Watch and judge for yourself.  CAUTION: crude images and language.

On Friday, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Budget Director Jack Lew announced the final results for fiscal year 2011 which ended on Septmeber 30.  The budget deficit for 2011 was $1.299 trillion, the second largest shortfall in U.S. history.  The largest deficit occurred in 2009 when the nation's deficit topped $1.4 trillion. Will President Obama shoot for a third record deficit in 2012?  Only time will tell.

113 convictions represent small fraction of total unlawful votes

Minnesota Majority today released a report on voter fraud convictions stemming from Minnesota’s 2008 general election. The report finds that 113 individuals who voted illegally in the 2008 election have been convicted of the crime, “ineligible voter knowingly votes” under Minnesota Statute 201.014.

“As far as we can tell, this is the largest number of voter fraud convictions arising from a single election in the past 75 years,” said Minnesota Majority president Jeff Davis, “Prosecutions are still underway and so there will likely be even more convictions.”

The highest number of convictions ever recorded in the United States came from the 1936 Jackson County, Missouri elections in which 259 individuals were convicted of voter fraud. A more recent five-year probe by the United States Department of Justice identified just 53 convictions for voter fraud nationwide.

“It’s mind-boggling to me that as a tiny non-profit corporation, we netted more than double the number of convictions in one year than the US Department of Justice was able to find in five,” said Davis.

Minnesota’s recent charges and convictions stem from research initiated by Minnesota Majority. The research identified upwards of 2,800 ineligible felons believed to have unlawfully voted in Minnesota’s 2008 general election.

“These convictions are just the tip of the iceberg,” said Davis. “The actual number of illegal votes cast was in the thousands. Most unlawful voters were never charged with a crime because they simply pled ignorance. We have evidence of these people casting illegal ballots, but in Minnesota, ignorance of election law is considered to be an acceptable defense.”

At the time of this report, nearly 200 additional cases are still pending trial. But time is running out for any additional cases to be prosecuted. The statute of limitations on election crimes is three years, and will expire for the 2008 election this November. Anyone who county attorneys have not charged by then will go free.

“The problem rests largely on our current Election Day registration system,” said Davis. “Most of the fraudulent votes cast in 2008 could have been prevented by using the normal registration and verification processes. But since the Election Day registration process does not include eligibility verifications, it simply leaves the door open to these kinds of abuses.”

Minnesota law requires voters to register at least 20 days before an election so that the information they provide and their eligibility to vote can be verified by election workers before they vote on Election Day. However, Election Day registration creates an exception. People who register at the polling place are given a ballot without first being subject to the same scrutiny.

“This is an example of why creating two classes of voters is unacceptable,” said Davis. “You shouldn’t be subject to less scrutiny than everyone else, just because you waited until the last minute to register. Less responsible voters are allowed to cut in line and cast a ballot without being validated and this is what happens.”

Investigations of voter fraud are also now underway from Minnesota’s 2010 election.

If Congressman Ellison is correct, then we could solve our unemployment problems overnight by simply having government mandate a bunch of new regulations.

Minnesota Majority's latest viral video presents the results of the Obama presidency.  The president's own words provides a compelling case why he does not deserve to be re-elected in 2012.  The video has been featured on Power Line, Fox Nation, Breitbart TV, Townhall,and The Blaze. Hat tip to John E. at Ace of Spades for developing the Infographs used in the video.

Posted from The Blaze

The latest anti-business viral video burning up the liberal blogosphere today seems heart-wrenching… that is, until you do your homework.

Robert Stephens, a resident of St. Paul, Minnesota, graduated from Carleton College (average cost: $42,942/year) in 2010 and now studies law at The George Washington University Law School (average cost: $70,449/year).  His father has a Ph.D. and two master’s degrees; his mother also has a master’s degree.  Only in America could a kid have been blessed with so much… and only in America could he still claim to be a victim. America’s capitalist society has apparently leveled a grave injustice against his family and Robert will not stand for it.

Robert, right, with a friend on the GWU campus (Image: Facebook)

Stephens — who identifies his personal political philosophy as Bolivian socialism — made a trip to New York City this weekend to participate in the “Days of Rage” march on Wall Street.  He was arrested Saturday when he refused police requests to get up and out of the way of traffic in the street.

In his emotional “rage,” Stephens told the sympathetic Socialist/Marxist/Anarchist crowd how an eeeeeevil Wall Street bank had taken his parents’ home away from them:

Attempts to contact Robert to find out exactly what grave injustices he and his family have suffered have gone unanswered.  In the meantime, sympathetic comments on both Robert’s Facebook page and the YouTube video are also… unsettling:

(Full disclosure: I attended GWU as an undergrad and, to help make sure my mortgage gets paid every month, I continue to work at the law school as a part-time employee on the weekends.)

Our friend Robert and his woeful tale have quickly become darlings of the liberal blogosphere and the mainstream media (and Iran’s Tehran Times!).  Here he is in a picture posted at Buzzfeed — an image that perfectly captures him utilizing the biggest tool in the left-wing’s arsenal: the media.

Caption on this photo: “Protested (sic) falls to his knees in tears in front of Chase Bank crying – this is the bank that took my parents’ home.”

According to the Daily Kos, Robert should be commended as “a patriot” for spelling out the reason people are protesting.  “If you can watch it without being affected, you are as heartless as Dick Cheney,” the site notes.

There’s just one problem: Robert Stephens’ story is (surprise!) completely bogus.

Phone inquiries into the county property records & taxpayer services office reveal that the Stephens family home is not and never has been in foreclosure, that property taxes had been paid in full this year and the remaining balance on their mortgage for the half-million dollar home is less than one year’s worth of tuition+fees at their son’s law school.

The nail in this empty protest‘s coffin is a delightful phone conversation I just had with Robert’s mother, Marquita, where she admitted Chase Bank indeed was not “taking” their home from them. Instead, due to a recent “reduction in income,” they’ve decided to hold a “short sale.” 

When I asked Mrs. Stephens if she and her husband planned to stay in their suburban St. Paul, Minn., surroundings after the sale, she told me they weren’t too keen on the idea.  The area is “a bit too conservative,” she said.

President Obama's latest jobs speech was like watching the rerun of a bad horror movie. He repeatedly repackages his failed Keynesian economic policies into the next "big" jobs program. In response, our economy crumbles around us. President Obama is clearly trapped in the Keynesian Twilight Zone.