Boycott Government Motors?

COAST polls readers on whether to join

One way for consumers to protest the massive government subsidy of General Motors and its subsequent bankruptcy and sweetheart deals cut for the labor unions is for conservatives to boycott the new company. In doing so, those advocating limited government could both show their displeasure with this outrageous conduct of our government and at the same time help the new entity to fail more quickly.

Those advocating a boycott include Rush Limbaugh and Hugh Hewitt.

COAST ponders, should it join the boycott? Cast your vote to the right of this window. COAST will decide at its September membership meeting. Please only vote once.

Crown Bestows Gifts; Vassels Gleeful

Prince Pepper proclaimed today that King Strickland will bequeath over $45 million in porkulus funds to Hamilton County and the City of Cincinnati, including (p12):

$ 5,000,000	The Banks Transit Center
$ 8,000,000	The Banks Street Grid
$ 20,000,000	Eastern Corridor Development
$ 6,100,000	Interstate 75 Rehabilitation
$ 10,200,000	Riverfront Intermodal Center Phase 2

Alas, no tribute is, as yet, forthcoming for the aristocratic streetcar, so the weary gentry of Over-the-Rhine shall be forced to continue circumambulating like peasants.

Prince Portune has spent, all told, over a fortnight currying favour before various royal courts. Perhaps he might be persuaded to continue his supplications and obtain a few more meager scraps for our humble shire.

Of course homage for this patronage must be dutifully rendered to Emperor Obama, for it is his dubious generosity that is so freely dispensing the contents of the treasury. Methinks his approval will not be so high once his subjects discover the gifts are not gold, but debts to be repaid by the subjects themselves, with hefty interest.

Reminder – Cincinnati Tea Party

Protest Rally on Fountain Square this coming Sunday, March 15, 3 PM – Be there!


COAST has endorsed the inaugural event of the Cincinnati Tea Party, formed to protest and oppose the stimulus bill and foreclosure bailout in Washington. The rally is on Cincinnati’s Fountain Square this Sunday, March 15, 2009 from 3-5 PM.

So many of us have watched in horror as the new administration and Congress have lived up to the worst nightmares of voters in their first two months in office. Well, these energetic volunteers from this new organization, including Mike Wilson, have given us an outlet for those frustrations and voice to the tens of thousands (hundreds of thousands?) of area residents appalled at the new direction of our nation.

You can read here about the Tea Party movement in other U.S. cities: St. Louis, MO., Chicago, IL, Atlanta, GA, Green Bay, WI, Harrisburg, PA, Jacksonville, FL, Washington, DC, and Fayetteville, NC.

COAST thanks Mike Wilson and this Tea Party organizers and joins them in this important event. Here’s how you can help:

• Tell your family, friends, neighbors and co-workers about this great opportunity to speak out about the ruination underway in Washington.
• Send e-mails, and use Facebook and Twitter, to drive people to the event.
• Come to the event and bring people with you.
• Bring signs. COAST will be organizing a sign-making party this Thursday night at 6:30 PM at 1550 Magnolia Drive, Cincinnati, OH 45215.

The rally will feature as speakers Congressman Steve Chabot and Councilmember Chris Monzel. For more information, contact Mike Wilson. COAST enthusiastically endorses this event. Please RSVP to their website.

Yeah, it’s pretty important.

Financial Mess Explained

Heidi is the proprietor of a beer garden. In order to increase sales, she decides to allow her loyal customers - most of whom are unemployed alcoholics - to drink now but pay later. She keeps track of the drinks consumed on a ledger (thereby granting the customers loans).

Word gets around and as a result increasing numbers of customers flood into Heidi's place. Taking advantage of her customers' freedom from immediate payment constraints, Heidi increases her prices for wine and beer, the most-consumed beverages. Her sales volume increases massively.

A young and dynamic customer service consultant at the local bank recognizes these customer debts as valuable future assets and increases Heidi's borrowing limit. He sees no reason for undue concern since he has the debts of the alcoholics as collateral.

At the bank's corporate headquarters, expert bankers transform these customer assets into DRINKBONDS, ALKBONDS and PUKEBONDS. These securities are then traded on markets worldwide. No one really understands what these abbreviations mean and how the securities are guaranteed. Nevertheless, as their prices continuously climb, the securities become top-selling items.

