Representative Jim Jordan lays out a forceful case to destroy the RyanCare healthcare proposal.  Jordan makes a lot of good points; however, the unnerving aspect is Jordan’s response to the long-term ramifications of blowing up the Senate process:  “I don’t care” if we lose elections and end up with single-payer healthcare.
Jim Jordan is scheduled to meet again with President Trump this coming Tuesday.

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Earlier on Fox Business News, House Majority Whip, Representative Steve Scalise, defended the current three-step proposal and extended the conversation into the budget ramifications and the Trump tax reform proposal.
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Secretary Wilbur “wolverine” Ross, aka Wilburine, discusses his perspective on trade issues, and enforcement.    Gotta love Wilburine’s magnanimous graciousness as he explains the “goodwill gesture” extended recently to Mexico.  {LOL} Wilburine also hits at Trade with Japan being utilized as offsetting leverage with China. [Explains golf with Abe]

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As more people begin seeing through the fog of political “talking points”, the next response from those suffering from battered conservative syndrome is to say: well, do nothing, and allow ObamaCare to simply self-destruct.
Unfortunately, this is not an option.  At least it’s not a reasonable option.  To understand how battered conservatives are being lead around, used and abused, it is very important to understand the abusers.  There are many.

Last week Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin informed congress it will soon be necessary to raise the debt ceiling.   Immediately, crony-constitutional conservative types, like many who assemble in the House Freedom Caucus, shouted “no way”; apparently, according to their pearl-clutching political position – it unnerves their fiscally conservative sensibilities.
Interesting.
On October 21st, 2015, the Freedom Caucus itself backed Paul Ryan for Speaker of the House of Representatives. (LINK)  A week later, October 28th, 2015, members of the same Freedom Caucus voted to approve a $2+ trillion dollar Omnibus spending bill, a massive continuing resolution, and removed the debt ceiling restrictions (link).  Two days later, October 30th, 2015, at 3:00am in the morning, the Omnibus CR bill passed the Senate (link).
This was yet another year without a federal budget, and a specific decision to fund all of Obama’s spending priorities for 2015 and 2016.  (more…)

On Saturday in Louisville, Ky., Vice President Mike Pence spoke about President Donald Trump’s plan to repeal and replace ObamaCare.  Anyone else notice Kentucky Senators Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul were not present?

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“The ObamaCare nightmare is about to end. … Virtually every promise with ObamaCare has been broken,” Pence said, adding Kentucky is one of the many states negatively affected by the Affordable Care Act.
Pence promised that ObamaCare would not continue, since it has been a top priority of the Trump administration to repeal and replace the program.
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In the largest measure, the basic problem is in 2009 Harry Reid passed the ObamaCare legislation in the Senate with 60 votes.  The House then passed the exact same bill, and the Democrats moved to immediate reconciliation to remove the House concerns (Gator-Aid, Cornhusker Kickback, Louisiana Purchase etc.).
In 2017 the Republican congress are attempting to repeal and replace that ObamaCare legislation with only 52 Senate votes available, well, maybe.
Unfortunately for the GOP there are not even 52 votes for repeal.  Portman, Thune, Collins, Murkowski, Graham, McCain, Blunt, Cochran, Cornyn, Hatch, McConnell and others, are not necessarily on board; that’s 11. (Leaving only 41).
No amount of byzantine rule changes surrounding “reconciliation” are going to overcome that factual vote hurdle.  In 2009 Senator Reid started with 60 votes.  In 2017 Senator McConnell starts with 52.

So anything coming from the House of Representatives has to keep this reality in mind.  Even if support or opposition is based on ideological principle, it still has to pass – or it’s moot.
There’s no doubt the Paul Ryan proposal holds the worst U.S. CoC aspects demanded by Tom Donohue.  Heck, Donohue poured a lot of lobbying money into the entire architecture in ’09/’10 and he’s paid republicans in congress hundreds of millions to make sure his interests in keeping ObamaCare around are protected.  Ryan is big GOPe and he’s supported by the Big Club.
And, as much as Paul Ryan is beholden to Donohue to retain some form of ObamaCare, so too are the Rand Paul / Ted Cruz types paid by billionaires like Cary Katz (Conservative Review); who want an abject repeal without compromise. (more…)

Reposting part of a previous outline by request.  The repost is requested as an outcome of the latest wage rate news within the February labor report.  The wage rate increase is not being highlighted, and in some reports downplayed, by media.   However, the measurable matrices inside the space between two economic engines is responding according to prior outline on the new economic dimension.

First the recap of the day’s news on labor rates:

WASHINGTON DC – With the labor market near full employment, wage growth could speed up as companies are forced to raise compensation to retain employees and attract skilled workers. A proxy for take-home pay rose a solid 0.5 percent in February.

The annual wage increase is close to the 3 percent to 3.5 percent range that economists say is needed to lift inflation to the Fed’s 2 percent target. Inflation is already firming, in part as commodity prices rise.

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State Department Journalists are some of the most tender snowflakes in Washington DC.  The latest outrage du jour is reporters complaining they are not allowed to fly with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to Asia.
There’s no-one stopping the reporters from flying to Asia and covering T-Rex’s visit.  The entire complaint is that they don’t get to fly on his airplane.
Who does the State Department run to when they need to voice their alarm,…. well, that would be CNN of course:

(Via CNN) The new secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, has been all but silent in his first month on the job. And he is planning on traveling to Asia next week without the traditional coterie of traveling press with him.
Journalists are strenuously objecting to the plan. But there is no indication that Tillerson is going to reverse course. The State Department may allow one hand-picked journalist to tag along, but the details are unknown.

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In the latest Bloomberg News report on the labor market, Bloomberg buried the lede:

[…]  Goods-producing industries, which include mining, construction and manufacturing, added 95,000 jobs in February, the most since 2000.

This is critical for many reasons.  However, before going further, again we must remind everyone about the Magic Wand. WATCH:

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What many people do not realize is the scope of four decades of lies being sold by politicians and political operatives, who are espousing the sales pitch of globalists, and who constructed the second (Wall Street) corporate paper economy around the premise of off-shoring manufacturing and industrial jobs.
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It’s obvious the financial interests are pouring in money to the R.A.T groups right now in the fight over ObamaCare Repeal and/or Replace.   Boy howdy are they all fibbing as they fling their poo at each other.  Forget the Democrats in this discussion.  For the sake of this analysis we only look at the right side of the UniParty; the Republican side.

There are two financial special interest groups within the Republican fight on ObamaCare. Two groups within the BIG CLUB.  Essentially, two swamp R.A.T factions:
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Our President Trump met with the CEO’s of various small and community banks earlier today as part of the financial reform that underpins much of the overall Trump economic agenda.
Previously President Trump issued an executive order which modified, actually tiered, the choking rules, regulations and compliance reporting within Dodd-Frank banking rules which buried smaller locally operated banks with the same regulatory framework as massive financial institutions.
The next aspect of Trump’s financial reform will most likely come in some form of reinstatement of the Glass-Steagall Act. President Trump personally put the reinstatement of Glass-Steagall into the GOP platform as part of uncoupling Wall Street financial policy from Main Street financial needs. [More explanation on that below]

[Transcript] 11:17 A.M. EST – THE PRESIDENT: Thank you, everybody, very much. Good morning and I greatly appreciate you being here. We have some real experts with us and we have some great bankers with us.
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