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NATIONAL HARBOR, MD – MARCH 07: Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) takes the stage before addressing the Conservative Political Action Conference at the Gaylord International Hotel and Conference Center March 7, 2014 in National Harbor, Maryland. The CPAC annual meeting brings together conservative politicians, pundits and their supporters for speeches, panels and classes. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Kentucky Senator Rand Paul won the 2014 CPAC Straw Poll going away, with nearly three times the support as the next runner-up.

The libertarian-leaning conservative took 31 percent of the vote with Texas Senator Ted Cruz coming in a distant second with 11 percent. Dr. Ben Carson won 9 percent of the vote, while New Jersey Governor Chris Christie took fourth place with a close 8 percent.

Rand Paul gave a fiery speech on day 2 of the 2014 CPAC conference, urging conservatives to start a “national revival of liberty,” taking a “pro-Liberty” message across the country in the upcoming campaigns.

He also weighed in on the current debate between the conservative base and the establishment Republican party, which has resulted in primary challenges of long-time incumbents.

“You might think I’m talking about electing Republicans; I’m not. “I’m talking about electing friends of liberty,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) said to a packed crowd at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Friday.

“It’s not good enough to elect the lesser of two evils,” he added.

Though he has been reluctant to discuss the possibility publicly, Paul is a top-tier potential 2016 presidential candidate, and will return to the first in the nation primary state of New Hampshire next month.

Kentucky Senator Rand Paul won the 2014

Bruce Rauner

State Sen. Bill Brady, State Sen. Kirk Dillard, front-runner businessman Bruce Rauner, and State Treasurer Dan Rutherford meet for the Republican Illinois Governor debate at WGN-TV in Chicago on Wednesday, March 5, 2014.

With just over one week to go before Election Day on March 18, when Republican voters will choose their nominee in the Illinois Republican primary for governor, we confidently predict Bruce Rauner will be the “Likely Republican” nominee. If victorious, as we believe he is “likely” to be, the well-funded businessman will go on to face vulnerable incumbent Democrat Gov. Pat Quinn in the 2014 Illinois governor race.

A new Tribune/WGN-TV poll, which we will contrast with We Ask America weekly tracking polls, found Bruce Rauner from Winnetka at 36 percent. Rauner’s support represented a slight tick down 4 points measured in their last poll one month ago, amid a TV ad blitz funded by labor unions on behalf of one of his Republican opponents attacking his business record.

Kirk Dillard, a state senator from Hinsdale backed by public employee unions, has benefited to some degree from the union-backed ad buy and has now emerged as the latest alternative to Bruce Rauner. The poll showed Dillard at 23 percent, which is literally double his support since last month’s survey. His increase in support was fueled by Downstate voters, but when we take the data in totality, it appears to be the end of the line for Dillard in his attempt to squeeze out more support from the area of the state that also supports Bill Brady.

While previous Illinois Republican primary races for governor have a proven propensity to show last-minute wild swings in the electorate, I view it as unlikely that Kirk Dillard can make up so much ground and pull off an election upset akin to former 2010 Republican nominee Bill Brady. First, the political fundamentals in 2014 differ greatly, but also Dillard’s late surge isn’t at all corroborated by We Ask America, who conducts weekly tracking for both primaries and general elections for Illinois governor.

Bruce Rauner leads the Illinois Republican primary for governor

Bruce Rauner leads We Ask America tracking poll for the Illinois Republican primary for governor race. (Poll type: Automated – Date: 3/4/2014 – Participants: 1,262 Likely GOP Voters – Margin of Error: ± 2.85%)

In 2010, Kirk Dillard narrowly lost to Bill Brady who was uniquely positioned to benefit from weeks of Andy McKenna-backed ads hitting both Dillard and Jim Ryan, eking out a 193-vote victory. However, because Rauner had the financial support to do so, he has been able to effectively rebut the negative ad campaign against him and proven for several weeks he could stop the bleeding. In fact, unlike the Tribune/WGN-TV poll, We Ask America actually shows him recovering over the past week.

With an irreconcilable difference between the actual margins of support in the polling surveys, we have to identify similarities in the data to learn the rest of the story. Despite showing a tightening race, the Tribune/WGN-TV poll is in agreement on several key findings, several being that voters see Bruce Rauner as the “most electable, knowledgeable and prepared candidate as well as the one displaying the strongest leadership and best equipped to deal with Democratic leaders.”

