Despite his purported skill as an orator, none of Obama’s addresses to Congress has been particularly successful. They are typically remembered more for the rancor they caused than for any positive effects.

Obama is expected to make inequality the focus of his address. That’s an important campaign theme, as well as a refrain of the Occupy Wall Street movement that Obama supported in the fall of 2011.

Yet it is not a significant departure from the tone of previous addresses, in which Obama bullied opponents and Supreme Court justices; fabricated health insurance horror stories; and called upon “millionaires and billionaires” to pay.

For reference purposes as you watch tonight’s State of the Union, here is a concise summary of Obama’s five previous speeches to Congress, and how they were received:

Obama's first address: February 24, 2009

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Address to Joint Session of Congress, February 24, 2009

In his first speech as the 44th President, Obama wanted to put his stamp on the presidency and introduce his ambitious policy agenda–one “that begins with jobs,” he said. The highlight of his address was the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act–i.e. the stimulus–which he promised would receive “tough, unprecedented oversight” under Vice President Joe Biden.

Obama also announced a government lending program to ease credit, a new housing plan to prevent foreclosures, and assistance to struggling banks. He asked for “long-term investments” in green energy; for a commitment to health care reform; and for new funding for schools, along with education reforms. And he promised to cut the deficit in half by the end of his first term, partly by letting “tax breaks” for the wealthy expire.

In addition, Obama touched on national security, reiterating his promise to close the detention facilities at Guantánamo Bay, hinting that he would press for civilian trials for terrorists, and promising to “defeat al Qaeda and combat extremism.” On foreign policy, Obama declared “a new era of engagement” through negotiations with hostile powers, and announced the appointment of a new envoy to help end the Arab-Israeli conflict.

The reaction to Obama’s speech was somewhat negative: he apparently intended to govern from the left, not from the center (as some had hoped). Stock prices fell sharply the next morning, recovering by the afternoon but ending firmly in the red. In retrospect, though Obama kept his promises on assisting banks and fighting al Qaeda, he broke many other pledges, and saw many of his policies–especially the stimulus–fail badly.

***

Health Care Reform Address, September 9, 2009

Obama’s speech is remembered more for Republican congressman Joe Wilson’s (accurate, though rude) outburst–”You lie!”–than for anything Obama himself said. Yet the speech was the climax of a heated political battle over health care reform that lasted well into the next year, divided the nation bitterly, and eventually cost Democrats control of the House in November 2010.

Obama began by taking credit for economic progress (“we have pulled this economy back from the brink”) before launching into his chosen topic. In outlining the problem, Obama told two stories about ordinary Americans who had suffered through losing their insurance; both of these later turned out to be false. He declared that while other presidents had tried to deal with health care reform, he was “determined to be the last.”

Obama presented his plan–which did not exist in legislative form–as the middle ground between Democrats’ preference for “single-payer” and Republicans’ proposal to “leave individuals to buy health insurance on their own.” He said his plan would be deficit-neutral; provide “more security and more stability” while insuring more people; slow the growth of health costs, and allow people to keep “the coverage or the doctor you have.”

Next, Obama turned to the “bogus claims spread by those whose only agenda is to kill reform at any cost.” These included so-called “death panels,” insuring illegal immigrants, and federal funding for abortion; the latter two turned out to be true, and the first persists in rationing proposals. Obama went on to criticize insurance companies, to defend his proposed Medicare cuts, and to offer a promise to consider tort reform (still unfulfilled).

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First State of the Union Address, January 27, 2010

Obama again began with the now-familiar refrain that he had entered office in tumultuous times, but had brought America back from the brink–“one year later, the worst of the storm has passed.” Yet Obama did not look confident–shaken, perhaps, by 10% unemployment and by the election of Republican Scott Brown to the Senate from Massachusetts, a striking rebuke to Obama.

Citing “experts from across the political spectrum,” Obama claimed government had needed to act “immediately and aggressively” in 2009. Likewise, citing “economists on the left and right,” he claimed the stimulus had “helped save jobs and avert disaster.” He also drew attention to tax cuts that had been part of the stimulus, claiming that he had done what was politically difficult in order to achieve what was economically necessary.

Obama continued by declaring that for businesses to create jobs, government first had to “create the conditions necessary.” To that end, he proposed using $30 billion of the TARP bailout money to help “community banks.” He also touted infrastructure spending and investments in clean energy. Describing the previous economic recovery as a “lost decade,” he urged Congress to reshape the new recovery by passing financial reform.

