren is being taken into custody, but not for safekeeping.  Most people understand that our rapid growth in spending and debt is unsustainable and will result in economic destruction.

The question before us in the current ‘sequestration battle’ is this:  Are our politicians willing to make even small adjustments to slow the rate of growth of government?

No, they are not willing.  They are kicking and screaming against even a slowdown in the rate of growth.  Imagine the impossibility of making real cuts in spending, where we spend less next year than this year.  Imagine the impossibility of getting on a sustainable path.

So we will stay on an unsustainable path of wildly increasing debt.  You can count on it.  And we will go to where that path leads.  I believe the current administration knows this and is focused solely on making sure the blame for the economic destruction is placed on their enemies.  If you create chaos and can successfully blame it on your enemies, then the chaos you created increases your power.  That’s the Cloward-Piven way.

The fact that there was not a healthy recovery in Obamas first four years was successfully blamed on George Bush.  Obamas’ economic policies will not allow a healthy recovery in the next four years either.  But he and the lap-dog press control the narrative, so all economic problems will  be blamed on Republicans.  ”If only they had not forced the draconian cuts of the sequester…” .  In Obama’s press conference this morning he said that the economic problems we will see in the future should all be blamed on the Republicans and how they handled the sequester.  He did not have to tell the media to do this.  They would have done it anyway.

A short but great Cato video on “Sequestration Panic:

Take a minute to read Charles Krauthammers’  Hail Armageddon .   Really.  It’s worth reading.

Here are some lessons we can take from the sequestration drama:

1. The “firemen first rule” still applies.  If we ask government to spend less of our money, they will say, “OK, we are going to lay of the firemen and teachers and let the prisoners out of jail.”  It’s a form of extortion.  Give us what we want, or else…

2. Obama is comfortable with lying (something we already knew).  His administration created the sequester plan.  He verbally supported the plan when he wanted to look like a budget cutter, saying he was absolutely not going to let the Republicans block the automatic cuts.  Now he is absolutely against these same automatic cuts that he says the cold-hearted Republicans are pushing.  It is worth noting that one or two people in the mainstream press have called him out on his lies.  Journalists doing real journalism is news.

3. It is increasingly clear that Obama’s Presidency is not about finding solutions to problems.  His Presidency is a performance aimed at creating divisions and laying blame.  It’s a constant campaign.  The sequestration deadline and the debt ceiling deadlines are known long in advance.  He does no work to solve these problems in advance.  He simply performs the blame campaign as the deadlines arrive.  This has worked quite well for him so far.

4. Obama’s “balanced approach” means:  more taxes.   He wants a ‘balanced approach’ where serious budget cutting is something we might do some day in the future and raising taxes is something we need to do right now.

5. People still get away with pretending that a modest cut in the rate of growth is a draconian cut in spending.  When you spend more next year than this year, that is an increase in spending.  If you were planning to spend an extra 100 billion next year and you instead spend an extra 98.5 billion, that is called an increase in spending.

6. The primary lesson is that there is no chance that the growth of government will be stopped.  What needs to be done will not be done.  We must plan accordingly.  [It would be more accurate to say that politicians will not reverse the growth of government, but that reality will bat last and will cut the size of government in some very unpleasant ways.  Reality will not allow the borrowing and spending to continue indefinitely.]

7.  People are asking the wrong question.  They are focusing on the negative effects of slowing the rate of growth of government.  The more important question is, what are the negative effects of not slowing the rate of growth of government.

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“If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading” ― Buddha
Things that can’t go on forever, won’t. Debt that can’t be repaid, won’t be.  Promises that can’t be kept, won’t be. —                        –Glen Reynolds

For more, see: Things That Can’t Go On Forever, Won’t

Update: Mark Steyn asks -

Can you pierce the mists of time and go back all the way to the year 2007? Back then, federal spending was 40 percent lower than it is today. In a mere half-decade, has all that 40 percent gravy become so indispensable to the general welfare that not even a teensy-weensy sliver of it can be cut?

If you really believe that, then America is going to die, and a gullible citizenry willing to give this laughable charade the time of day will bear ultimate responsibility.