Voters also named Rauner as the candidate showing the strongest leadership by 31 percent, with Dillard and Brady not even able to hit 20 percent.

Further, early on Rauner made the taming of out-of-control unions central to his campaign message, a message that a significant number of union households are even identifying with. The potential loss of support Kirk Dillard was hoping to facilitate among union households was actually pretty minimal. Though nearly 1 in 5 respondents claimed to be from a union household, Dillard earned just 29 percent among Republican households with a union member versus a close 26 percent for Rauner. It’s a dip from the 31 percent who supported Rauner in the last poll compared to 25 percent for Brady, but it is not enough.

Apparently, I am not the only one to think so, since labor unions are asking members to pull Republican ballots and vote for Dillard to stop Rauner. Not only are there simply not enough votes to overcome what I see to be a pretty substantial Rauner lead, but if this news circulates widely, as it has begun to do, it is likely to backfire on Dillard.

Without revisiting a hypothetical already noted by the crew at We Ask America, we would just reiterate that it seems to be an insurmountable task to find just over a quarter-million union members willing to do so, particularly with so many breaking traditional ties and supporting Rauner to begin with.

Illinois Republicans want to win in November, and nearly 7 in 10 Republican primary voters said they believe it iss likely that the Republican nominee will win. When asked about electability in the general election, against a vulnerable Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn who is ready to hand Republicans the mansion keys for the first time since 1998, 37 percent said Bruce Rauner. He is trailed by a distant Brady with just 19 percent, while only 17 percent said Dillard and 7 percent for Rutherford.

The bottom line is Bruce Rauner made a wise decision to run an early and sustained TV ad campaign, in which he spoke directly to the voters of Illinois. This no doubt helped to define his character before his opponents could, which is why voters still see Rauner as the candidate most able to identify with regular Illinoisans. When asked, a total of 27 percent said Rauner, while about 1 in 5 listed Brady and Dillard.

What else can I say? The Carhartt sporting vest worked.

View Polling Below, Illinois Governor Race Prediction Or Return To Our 2014 Governor Map Predictions

Poll Date Sample Rauner Dillard Brady Rutherford Spread
PPD Average 3/1 – 3/5 38.0 18.5 15.0 8.5 Rauner +19.5
WeAskAmerica 3/4 – 3/4 1262 LV 40 14 12 8 Rauner +26
Chicago Tribune/WGN 3/1 – 3/5 600 LV 36 23 18 9 Rauner +13
WeAskAmerica 2/25 – 2/25 1178 LV 36 17 13 7 Rauner +19
Chicago Tribune/WGN 2/5 – 2/8 600 LV 40 11 20 13 Rauner +20
WeAskAmerica 11/26 – 11/26 1233 LV 26 10 18 17 Rauner +8
PPP (D) 11/22 – 11/25 375 RV 24 10 17 14 Rauner +7

PeoplesPunditDaily.com is now predicting Bruce Rauner will

ObamaCare deadline

Less than three weeks out from the ObamaCare enrollment deadline, and the president’s signature health care law faces predictable challenges far greater than mere website problems. The law’s failure to meet its goals has not only been predictable, but also unjustifiable, because only an ill-intent to cause Americans unnecessary pain for the glory of big government remains as a reason to support keeping this law.

The entire justification for the government takeover and remaking of the health care industry was supposedly to cover a claimed 47 million who were uninsured. That number, itself, was based upon misleading data, including people who lost health coverage and were statistically likely to receive Cobra coverage while in between jobs, illegal immigrants, and so on.

Forgetting the near impossibility to implement the law within its legally mandated timetable, prompting the administration to lawlessly wave or delay key elements of the act, or that the website’s security risks are borderline criminal and will likely result in the identity theft of an untold number of Americans, the uninsured are just not signing up.

Even with the “glitches” that previously blocked would-be enrollees supposedly “fixed,” as claimed by the administration, the unaffordable prices of health plans offered by the so-called “Affordable Care Act” still lays at the heart of the law’s inability to achieve its stated goal to insure the uninsured.

Friday, PeoplesPunditDaily.com reported only 1 in 10 uninsured Americans who qualify for private plans through the new health insurance marketplaces actually enrolled as of last month, according to a survey by the consulting firm McKinsey & Co., which had been corroborated by Gallup and the Urban Institute. Is there any wonder why the ObamaCare deadline is fast approaching and the administration is without the numbers needed to keep the program viable?