After outlining several other government-driven economic proposals, Obama turned to health care, reiterating that his reforms would be deficit-neutral and allow Americans “to keep their doctor and their plan.” Striking a bipartisan tone, Obama asked for proposals for a “better approach” (though Republican plans were never, in fact, considered). He also announced his bipartisan debt commission (whose advice he ultimately rejected).

In a striking breach of decorum, Obama then turned to the Supreme Court justices who were sitting impassively in the chamber and excoriated them for their ruling in Citizens United–prompting Justice Samuel Alito to shake his head and mouth the words: “Not true.” Democrats leapt to their feet. Obama then decried partisanship in Washington, singling out Senate Republicans for the filibuster power they had only recently regained.

On foreign policy, Obama touted his pursuit of terrorists, and promised to bring troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan. He also highlighted his work on nuclear disarmament, and highlighted the cause of human rights in Iran–a cause Obama had conspicuously failed to support when protests erupted there in 2009. In closing, he promised to end “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” and concluded: “I never suggested that change would be easy.”

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Second State of the Union Address, January 25, 2011

This was Obama’s first address to the new, divided Congress after his party suffered an historic defeat in the November 2010 elections. Missing a few Supreme Court justices, and facing a chamber dominated by Republicans, Obama’s speech failed to demonstrate that he had received the urgent message Americans had sent his administration at the polls just a few weeks before.

Obama began with the Tucson shootings–which Democrats had already mobilized for partisan purposes–as a symbol of the need for unity. Once again, he claimed credit for signs of economic progress, including rising stock prices and new private sector jobs. In order to succeed further, Obama said, the government would have to invest in “winning the future” (a slogan stolen, ironically, from his possible future opponent Newt Gingrich).

The slogan–which Sarah Palin would mock with the acronym “WTF”–included plans to spend, once again, on clean energy; to increase spending on education; to solve illegal immigration “once and for all”; and to invest in high-speed rail and other infrastructure projects. Aside from vague nods on tax reform and entitlements, and a promised “review of government regulations,” the address simply reiterated Obama’s past priorities.

Obama acknowledged his health care law could be “improved,” but–setting up a straw man–vowed never to “go back to the days when insurance companies could deny someone coverage because of a pre-existing condition.” On the issue of the national debt, he proposed freezing domestic spending for five years–at the high levels he had already set. Critically, Obama failed to endorse the proposals of his debt commission.

Once again, Obama spoke about his administration’s success in fighting al Qaeda, and his goal of ending the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. He also, however, added that he had “increased cooperation” with American allies on missile defense–a gross distortion, given that he had backed out of commitments on missile defense with Poland and the Czech Republic. Overall, the speech fell flat, setting the stage for a difficult political year.

***

American Jobs Act Address, September 8, 2011

This address was President Obama’s most partisan, and most futile: the “jobs bill” it was meant to promote was delayed by the president’s own party in the Senate, and ultimately never passed. For the first time, Obama did not attempt to claim credit for economic recovery, but highlighted “economic crisis”–and attacked Congress for causing “a political crisis that’s made things worse.”

The American Jobs Act was essentially a reprise of the stimulus of 2009, which Obama tacitly acknowledged had failed. Packed with proposals that the president knew would not pass the Republican-controlled House–such as more spending on profligate state governments, and new taxes on people Obama called “millionaires and billionaires”–the address set Congress as the rhetorical punching bag of Obama’s re-election campaign.

As he had done two years before in pressing Congress to pass health care reform, the president described his bill as the  moderate alternative. He scolded Democrats “who don’t think we should make any changes at all to Medicare and Medicaid”; he attacked Republicans “who don’t believe we should raise taxes on those who are most fortunate and can best afford it.” This time, neither party appeared to be impressed by the tactic.

Once again, Obama argued for the role of government in American life, asserting that its importance was based on “a belief that we’re all connected, and that there are some things we can only do together, as a nation….No single individual built America on their own.” Republican pundits were critical of the speech, but some greeted it with relief: finally, there was no more pretense. Obama had become his true, big-government self.

