From American Thinker:

The commission appointed by President Obama to investigate the Gulf oil spill (the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling) does not include a single member with specialized knowledge of petroleum engineering. This is akin to performing a heart transplant with a surgical team that has never set foot in an operating room.

Of the seven members appointed to the commission, not one is a petroleum engineer, and all have long-standing ties to the environmental movement. This is certainly the case with Frances Beinecke, Donald Boesch, Terry Garcia, and Frances Ulmer, all of whom have close ties to environmentalist research and policy groups. Beinecke, in fact, is president of the Natural Resources Defense Council, while Ulmer is a member of the Union of Concerned Scientists. How’s that for an unbiased commission on drilling?

If the president’s intention was to prevent future leaks, why would he appoint a commission with no knowledge of drilling? The answer, it would seem, is that this commission was never meant to perform the task it was officially charged with. It was never really intended to be a commission on drilling safety, but rather a group of environmental activists intent on regulating and taxing the oil and gas companies out of business. Its report is unlikely to focus on improved safely measures with the intent of increasing oil and gas exploration and production. It will more likely issue a blueprint on how to restrict drilling while extorting profits from oil companies by way of new fees and regulation.

Even as the commission hears impassioned testimony from Gulf Coast residents about the economic devastation of Obama’s ban on deep-water drilling (his second ban, the first having been ruled illegal by a federal court), its members continue to register their opposition to drilling of any sort. Following recent testimony in New Orleans, during which prominent Gulf leaders pleaded for a resumption of offshore drilling, the commission’s directors, William Reilly and Bob Graham, offered lip service to the resumption of drilling. But where were Ms. Beinecke and the commission’s other environmental activists during these hearings? From all accounts, they have been silent about the economic damage caused by Obama’s drilling ban.

There are two crucial lessons to be learned from the Deepwater Horizon accident, but it is doubtful whether the commission will comprehend either of them. The first is that “best practices” exist which, had they been strictly adhered to, may have prevented the Deepwater Horizon accident. It is for the commission to determine whether they were followed in that case, but it is incontrovertible that best practices have prevented significant accidents on all of the other 40,000 wells drilled in the Gulf. These practices, with continual improvement, should prevent spills in the future as well.

The second lesson, and one that no one in government or the mainstream media seems to have considered, is that the Deepwater Horizon, however flawed its management might have been, had the capacity to produce a great deal of oil and gas. Based on the enormous flow of oil from the Deepwater Horizon and others among the 33 deep-water rigs operating in the Gulf, it is clear that vast reserves of oil and gas exist off America’s shores. These reserves are enough to make the United States energy-independent. They are enough to revive our flagging economy, enough to produce jobs for hundreds of thousands of workers and to create secondary and tertiary jobs for millions of others.

Estimates of oil flow from the Deepwater Horizon have come in at between 40,000 and 100,000 barrels. Taking a mean estimate of 70,000 barrels, the annual production from the well, not counting natural gas and condensates, would have amounted to 25,555,000 barrels per year. One hundred such deep-water wells in the Gulf, producing equal quantities of oil, would produce over 2.5 billion barrels per year, enough to supply one-third of the petroleum needs of the United States. This new production alone would add over $175 billion to annual GDP, and it would cut America’s annual trade deficit by the same amount. Combined with increased onshore drilling, conservation measures, and increased production of natural gas made possible by advances in drilling technology, offshore drilling would render the United States energy-independent for the first time in a half-century.

Moreover, deep-water drilling has the potential to transform America from the slow-growth, high-unemployment welfare state that President Obama envisages into a prosperous, full-employment economy. This new economy would not only be energy independent, but it might well become an exporter of oil and gas — as it is now an exporter of coal.

Expansion from the current 33 wells to 100 is a realistic goal, since it would not be necessary to drill 100 deep-water wells annually. Oil flow from wells such as the Deepwater Horizon continues for ten to thirty years, or even more (as it has in the North Sea). Ten additional deepwater wells per year, combined with fracking for natural gas on shore, would soon move the country toward energy independence.