The numbers the Obama administration is using to boast about the law’s progress have been examined under a microscope by People’s Pundit Daily, The Washington Post and Sean Trende at RealClearPolitics.com. While administration officials continue to claim 4 million people have signed up for private insurance on the exchanges, which is still short of the 7 million needed by the end of March, many of them were previously insured. In fact, McKinsey & Co. found no more than a quarter of those who did sign up for coverage in the marketplaces were previously uninsured.

Further, according to insurers, as was also previously reported by PeoplesPunditDaily.com, of those who have selected a plan either through the FFM or SBM online Marketplaces roughly 20 percent have never paid the first month’s premiums, and an additional 2 to 5 percent haven’t paid the second month’s premium. Now, health insurers “participating in ObamaCare are a very worried group right now,” according to health insurance industry consultant Robert Laszewski.

Meanwhile, the administration is apparently claiming they have no clue how successful the program is when it comes to the core, stated goal and only justification for passing the law in the first place, which is insuring the uninsured. The National Journal reported that Gary Cohen, the health official overseeing the insurance marketplaces who will soon be stepping down, outrageously claimed the administration is not really tracking the ever-important data.

“That’s not a data point that we are really collecting in any sort of systematic way,” Cohen said.

Aside from that statement almost assuredly being false, it is suspiciously convenient  for those who blindly believe Obama when he lies about the law’s true purpose, its progress or if premiums will necessarily rise. When asked about the McKinsey study, America’s Health Insurance Plans spokesman Robert Zirkelbach said that what “ultimately matters” is who signs up, not necessarily how many sign up.

But the insurance companies, who sold out to textbook fascist control of our health care industry, made the rookie mistake of believing big government cares any more about their interests than they do the interest of the American people. What “ultimately matters” to this administration, congressional Democrats and the law’s ruling class of supporters, is that they hook enough people on the program to ensure ObamaCare — or, rather a future single-payer system — is here to stay.

Whether or not Americans were previously uninsured or if they were hurt by having their affordable plans replaced with higher premiums, which even naive Kirsten Powers had the nerve to complain about, is irrelevant. Whether or not a nonexistent infusion of young and healthy people is sufficient to cover the soon-to-skyrocket costs associated with covering older, sicker Americans who are flooding the risk pool, which will inevitably result in even higher costs to consumers, is also irrelevant.

If Republicans turn out to be right about the risk pool, though that’s an “if” that’s no longer an “if,” then no worries. That’s why a taxpayer-funded bailout was intentionally and shamefully included in the law, itself.

Yet the insurance companies still made a gross miscalculation if they think this fascist arraignment will be preserved in the event a bailout is needed. Democrats already have plans to put the blame on them for hundreds of billions, if not trillions, in taxpayer funds being spent to bail them out, as scapegoating insurers was always the plan to make single-payer the only viable option for Americans who otherwise hate the idea. Step two, will be removing insurers from their privileged position with finely tuned Stalin-esque propaganda, and they have had plenty of practice.

Never mind that the Congressional Budget Office “revised” findings that forecast ObamaCare will destroy, at least, 2.3 million jobs, taking with it our unique and irreplaceable Protestant work ethic that has made us the military and economic power we are (or, were). Big government programs have long attacked traditional institutions and religion as a means to diminish this empowering national characteristic, which I have chronicled over the years. But rarely, if ever, has a progressive bureaucracy actually included the negative impact these programs have on labor in their findings.

And make no mistake, the CBO is a progressive bureaucracy created with the sole purpose to justify “Great Society” reforms in an era of massive government expansion. But shockingly, much to even my surprise, not even the CBO can justify ObamaCare any longer, unless you believe insuring millions of imaginary Americans — another CBO claim that needs revision — is worth the millions of jobs that will soon become big government’s collateral damage.

So, here we are with the ObamaCare deadline fast approaching. It’s nearly here, yet Democrats can’t even justify keeping the law amid the its failure to achieve its stated goals. Billions and soon-to-be trillions of dollars later, and all we have to show for it is an expansion of big government at a priceless expense to our freedom, and a dangerous president who refuses to obey his own oath by faithfully executing the laws of the United States and the Constitution.