Mission Point Capital Partners, “a private investment firm established by Mark Schwartz, former President and Chief Executive Officer of Soros Fund Management and former Chairman of Goldman Sachs (Asia); Jesse M. Fink, co-founder and former Chief Operating Officer of priceline.com; and Mark J. Cirilli, former Chief Investment Officer of Marshall Street Management,” explains:

The Smart Grid is a collection of energy control and monitoring devices, software, networking and communications infrastructure that are installed in homes, businesses, and throughout the electricity distribution grid. This collective system provides a “nervous system” for the grid and for customers that provides the ability to monitor and control energy consumption comprehensively in real time. Think of it as the Internet for Energy… Smart meters and other smart grid technologies… are designed with this ability, and they can provide the infrastructure that will support the implementation of responsible climate change policy. [emphasis added]

Smart thermostats, smart meters and the smart grid will provide the utility with information and the ability to monitor energy consumption throughout the country. These devices will enable them to regulate your use of electricity and turn it on and off at their discretion.  According to SmartGrid.gov, “The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act) provided the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) with about $4.5 billion to modernize the electric power grid and to implement Title XIII of the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (EISA), which focused on the Smart Grid.”  This site shows the government’s progress  in implementing smart grid technology through the country.  The money put into this is staggering! The Solyndra scandal is only the tip of the iceberg of this Administration’s green radicalism.

Implementing “responsible climate change policy” will come at a tremendous cost to the energy consumer and benefit those involved in producing and installing these devices as well as those involved in the carbon emissions permit exchange market.

During his presidential campaign, candidate Barack Obama said that under his plan of a cap and trade system, electricity rates “will necessarily skyrocket.”  As utility companies across the country continue to comply with the strong arm demands of the EPA to provide a greater percentage of energy to its customers using renewable sources of energy, such as solar and wind, we will see a substantial increase in our electricity bills.

When his cap and trade bill stalled in the Senate,  John Kerry (D-MA) issued a statement, “Today we went from ‘wake-up call’ to ‘last call’ on the urgency of Senate action on comprehensive energy and climate legislation.  The Obama Administration has again reminded Washington that if Congress won’t legislate, the EPA will regulate.”   That is exactly what they are doing.

The video below explains what allowing a smart meter to be installed in your home means to you, the energy consumer.

Likely voters have good reason to be concerned about the negative consequences of another round of big government spending. U.S. stock prices of the 500 large largest American companies in the S&P 500 Index made all-time highs just prior to the real estate and banking 2008 Credit Crisis. Over the next seven months, the stock prices of these conservative companies fell by 50% and heralded the start of the worst economic decline in America history since the Great Depression.

Here are a few statistics that demonstrate just how historic last month’s response has been to the downgrade of America’s credit rating by the S&P 500 Stock Index:

• The index was down whapping 5.7% for the month;
• The sum total of the violent up and down moves during the month was equal to 47%;
• Volatility was in the 98th percent highest level of any month since 1928;
• Investment return was in the bottom 10% of monthly returns since 1928;
• If September shows a loss, it will be only the 9th consecutive 5 month loss since 1928;
• The last 5 months of continuous stock losses before the Credit Crisis of 2008, was 1974.

The stock market is predicting that the United States reliance on big government initiatives funded by deficit spending is over. Next year, the recent deal to increase the debt ceiling requires $71 billion spending cuts. Furthermore, on December 31, 2011 the 100% depreciation of corporate capital purchases for 2011 will expire. The net effect of these cutbacks will result in approximately a 2% reduction in GDP. This will be the largest reduction in government activity since WWII.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 was literally a $787 billion no-questions-asked blank-check written in support of the most extreme elements of the progressive movement since the Great Depression. When President Obama signed the bill, he charismatically said: “We have begun the essential work of keeping the American dream alive in our time.” Unfortunately, his dream appears to have morphed from the real estate and banking Credit Crisis of 2008 into the real estate, banking, and United States Sovereign Debt Credit Crisis of 2011.

When President Obama said in July that Americans needed to: “Pull off the band aid. Eat our peas.” The President was urging Congress to agree to raise taxes in order to continue the stimulus spending to create jobs favored by likely voters. But after the gut-wrenching financial turmoil of the last month and threats by S&P to further downgrade the U.S. credit rating; the historic consensus of American voter to support the Federal government as a jobs creator has evaporated.

Feel free to forward this Op Ed and follow our research at www.chrissstreetandcompany.com

Labor unions and leftist activists are expected to once again descend upon the Captiol in Madison, WI on Tuesday. They plan to protest Governor Scott Walker’s first 2-year budget proposal, which seeks to cap entitlement programs and make cuts in education while expanding school voucher programs, in an attempt to close a $3 billion budget deficit. Republicans also expect to add the collective bargaining provisions that were passed in March, unless the State Supreme Court issues a ruling before then.