For most Americans, new drilling and the energy independence that comes with it seem like a good thing, but that is the very reason why the president has appointed a commission hostile to increased drilling. The success of the free market in the United States depends to a great extent on the availability of cheap energy. By cutting off the supply of oil, natural gas, and coal, Obama ensures a continuation of high unemployment and an extended period of slow growth, and with these, the expansion of the socialist welfare state.

Nothing could be further from the interests of the modern-day Democratic Party than the transformation of the American economy into a flourishing free-market economy powered by cheap and reliable fossil fuels. The fight over drilling, in this sense, is nothing less than a struggle for the future of capitalism in America.

As everyone knows, Arizona, chafed by the Federal government’s inability to control the flow of illegal immigrants into the State, enacted Senate Bill 1070(PDF) in an effort to do something about the resulting collateral damage to it and its citizens. Now, a federal judge appointed by President Clinton, Susan Bolton, has temporarily blockedenforcement of portions of S.B. 1070, reasoning that those portions interfere with the Federal government’s system of immigration laws.

Significantly, Judge Bolton rejected the demand by the Obama Justice Department that the entire law be struck down. In fact, the judge upheld twelve different provisions of the law, including a prohibition on Arizona officials limiting the enforcement of federal immigration laws and another that allows Arizona citizens to sue any state official that adopts a policy of restricting such enforcement. The judge also upheld parts of the law intended to stop human smuggling, such as a provision that makes it possible to impound vehicles used to transport or harbor unlawfully present aliens.

Unfortunately, however, Judge Bolton (using very fallacious reasoning) did preliminarily block provisions (1) calling for Arizona law enforcement officials to verify the immigration status of individuals who are arrested when an officer has a reasonable suspicion that they are an illegal alien; (2) making it a state crime to violate federal alien registration requirements; (3) creating a crime for an illegal alien to solicit, apply for, or perform work; and (4) authorizing an arrest when there is probable cause to believe that an individual is removable from the U.S.

Of course, to come to that conclusion, the judge had to torture the language of the Arizona statute, ignore federal law and precedent, and come to an illogical conclusion about the supposed burdens placed on the federal government by the Arizona law.

For example, Section 2(B) of S.B. 1070 states very clearly that:

For any lawful stop, detention or arrest made by [an Arizona] law enforcement official…in the enforcement of any other law or ordinance…where reasonable suspicion exists that the person is an alien and is unlawfully present in the United States, a reasonable effort shall be made…to determine the immigration status of the person, except if the determination may hinder or obstruct an investigation. Any person who is arrested shall have the person’s immigration status determined before the person is released.

This paragraph could not be clearer – the immigration status of individuals who have been arrested for some other crime will only be checked if the officer has a “reasonable suspicion” that they are an illegal alien. Yet the federal judge reads the second sentence of this paragraph without reference to the first as supposedly requiring that the immigration status of all arrestees must be determined, despite Arizona’s claims to the contrary. In other words, she completely ignores the first sentence and then claims that checking the immigration status of all arrestees would be an impermissible burden on the federal government.

This reading of the Arizona statute is illogical and the judge’s refusal to defer to Arizona’s construction of its own law is legally improper and certainly unnecessary, except for an activist judge with an agenda. In 1997, the Supreme Court chastised the Ninth Circuit and an Arizona district court for their treatment of a limiting construction of a state law suggested by the Arizona Attorney General and the recommendation that the Arizona Supreme Court be asked for its opinion of the proper construction of state law. The Court unanimously said that the federal courts should ask, “Is this conflict really necessary? When anticipatory relief is sought in federal court against a state statute, respect for the States in our federal system calls for close consideration of that core question.” The Court also suggested that the opinion of a State’s Attorney General on a matter of state law was entitled to respect.