Odds ‘n Ends

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Best Actor in a Tragic Drama:   Barack Obama     in    “Nothing Is Our Fault”

On the attempt to disown his sequestration plan:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNBhue9OMTY&feature=player_embedded

 

Dan Mitchell has a good column explaining that the “devastating budget slashing of sequestration” is really just a slight decrease in the rate of growth.

sequester cuts

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White House confirms:  Obama did NOTHING on Benghazi.  President Obama made no phone calls seeking help or information on the evening of September 11, 2012, during the seven or eight hours when Americans were fighting for their lives in Benghazi.

But, we can report that finally there are some arrests in Benghazi.  Four missionaries were arrested and charged with distributing Christian literature, a crime punishable by death.

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George Will on “State of the Union Nonsense“….   in which Obama said that all his new programs would “not increase our deficit by a single dime”.   In spite of this and other lies, the national press again proved that they are foolish lapdogs with the single-minded goal of attacking conservatives.

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Here is the great writer and thinker, Victor Davis Hansen, pondering how the world has changed in the last few years.

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On Krugman and Zombies…

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twinkie_funeralAnd last, but not least, a Twinkie update…

After Bankrupting Hostess, Union Workers Rake In The  Federal Dough

It’s lawlessness and corruption, just like the “restructuring” of General Motors in which vast amounts of money were funneled to unions.

SOTU Preview

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Tonight, he will pile it higher and deeper….

Expect a string of straw-man arguments.  Expect claims of accomplishments that are not really his.  Expect grandiose promises.  Expect special tributes to Latinos and women. Expect arrogance.

Skip SOTU and Watch This

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Rather than watch the State of the Union pack of lies tonight, you could listen to an honest man address some of our country’s big problems here:

Dr. Carson has been widely criticized for challenging Dear Leader.  Laura Ingraham made this observation about the criticism of Dr. Carson, “We can have celebrities talk about fracking and all sorts of political  issues…but the head of pediatric neurosurgery at one of the top hospitals in  the world” shouldn’t discuss healthcare.”

The Wall Street Journal Online adds to the healthcare discussion with this post:

Great Moments in Socialized Medicine “Shockingly bad care and inhumane treatment at a hospital in the Midlands led to hundreds of unnecessary deaths and stripped countless patients of their dignity and self-respect, according to a scathing report published on Wednesday,” reports the New York Times’s Sarah Lyall from London:

The report, which examined conditions at Stafford Hospital in Staffordshire over a 50-month period between 2005 and 2009, cites example after example of horrific treatment: patients left unbathed and lying in their own urine and excrement; patients left so thirsty that they drank water from vases; patients denied medication, pain relief and food by callous and overworked staff members; patients who contracted infections due to filthy conditions; and patients sent home to die after being given the wrong diagnoses.

We certainly hope the Times’s public editor sets Lyall straight. After all, as former Enron adviser Paul Krugman points out: “In Britain, the government itself runs the hospitals and employs the doctors. We’ve all heard scare stories about how that works in practice; these stories are false.”

What Difference Does It Make?

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Benghazi

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta confirmed Thursday that, on the night of September 11, 2012,  Obama had no interested in the attack on the American Consulate in Benghazi.  Panetta informed Obama, at a regularly scheduled meeting, that an armed assault on the consulate, an act of war, had commenced just before their meeting.

Astonishingly, the Commander-in-Chief was not interested in this news.  Panetta testified that Obama had no further contact with him that evening.  Obama did not even contact him to see how things were going.  There is testimony that Hillary Clinton was similarly uninvolved.  Even for someone like me, who does not have a high opinion of Obama or Clinton, this callous incompetence is almost unbelievable.

As far as we know, the first serious involvement of Obama and Clinton in Benghazi was to concoct lies and alibis the next day, something they both do well.  Their adoring press was ready, as always, to help them with the cover-up.  A scandal that is 1000 times worse than Watergate was swept under the rug.  And Republicans, including Romney, were herded into submission.

The President knows that September 11 is a date when Osama’s Islamic warriors are especially likely to attack.  He knows that an armed attack on a diplomatic post is an act of war.  He knows that any response to the attack that involves U.S. forces crossing a country’s border requires Presidential approval.  And he could have known, if he cared, that brave Navy Seals were on the rooftop of the compound in Benghazi, fighting for their lives and begging for help.  The Seals were in radio contact with their superiors for most of the 7 hour ordeal.