Opponents of Walker’s proposal view their side as an issue of human rights and a statement against corporations, and have not surprisingly ratcheted up the rhetoric. On its website announcing Tuesday’s protest, the Wisconsin state AFL-CIO posted:

Debate will be limited, democracy will be circumvented and the balance will greatly tip in favor of ramming through an anti-worker, anti-family, anti-community agenda. Come bear witness to this denial of democracy… Please take part in democracy and bear witness to the extreme attack on the people of Wisconsin. Join us tomorrow, Tuesday, June 14, as we continue to stand strong against a budget that guts public schools, attacks health care, raises taxes on workers and seniors, and jeopardizes public services like police and fire. All while handing over $300 million a year in tax breaks to the rich.

Oh, the drama….

The message from the left is much the same as it was in March. One of the speakers at those many rallies was then former mayor Paul Soglin, who is now Madison’s current mayor, again.  Here he is as he speaks about business: profit bad, corporations bad, happy hand-holding workers good.

Soglin, who camped overnight with protesters at the state capitol during the last budget battle, is a Wisconsin fixture in liberal activism and politics, having been a noted activist since the 1960’s and featured in several books and the anti-war documentaries, “Two Days in October” and “The War at Home.” He has spoken of things like government sponsored cooperatives, and stated that “Since the Berlin Wall came down, the Republican Party, with its designer wars, poses greater threats to national security than the ice cream parlors in Havana.” In fact, during an earlier term as mayor, Soglin awarded Fidel Castro the key to the city of Madison, and spent time with Castro in Cuba in 1975.

As Tuesday’s protests roll around, we’re reminded of some of Soglin’s words just prior to his election. While he often seems to be a reasonable guy, his ideology is unapologetically leftist and he frequently speaks in terms of shared responsibility and the government having a large role in that collective effort.

“I look at management as a Tom Sawyer experience….if there’s a fence that needs to be painted, the best way to do it is to get everyone to participate and make it fun. That is what we’re going to do in the future.”

Sounds groovy.  What’s especially interesting to note though is that the mayor shares some of his background and ideology with someone we’ve previously mentioned on the Bigs in the past. Mind you, her role was not yet fully recognized at the time, but once she caught the eye of a few bloggers in the Wisconsin area, she started to take on a little bit of a George Soros persona. And she’s apparently rubbed off on the mayor:

After leaving City Hall in 1997, he worked for Lincoln Financial Advisors, and after losing to Cieslewicz became a project manager at booming Epic Systems in Verona from 2003 through 2008. He says he gained invaluable insights into economic development and corporate success from Epic CEO Judith Faulkner.

Drawn back to the public arena, Soglin left Epic and started a blog and a consulting business. His efforts for unions and developers, he said, created better understanding of labor and tensions between neighborhoods and builders.

Now Soglin is on leave from an adviser job with the Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority. He still teaches graduate seminars at UW-Madison’s La Follette School of Public Affairs.

If you haven’t previously read about who Judith Faulkner is, it’s imperative – especially if you live in Wisconsin – to read this post first, Will Money & Power in Wisconsin Politics Influence Health Care Policy?, particularly the last third of it.

You see, it turns out that one of the biggest backers of liberal politicians and big labor in Wisconsin is actually none other than….an evil corporation!

But this isn’t just any little local corporation either. This is Epic Systems, the company whose CEO, Judith Faulkner, is helping to implement standards for the federal mandate of nationwide electronic health records. You know, the digital storage of your own personal medical information? (And quite possibly transitioned over to the government as part of a single-payer system, if liberal politicians have anything to do with it).  From my prior BigGovernment post:

It turns out that Judy Faulkner is also important outside of Wisconsin.  She was appointed to the federal Government Accountability Office Health IT Policy Committee in April 2009.  This is a committee that was created in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) for the purpose of “mak[ing] recommendations on creating a policy framework for the development and adoption of a nationwide health information technology infrastructure, including standards for the exchange of patient medical information.”  Electronic Medical Records (EMR) / Electronic Health Records (EHR) – long considered by the left to be the holy grail to a single payer system -  are a key financial component of both the ARRA and the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.  Faulkner’s company, Epic Systems, is the same software that is installed at many of the facilities often cited by President Obama and members of Congress as the “model health care systems,” including Geisinger, Kaiser Permanente and Cleveland Clinic, to name just a few.