Less than three weeks out from the

Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) brought the house down during his CPAC 2014 speech, bringing a message that speaks to the ensuing battle for the heart and soul of the Republican Party. In the debate over whether or not the conservative base should primary establishment incumbents, Paul made no bones about staking out his position.

“You might think I’m talking about electing Republicans; I’m not. “I’m talking about electing friends of liberty,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) said to a packed crowd at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Friday.

“It’s not good enough to elect the lesser of two evils,” he added.

Senator Rand Paul, himself, owes his seat to the 2010 Tea Party uprising, defeating Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s  hand-picked candidate of choice. Ironically, he is supporting his fellow Kentucky delegate in his own primary versus another conservative challenge from Matt Bevin, who is back by the Senate Conservatives Fund and other heavyweights.

Still, no one questions Paul’s conservative credentials, which are well-established by his inspirational filibuster of Obama nominee John Brennan in protest of drone strikes on American citizens. Paul also railed against the NSA spying program during his speech, a program he has been a leading voice of opposition against.

Paul is suing the Obama administration in what may just turn out to be the largest civil action lawsuit in American history.

Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) brought the house

insurers-worried-obamacare-signupsPresident Obama drew immediate criticism after announcing that health plans which were supposed to be cancelled this year can now be renewed for another two years. But, now, health insurers “participating in ObamaCare are a very worried group right now,” according to health insurance industry consultant Robert Laszewski.

Laszewski, who has inside relationships with insurance industry executives, has become an oft-cited authority following the disastrous rollout of the health care law, and now he says insurers who agreed to take part in the law are concerned the number of ObamaCare signups are not only far too short, but the risk pool is far too old and unhealthy to sustain the law without a bailout.

“The fundamental problem here is that the administration is just not signing up enough people to make anyone confident this program is sustainable,” Mr. Laszewski said.

Though the Health and Human Services Department has claimed 4 million have signed up for health care plans through one of the program’s new marketplaces, which has been widely debunked as misleading, the number drops even further to around 3 million when factoring individuals who haven’t even paid their first month’s (or subsequent) premiums are included.

According to insurers, as previously reported by PeoplesPunditDaily.com, roughly 20 percent have never paid the first month’s premiums, and an additional 2 to 5 percent haven’t paid the second month’s premium, Laszewski wrote, citing insurers.

That isn’t enough to create a sustainable risk pool with a critical mass of young and healthy enrollees needed to offset the cost of covering older and sicker individuals who are now guaranteed coverage. Insurers are legally protected, in theory, by a provision in the law that provides a taxpayer-funded bailout if the insurance death spiral kicks in. While Americans will be stuck footing the bill, which will amount to trillions over a decade, insurers would still have to increase insurance premiums, placing an even greater burden on the American people.

In fact, a recent study found that only 1 in 10 uninsured Americans, the target demographic used by Democrats to justify a government takeover of health care, have signed up for ObamaCare even though they are fully eligible. The number one reason cited was cost. Ironic, considering the not-so appropriate name “Affordable” Care Act.

Meanwhile, according to a Fox Poll that asked voters to pick from a range of emotions that describe how they feel about the law, 49 percent say they are pessimistic, 45 percent say scared and 43 percent say they are angry.

Insurers say they are "very worried" the

uninsured Americans

A new study finds that uninsured Americans are not signing up for ObamaCare, which is a trend that is consistent since the law’s launch in Nov., 2013.

PeoplesPunditDaily.com first reported in Nov. of 2013 on early studies that found uninsured Americans aren’t interested in ObamaCare. Though covering these individuals was the entire justification for the law in the first place, proponents of the government takeover still have no progress to speak of.

Only 1 in 10 uninsured Americans who qualify for private plans through the new health insurance marketplaces actually enrolled as of last month, according to a survey by the consulting firm McKinsey & Co.

The McKinsey survey found just 27 percent of people who have selected a plan on the exchanges said they previously had been without health insurance, up from 11 percent a month earlier.

The Obama administration, and the president himself, has oft-claimed 4 million people have signed up for private coverage through the insurance exchanges, although that claim has widely been debunked, since it is not known how many of them were previously uninsured Americans.

The administration has also claimed 9 million people are eligible for Medicaid, again, a number that has received four Pinnochios from Glenn Kessler at The Washington Post because it includes renewals. Independent experts estimate that the Medicaid eligible number is far lower, topping of at 3.5 million maximum.

