Victims of Government - Steve's Story

Over-regulation consumes massive amounts of the people’s money, too often lacks common sense, has no heart, costs jobs and economic growth. Stephen Lathrop has spent 23 years mired in bureaucratic red tape, been shuttled between agencies, and been the victim of government miscommunication and inefficiency. You can raise awareness about over-regulation and encourage oversight by sharing Steve's story.

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Outbreak of Regulation! Meningitis Outbreak Could Lead to Fewer, More Expensive Drugs

Reports are linking compounded drugs to a large fungal meningitis outbreak that has resulted in over 100 deaths. Compounded drugs escape stringent FDA regulation. The Front Page gang worries that stringent regulations on boutique drug manufacturers could have terrible effects on health care. Hear why as Bill Whittle talks to Rituparna Basu of the Ayn Rand Institute and Terry Jones of IBD about regulations on the pharmaceutical industry.

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Anne from PA - Rep. Kelly's Rousing Floor Speech Receives Standing Ovation and Chants of "USA!"

Rep. Mike Kelly (R-PA) gave an impassioned floor speech on Thursday (7/26/12), in which he explained that there are many colors of tape available, but red tape is by far the most expensive for American businessmen. Rarely has the point been made with such reason, sincerity, and energy.

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PJTV Trifecta - Move Over Liberals and Let Conservatives Drive the Economy

Move over liberals, it's time you let conservatives drive this economy. You might even have fun riding shotgun when the economy goes from 0-60 in less than four seconds. Hear why the liberals need sit back and let the economy roar on this Trifecta.

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Alfonzo Rachel - The Individual Catdate: Neuter Your Pet or Pay Taxes

The constitution says that Congress can regulate commerce, but that is not good enough for liberals. Liberals want to compel commerce. Are liberals therefore the agents of totalitarian government? Find out on this ZoNation.

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Uncommon Knowledge - Rick Perry on What the U.S. Can Learn from Texas about the Economy

Texas Governor Rick Perry (R) talks to Peter Robinson about his career in Texas and his race for the White House. Perry speaks candidly about his presidential aspirations, and how they were thwarted by back surgery and a late entrance into the race. He also talks about why Texas is succeeding and California is failing when it comes to jobs and the economy. Is it as simple as low taxes and simpler regulations? Find out.

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PJTV Trifecta - Holy Cow! Immigration Punishes Dairy Farmer Who Doesn't Hire Illegal Aliens

Most cows are milked by illegal aliens. So what happens when dairy farmers hire legal workers to milk their cows? Would you believe that that they could be accused of breaking the law? Hear more on this Trifecta

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Lurita Doan - Barack Obama the Shape Shifter

Barack Obama does lip service to the concept of entrepreneurship and small business ownership and, as he moves full tilt into election campaign mode, repeatedly cues up small business photo ops in an effort to become all things for all people. Like a shape-shifter from a sci-fi film, Obama’s primary skill is to appear to be something he is not, as he repeatedly masks his full-tilt assault on entrepreneurs and small businesses.

Consider the many, small business photo-ops that Team Obama has staged in the past few months, in New York, Ohio, Wisconsin, Georgia, Michigan, and Florida. At the same time, the regulatory costs and burdens of Obama’s policies have fallen heavily on the small business community, even as the net worth of Americans has plunged 40% in the past three years under the Obama Administration.

Barack Obama has, arguably, destroyed more wealth during his three years in office than almost any other individual in the history of the United States. And much of this destruction has occurred because Obama is anti-small business and anti-entrepreneurship. Much of this destruction of the economy has occurred because Barack Obama does not understand that business owners and risk takers are what grow an economy, and when the government creates an environment of instability, uncertainty, scapegoatism, topped off with draconian tax regulations, businesses and the economy suffer.

To Obama’s thinking, small business owners are considered part of the “rich”, and thus have become the whipping boy of the Obama Administration. The group labeled “rich”, earning $200,000 or more annually, whom Barack Obama believes need to be taxed at 40% or higher is mainly composed of small business owners, sole proprietors and entrepreneurs, who file their business taxes on Schedules and addenda to their personal income taxes.

Consider, too, that the group hardest hit by the mandates of Obamacare is the small business community which will be required to provide government-legislated healthcare options to employees, regardless of business size and profitability. The new rate hikes due to Obamacare may result in businesses facing a 9% increase in the cost of healthcare premiums. For many small businesses, 9% oftentimes represents the business' entire profit that year, so the Obamacare mandate could wipe out the fruits of an entire year's effort, or even worse, put a small business in the red.

The sad story goes on, as the group hardest hit by the reporting requirements of the Obama Administration policies is the small business community, where the SBA estimates that the cost of the various reports now required by the federal government cost approximately $10,000 to $20,000 dollars—often more than what the average small business makes in profit annually.

The proof that the small business community is the hardest hit by the Obama Administration’s anti-business policies is evidenced in several surveys that have been released this past month.

