Barack Obama to Sign Package Extending Tax Breaks for the Rich
THE GUARDIAN: Passage of bill reflects weakness of both the presidency and the Democratic party after Republican wins in November elections

Barack Obama was forced to sign the bill despite admitting that he opposed some of its provisions. Photograph: The Guardian
The US president, Barack Obama, will today sign into law measures approved by Congress extending tax cuts introduced by George Bush amid Democratic complaints that the breaks favour the rich.

Despite objections from many of Obama's fellow Democrats, the House of Representatives passed the $858bn (£548bn) package of renewed tax cuts last night. The package, which also extended benefits for the long-term unemployed for 13 months, was passed by 277 votes to 148. On Wednesday the Senate passed it by an overwhelming 83-15 margin.

Passage of the bill reflects the relative weakness of both the presidency and the Democratic party after the Republican sweep in November's congressional elections, giving them a majority in the House and big inroads into the Democratic majority in the Senate.

Obama has been forced to bend to the resurgent Republicans, his current position on taxes contrasting sharply with his stance earlier this year when he and his fellow Democrats fought against renewing tax reductions for the wealthiest Americans – those with household incomes above $250,000 – while supporting continued cuts for middle-class taxpayers. >>> Mark Tran | Friday, December 17, 2010

Obama Forced to Fight Own Party to Spend Taxpayers’ Trillions
TIMESONLINE: President Obama was huddled in talks yesterday with congressional Democrats over proposals that would pare his $3.6 trillion budget, raising question marks over how he would fund promises on healthcare, climate change and tax cuts.

Although the President was braced for ferocious opposition from Republicans, who warn that his spending plans will bankrupt America, he also faces growing hostility from a group of fiscally conservative Democrats alarmed by forecasts of a $9.3 trillion (£6.3 trillion) deficit over ten years. Barack Obama's Pledges in peril as Blue Dogs Take a Bite at Budget >>> Tom Baldwin in Washington | Thursday, March 26, 2009

MAIL Online: Brown Spooked by the Markets: PM Accused of Heading Down 'the Road to Hell'

In London: Investors won't buy our bonds / In Europe: PM accused of heading down 'the road to hell'

Gordon Brown is in retreat on his Budget plans amid signs of City alarm over the soaring level of Government borrowing.

He pulled back from another debt-fuelled giveaway to kickstart the economy after Tuesday's intervention from the Governor of the Bank of England.

Downing Street insisted there was no rift between Mr Brown and Mervyn King over his bombshell claim that Britain cannot afford another 'fiscal stimulus'.

But the Governor appeared to have spooked the markets when it emerged that a routine sale of Government bonds fell short yesterday.

City experts blamed doubts over Mr Brown's economic policy for the Treasury's failure to find buyers for £120million worth of debt, or 'gilts'.

It was the first time since 2002 that the Government has been unable to sell its debt, and this will be seized on by those who have warned that there is insufficient demand for the volume of debt being sold by the Treasury.

Officials played down the significance of the shortfall, but economists said investors were beginning to doubt the Government's credit rating.

The Tories turned up the pressure on Mr Brown by insisting there was now a question mark over his ability to fund the crippling levels of debt needed to keep the economy afloat.

And the European Union added to his woes when its acting president warned that President Barack Obama's call for more borrowing and spending, backed by Mr Brown, was 'the road to hell'. >>> By Benedict Brogan and James Chapman | Thursday, March 26, 2009

Financial Crisis: Republicans and Democrats Agree £380 Billion Bail-out Deal
THE TELEGRAPH: A £380 billion deal to save the world's economy has been struck in the US after Republicans and Democrats reached a "fundamental agreement" to bolster America's banks.

Standing alongside his Republican counterpart, Senator Chris Dodd, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, said a deal on a set of principles to be voted on by Congress would be to be passed within the "next few days".

The bill represents a dramatic attempt to prevent the global economy plunging into a deep recession.

The outline deal came as President George W. Bush, the two candidates vying to replace him and congressional leaders were preparing a crisis summit at the White House to hammer out final details.

Representative Barney Frank, Democratic chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, said he would tell Mr Bush there "really is not much of a deadlock to break" because a skeleton package had been agreed by both parties in Congress.

Dana Perino, Mr Bush's press secretary, said that "significant progress" had been made.

"We have a framework that we can try to close on and we hope that we can get it done quickly."

She would not, however, outline specifics about provisions the Bush administration saw as deal breakers. "We have made a few steps forward and they've come a few steps our way. So we're reaching a consensus and we're going to try to drive that to a conclusion today."

The summit came after Mr Bush issued a portentous warning that "America could slip into a final panic", triggering a deep recession in which "millions of Americans could lose their jobs" without "immediate action" by Congress.