But he didn’t care.  He did nothing.  He went to bed.  He went to a fundraiser in Vegas the next day.  This is stunning.  And the fact that both Obama and Hillary knew that the media would cover for them is equally stunning and disturbing.

Obama and Clinton both lied repeatedly about their actions and about the cause of the attack.  David Axelrod, the minister of propaganda, said, “when word of the attack came, the president was meeting with his top national security folks. He was talking to them well into the night. He was in touch with them during the day, as – during the next day as well. So, there is no question about the fact that he was focused on this.”

All B.S.. The President was focused on how to lie about this disaster and protect his chance for re-election.  The things that were truly important to him were how to hide the real unemployment figures, how to misrepresent the growth in the economy, how to sell the stories that Al Qaeda was dead and the Arab Spring was a good thing, how to destroy the character of the good man who was challenging his power.

Obama said Benghazi was “a bump in the road” and that voters would not pay much attention to it.  He was right.  We are still on his road, going downhill fast.

Media Groupies Out In The Open

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power

The overwhelming media adulation for Hillary Clinton this week really brings into focus the fact that mainstream media is a branch of the Democrat party.  They don’t attempt to hide it much any more.  They are simply cheerleaders for leftists and consistent advocates of big government as the solution to all problems.

As the praise was piled higher and deeper for the phenomenal job Hillary has done as Secretary of State, I wondered what world they were living in.  Where, in the real world, are things better from Hillary’s efforts? Is the middle east better? Do we have better relationships with our enemies, or even with our allies?  One Senator at the Benghazi hearing did offer a concrete example of Her Greatness’s achievements –  The Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves.  Yes, indeed.

The facts  show repeated pleas for additional security in Benghazi as the danger and violence escalated.  The pleas were ignored.  On the night of 9-11, officials knew almost immediately that the attack was a planned assault and they knew there was no demonstration prior to the assault.  They crafted lies and a huge cover-up far more consequential than Watergate ever was.  With the media’s help, they successfully sold their lies.

The media act as defense attorneys for their friends and prosecuting attorneys for their enemies.  Their political allies are portrayed as smart, competent, good people; their enemies are stupid and bad.  News stories are filtered just that way.  And the facts don’t matter.

If there is economic destruction under a President’s policies, it is his fault if he is a conservative; someone else’s fault if he is a liberal.  The way economic news is reported is determined completely by who is in power.  A liberal leader with 8% unemployment, skyrocketing deficits, increasing poverty can be portrayed as a good man headed in the right direction.  A conservative with a much better record will be endlessly criticized.

Scaring the truth out of 3 terrorists by pouring water down their throat is reported as inexcusable torture if a conservative does it.  But, killing suspected terrorists with drone missiles, instead of interrogating them, is not so bad if liberals do it.  Guantanamo ceased being bad with the change of administrations.  Going to war with Libya without congressional approval was fine because a liberal did it. If you give government money to your contributor friends in business, massive amounts of money, it’s not a corruption story if you are a liberal.   If you secretly tell the Russian leader that you will be free to give him concessions after the election, it’s not selling out if you’re a Democrat, because you mean well.  And if you cheerlead the Muslim Brotherhood in the Arab Spring takeover…  well, you meant well there, too.

That’s the power of the (D).  KKK grand kleagle Senator Robert Byrd (D) was protected all his life from charges of racism.   Ted Kennedy (D) drove off a bridge and left a girlfriend to drown while he hurried home to plot a strategy for self protection. But self protection was easy – he is a Kennedy with a (D). The media worked hard and long to try to protect Bill Clinton (D) from his serial sexual predations and John Edwards (D) from his lies.  Barney Frank (D) played a major role in causing the sub-prime meltdown and he escaped unscathed.  And for black politicians (D), no level of corruption is taken seriously.  All that matters is that you support keeping black people on the Democrat Plantation.