Mayor Soglin’s former employer is a powerful source – pouring money into Wisconsin politics and influencing decision makers throughout the state. One of the political committees to which she donates, the Greater Wisconsin Committee, spent over $1.3 million on just the Supreme Court race alone, much of it on disgraceful attack ads on television.  But in the 2008 race, Faulkner, along with Soglin’s help, called for a boycott of Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce (WMC), the state’s leading pro-business lobby, when it spent $1.2 million on campaign advertising in support of the conservative candidate, which prompted the resignation of WMC board member and J.P. Cullen & Sons CEO, David Cullen.  Cullen’s company was Faulkner’s building contractor working on the $300 million expansion of Epic Systems’ Verona campus at that time.  The bullying has continued into more recent elections, as the committee has also been running anti-Walker ads all throughout these protests.

As usual, it seems hypocritical for labor unions to be crying foul over corporate donors throughout these protests and screaming for a more “collective” way of life in Wisconsin, when one of their own is not only bankrolling a good amount of liberal politicians in the state, but also in federal elections, including Obama’s. Meanwhile, some of those very politicians who have received donations from Epic have coincidentally been interfering in policy decisions at state and federal levels, seemingly on the company’s behalf.

Epic Systems and the Faulkners are also donors to many liberal and Democratic candidates, including some who have been cited as potential 2012 Wisconsin Senate candidates, such as Rep. Tammy Baldwin.  Epic Systems came up recently when five members of a congressional delegation, including Tammy Baldwin, sent a letter to the Departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs, asking them to consider using a commercial off the shelf system for their electronic health records solution.  The letter cited Kaiser Permanente, Cedars Sinai and Cleveland Clinic as model examples – all Epic Systems installations.

Of course given its business model, Epic thrives on government contracts and on new government mandates and regulations. The Obama administration has set aside almost $100 million in total for electronic health records incentives, claiming it would create tens of thousands of jobs, and issued numerous mandates and regulations pertaining to electronic health records. Well, when the CEO of Epic just so happens to sit on the federal Health IT board, one would think that probably gives this heavyweight campaign donor and labor union allies quite a few perks.

I’m sure much of this will come in handy for the 2012 elections as well.

It’s also worth pointing out that Epic Systems is not a union shop. I suppose that doesn’t bother unions as much, since the Faulkners donate so much to union causes and their preferred politicians. Wisconsin’s labor unions, the mayor of Madison and his business muse at Epic can all go ahead and keep criticizing Scott Walker’s pro-business policies and his “Open for Business” campaign slogan all they like. They seem to play the political donor game just as well as those they criticize. The difference between the two sides is that one cannot succeed without the government, while the other can only succeed if government gets out of the way.  Just as Wisconsin Policy Research Institute recognized at the time, figures like Faulkner benefit from the pro-business groups like Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, which, despite the coordinated attacks from Faulkner and Soglin’s allies on the left, had “helped assure that she can run her company as she sees fit.”

Then again, let’s remember, this is where Fidel Castro was once given the key to the city, by its current mayor.

The activity in Wisconsin over the last few months becomes crucially pertinent as the state gears up for the 2012 Wisconsin Senate race.  It’s worth looking at the financial innards  of the Supreme Court race and the protests against Governor Scott Walker in order to assess what the fight for the Wisconsin Senate seat, soon to be vacated by retiring Democratic Senator Herb Kohl, will look like.  What many don’t realize is that this race could have broader implications – not just in national politics, but in specific policy areas, like health care and your personal medical records, for example.  Lots of money, fueled by liberal business interests and an ever-growing progressive movement in Wisconsin, has already been freely flowing.

But is anyone watching? Who are some of these donors?

Let’s start by looking back at the recent Wisconsin protests and the Supreme Court election, and then dissecting some of the money trail.

The hostility stemmed from the union reform bill signed by Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker on March 11^th as a stand-alone portion of the overall budget repair bill.

Preceding this were weeks of relentless organized labor protests, many of which included acts of thuggery and even death threats against Republican lawmakers.  But the measure was promptly challenged by Democratic officials and restraining ordered away into legal-limbo land until June 6th.  Expecting that the challenge may ultimately be decided by the state Supreme Court, Democratic supporters promised an ugly fight for that Supreme Court Justice seat.

And ugly it got.  Not only did the Wisconsin judicial election between conservative incumbent Justice David Prosser and liberal Assistant Attorney General JoAnne Kloppenburg turn into an unprecedented sleaze fest, but spending levels also broke records.  Topping that list of sleaze funders was a non-profit group called the Greater Wisconsin Committee – a medley of labor unions, the Democratic Party, a few powerful liberal business elites, and even the offspring of George Soros.