According to McKinsey, the most common reason for not signing up for insurance cited by both previously insured and previously uninsured survey respondents was that it wasn’t “affordable” coverage, at all, despite naming the law the “Affordable Care Act” in a Stalinesque looseness with the truth. Ironically, former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi refused to call ObamaCare anything other than the so-called Affordable Care Act, even getting nasty with a reporter at a press conference who referred to it as ObamaCare.

While Democrats are touting the narrative that Republicans and ad campaigns are responsible for a “perception” that plans are unaffordable, the current PPD average of ObamaCare approval polls shows just 38 percent support the law, while a whopping 54 disapprove. When asked about their feelings on ObamaCare in a new Fox Poll, 49 percent say pessimistic, 45 percent say scared and 43 percent say angry.

A second survey, which was conducted by the Urban Institute, a Washington D.C.-based think tank, found that Americans with lower incomes and those who are uninsured are less likely to even know about the ObamaCare marketplaces. This has been a steady challenge for the proponents of the law, who naively believed that — younger people particularly — would run out to purchase coverage that they could not afford.

The study, based on data collected in December, found just about 23 percent of uninsured Americans respondeds, 27 percent of adults in low-income families, and nearly 23 percent of those ages 18 to 34 still had not even heard about the marketplaces.

Gary Cohen, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services official who oversaw the insurance marketplaces after it became clear the rollout would be a failure, told an insurance industry conference on Thursday that the administration doesn’t know how many uninsured Americans are actually signing up. Cohen will be leaving the project shortly, prompting critics to doubt the competence of a group that needed him so much to begin with

“That’s not a data point that we are really collecting in any sort of systematic way,” Cohen told attendees when asked how many of the enrollees were previously uninsured.

The Republican-controlled House of Representatives Wednesday again voted on a one-year delay in the penalty for individuals would have to pay for not signing up for health insurance. The vote was the 50th time Republicans have forced a vote to repeal, gut or change ObamaCare, which is increasingly seeming unjustifiable since it doesn’t even achieve coverage for uninsured Americans.

The vote tally was 250-160, with 27 Democratic lawmakers — many of whom are facing tough reelection battles — joining Republicans on legislation to postpone the individual mandate under the law. The proposal, however, stands zero chance of even being voted on in the Democratic-led Senate and the White House said Obama will veto the measure. Apparently, President Obama, who is the only one without the Constitutional authority to change the law, is the only one who is allowed to make changes, even sweeping changes like delaying the inevitable policy cancellations until after both the 2014 and 2016 elections.

The 4-year-old law requires U.S. citizens and legal residents to have qualifying health care coverage or face a tax penalty based on household income. The penalty would be phased in at 1 percent of taxable income this year, 2 percent in 2015 and 2.5 percent in 2016. The Wall Street Journal reported that — according to the Tax Policy Center — the penalty for not buying insurance could be a lot higher than the $95 fine Americans usually hear about.

A new study found only 1 in

America is no longer capable to confront dangerous behavior by other nations around the world, according to host of “The O’Reilly Factor” on Fox News, Bill O’Reilly. O’Reilly argued we are witnessing America on decline and gave myriad reasons why under President Obama, we are weaker as a nation.

During the five years President Obama has been in office, O’Reilly noted, the average medium income dropped around 7 percent, despite Obama’s claims that progressivism helps the poor, which it never does.

“While prices and taxes are rising, take-home pay is falling, thus individual Americans are less secure,” he said. As for the economy, overall, because “politicians in Washington favor social justice over a robust marketplace,” the economy is abysmal, getting worse and will only get even worse.

“In order to create economic opportunity for all, business must be prompted to expand,” he added. “But the Democratic Party, which now controls the Senate and the White House, has imposed a huge tax burden on private business, as well as on affluent consumers.”

He went on to explain how these Democratic Party policies have resulted in fewer jobs, and with fewer people working, paying into the system and remaining self-sufficient, the country is weaker. “In addition, millions of Americans are looking for handouts, as the explosion of disability and entitlements prove,” O’Reilly plainly pointed out.

On the military front, the nation’s military is “exhausted,” which many would contend with, but all are in agreement that the way Obama handled Iraq and Afghanistan has failed to inspire the American people during a time of war.

“The American people have no appetite to right international wrongs,” O’Reilly said, which is the job of a president to give the public strength in times of war. “The Obama administration is even seeking to downsize the Army,” a move he says is “a major mistake in a dangerous world.”