One day, although the prices are still climbing, a risk manager of the bank (subsequently fired due his negativity) decides that finally the time has come to demand payment of the debts incurred by the drinkers at Heidi's. However they cannot pay back the debts. Heidi cannot fulfill her loan obligations and claims bankruptcy.

DRINKBOND and ALKBOND drop in price by 95%. PUKEBOND performs better, stabilizing in price after dropping by 80%. The suppliers of Heidi's place, having granted her generous payment due dates and having invested in the securities are faced with a new situation. Her wine supplier claims bankruptcy, her beer supplier is taken over by a competitor.

The bank is saved by the Government following dramatic round-the-clock consultations by leaders from the governing political parties. The funds required for this purpose are obtained by a tax levied on the non-drinkers.

And so it goes...

Boehner Blasts Porkulus Bill

What happened to our 48 hour waiting period?!?



Rep. John Culberson, TX claims the "stimulus" bill must be urgently voted on today because Speaker Nancy Pelosi is leaving at 6:00 PM for an 8 day trip to Europe! Culberson made the charge on Houston's KSEV radio.

Pelosi is hoping to lead a delegation to Europe; there's a meeting with the Pope and an award from an Italian legislative group. In the rushing, Democrats have now broken their promise to have the public see the $790 billion bill for 48 hours before any vote.

Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) predicted that none of his Senate colleagues would 'have the chance' to read the entire final version of the 1,071-page bill before it comes up for a final vote. When CNSNews.com asked members of both parties on Capitol Hill on Thursday whether they had read the full, final bill, not one member could say, "Yes."

The bill is expected to land on President Obama’s desk no later than Monday, and the president is expected to sign it into law--whether the nation's lawmakers have read it or not.

Portune Panhandles DC Politicians

From: Portune, Todd
Sent: Wednesday, February 04, 2009 12:25 PM
To: COAST
Subject: Out of Office AutoReply:
Action Alert-Speak Out on Trillion Dollar "Stimulus"

Thank you for your email. I will be traveling to Washington DC Tuesday February 3rd and returning late night Thursday the 5th. While in Washington I will be meeting with key Congressional Leaders and Obama administration Officials about energy legislation and energy related stimulus bill projects.

If you have a specific issue or question demanding immediate attention please contact my aides Lisa Daria and kathy Binns. They can be reached at 946-4401, or 946-4402. Their emails are lisa.daria@hamilton-co.org and kathy.binns@hamilton-co.org.

Thank you,

Todd Portune

This e-mail message, including any attachments, is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain private, confidential and/or privileged information. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, employee or agent responsible for delivering this message, please contact the sender by reply e-mail and destroy all copies of the original e-mail message.

Speak Out on Trillion Dollar “Stimulus” Bill

The United States Senate is poised to vote on an unprecedented $1 trillion dollar so-called “stimulus” bill. In fact, combined with the unprecedented levels of spending imposed during the waning days of the Bush administration, the spending plans have and will impose on this county a new command economy directed not by private entrepreneurs and free enterprise, but by the Presidency. The enormous levels of spending, combined with unprecedented control over these new dollars without even Congressional input, signal a dangerous new direction for our nation.

COAST needs you to contact your senators to express your firm opposition to this rapid socialization of the American economy. Our frequent partner for economic liberty, Americans for Prosperity, has set up a web site to expose some of the ridiculous spending items in the so-called federal stimulus bill.

http://www.nostimulus.com/ gives a lot of great information and it provides links to contact our Senators directly. It also has an on line petition which has received more than 23,000 signatures as of 9:00 AM yesterday morning. (25,700 as of noon)

1. Sign the petition! [Click Here] COAST also encourages people to visit the web site and forward the petition to everyone in their email list.

2. Call your Senators! COAST also asks our supporters to call both of our Ohio senators every day until the stimulus package is voted on. Call the local office and the Washington office each day and express your outrage at the pork, the debt, and the lack of stimulus.. If you can't get through, GREAT. That means a lot of people are calling and our message is getting through. Keep trying.