At the top of mind for most Wisconsin residents was this controversial anti-Prosser TV ad, sponsored by the Greater Wisconsin Committee.

Politifact Wisconsin thoroughly examined each of the claims made in the ad and rated the ad to be “barely true”.

The Greater Wisconsin Committee claims David Prosser didn’t ask police to investigate a mother’s report that a 30-year pedophile priest had indecently touched her two sons, then refused to file charges [against] him and participated in a cover-up of the priest’s acts.

The committee’s TV ad uses generally factual statements to make its case, but ignores critical facts that would give a different impression. By using information that only became known later, it suggests more information was available to Prosser at the time than really was. For instance, Prosser didn’t know that the priest had a long history of molestation — that came out 24 years later. And it wasn’t until 24 years later that one of the brothers made the most serious allegation against the priest.

The ad was so offensive to some that even one of the priest’s victims spoke out against it to ABC news in WI:

“In an email obtained by 12 News on Thursday, one of the victims in case, Troy Merryfield, wrote that he finds the ad offensive, inaccurate and out of context and said he hopes the organization will remove the ad.”

Offensive or not, the strategy of sleaze appeared to have worked.  All that money flowing in, especially from one group in particular, made an impact.

From the Wall Street Journal:

Tuesday’s race between Justice David Prosser and liberal challenger JoAnne Kloppenburg was a dead heat, with Ms. Kloppenburg pulling ahead by about 204 votes late yesterday. Until Mr. Walker’s collective bargaining reform passed last month, incumbent Justice Prosser was a heavy favorite. Unions then turned it into a grudge match, with the union-backed Greater Wisconsin Committee alone spending $1,363,040 for Ms. Kloppenburg, according to the Brennan Center for Justice. Turnout of 1.5 million was nearly double the usual number of voters in a state Supreme Court election.

So, who is this Greater Wisconsin Committee?

Established in 2004 as a 501(c)4, , the organization describes itself as “a state-based, progressive issue advocacy organization that conducts aggressive grassroots and media campaigns on the important public policy issues facing the state.” The Greater Wisconsin Political Fund is its affiliated 527 organization.

According to the Center for Responsive Politics, the Greater Wisconsin Committee’s 2010 funders include:

• AFSCME: $915,000
• SEIU: $185,000
• Judith R & Gordon T Faulkner, Epic Systems (CEO, Judith Faulkner): $60,000
• Lynde Uihlein of Brico Fund/Time Out Enterprises (Schlitz Brewing heir): $275,000
• Grant Abert (co-founder of the Donor Collaborative of Wisconsin, Wisconsin Community Fund): $30,000
• Jonathan Soros, Soros Fund Management: $5,000
• Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee and Democratic Governor’s Association: $1,580,000
• Greater Wisconsin Committee: $300,000

The special interest spending building up to this year’s Supreme Court race rivaled that of Wisconsin’s active 2008 race, when conservative-leaning Judge Michael Gableman defeated incumbent Justice Louis Butler by just 2% of the vote.  When the state’s leading pro-business lobby Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce (WMC) spent $1.2 million on that race, it sparked outrage amongst liberal Democrats and the media.  So much so that Greater Wisconsin Committee member Judy Faulkner, founder and CEO of health information technology company Epic Systems, called for a boycott of WMC in protest, prompting the resignation of WMC board member and J.P. Cullen & Sons CEO, David Cullen.  (Cullen’s company was also Faulkner’s building contractor working on the $300 million expansion of Epic Systems Verona campus at that time).

It turns out that Judy Faulkner is also important outside of Wisconsin.  She was appointed to the federal Government Accountability Office Health IT Policy Committee in April 2009.  This is a committee that was created in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) for the purpose of “mak[ing] recommendations on creating a policy framework for the development and adoption of a nationwide health information technology infrastructure, including standards for the exchange of patient medical information.”  Electronic Medical Records (EMR) / Electronic Health Records (EHR) – long considered by the left to be the holy grail to a single payer system -  are a key financial component of both the ARRA and the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.  Faulkner’s company, Epic Systems, is the same software that is installed at many of the facilities often cited by President Obama and members of Congress as the “model health care systems,” including Geisinger, Kaiser Permanente and Cleveland Clinic, to name just a few.