Here, Judge Bolton failed to give the State the respect it was due on this issue. Indeed, it is strong evidence of an activist judge straining to find a way to stop a law that she does not like from a policy (not a legal) standpoint. It is also completely contrary to federal law that specifically requires federal officials to “respond to an inquiry by a…State, or local government agency, seeking to verify or ascertain the citizenship or immigration status of any individual.” (8 U.S.C. §1373). How can Judge Bolton rationally conclude that Arizona is placing an impermissible burden on the federal government to respond to citizenship verification requests when federal law mandates that the feds respond to such requests? The judge’s reasoning is foolish – she is treating the Obama administration’s enforcement priorities (or lack of enforcement priorities) as if they are federal law. Arizona’s law does not conflict with federal immigration law, although it may conflict with the Obama administration’s policies. But policy conflicts do not result in federal preemption. Judge Bolton’s reasoning also conflicts with a very recent First Circuit Court of Appeals decision, Estrada v. Rhode Island, that upheld the right of state law enforcement officers to check the immigration status of individuals detained for other reasons such as a traffic stop, as well as other precedents.

The judge also temporarily halted Arizona’s attempt to make it a state crime for an alien to not carry alien registration papers despite the fact that under federal law ((8 U.S.C. § 1304), all aliens are required to “at all times carry with him and have in his personal possession any certificate of alien registration” issued by the federal government. Contrary to Judge Bolton’s view, there is no violation of the Constitution because a state has added state penalties on top of federal penalties for the same offense. Otherwise, it would be unlawful for states to punish possession of illegal drugs since that is already a federal offense. Unfortunately, this type of tortured reasoning is applied by the judge to other provisions of the Arizona law.

Arizona should continue its court fight to implement all of the provisions of the Arizona law. The chances are very good as this case works its way up through the courts and eventually to the U.S. Supreme Court, that Arizona will win in the end. It is a battle well worth fighting and it is one that other states should join, particularly in the face of this administration’s refusal to take the steps necessary to secure our borders and protect our national security. In fact, if other states participate in this battle in other federal circuits, it is highly likely that they will get rulings directly conflicting with Judge Bolton’s erroneous decision. The Justice Department should be forced to fight as many states as possible on this issue.

President Barack Obama’s weak leadership on the Afghanistan war, Guantanamo, and the Gulf oil spill has Democrats backing away from him in droves, political analyst Dick Morris tells Newsmax.TV.

“Obama is down to a new low of 43 percent job approval,” Morris says, citing a recent Rasmussen Reports poll. “It’s Democrats he’s losing. He’s about where he always was with Republicans and independents, but it’s the Democrats who are turning on him.”

Morris predicts that the erosion of Obama’s base will continue, making his defeat in 2012 increasingly evident.

The decrease is especially true among Hispanics, who have grown disillusioned with Obama’s immigration policies. A recent Associated Press-Univision survey of 1,500 Hispanics found only 43 percent believe the president has addressed their needs. This contrasts sharply with a Pew Research Center exit poll from the 2008 election that found 67 percent of Hispanics supported Obama.

Obama’s political liabilities could cost the Democrats in the November election regardless of what people such as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., might say, Morris says.

Reid claims that healthcare reform will help Democrats even though a recent Rasmussen poll found that 58 percent of voters favor repealing the law.

“I think the Democrats can be dragged down by the healthcare bill,” Morris says. “It’s ridiculous to say that a bill that 58 percent of the country opposes long after it’s been enacted is going to help those who voted for it. That’s kind of fuzzy math, and I believe Harry Reid will be defeated, too.”

Extending the Bush tax cuts also could play into the fall elections, and Morris says it will create an opportunity for the world to see where the “phony” conservative Democrats stand on their extension.

“It’s going to take 60 votes to extend the any of the Bush tax cuts, and therefore only 40 to kill them,” Morris says. “So what all of the conservative Democrats are going to say is, ‘I don’t want to kill all of the Bush tax cuts; I don’t want anybody’s taxes to go up,’ but unfortunately it takes 60 votes extend the lower tax rates to the wealthy.”

Morris predicts these Democrats will posture, then throw in the towel, and Republicans will support extending the Bush tax cuts only if the wealthy are included in the extension.

Republicans “are going to hang tough, I hope, and vote against canceling the cuts on the middle class unless the cuts are also cut on the wealthy,” Morris says. “The whole point of that is it doesn’t make any difference whether the wealthy pay more in taxes . . . but it does make a difference to the economy because a third of all spending is done by those whose taxes are going to go up.”