Do Americans agree with Bill O”Reilly’s assessment of America on decline under President Obama?

PeoplesPunditDaily.com recently reported on a new survey by Gallup showing that — for the first time — Americans no longer believe President Obama is respected on the world stage by other world leaders. The survey was actually conducted prior to the Ukraine crisis and the aggressive response by Vladimir Putin in Russia.

In a new Fox Poll, which was conducted after the Crimean crisis, by a 33 – 56 percent margin most voters disapprove of the president’s handling of foreign policy, which is a new low for the Obama job approval rating on foreign policy. Overall, when asked if “things are better since Obama became president,” only 34 percent of voters said they think the country is better off, while a significant majority — 60 percent — disagreed.

Consequently, the new survey found for the first time, not even four in ten voters — 38 percent — approve of President Obama’s job performance, while 54 disapprove.

Regarding the economy, a 59-percent majority thinks the White House has mostly failed at creating jobs, and his approval on the economy has plummeted to 38 percent who approve to 58 percent who disapprove. Likewise, 56 percent feel it has failed on growing the economy, an increase up from 52 percent.

Host of "The O'Reilly Factor" on Fox

keystone-xl-pipeline

The vast majority of Americans, — nearly two-thirds — support the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, an economic issue that has fractured the Democratic Party, according to a new ABC News/WaPo poll.

In total, just 65 percent of Americans say the Keystone XL pipeline should be approved and just 22 percent are opposed to its construction.

Interestingly, half of the poll’s respondents — 47 percent — also said they think the Keystone XL pipeline will pose significant risks to the environment.

Republicans, unsurprisingly, are more supportive of the pipeline’s construction, with 82 percent approving. Yet, among independents and Democrats, the support is also very high, with 65 percent of independents and 51 percent of Democrats giving the pipeline a thumbs up.

The vast majority of respondents — 85 percent — said the pipeline will create a significant number of jobs, despite a recent partisan State Department report saying the project will create around 1,950 jobs for the first two years, and just 50 permanent jobs after that. Americans seem to understand that the liberal bureaucracy doesn’t score jobs created in support of the pipeline, which will span the entire continental U.S.

The nationwide survey of 1,002 adults was conducted Feb. 27 to March 2. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

The vast majority of Americans, -- nearly

The financial crisis explained in terms of reckless limited government policies, as Democrats were allowed to do in 2008 and 2012, is factually untrue. Big government cronies cause financial crisis.

The last 40 years has been the most financial crisis-prone period in banking history, according to a new study released by AEI. Paul Kupiec of the American Enterprise Institute looked at the history and structures of banking systems in Canada and the US, and found that big government creates financial crisis, not deregulation per se and other limited government policies.

In fact, it is big government doing what is in big government’s crony interest that spurs the conditions ripe for financial crisis.

Charles Calomiris, author of the new book, Fragile by Design: The Political Origins of Banking Crises and Scarce Credit, detailed how political groups captured economic benefits and weakened the U.S. banking system, while Canada’s constitutional structure blocked such bargains and produced a stable, competitive banking system.

Calomiris found only six countries who both retained abundant credit and remained crisis free. And the conditions in these states were unfavorable to big government, at least regarding banking industries.

During an event in Feb., the findings of this study and Calomiris’ new book were presented at an event in Washington D.C., and can be viewed in the video above. However, the entire study is below for your reading pleasure.

The biggest mistake the Republican Party made was to allow the Democrats to set a narrative involving the financial crisis, explaining the cause in terms government failing to protect Americans and Republican tax policy favoring the rich. In reality, government not only fails to protect Americans’ interest, but its own interest is in direct contrast to Main Street Americans. The bottom line is that when government directs bank credit, as it did with Fannie and Freddie and continues to do with the FHA, with the explicit purpose of buying voters’ allegiance, then the economy suffers and crisis is created.

I have argued in Our Virtuous Republic: The Forgotten Clause in the American Social Contract, which also examines law and financial policy throughout American history, government not only is responsible for creating crisis, but does so intentionally. James Madison said that “crisis is the rallying cry of the tyrant,” a sound we have forgotten much to the detriment of our freedom and economic prosperity.

Key Points & Findings:

• Without proper checks and balances, governments invariably choose to use their financial systems to carry out social and political goals, often financed through private banks, off the government budget.

