Truths About the Obama Years

First Truth:

Lies, damn lies and statistics.  That's the old adage, right?  Well, statistics tell us a very interesting truth about what's gone on since January of 2009.  154,521,000.  154,871,000.  Those represent the size of the "Civilian Labor Force Level" as calculated and tracked by the government's Bureau of Labor Statistics.  8.3% is the unemployment rate according to the BLS in both February of 2009 and February of 2012.  Sounds okay at first glance.  After all, the labor force did grow by 350,000 in those 3 years.

But wait a minute.  The population did grow during that period, right?  Actually it did.  From 305,980,358 in February of 2009 to 312,941,906 in February of 2012.  Simple math tells us that if you divide 154,871,000 by 305,980,358 you get 50.5%.  Do the same for 154,871 by 312,941,906 and you get 49.5%.  So the percentage of the population in the labor force has been reduced.  Meaning that roughly 3.12 million more people are actually unemployed than are reflected in the numbers that the Obama administration is reporting.

That's because they don't count people whose unemployment benefits have run out, and because they don't count people who've stopped looking for work.

Second Truth:

We were promised the most transparent administration in history.  We were promised that no one would be allowed to work for an agency that they had lobbied within the past two years.

The second promise was broken less than 48 hours after President Obama took the oath of office.  He nominated William Lynn, a former Raytheon lobbyist to be a Deputy Secretary of Defense and he nominated William V. Corr to be a Deputy Secretary of Health and Human Services in spite of his having lobbied for the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids.  Less than 2 days in office and he was already breaking campaign promises about lobbyists.  I'm not saying breaking promises makes him unique in politics.  I'm pointing out that he is no different than any other politician, you can tell he's lying when his lips are moving.

Transparent?  Want to discuss Solyndra?  No, we're tired of that tired subject.  Let's talk about Siga Technologies.  Never heard of it?  That's not surprising.  Controlling interest in Siga is owned by billionaire Ronald O. Perelman, a long-time Democratic Party donor.

Siga got a $443 million, "sole-source procurement" contract to provide a smallpox vaccine.  It got it because Obama administration officials interfered in the bidding process.  The per dose price was well above what the procurement specialist determined was a reasonable price.  A competing bidder was shut-out of the bidding process, even though the process mandated a small business be chosen.  The competitor was a small business, Siga was not.  The competitor complained and Siga's bid was disqualified.  So the Obama administration arranged for a new round of bids where Siga was the only one allowed to bid.

Perelman donated $50,000 to Obama's inauguration.  Think that had nothing to do with this bid rigging?  Think again.

Third and Final Truth for Today

When then Senator Obama was running for President he made yet another promise.  Any bill that landed on his desk for signature would remain there for five days.  "The public will have five days to look at it (the bill) online so they can see what's in it." 

The first  law signed by President Obama was the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009.  He signed it on January 29, 2009.  It passed the House on January 27, 2009.  It spent less than 3 days on his desk.  He promised 5.