Taxing the rich will kill the economy because they will stop spending, Morris says.

When asked whether Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., will survive allegations of ethical wrongdoing, Morris says they could make him vulnerable against his primary challenger, Adam Clayton Powell IV. Powell is the son of Adam Clayton Powell Jr., whom Rangel defeated for his seat in 1970 amid a similar ethics cloud.

“Adam Clayton Powell lost that seat because of ethics charges brought against him by the House of Representatives, charges which were largely phony and trumped up by the white conservative Southern majority, which was uncomfortable with a black committee chairman,” Morris says. “The charges against Rangel are completely real.”

Morris believes Rangel’s Harlem voters may do the Ethics Committee a favor and throw him out in his mid-September primary.

Also in the wide-ranging interview, Morris:

• Lambastes the National Rifle Association’s decision to back the Disclose Act, which would reverse the Supreme Court’s allowance of unlimited corporate and union campaign advertising.
• Alleges that the gun group’s rumored decision to back Reid’s re-election puts it in the same category with AARP and the American Medical Association, which he believes sold out their constituencies to back Obama’s healthcare plan.
• Predicts that the healthcare reform act will be repealed after the 2012 election, when a new president is in the White House.

The White House has some tough questions to answer about the Deepwater Horizon disaster in light of a new report from the Center for Public Integrity. In the critical first days after the explosion, the U.S. Coast Guard disregarded its own firefighting policy and might have caused the oil rig to sink — prompting the leak that resulted in the largest oil spill in U.S. history.

New evidence unearthed by reporters Aaron Mehta and John Solomon reveals the cash-strapped Coast Guard broke its own rules and didn’t have a firefighting expert on the scene to oversee the private boats battling the blaze. There’s an ongoing investigation to determine if the salt water sprayed on the burning oil rig caused it to sink.

“[T]he question of what caused the platform to collapse into the Gulf … remains unanswered and could prove vital to ongoing legal proceedings and congressional investigations,” the article states. “That is because the riser pipe from which the majority of BP’s oil spewed did not start leaking until after the rig sank.”

These new details put the spotlight on the White House, which has repeatedly pinned the blame on BP. If it turns out the Coast Guard is at fault — either because it didn’t follow proper procedures or couldn’t respond adequately because of a lack of resources — the public has a right to know why we’re just now learning this information 100 days after the disaster began.

The crippling budget cuts President Obama proposed for the Coast Guard also deserve a closer examination. Obama’s spending plan reduced the blue water fleet by a full one-third, slashed 1,000 personnel, five cutters, and several aircraft, including helicopters. According to the Center for Public Integrity, the Coast Guard updated its official maritime rescue manual — advising against firefighting aboard a rig — just seven months before the Deepwater Horizon explosion. That change in policy came at a time when Adm. Thad Allen warned the budget cuts threated to turn the Coast Guard into a “hollow force.”

An earlier report from Mehta and Solomon also raised important questions that White House has yet to answer about what Obama knew when. That investigation revealed the White House timeline of events failed to acknowledge an oil leak until four days after the explosion, even though the Coast Guard’s timeline reported a leak one day after explosion.

It seems like a nice gesture – an e-mail message from a loving wife, urging thousands of people to join her in wishing her husband a happy 49th birthday by signing an electronic birthday card.

But in Washington, D.C., nothing is that simple.

The wife, in this case, is First Lady Michelle Obama, and the message is being sent by the Democratic Party to people on its list nationwide. And underlying the birthday wishes, the message is political: The electronic card to Barack Obama also is a Democratic Party fundraiser.

“Every year, our family tries to come up with a fun way to wish Barack a happy birthday,” the message from Michelle Obama says. “And this August 4th, when he turns 49, I have something new in mind.”

Her message, which went out Tuesday, is being sent out by Democrats.org, the online presence of the Democratic National Committee.

The first lady, meanwhile, acknowledged that her husband has been “busy.”