• This practice can push resources out of the financial sector, reducing business and consumer access to credit and limiting economic growth.

• Eventually, government-directed lending programs end up costing taxpayers dearly, as loans made to satisfy political goals rarely make economic sense without an explicit government subsidy somewhere in their life cycle.

• Armed with new authorities from the Dodd-Frank Act, and fortified by public hostility toward bankers, US bank regulators are increasingly using their new powers to direct lending.

A new study finds the financial crisis

The potential 2016 Republican presidential candidates took the first day of CPAC 2014 by storm, making the case for Republican Party principles and policies.

Gov. Chris Christie received a standing ovation after his speech to the CPAC crowd, during which he discussed the media and issues facing the Republican Party. “Our ideas are better than theirs,” Christie said of the Democratic Party policies that are harming the economy and health care. He went on to draw a stark contrast between Washington and the states, a comparison that in and of itself shows conservative philosophy on government is correct.

“Leadership is getting in and getting something done and making government work. Leadership is not about standing on the sidelines and spit balling. And that is what we see all across Washington, but that’s not what we see in the states,” Christie said.

Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) spoke about the IRS and how to move the party forward. Responding to some of his critics, specifically regarding the government shutdown and strategy to defund ObamaCare, Cruz said the Republican Party must stand on their principles.

“In ’06, ’08 and ’12 we put our head down, we stood for nothing and we got walloped. The one election that was a tremendous election was in 2010 when Republicans drew a line in the sand – we said we stand unequivocally against ObamaCare, against bankrupting the country, and we won in a historic tidal wave of an election,” he noted.

“There are a lot of D.C. consultants who say there’s a choice for Republicans to make: We can either choose to keep our head down, to not rock the boat, to not stand for anything, or we can stand for principle,” Cruz said. “They say if you stand for principle you lose elections. The way to do it — the smart way, the Washington way — is don’t stand against Obamacare, don’t stand against the debt ceiling, don’t stand against nothing. I want to tell you something — that is a false dichotomy.”

Cruz made clear that not standing on principles is the true way to defeat.

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio railed against Obama on his failed foreign policy, telling the crowd that strong American leadership is necessary to guide the world its challenges.

“Without American engagement, the world I just painted to you is not just a possibility, it is a real probability,” Rubio said. “And I don’t like to make these issues of national security partisan … but we cannot ignore that the flawed foreign policy of the last few years has brought us to this stage.”

Rubio, who is still a top 2016 Republican presidential candidate despite his support for amnesty, painted a picture of a world in which the U.S. was not the predominant force. It was a scary picture. He also outlined how foreign policy affects economic events, citing failures by the Obama administration in both regards.

Rubio ended on a personal note about how much his father, bedridden and dying of cancer, wanted to make it to his Senate primary victory party in 2010 but was too tired to come. Rubio described how, for his father, a Cuban immigrant, seeing his children achieve what he couldn’t was his idea of the American dream.

“This country made that possible,” Rubio said. “That’s why I know America is special … and that’s why I know she is worth fighting for and saving.”

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal dispelled myths about Obama’s intelligence and his effectiveness as a leader and policy-maker. He also quibbed about President Carter no longer being the worse president in history.

“We have long thought and said this president is a smart man; it may be time to revisit that assumption. Or at least to make a distinction between being book smart and being truly wise,” Gov. Jindal said Thursday.

“I spent a lot of 2012 going around the country saying that President Obama was the most liberal and most incompetent president in my lifetime ever since Jimmy Carter. Now having witnessed the events abroad these last several days,” Jindal said.

“To President Carter, I want to issue a sincere apology. It is no longer fair to say he was the worst president of this great country in my lifetime, President Obama has proven me wrong,” he added.

“I’m not for lawsuits, and I’m not about suing people, but we’ve got a constitutional scholar as president. Strikes me he might benefit, we might benefit if he actually reads the Constitution now and then,” Jindal told the CPAC audience. “If I were him, I’d consider suing Harvard Law School to get his money back because I’m not sure what he learned in three years.”

CPAC 2014 is filled with young people in attendance and the party’s potential 2016 Republican presidential candidates are many, filled with new ideas and youth. The Democratic Party, on the other hand, are coalescing behind Hillary Clinton, a symbol of the old Washington style of politics and stale political ideas that have failed Americans for years.

That’s political irony at its best.

The potential 2016 Republican presidential candidates took

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