Epic Systems and the Faulkners are also donors to many liberal and Democratic candidates, including some who have been cited as potential 2012 Wisconsin Senate candidates, such as Rep. Tammy Baldwin.  Epic Systems came up recently when five members of a congressional delegation, including Tammy Baldwin, sent a letter to the Departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs, asking them to consider using a commercial off the shelf system for their electronic health records solution.  The letter cited Kaiser Permanente, Cedars Sinai and Cleveland Clinic as model examples – all Epic Systems installations.

This year, Greater Wisconsin Committee spent over $1.3 million on just the Supreme Court race.  The remaining top four donor groups spent under $1 million each, two of those under $500K.  That seems quite a reversal from the same “principled” stance of these same liberal voices in 2008.

So, why has one organization – the Greater Wisconsin Committee – had so much financial pull in Wisconsin?  And just as importantly, why are just a few individuals and companies in particular, like Judy Faulkner and Epic Systems,  so closely aligned with the labor unions and Democratic party machine?  Wisconsin is having a nationwide impact on politics in our country today.  It’s just as likely that the people shaping Wisconsin’s politics may have a nationwide impact as well.  Just look at Judy Faulkner and Epic Systems – who knows? Wisconsin could even decide who manages your personal medical records.

As the 2012 Wisconsin Senate Race shapes up, perhaps it might be time to watch what the left is doing while they’re crying foul over Koch money.

I was on the road recently, driving from my home in southeast Louisiana through a long stretch of Mississippi to Tuscaloosa, Ala., then to the outskirts of Birmingham and on to Auburn, Ala., and finally back to my home by way of Montgomery and Mobile. Along the way I was slowed from time to time as I passed by road and bridge repair projects marked with prominent signs indicating they were funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, President Obama’s so-called stimulus bill.

Naturally I was thrilled to see my tax dollars at work, although honesty compels me to report that not much actual work seemed to be going on at any of the sites. Most of the visible workers were just standing around. Of course, such standing around is typical of public construction projects, so I don’t suppose that what I saw was in any way owing to the stimulus funding in particular.

This huge legislative enactment provides for a great variety of increased spending and some reduction in taxes over a period of 10 years. The Congressional Budget Office computed that the net amount of money to be injected into, or not removed from, the economy as a result of the stimulus bill totals about $787 billion.

At the time the bill was being debated and discussed, a common plea in its defense had to do with funding so-called shovel-ready projects to repair or replace public roads, bridges and other structures widely taken to be in a state of decay or disrepair. This plea made an appealing talking point, since most Americans place at least some value on such infrastructure.

Alas, only a tiny proportion of the funds expended so far has been directed to this well-advertised objective.

According to the government’s website for tracking stimulus expenditures (Recovery.gov), as of October 27, 2010, $464.2 billion had been made available to a long list of government agencies and $317.8 billion had been spent.

Of the total amount disbursed, 70 percent had been spent by three departments: $91.9 billion by the Department of Health and Human Services, $65.0 billion by the Department of Education, and $62.6 billion by the Department of Labor. The Department of Transportation’s outlays came to just $21.6 billion, or 6.8 percent of the total.

Shovel-ready infrastructure projects have evidently proved difficult to find. Small wonder, then, that President Obama confessed just prior to the election to having “realized too late that ‘there’s no such thing as shovel-ready projects.’” Despite this realization, the president did not propose freezing such spending. Perhaps he had other objectives in mind from the start.

Other leading spenders of “stimulus” money have included the Department of Agriculture ($18.5 billion), the Social Security Administration ($13.7 billion), the Department of the Treasury ($7.9 billion), and the Environmental Protection Agency ($4.3 billion).

A common element of these government departments and agencies is their shortage of shovels, not to mention shovel-ready projects. They also excel at dishing out subsidies to undeserving but politically potent special interests and paying handsome salaries and benefits to bureaucratic drones and wreckers on the government payroll.

So far, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration has spent $733 million of the more than $1 billion allocated to it. Is it possible to shovel outer space?

No doubt the General Services Administration, the Department of Veterans Affairs, the National Science Foundation, the Railroad Retirement Board, and the National Endowment for the Arts are shoveling something. I leave it as an exercise for the reader to ascertain exactly what.

Yet, as I saw with my own eyes, some work evidently is going on in Mississippi and Alabama to fix roads and bridges. That’s something, but it’s hardly going to have a noticeable effect on recovery from the recession.