“This has been a big — and hectic — year for him,” she wrote. “After signing the Affordable Care Act and Wall Street reform into law — and completing his first year as president — I think it’s safe to say we will remember it for a long time.

“And I know full well how much he credits this movement, and the work of supporters like you, for the change that we’ve accomplished,” reads the message.

“So I’m putting together a birthday card that I would like you to sign,” it says. “Together with supporters — and me, Malia, Sasha, and Bo — we’ll wish him a happy birthday and let him know that we’re ready to take on the year ahead alongside him.”

Clicking on the link — “Will you wish Barack a happy birthday with me?” – sends you to “MyBarackObama.com,” the Organizing for America Web site, which describes itself as “a project of the Democratic National Committee.”

But typing in your name, address and E-mail, and hitting “Sign the Card” takes you directly to another page — a donation page, which states:

“Thank you for standing alongside us, with the President. Now can you make a donation to help us take on the year ahead?” — and a disclaimer that funds would not go to political candidates.

A drilling moratorium aimed at big oil is a drilling moratorium aimed at local oil as well. That’s the message being sent by the Greater Lafayette Chamber of Commerce in Lafayette, Louisiana as they revive the “Energy Division” from several years of dormancy.

Why now?

According to The Daily Advertiser, “challenges from the moratorium and other anti-industry legislation signaled a need for its return, said Chamber President and CEO Rob Guidry.” In short, they are fighting the federal government. The Chamber was amongst those who organized last week’s11,000 strong anti-moratorium “Rally for Economic Survival” held at the Cajundome.

The near-complete shut down of Gulf Coast drilling by the Obama administration continues to compound the blows to jobs that towns like Lafayette are already feeling. Some drilling companies aren’t holding their breath for an expedited end to the moratorium and have already recommitted drilling resources to other countries. And with the “small people” sitting on the sidelines, they’re left with a spectacle of disaster.

That is why groups like the Lafayette Chamber’s Energy Division are continuing to crop up.

“With so many local companies involved in the exploration of oil and gas, it just made sense to provide them with a common ground,” said Guidry.

“Volunteers will lobby all levels of government to promote pro-industry legislation and work to defeat measures that negatively impact the industry. Immediate attention will be given to the moratorium on deepwater drilling.” – Jeff Moore, The Daily Advertiser

And they have every reason to be committed to seeing this moratorium come to an end. Heritage Foundation research has shown that the effects of an offshore drilling ban would result in a $5.5 trillion reduction in GDP and a reduction in job growth by more than 1.5 million jobs by 2030. Pair this with the realization that our expenses on imports would raise by more than $730 billion in the same timeframe, creating foreign employment while stifling the domestic market, and a very grim image begins to be formed.

The drilling ban was allegedly put in place to prevent repeat disasters like the Deepwater Horizon Spill, a worthy concern to be sure, but banning all drilling in the Gulf of Mexico is not a worthy answer. Other options remainthat will not only preserve jobs in Gulf States, but ensure that safety standards on drilling rigs are maintained.

From the smallest oil businesses on the Gulf Coast, to the Governor of Louisiana, to the majority of our nation, the resounding cry is for an end to the Gulf of Mexico drilling moratorium. Will it be heard? Or will the oil-spill simply remain another crisis to be taken advantage of?

Obamacare has been rightly blasted as fiscally irresponsible, yet few have noticed what may be Obamacare’s largest ticking entitlement time-bomb: the CLASS Act. My new op-ed on the subject is here, and my new report, co-written with Jim Capretta, is here.

CLASS is a new long-term-care insurance program that was inserted into Obamacare so that Congress could raid its $70 billion surplus through 2020 to cover Obamacare’s initial deficits. Like the raided Social Security trust fund, future taxpayers will have to repay that $70 billion with interest when the program falls into deficit later.

Thus, even Sen. Kent Conrad (D., N.D.) admits that Congress has enacted “a Ponzi scheme of the first order, the kind of thing that Bernie Madoff would have been proud of.”