• Senator Sherrod Brown
  Cincinnati: 513-684-1021
  Washington: 202-224-2315


• Senator George Voinovich
  Cincinnati: 513-684-3265
  Washington: 202-224-3353

3. Attend Townhall Conference! AFP is sponsoring a national tele-townhall with Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC) to talk about the stimulus legislation. DeMint has been a great leader in the fight against earmarks, pork, and wasteful government spending. Anyone can join the call as follows:

Wednesday, February 4th, 2009 at 8:00 pm EST.
Telephone: 1-877-229-8493
Dial Pin # 13896

Steve Driehaus shows his hand:

Yet another big-spending Democrat

For years, Steve Driehaus has claimed to be a “conservative” democrat, and has campaigned telling his constituents that he has west-side, fiscally conservative values. Well, the new Congressman was tested with his first major vote – on the bloated $819 billion stimulus bill. He voted “yes.”

The Enquirer asked Driehaus about his inaugural vote and he cynically declared: "I take very seriously the notion that we should be balancing budgets," he said. "But when we are facing an economic crisis as bad as this, there is little choice but government intervention."

Um-hm, the big spenders always have a reason, don’t they. Expect more of the same from this traditional tax-and-spend democrat.

Cincinnati Requests $12.6 Million of Federal Stimulus Package For Trolley

Boondoggle railroaded on voters

Ignoring the WeDemandAVote.Com coalition’s petition drive to force a public vote on Council plan for a $400 million trolley system serving only three neighborhoods, Mayor Mark Mallory in January asked its Congressional delegation to support inclusion in the federal stimulus bill of $12.6 million for the nascent trolley plan. A copy of the City’s request is here.

The request is part of an overall request by the City of nearly $333 million in Stimulus funds. Read the entire request here. COAST supposes we should be happy there is no request for funds for the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in there.

Cincinnati City Council first approved the trolley plan in April of last year. The Council resolution called for raising $32 million of the costs for the plan from private sources and charged the City Manager with doing the private fundraising. The April resolution called for the City Manager to report to Council quarterly on his fundraising results. To date, the City Manager has never issued such a report and no private funds have been donated.

The City did, however, extract $3 million from Duke Energy as part of a complex kick-back deal in which the City consented to a higher rate increase than Duke requested, and sold them 20,000 city-owned streetlights for $200 a piece. Cincinnati previously maintained the lights themselves to save money under a recommendation by the Smale Commission. The city sellout abandons that strategy to raise some quick cash.

The WeDemandAVote.Com coalition, which has placed three issues on the ballot in the past two years, has committed in 2009 to placing an issue on the ballot preventing the expenditure of major funds by the City for passenger rail transportation without first receiving the approval of voters. Call Mark Miller at 513-617-2263 for your copy of the petition and instruction sheet, or e-mail Treasurer@GoCOAST.Org.

Is Wild Inflation On The Horizon?

Guest Editorial by Randy Kleine

Inflation, properly defined, is the rapid expansion of the money supply and/or credit. Higher prices at the pump and at the grocery store are not inflation--higher prices are the result of inflation. Inflation is the deliberate government policy of printing more money or extending more credit through its privately-owned agency, the Federal Reserve Bank (affectionately called "The Fed").

The latest example of inflationary policy is the $1 trillion "economic stimulus" bill passed by the House of Representatives on January 28. Since the government has not yet collected the money to support this spending through taxation, it will ask a compliant Fed to extend it credit. Then politicians will have "money" available to spend on whatever they dream up.

A look at the spending proposals in the "economic stimulus" bill quickly reveals a cornucopia of "pork-barrel" social-engineering projects and an increase in the size and power of government that would make any dictator's (or king's) heart go a-twitter. Dictator, you say?

A key principle of a republican form of government is the "consent of the governed," that is, the people are consulted when decisions affecting them are being made by that government. Dictators, on the other hand, need consult no one (although most dictators will surround themselves with a group of yes-men). The term "dictator" arose in ancient Rome to connote a magistrate with supreme power, appointed in times of emergency.

The numerous Bush "bail-outs" in 2008 and the Obama "economic stimulus" of 2009 are predicated on the allegation that the United States is in an economic emergency. The question is: do these guys think like dictators?

Hear President Bush's Secretary of the Treasury Hank Paulson as he used fear to force Congress into granting him unprecedented powers for a $700 billion bail-out of Wall Street. Language from his three-page proposal is telling: "Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency."

