Obama Runs Away in Quincy

Our President Barack Obama changes his Quincy, Illinois town hall to a rally. Perhaps he wants to evade pointed questions, like--

A 1099 form for every $600 transaction? Sneaky costly mandates in ObamaCare. HT Potluck.

I had initially glanced at the article and assumed it had to do with the financial "reform" bill being debated on the Senate floor, but no.

What does this have to do with health care? You may well ask. I just got off a conference call with GOP Rep. Aaron Schock and small businessman Mike Nobis, who thinks it's a sneaky precursor to a VAT tax.

As Rep. Schock points out, it was just over a year ago that President Obama came to Peoria and promised stimulus that would keep the employment rate at 8%. Now it's in double digits.

Any questions?

America has them. As does his home state of Illinois. What kills a skunk still resonates.

More. And this was supposed to be an official trip, not political. What a laugh. Will Dem. Rep. Phil I don't care about the Constitution Hare make some remarks? And Dem Illinois Senate candidate Alexi Giannoulias is apparently going to be there too, the guy whose family bank just failed due to his loans to mobsters--which happened before his election as Illinois Treasurer and Barack Obama still endorsed him.

Added to those regs mentioned above embedded in ObamaCare are more of the so-called consumer protections in store for us from the supposed financial "reform" bill, which are a big job-killer for small business, hurting community bank lending. Veronique de Rugy:

The proposed regulations don’t attack the problem of excessive leverage. They don’t reform Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. They don’t guarantee that taxpayers won’t have to pay for the future errors of bank executives who, cheered on by their government enablers, take on excessive risk. The “reformers” simply wish away the root causes of this crisis: the “too big to fail” mentality and crony capitalism.

Crony capitalism means that not everybody plays by the same rules. Allowing financial institutions such as Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae, and investment banks to maintain significantly smaller capital reserves than commercial banks, while implicitly guaranteeing their obligations, was a critical part of the financial problem. Capital-ratio rules require that firms value all their tradable assets at market prices and maintain a cash balance equal to a certain percentage of that price, weighted for the risk of each asset. In 2004, the SEC decided to allow five firms — Lehman Brothers, Bear Stearns, Merrill Lynch, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley — to reduce their capital ratios, letting them keep more assets on their balance sheets while subjecting them to less-stringent reporting requirements. Special favors like that — favors from the regulators themselves — are representative of the unhealthy marriage between government and its friends on Wall Street.

And nowhere has that relationship been more toxic than in the case of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Barack Obama (D-Fannie Mae)

More. On the Caterpillar and John Deere writedowns:
Dems admit that ObamaCare tax writedowns legit

P.S. The president is probably worried about scary Tea Party infiltrators.

More. The One pontificates: AP with the president's spin:

"It's one thing to oppose reform, but to oppose just even talking about reform in front of the American people and having a legitimate debate, that's not right," Obama said in Ottumwa, Iowa. "The American people deserve an honest debate on this bill."

Yet he won't even engage in honest debate at a town hall in his home state. (Nor in Iowa yesterday)

And was there anything honest about ObamaCare? Americans aren't fooled.

More. Marathon Pundit with this take-away of the conference call.