News

How much did taxpayers lose in Obama’s GM bailout?

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Investors Business Daily does the math on the GM bailout.

Excerpt:

Sale of the U.S. government’s stake in General Motors Corp. ends a sorry saga. Not only were Americans lied to about the costs, but the bailout underscores why replacing market forces with federal bailouts doesn’t work.

The Obama administration says it will unload 200 million shares — or about 40% of its holdings — back to GM right away. The rest, 300 million shares, are to be sold by March 2014.

[…]Well, GM on Wednesday said it will buy back the 200 million share government stake for $5.5 billion, or $27.50 a share.

The break-even point on the government’s total holdings was $53 a share. But now, with $20.9 billion in taxpayer funds left to pay off from 300 million shares, the break-even point has risen to $69.72 a share.

In other words, at current prices, taxpayers are sitting with a loss of 61%, or nearly $15 billion, on their investment.

So where did the money go, then?

According to a study last summer by the Heritage Foundation, the $80 billion auto bailout gave the UAW and its members nearly $27 billion due to the fact that GM couldn’t shed its outrageously expensive labor contracts, something it could have done in a normal bankruptcy.

As such, Obama didn’t bail out the auto industry; he bailed out the unions. Without the unions’ added costs, taxpayers would have owed nothing.

It’s not hard to see how this happened. The UAW and its affiliates give tens of millions of dollars each election cycle, almost entirely to Democrats.

This union influence explains why Obama’s auto czars, Steve Rattner and Ron Bloom, arranged a government bankruptcy for GM that flew in the face of hundreds of years of bankruptcy law and violated investor rights.

Bondholders took huge losses, while unions got a big chunk of ownership in GM stock that they weren’t legally entitled to.

In a shocking display of favoritism and blatant unfairness, GM’s union workers kept their pensions, while nonunion workers at GM spin-off Delphi lost theirs.

Those unions paid Obama back by working hard to get him re-elected. That’s how socialism works.

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My recommended charity for 2012: Life Training Institute

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Unborn baby scheming about what to get WK for Christmas
Unborn baby scheming about what to get WK for Christmas

Scott Klusendorf, the best and most experienced pro-life debater in the United States, wrote this on Facebook:

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Scott is one of my favorite Christians, and I fully endorse his pro-life ministry. Some of you have asked how you could help me with the blog or donate. I am fully supplied already, so if you really want to send me a present, please consider making a donation to Scott’s pro-life ministry. They are absolutely solid in their use of evidence as well as in their theology. You couldn’t find a better group to support.

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News

Off-duty policewoman uses her gun to stop a mass shooting at a theater

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Story from WOAI News.

Excerpt:

 Two people are hospitalized after a gunman chased terrified restaurant patrons into the lobby of the Santikos Mayan 14 movie theater during a showing of “The Hobbit” last night, 1200 WOAI news reports.

Police detectives and sheriff’s investigators say the incident started in the China Garden Restaurant on Southwest Military Drive about 9 PM Sunday, when an employee of the restaurant walked in looking for a woman.

When the woman, who officials say is also a restaurant employee, wasn’t there, the man pulled a gun and attempted to open fire in the restaurant but his weapon jammed.

“It started at the restaurant and then went into the parking lot and then into the movie theater,” Deputy Lou Antu told 1200 WOAI news.

Investigators say some of the terrified restaurant patrons poured into the movie theater, and the gunman followed.

He opened fire, shooting one man in the chest, before Antu says an off duty sheriff’s deputy who was working security at the theater shot him once.

“The officer involved, she took the appropriate action to try to keep everyone safe in the movie theater,” Antu said.

The gunman and the patron are hospitalized.

Antu says the gunman never made it into the theater itself, thanks largely to the heroic work of the off duty deputy.

“She did what she felt she had to do,” Antu said.  “I feel that she saved a lot of lives by taking the action she had to take.”

That’s what could have happened at Sandy Hook in Newtown, Connecticut – if some of the teachers had been armed with concealed weapons. If doesn’t have to be a security guard or an off-duty police officer. Anyone who has a legally-owned firearm can stop a shooting like this, and even deter others.