It gets worse. CLASS is simultaneously 1) voluntary, 2) supposedly self-financing (premiums must be raised to match benefits), and 3) required to charge the same premium to healthy and unhealthy individuals of a given age. This is a recipe for insolvency.

To see why, consider an admittedly simplified example: Let’s say three 45-year-olds, based on varying health and expected long-term needs, state their individual willingness to pay for this insurance at $100, $500, and $900 per month.

In order to maintain solvency without risk-based pricing, CLASS would be required to charge all three people the same $500 premium. The healthiest person (willing to pay just $100) would consider this a bad deal and decline participation. At that point, premiums for the remaining two individuals would have to rise to $700 to keep the program solvent. This would cause the moderately healthy person (willing to pay $500) to also drop out, leaving only the unhealthiest person and a $900 premium.

Health economists call this an “adverse-selection death spiral,” and it would likely end in program bankruptcy. The CBO, the Department of Health and Human Services, and even the American Academy of Actuaries all agree that CLASS is unsustainable. Once it goes bankrupt (likely in 15 to 25 years), the subsequent taxpayer bailouts could cost trillions of dollars.

The best way to avoid a bailout would be to repeal CLASS before it begins enrolling participants and collecting premiums, which could be as soon as January 1, 2011. Is anyone in Congress paying attention?

President Barack Obama, the honorary chairman of the Boy Scouts of America, will not speak in-person before the group on Wednesday at Fort A.P. Hill in Virginia, as part of the organization’s 100th anniversary celebration. However, the president is sending a videotaped message to the scouts for Wednesday, the same day he will be in Manhattan to tape an appearance for ABC TV’s talk show “The View.”

Bob Dries, chairman of national news and media at the Boy Scouts of America Jamboree – a gathering that happens every four years and attracts thousands of scouts from around the world – told CNSNews.com that the organization was told on Monday that the president had scheduling conflicts and would not be speaking in-person at the week-long event.

The BSA had scheduled its Wednesday arena program to include remarks by the president at 11 a.m. in front of the more than 45,000 scouts who will be in attendance.

The White House did not confirm to CNSNews.com that the president would not speak live at the Jamboree on Wednesday, but reporters were sent an e-mail at 1:45 p.m. on Monday announcing that the president will be in New Jersey on Wednesday afternoon to talk about the economy before he travels on to New York City to film his appearance for “The View’s” Thursday edition.

Also, shortly after the White House e-mail was distributed, Bob Dries confirmed that Jamboree officials had been informed the president would not be speaking in-person but would address the scouts via pre-taped remarks.

Since the Jamboree was launched in 1937, sitting presidents have been invited to speak at the event in their role as the honorary chairman of the BSA. That year, President Franklin D. Roosevelt spoke at the inaugural Jamboree, held on the Mall in Washington, D.C.

Obama’s three predecessors spoke at the event – George H. W. Bush in 1989 and Bill Clinton in 1998 in-person, and George W. Bush who spoke via video in 2001 when bad weather prevented him from traveling. George W. Bush did speak in-person at the 2005 Jamboree.

First Lady Nancy Reagan addressed the Jamboree in 1985, the first year someone from the White House had spoken there since President Lyndon Johnson in 1964. Prior to Johnson, President Harry Truman was joined by then-General and future President Dwight D. Eisenhower, both of whom spoke at the 1950 Jamboree in Valley Forge.

Presidents Nixon, Reagan, Carter and Ford did not speak at a Jamboree and President John F. Kennedy was assassinated before the Jamboree in 1964 when Johnson spoke.

The BSA issued a statement late on Monday about President Obama not being able to speak at the event.

“Due to his schedule, President Obama will not be able to attend the 2010 National Scout Jamboree,” the statement reads. “In February, the President sent a letter honoring the BSA’s 100th Anniversary and his signature appears on Eagle Scout cards.”

“Also, he has welcomed Boy Scouts contingents in the Oval Office twice since taking office,” the statement reads. “President Obama serves as the Honorary President of the BSA, as has every President since Howard Taft. While each President is traditionally invited to attend the Jamboree, not every President has been able to attend the event.”