But if your name is followed with (R), there are at least two strikes against you to begin with.  If you tap your foot in a bathroom stall, (Craig (R)), or kiss an unwilling girl (Packwood (R)) the media will cover the story intensely until you resign.  Clinton (D), can warn of Iraqs WMD’s, say “I guarantee you he will use the arsenal“, and pass the “Iraq Liberation Act” calling for regime change, but Bush (R) is a liar for agreeing. Congressmen (R) who sound the alarm about unsustainable spending and debt are called extremists and obstructionists.  This is actually true to some extent because they are trying to obstruct the path that leads to certain economic destruction, but the media faults them for exactly that effort.  And if you are a black leader (R) who has escaped the Democrat Plantation, the media will heap scorn upon you.

Obama and Hillary know that their failures will be hidden as much as their lackeys in the media can possibly hide them.  As liberals they are, by definition, good and right in the eyes of the media.  That is the narrative that they can count on.  There is incredible power and safety in the assurance of that false narrative.  This system works well for liberals, but not for our country.

A free country needs an adversarial press to question authority and hold those in power accountable for their actions.    In free societies, the press has an important role in countering the natural tendency of those in power to abuse their power.  It is more clear than ever that the mainstream media have abandoned that role and have joined forces with those in power.  They speak with one voice and have shared goals.  The media role now is to create and perpetuate myths that justify increasing the power of government.

SecondComing

Newsweek editor Evan Thomas was on Hardball with Chris Matthews after President Obama’s ’09 speech in Cairo.   Matthews had been having “tingles” up his leg from Obama’s greatness.   Thomas trumped the tingles by saying that Obama was “sort of a God”.   Thomas predicted that in the middle east, this new God would, “…bring all different sides together…  He’s the teacher. He is going to say, ‘now,  children, stop fighting and quarreling with each other.”

When Thomas’ childish view of middle east diplomacy was crushed by reality, did he change his view of Obama?  No.  The recent inauguration cover for Newsweek touts “The Second Coming”.  God lives!  The narrative is impervious to facts.messiah

John Dickerson, the political director of CBS News, made it clear last week that he stands ready to help Dear Leader any way he can.  He suggested to Dear Leader that he, “can only cement his legacy if he destroys the GOP. If he wants to transform American politics, he must go for the throat.”  Niccolo Machiavelli Dickerson will continue to do everything he can to destroy conservatives and advance the all powerful state.  You can count on it.   And he would shine Obama’s shoes, too.

The media groupies should be embarrassed by their behavior, but they do not appear to be.  They are in a bubble insulated from contrary opinions and all smugly certain that big government solutions are the only solutions.  This is not a trivial problem.  Even though we have alternative media, the Old Media are still a powerful force.  Obama would not be President without their help.  Not the first time and not this time.

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Just for fun, here are a couple of clips to demonstrate the intelligence of ‘news’ reporters.  Both clips are from MSNBC, the easiest place to find fools, but sadly not the only place.  In the first clip, the reporter is discussing the Easter Island stone statues with a scientist who has studied them.  The reporter, with a straight face, asks the scientist if she thinks the statues walked to their current location, or were put there by space aliens, or could they possibly have been put there by humans who lived on the island.  I have seen CNN’s Soledad O’Brien demonstrate similar levels of self-assured ignorance.

After Chris Matthews watched Bill Clinton speak at the Democrat convention last fall, he shared with viewers some fan-boy thoughts about Clinton.  He said, “I always figured that if Bill Clinton landed on Mars, he would know how to do it with them, he would know how to reproduce, he would know everything.”   Wondering if Bill Clinton would know how to have sex with Martians is just something Chris thinks about.

how_people_see_obama

Odds ‘n Ends

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It’s not April Fools Day, but…

Bill Clinton was named Father of the Year by the National Father’s Day Council.

billnose

Hillary Clinton was named one of the “100 Hottest Women of the 21st Century“.

 

 

 

Politifact’s “Lie of the Year”  turns out to be true.  Romney told the truth.

pants-on-fire1

 

 

There has been huge coverage of Manti Te’o's fake girlfriend.  Many charge that he used the fake narrative for personal gain.  But there is another pop-culture hero who faked much of his history for personal gain and received very little scrutiny.  He had fake girlfriends, fake stories about his childhood, blatant fabrications about his mother and grandfather, and much more.  There are reasons to believe that Te’o was duped,  but that is not the case for the other fabricator, Barack Obama.  His false narrative was purposeful from the beginning.  See here, here, here and here.  And the mainstream media is happy to accept it without question. Bill Whittle exposes a few lies here:

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Obama will be inaugurated tomorrow.  His predecessor has left him an unbelievable mess.