Mr Bush's proposed bailout plan involved the federal government buying up the assets of tottering financial companies, an intervention designed to keep credit markets open and heading off economic disaster on the scale of the Great Depression of the 1930s. Financial Crisis: Republicans and Democrats Agree £380 Billion Bail-out Deal >>> By Toby Harnden in Washington | September 25, 2008

The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Dust Jacket Hardcover, direct from the publishers (UK) >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age – Paperback, direct from the publishers (UK) >>>

Electing a President: The US at a Fork in the Road
EDITORIAL: Never in recent history has it been so critical for American voters to make a wise choice at the polls. Never in recent history has so much rested on one ballot. Americans are going to be faced with a decision of momentous importance in November 2008: Whom to elect to the White House.

It is always important to vote wisely, of course; but it is to be hoped that American voters will pay particular attention when voting the next time. Why? Because so much depends on electing the very best president the US can kick up.

Elections in the West have become an opportunity for media-hype on a grand scale. The MSM love to choose a candidate and run with their choice, all the while paying far too much attention to looks and glitz, and paying far too little attention to what each candidate has to offer, paying far too little attention to the candidates’ experience.

Barack Obama seems to be the darling of the media. He has been likened even unto Jesus Christ Himself! This, of course, is totally absurd. Barack Obama, whatever else he is, is a political greenhorn, an “empty suit”. Can this man really, truly offer the Americans public any form of salvation? Aren’t people just taken in by his so-called charisma?

This is no time to elect a man on charisma alone, nice though charisma is to have. This is a time for Americans to take stock – BIG time. We are witnessing the declining influence of the USA worldwide. The country has become very unpopular since the election of George W Bush. His obsession with trying to bring democracy to a part of the world which is impossible to democratize, his obsession with characterising Islam as a "religion of love and peace”, when it so clearly isn’t, his obsession with all things Christian, when in actual fact he couldn’t have done more to weaken Christendom, his obsession with pandering to the Muslim electorate - all have weakened America beyond anyone’s wildest dreams only ten or so years ago.

The American electorate is given to obsessing about abortion issues, gay rights issues, and all manner of issues which are only marginally important to the continued supremacy of a truly wonderful nation.

9/11 has weakened America. There is no doubt about this fact. Osama bin Laden could not have wished for a better outcome! But there was no need for this to have happened. The war on Islamic terrorism has been handled so badly that one couldn’t have written a believable book of fiction depicting this outcome. Look at what has happened to the States since 9/11! Its standing in the world has gone down and down; the dollar, especially in recent times, has declined in value to a staggering extent; thousands have been killed in a war that should never have been started (democracy and Islam are totally immiscible); thousands of American jobs are going overseas to countries where labour costs are much lower than at home; illegal immigration has soared to breaking point; and the US National Debt is totally out of control. Yet the US continues to give away billions of dollars in aid to countries which it can ill afford to give aid to in the hope of buying influence. Influence, however, is not being bought; rather, the money is being squandered. It’s like throwing it into the four winds!

When the Americans go to the polls in November 2008, they need to think about what is important for their country: they shouldn’t be taken in by personalities.

One of the first things that needs to happen is that the national debt, now standing at the staggering figure of trillions of dollars, be reduced severely. The US needs a good dose of Thatcherism at this time. Remember what she said about government spending. She said that governments don’t have any money to spend; governments, she said, spend only other people’s money, collected in the form of taxes!

So what is going to be important for the American voters is to choose a president who is going to restore US supremacy, restore confidence in the US, reduce its colossal national debt (which has grown exponentially under George W Bush), and the country needs to start working with the rest of the West, not against it. The rest of the West needs a strong America as much as a strong America needs the rest of the West.

Only today, it has been reported that Kuwait has unpegged its dinar to the dollar. This is not a good thing for the US. On the contrary, since the Kuwaiti dinar has been pegged to the US dollar for so long, it shows a complete lack of confidence in the dollar! Don’t be surprised if Saudi Arabia follows suit!

Are we witnessing a United States of America in terminal decline? Don’t forget these facts: Europe is gaining in strength. France may well be about to surprise us all with its ability to renew itself. Yes, it has problems, but at least it has a president, in Sarkozy, with a will and determination to overcome those difficulties and problems (if he can overcome his own). Then we have China and India on the up and up. All these countries pose a long-term threat to the continued hegemony of the USA.

And all this says nothing about the growth of Islam in the US, and the danger that religious group poses for the continued existence of the States as we know it – as a land which is whole and peaceful and free. When the USA is no longer counted as ‘the land of the free’, then all of the free world will be in trouble. The forces at work within the USA to turn the country Islamic should not be underestimated. We have already seen the first Muslim elected to Congress in Keith Ellison. This is no harbinger of good fortune for the United States; on the contrary, it shows that there are great problems ahead for the country.

It is my belief, as much as it hurts me to say it, that America has come to a fork in the road. The one turning will return the US to its former glory, whilst the other will take it down the road to oblivion: it will make the country an irrelevance to the world. It is up to you, the American voter, to choose a president who will lead you and your great country to a place of unparalleled supremacy.

Remember this: The free world needs YOU! And it needs a STRONG AMERICA, too!

©Mark Alexander

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