Well, THERE’s your problem right there!

For the first time since the Great Depression, households are receiving more income from the government than they are paying the government in taxes.

Politicians and government officials at all levels are being grossly irresponsible.

The irresponsibility crosses party lines, though Democrats are by inclination far bigger redistributionists. Every day I see where some congressman is bragging about federal dollars he or she brought to the district to be wasted on some unnecessary entity. When will they acknowledge the severity of this problem and put the country’s welfare above their own political survival?

I’ll tell you when: When the Tea Party movement pushes them to get serious. Can’t wait for 2012.

Help! My electric car just burned down my garage

Here’s a hazard of owning an electric or hybrid car that the greenies don’t talk much about:

Fire officials suspect an electric hybrid car may have sparked an overnight blaze in a garage in Barkhamsted on Center Hill Road.

Homeowner Storm Connors and his wife, Dee, said they awoke to the sound of a smoke alarm around 4 a.m. The couple said they have lived in the home for nearly 40 years. They built it and raised their children there, so when the flames took over their attached garage Thursday morning, burning it down to its beams, the couple started to panic. They said they were worried they were going to lose their home and the memories inside.

“I walked outside and looked in the garage door and it was flaming,” Dee Connors said. “I grabbed a pocketbook so I’d have a cellphone and a driver’s license and a jacket and a pair of slacks. I had no shoes, my feet were freezing.”

Within minutes of the 911 call reporting the fire, nearly 50 firefighters from surrounding communities headed to the scene. …

Officials said they can’t rule out that the couple’s brand new Chevy Volt hybrid had something to do with the blaze.

S&P Downgrades U.S. Credit Rating Outlook to Negative

Those who say deficits and debts don’t matter and that massive government spending is the answer to this country’s economic woes — well, they’re flat-out wrong. We are careening toward $15 trillion in debt.  The latest development:

Sounding the alarm about the country’s deep fiscal problems, Standard & Poor’s on Monday downgraded its outlook on the U.S. credit rating to “negative,” raising the likelihood the U.S. will lose its coveted ‘AAA’ rating.

The move signals the seriousness of the debt crisis in the U.S., which at most times is considered the safest investment in the world. It is likely to increase pressure on Washington to fix the country’s beleaguered balance sheet and could mark the first step to the U.S. losing its perfect credit rating that allows it to tap the capital markets at low rates.

Deny, Deny, Deny

Six months after getting out of federal prison early, former Democratic House Speaker Jim Black is denying key elements of his corruption case – despite the evidence. From the Charlotte Observer:

Jim Black wants to make a few things clear.

He never took cash in the bathroom at the Capital Grille.

He never bribed Michael Decker.

He never took money to enrich himself.

You’ll find the facts of the Jim Black corruption case here.