Ms. Sittenfield apparently bottled whatever Obama’s campaign managers put in the water, and she has been sipping it for the past two years, because her essay reads like a 7th grader’s love note to the handsome school principal.  And like most 7th graders, she is uneducated about politics and economics.

Sittenfield illustrates all that is wrong with the least astute of Americans.

They place their faith in politicians, whose first priority is their own survival, not the desires of their constituents.

They place emotion above practicality.

They ignore the most basic economic concepts.

These are the Sittenfield Americans, folks who can’t — or won’t — see beyond Obama’s gleaming surface, where they would find that almost every policy decision made by this Administration….uh….fell short of what was promised.

So, mesmerized as Sittenfield is — struck dumb, so to speak — I thought I’d point out exactly why so many people seem so disenchanted.

“I’m surprised that so many people have turned against the president. Obviously, if you’ve lost your job, life is tough, but did voters really believe the country was going to quickly and dramatically reverse course once he was elected?”

Now perhaps Sittenfield’s life experience is playing against her.  Boarding school, Vassar College, Stanford.  M.F.A. in creative writing.   Maybe Mom and Dad are paying her way.  Because life isn’t just “tough” if you’ve lost your job.  When you can’t pay for the roof over your head, life is a nightmare.  Not having a job does a number on one’s confidence, psychology, and sense of identity.  It stresses a marriage.  It creates an overwhelming feeling of fear.  Maybe these tiny little things might just create a whole lot of resentment towards a President that ignored the jobs situation, and instead spent over a year trying to pass a health care plan that 1) didn’t accomplish what the far Left wanted, 2) 58% of Americans want repealed, 3) is already creating uncertainty and havoc in the medical community, 4) is being challenged as unconstitutional by 20 states.

But to answer her question, voters didn’t expect an instant fix — nor they didn’t expect that every policy decision made by this Administration would …uh….fall short of what was promised.

“I (apparently alone among sentient voters) don’t think he’s made any major missteps: As far as I can tell, the economic stimulus package might not have been perfect, but it prevented something bad from being even worse”.

The definition of “sentient” among creative writers is, apparently, recognizing that the stimulus package was a positive thing in even the most fantastic of realities.   And I suppose sentient voters read the stimulus bill.  You know, like the Congressional reps who…uh…didn’t read the bill.

I read the bill.  Not only was it really boring, but there was no actual stimulus.

It made bad a lot worse.

A stimulus creates jobs.

It doesn’t do stupid things like require states to match federal funds for an infrastructure project — further driving states into debt.

A stimulus, for example, might lift all bans on oil drilling, and the construction of additional refineries, which would decrease gasoline prices and reduce dependence on foreign oil.  Oops!  Can’t do that!  The Environmental lobby wouldn’t allow it.  Oh, but I thought Obama wouldn’t be beholden to special interests?

Maybe that’s another reason why voters don’t just love Obama.  They don’t like being lied to.

And make no mistake, they pay attention.

You might wonder why the stimulus didn’t provide a free solar energy system to as many Americans as possible?  Imagine all those “green jobs” that would’ve been created in training workers to install those units, not to mention the boost to private solar businesses?  The reason is that that would mean Democrats who voted for the stimulus wouldn’t get all the pork they wanted.   Or rather, turkey.

“And, hell, I have no idea what Obama could have done differently with the oil spill”

Really?  No idea at all?   You know, for a creative writer, she really lacks imagination.

I had a few ideas.  So did a lot of others. Maybe that’s another reason some people just aren’t as hot and bothered about Obama as Sittenfield is.

The remaining reasons why people don’t just love Obama anymore can be complicated when examined in depth.  So I’ll make it easy.

See Barack Bow. See Foreign Leaders Perceive Him As Weak.

Heck, Bow To Dictator, Barack!

See Ronald. See Ronald Command Respect.

See Barack golf...

...While Americans Line Up For Jobs

See Voter Intimidation...

...See A.G. Drop The Case

Imagine A Mosque Here Instead...

See Deficit Soar...

...As The Stimulus "Works"

So Ms. Sittenfield is welcome to Love Love LOVE Obama.

She is welcome to dream up her novels while shutting off that imagination in favor of ideology.

She is welcome to remain enamored of that smile, that wit, that je ne sais quoi.

However, if she wants to Love Love LOVE Obama beyond 2012, then she needs to step outside of her herself and look around.

Look at the images.  Those are the images the rest of America sees.  Those are the images that drove them to bounce Democrats in record numbers.

Those are the images that speak the results of the Obama Presidency.