That the government must go to the people (through their representatives) to request taxes to finance government projects (for example, a school levy or bond issue) is vital to liberty because the peoples' consent must be obtained. When a government can print and spend money at whim (through inflation by the Fed), the peoples' consent is no longer required.

What we have is the arrogance of several hundred people in the Federal government who think that they are more capable than 300 million Americans in making sound economic decisions. The politicians are running the economy instead the people. How is that different from Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia, or Communist China?

Dear reader: even if you don't care about your liberty, do you care about your bank account or dollar-denominated investments?

Do Republicans finally grow a pair?

“The Democrat bill won't stimulate anything but more government and more debt”

Now that tax-and-spend President George W. Bush has finally retired to Crawford Texas, the remaining Republicans in Washington appear to (maybe, sort of) have gotten the message and intend to oppose the massive spending bill proposed by the Democrats on Capitol Hill. Here’s Chairman of the Republican Conference, Representative Mike Pence of Indiana:

"The Democrat bill won't stimulate anything but more government and more debt. The slow and wasteful spending in the House Democrat bill is a disservice to millions of Americans who want to see this Congress take immediate action to get this economy moving again."

Maybe the massive defeats suffered by Republicans in 2006 and 2008 caused their testicles finally to drop and generate some testosterone. We can only hope.

COAST Speaks on Auto Industry Bailout

In December, America’s three major automakers asked Congress a second time for a bailout, this time totaling a whopping $34 billion. COAST vigorously opposes this request. Here’s why:

· In essence, the big three automakers have for decades “made their own bed,” choosing not to serve customers or shareholders, but demands of over-paid and lazy executives, big unions and government.

· In failing to serve consumers, the automakers have for decades put out over-priced, poor quality cars that failed to meet consumer demand. The recent mistakes included continuing to make large SUVs and not move quickly to high-demand hybrid technology, as gas prices rose and Japanese competitors quickly fulfilled the new consumer demand.

· In failing to serve shareholders, the adjusted stock price of General Motors today is identical to what it was in 1969. That is, if you invested $100 in General Motors stock nearly 40 years ago, you would not have had one dollar of appreciation in value of that investment.

· Ultimately, the companies are losing money, and shareholder value is not increasing, because their expenses exceed their revenues. American automakers expenses are so high compared to competitors because since the 1970s they consistently have capitulated to union demands on wages, benefits and job rules. Foreign manufacturers – even those with substantial U.S. operations – have been more successful in driving down costs. Here are just a few facts and figures explaining their uncompetitive cost structure:

a) GM's health-care costs tack on $1,500 per vehicle.

b) GM has instituted a union “job bank,” which continues to pay workers whose jobs fell victim to technological progress or plant restructurings even though they aren’t actually working. The job bank, established in the mid-1980s, requires GM to pay displaced workers nearly their entire salary plus benefits and pension.

c) For every GM worker, there are about 10 dependants deriving benefits from General Motors, which are defined as retired workers and their families.

d) GM's per-hour labor rate for car assembly is about $75 per hour, compared to $40 to $45 for other car companies.

So what is really happening is that at the very moment the abysmal failure of decades of poor management is brought into full bloom, the Democrat Congress intends to use your tax dollars to shield them from the natural forces of the marketplace.

The reasons why America’s automakers, and their shareholders, should suffer the consequences of their bad management are legion and compelling. COAST opposes the bailout. Read also Mitt Romney’s excellent New York Times editorial on this topic here.

Ohio Senator George Voinovich has been one of the champions of the bailout.

Schmidt backs pork-laden Bush billionaire bailout boondoggle

Despite an outpouring of opposition, running 90% nationally, Congressman Jean Schmidt voted in September for the $850 billion bailout of the financial services industry. Schmidt opposed the bailout before she supported it. The changed that garnered her vote: Democrats added $150 billion in pork and more in special-interest tax breaks. "After six years of supporting every bad tax and spending plan of Bob Taft," said COAST Chairman Jason Gloyd, "we are not surprised by this new sell-out of our nation's taxpayers. By signing on to this bill," said Gloyd, "Schmidt supported the fastest descent into socialism ever in the history of this nation." Voters have a chance to get rid of Schmidt this November 4.