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Two more additions to the long liberal hypocrisy list:  Avoiding taxes the Warren Buffet Way.  [hat tip - Justin Kennedy]     Costco’s tax avoidance scheme.

Mark Steyn adds to our trillion dollar coin discussion and wonders if “America’s choo-choo has left the tracks“.

Just for fun – watch California over-react to a bit of cold weather:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6t-EjrtD3U&feature=player_embedded

 

Emotionalism – The Liberal Method of ‘Argument’

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“ You  never let a serious crisis go to waste. And what I mean by that it’s an  opportunity to do things you think you could not do before.”
Rahm  Emanuel

“The state must declare the child to be the most precious treasure of the
people. As long as the government is perceived as working for the benefit of the
children, the people will happily endure almost any curtailment of liberty and
almost any deprivation.”                  Adolf Hitler    –Mein Kampf

It’s always for the children….

 

 

 

After the horrible tragedy at Sandy Hook, our revulsion at this evil deed led many people to speak from emotion, saying things like:

  •  We must do something to make sure that nothing like this ever happens again
  •  If we can do anything to save even the life of one child, we must do it now.

If you take an honest look at the world, though, what do you think are the chances that we can stop insane violent people from doing insane violent things?  Can we “make sure this never happens again”?  Not a chance.  It is an absolute certainty that evil and violent people will do evil and violent things in the future.  The real questions are, how can we best protect ourselves and how can we minimize the number of these people in society.

As to the “saving the life of one child” argument, here are some facts to consider:

According to the Center for Disease Control,  “Every day, about ten people die from unintentional drowning.  Of these, two are children aged 14 or younger.”  So that is around 700 dead children per year.  Approximately 20% of these deaths occurred in public pools with certified life-guards.

There are approximately 365,000 dog bites per year in the U.S. that are serious enough to require a visit to the emergency room – 1000 per day.  38 people in the U.S. were killed by dogs in 2012.  Around 50% of those injured and killed are children.

The government reported that in 2010, 1210 children under the age of 15 died in traffic accidents.  Approximately 70 children per year choke to death on food.  Since 1973, 110 children have choked to death on balloons.

I could go on, but the point is that there are many, many government controls we could propose that would “save the life of at least one child”.  We don’t do that because that isn’t the standard we use in the real world.  It is the standard used only in political theater where politicians seeks to prove that they care about the children more than you.

For liberals, caring, not efficacy, is what matters.  None of the proposed new gun regulations would have effected the Sandy Hook shooter in any way.  No matter.  The appearance of caring is there.  It doesn’t matter that the War on Poverty did not diminish poverty (and had devastating social consequences).  The Head Start Program has been shown repeatedly not to work.  Obamacare will increase medical costs and decrease quality.  The stimulus didn’t.  Climate change legislation won’t change the climate. The Dream Act is a nightmare.  The failings of leftist legislation are not a problem though, because the legislation represents caring.  So it’s all good.

For those who want to deal with facts, not emotions, on the gun control issue, I suggest the following:

It is interesting to note that , according to World Health Orgaization statistics, there are are 108 nations with higher murder rates than the US.  Most of them are much higher.  All of these nations have a complete ban on guns.  And without black on black violence, our murder rate would be much lower than it is.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One  very great threat to our childrens well-being is the exponential growth of State power and State debt.  Liberty and prosperity are directly related.  Fighting for liberty is one of the best things we can do “for the children”.

The following are 20 signs that the U.S. poverty explosion is hitting children and young people the hardest…

1. If you can believe it, a higher percentage of children is living in poverty in America today than was the case back in 1975.

2. More than one out of every five children in the United States is currently living in poverty.

3. According to U.S. Census data, 57 percent of all American children live in a home that is either considered to be “poor” or “low income”.

4. Median household income for families with children dropped by a whopping $6,300 between 2001 and 2011. Continue reading →

Magical Thinking on the Economy

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zim trillion

The absurdly named “debt ceiling” is not a ceiling at all.  Never has been.  Congress has just blasted right through this supposed ‘limit’ each time they reach it.  The ‘limit’ has been raised 74 times since 1962.  Congress spends with wild abandon and does not recognize limits.