“We thank the President for his effort to recognize Scouting and look forward to working with his administration as we work toward accomplishing our mission of preparing young people to become exceptional adults,” the statement concludes.

The two occasions referred to in the statement were when scouting representatives visited the Oval Office in 2009 and earlier this month for the BSA to present the president with the organization’s annual Report to the Nation, which outlines accomplishments for the year and the BSA’s vision for the future.

In a statement about his appearance on the “The View,” ABC said it would be “the first time in history a sitting United States president has visited a daytime talk show.”

In an e-mail, White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer told The New York Times that Obama’s appearance on “The View” had been “contemplated for several weeks because the president was scheduled to be in New York City for a fund-raiser,” and that the appearance “was nailed down early last week.”

“If it works schedule-wise, we try to have the president appear on some non-traditional news shows shen we go to New York City, since that’s where most of the shows tape,” Pfeiffer said in his e-mail.

The White House today released its updated federal budget projections. By releasing the report late on a Friday afternoon—a longtime Washington tradition for stories that politicians want to bury—the Obama Administration is effectively admitting that its budget numbers will not be well-received.

The “Mid-Session Budget Review” projects that this year’s budget deficit will reach $1.471 trillion, or 10 percent of the economy. In nominal dollars, it’s the largest deficit in American history. As a percentage of the economy, it’s the largest deficit since World War II.

This will be the second consecutive year of trillion-dollar deficits that approach 10 percent of the economy. By comparison, the previous post–World War II record was 6 percent of the economy in 1983. Under President George W. Bush, deficits typically ranged between $160 billion and $400 billion (around 3 percent of the economy).

And the Obama Administration concedes that these large deficits are here to stay. It projects another $1.4 trillion deficit in 2011, followed by sustained deficits that never fall below $698 billion. The national debt held by the public—$5.8 trillion at the end of 2008—would soar to $18.5 trillion by the end of this decade.

These future deficits are driven almost exclusively by rising spending. President Obama’s budget would push inflation-adjusted federal spending past $36,000 per household by 2020—$12,000 above the level that prevailed under President Bush. Even President Obama’s enormous and anti-growth $3 trillion tax increase proposal won’t stop this spending spree from pushing the national debt to economically dangerous levels.

The Mid-Session Budget Review also confirms the failure of Obama’s economic agenda. The President concedes that the unemployment rate will remain at nearly 10 percent this year and not revert to pre-recession levels until 2016—and even that is based on the same optimistic Keynesian economic models that claim the stimulus created or saved 3 million jobs. If this is economic policy success, one wonders how failure would look.

With the Mid-Session Budget Review, the Obama White House has once again confirmed its agenda of runaway spending, surging taxes, and soaring budget deficits. And its economic figures concede that high unemployment rates will be a mainstay of the Obama presidency.

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich slammed the Obama administration’s firing of a USDA official Sunday as a panicky response that shows they’re not prepared for the big issues facing the nation.

“If the Obama administration is this afraid of Glenn Beck, how do they deal with the Iranians?” Gingrich asked on “Fox News Sunday.” News accounts this week depicted the firing of USDA official Shirley Sherrod as an effort by the administration to avoid being criticized by Beck.

The quip came during an exchange with former Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean, who accused Fox News of promoting racism.

“Let’s just be blunt about this … I think Fox News did something that was absolutely racist,” Dean charged, referring to the firing of Sherrod after a tape emerged that appeared to show her endorsing the racist treatment of a white farmer.

The opposite turned out to be true – Sherrod helped the white farmer and spoke openly about her own racial issues. She was offered a new job by the Obama administration after the news story turned out to be the sensation of the week.

“Fox News was not blameless during this,” Dean said. “You played it up.”

But host Chris Wallace shot back, “I know facts are inconvenient things, but let’s deal with the facts.” They include that Fox News did not play the clip or mention her name before the Obama administration forced Sherrod on Monday to step down, he said, according to The Hill.

Dean said the clip was about to run on Glenn Beck’s program on Fox, “which is what the administration was afraid of.”

Read the entire story at The Hill.