Obama's latest power grab; Newt asks PAC to remove lies from their Romney video; See how our enemies now love us?; First legal challenge to (non)recess appointments; Government financials unreliable and abysmal; Michigan now expects budget surplus under Republican Governor; The math on taxpayer support of clunker cars being destroyed

Examiner reports: In one of his most blatant acts of audacity, President Barack Obama will petition Congress for even more executive power.  He wants the ability to "single-handedly" fast track making efficiency changes to government agencies and departments--under the banner of reducing expenditures and the deficit, according to an Associated Press article today.
A "senior administration official" said the first such "test case" would be the six agencies of the Commerce Department, including the Commerce Department's core business and trade functions; the Small Business Administration; the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative; the Export-Import Bank; the Overseas Private Investment Corporation; and the Trade and Development Agency.
The goal would be to have one agency designed to help businesses thrive. http://www.examiner.com/political-buzz-in-national/obama-trying-to-orchestrate-another-camouflaged-power-grab
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The Wall St. Journal blogs report: Newt Gingrich is calling on a political group backing his campaign to revise or withdraw a documentary attacking Mitt Romney’s work at Bain Capital.  In his statement, Mr. Gingrich says: “I am calling for the Winning Our Future super PAC supporting me to either edit its ‘King of Bain’ advertisement and movie to remove its inaccuracies, or to pull it off the air and off the Internet entirely.”
Mr. Gingrich said Mr. Romney should also ask super PACs backing him to remove any ads that contain inaccuracies. Mr. Romney has said that he isn’t responsible for the ads of pro-Romney super PACs, which by law can’t coordinate with the candidate. http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2012/01/13/gingrich-calls-on-pac-to-alter-film/
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Yahoo News writes: Thousands of mourners chanted "Death to Israel" and "Death to America" on Friday during the funeral of a slain nuclear expert whom Iranian officials accuse the two nations of killing in a bomb blast this week as part of a secret operation to stop Iran's nuclear program.

The assassination of Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan has raised calls in Iran for retaliation against the U.S. and Israel, and an independent news website Friday said Iran is preparing a covert counteroffensive against the West.

"Iran's intelligence community is in a very good position to design tit-for-tat operations to retaliate for assassinations carried out by Western intelligence services," the official said, according to the website. "Iran's response will be extraterritorial and extra-regional. It follows the strategy that none of those who ordered or carried out (the attacks) should feel secure in any part of the world." http://news.yahoo.com/anti-us-chants-slain-iran-nuclear-expert-buried-130905499.html 

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Washington Examiner reports: Two pro-business advocacy groups on Friday filed the first legal challenge to President Barack Obama's recent recess appointments, asking a federal judge to find them unconstitutional.
The National Federation of Independent Business and the National Right to Work Foundation argue Obama cannot legally bypass the Senate to appoint three new members of the National Labor Relations Board, an agency that referees labor-management disputes.
The groups made the argument in a motion in federal district court in Washington, D.C., as part of an ongoing lawsuit against the labor board for requiring businesses to put up posters telling workers about their right to form a union.

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://washingtonexaminer.com/news/2012/01/anti-union-group-challenges-recess-appointments/2094366#ixzz1jR6A6sZz

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The Government Accountability Office’s (GAO) annual audit of federal agency financial statements [was] released last month. As it has for many years, the GAO concluded that it cannot express an opinion on the statements because of weak internal financial controls and unreliable evidence to support material information.In other words, the government’s financial reporting is so abysmal no one can tell taxpayers exactly how their money is being spent. That’s aside from the fact that the nation’s current fiscal path is unsustainable.  http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/jan/13/help-wanted/
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Michigan Governor Rick Synder reports: Today, I am proud to report that in 2011, job growth in Michigan actually beat the national average.  That is the assessment from an economist from the University of Michigan who took part in today’s official Consensus Revenue Estimating Conference, through which the state treasury department and the House and Senate fiscal agencies agree on what the state can realistically expect in terms of revenue for the upcoming year.
But that’s not the only good news.  Today we also learned that the state expects a budget surplus of approximately $457 million.
2011 was not easy.  But by making the tough decisions and working to structurally balance the budget, we now find ourselves in a place where instead of worrying over how to eliminate deficits, we are now able to concentrate on paying off debt and making strategic investments for the future.
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Free Republic wrote this one year ago, but it is still valid: The person who calculated this bit of information is now and has been a professor at The University of West Virginia in Morgantown for the last forty some years..

 

A clunker [car] that travels 12,000 miles a year at 15 mpg uses 800 gallons of gas a year.
A new vehicle that travels 12,000 miles a year at 25 mpg uses 480 gallons of gas a year.  So, the average Cash for Clunkers transaction will reduce gasoline consumption by 320 gallons per year.

 

The government claims 700,000 clunkers have been replaced so that’s 224 million gallons saved per year.  This equates to a bit over 5 million barrels of oil.

5 million barrels is about 5 hours worth of US consumption.
More important, 5 million barrels of oil at $70 per barrel costs about $350 million dollars.

 

So, the government paid $3 billion of our tax dollars to save $350 million.

We spent $8.57 for every $1.00 we saved.

I’m pretty sure they will do a much better job with our health care though? http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2659980/posts