But reality recognizes limits, and will re-assert itself in some unpleasant ways when our wild spending spree reaches its end.  Our exploding debt is unsustainable and will not be sustained.

A substantial portion of our population understands the danger and is seeking to do something about it.  They have even managed to elect a few legislators who are committed to changing course to avert disaster.  These honest people are a minority, though, and are regularly ridiculed for their principled wisdom.

We have once again reached the debt limit and most legislators want to blast right through as usual.  Obama says he doesn’t even want to discuss it.   Those who want some spending cuts are threatening to block continued spending unless there are real cuts.  That brings us to two ploys that are being considered by the big spenders.

First, some are saying the President doesn’t need Congress for spending authority.  They say the 14th Amendment would allow Obama to spend without regard to the limit, even though the constitutions says all spending must be authorized by Congress.  Second, some say there is a magic trick we can do that will fix things.  The magic trick is to put a platinum coin in the Federal Reserve and say it is worth a trillion dollars.  Then government would write checks on that trillion without borrowing money.

Functionally, depositing the platinum coin would be the same as depositing a lump of coal.  Both would be about the same distance from actually having a value of a trillion dollars.  An absurd stunt like this would confirm the worst fear of prospective bond buyers…   that we are not serious about dealing with our debt.  The credit rating agencies would come to the same conclusion.

Yet, the platinum stunt is being discussed as though it has merit.  Paul Krugman, for example, has written that the coin trick would result in, “no economic harm at all”.  He sees it as a reasonable response to the, “ruthlessness and craziness that now characterizes House Republicans”.  He is speaking of those extremist fools who are worried about  out-of-control spending.  Those obstructionists.

Each of us needs to decide where the craziness lies in this debate.  If you think reality will allow us to spend our way out of debt, go with Krugman.  If you think people will continue to fund our increasing debt by buying our bonds when it becomes clear that we cannot possibly pay the debt, go with Krugman.

Governments that follow the Krugman path and debase their currency often do pretend to  pay their debts.  They put a big number on a worthless piece of paper and say, here you go.  It’s like giving someone a platinum coin and saying, here’s a trillion dollars.

The Zimbabwe One Hundred Trillion Dollar bill above is real, government issued money.  You can get one for about five bucks on Ebay.  So governments can ‘repay’ their big debts with what is essentially toilet paper.  In the process, they will have destroyed the economy and wiped out the savings of the citizens.  It has happened many times before and we may be witnessing it again.  It happens when politicians care more about their power than about the future.  It happens when citizens believe there are free lunches, when there is no such thing.

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Additional info:                 At monetaryrealism.com, Vimothy posted this comment:

It comes down to the fact that the government ultimately has two and only two choices when it wants to get hold of some real economic resources: either it expropriates them outright, or it borrows them and replaces them at a later date. That’s it. There is no third choice.

All of these things like taxes, selling bonds, the platinum coin and the “operational” ability to issue as much nominal money as you like are at the end of the day simply ways to achieve (a) or (b), or some combination of the two.

The government is obviously  limited in its ability to borrow as much as it likes from the real resources of the economy because its ability to return those economic resources is itself limited. And if the government does not intend to return what it borrowed, because, for example, there is no entity above it that can force it to do so, then it did not borrow the resources; it expropriated them.

 

Good News… No Big Problems

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Speaker John Boehner reported that during the fiscal cliff negotiations, Obama got irritatied with Boehner’s repeated insistence that they deal with the spending problem.  Obama said, “We don’t have a spending problem”.  That’s great news.

Robert B. Reich, Clintons Secretary of Labor, agrees with Obama.  He recently reported that, “Entitlement reform sounds like a noble endeavor, but it has little or nothing to do with reducing future budget deficits.”  More good news.

So spending isn’t a problem and entitlements aren’t a problem.   And even if high unemployment is a problem, Nancy Pelosi reports that she has found a solution for that.  The solution is paying people not to work.  Pelosi says unemployment benefits,  “create jobs faster than  almost any other initiative you can name.” She says spending on unemployment benefits, “creates jobs to help reduce the deficit ”.  So the spending has two benefits, more jobs and less debt.