Small businesses are the biggest employer for minorities and teenagers. But, hiring by small business has slowed to the lowest point ever measured over a ten year period—which also helps to explain the disastrous unemployment numbers for minorities and teens. (The Administration has been trying to posit that teen hiring improved in May, but studies show that teens are discouraged and, thus, there are fewer teens in the market looking for jobs.)

Since small businesses are not hiring, they are also not borrowing as much—which affects the banking industry. Business lending to small business has slowed. Small loans to business of $1 million or less have been shrinking consistently since June 2008.

Average monthly pay for all small business employees decreased to $2,688 in May, a decrease of 13 percent.

The construction sector which has a large proportion of small businesses is, as a direct result of Obama’s anti-business assault is also in serious trouble. Construction sector revenue stopped growing at the beginning of 2006, began a slow decline in mid 2007, and then continued a more dramatic decline starting in mid-2008

“The most common source of startup capital for immigrant-owned businesses is personal or family savings, with roughly two-thirds of businesses reporting this source of startup capital”. But, the devastation within the economy over the past three years means that there’s a lot less “family savings” available for use as startup capital.

There’s an oft heard saying “small businesses need a hand up, not a hand out”, but in the Obama Administration, these kinds of assistance to small businesses are regarded, incorrectly, as one in the same.

The belief that one person can make a difference, can create a thing of value with no help from the government is antithetical to everything that Obama believes. Furthermore, the entrepreneurial ideology scares Obama because business owners act in direct opposition to the kind of government-doled out opportunities that Obama wants Americans to think is the best they can do.

The 2012 election is all about the government and its relationship to the American people and American business. That’s it. That’s all. Whether the issue under discussion is the economy, strengthening the capital markets, the bloated entitlement system, the military, American involvement overseas, Greek debt, healthcare legislation, attracting talented and educated workers, the tax code, or the risks and rewards of being an American, there’s just one degree of separation from these issues and the Obama Administration’s heavy-handed, regulatory overreaching into the lives of Americans.

Barack Obama’s policies cannot and will not work, because the Obama Administration does not truly believe that the economic success of America is intrinsically tied to the success of the American small business community.

And so, our shape-shifting president hopes to disguise his antipathy towards business, entrepreneurs and small business leaders, as he moves skillfully around the country in one staged photo-op after another. Each carefully orchestrated to mask the economic destruction caused by his policies.

Americans should watch how effortlessly Obama shifts his shapes, how effortlessly Obama dons whatever mask is calculated to disguise his intents and best serve his reelection efforts. Americans better say a prayer for the small businesses and entrepreneurs pitted against Barack Obama—a most formidable foe, capable of destroying vast amounts of wealth, ushering in even more restrict regulations, and killing off job creators.

Lurita Doan

Lurita Alexis Doan is an African American conservative commentator who writes about issues affecting the federal government.

Lurita has been involved in the business community through participation in many trade associations, membership in business organizations including the Young Entrepreneurs' Organization (now Entrepreneurs' Organization) and Young Presidents' Organization, and involvement on charitable community activities.

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Lurita Doan - Obama Has No Faith

Acts of faith are performed each day in this country, and we are all the better for it. But sadly, Barack Obama does not seem to have faith in the American system, nor does he believe in American exceptionalism, nor does he believe that Americans can make it on their own without government handouts.

In short, Obama doesn’t have faith in us.

Faith has become an inflammatory topic in the 2012 election. In policy, speeches and campaign ads, the president has used faith as a means to demagogue his Republican opponent. Faith has been used by the left-wing extremists as a diversionary tactic, to attack Catholics and divert attention from a floundering economy. Faith has been used by Democrats as a political tactic to try to turn women against the Republican party. But, faith plays an even bigger role in the 2012 election than Democrats may realize because every day, the president shows a lack of faith that reveals his disdain for America.

For example, Barack Obama does not seem to understand that every small business that opens its door is the result of a profound act of faith. An entrepreneur believes in himself and his idea enough to take the risks, sometime to use his life’s savings, to create a better life.

Each time a business hires a new employee, it is an act of faith shown by both parties—the business believes that it can support the increased staff costs and will grow enough to make the expense worthwhile. The employee shows faith that the business will keep its doors open and offer opportunities for upward mobility.

But each small business also shows its faith when it counts on its government to create a climate with policies that support and encourage that growth.

Obama has shown that he doesn’t have faith in small businesses or the judgment of entrepreneurs. Instead he believes that only the government can make wise investment decisions or hire the unemployed.

Obama has shown that he doesn’t have faith that investors will do the wise things on their own. And so, he urges his Administration to invent even more restrictive mindboggling regulations al l designed to further the government’s ability to manage, direct, and ultimately control private enterprise.

Obama has shown that he doesn’t have faith in his fellow American to provide charitably, despite decades of evidence that Americans are the most generous people, the most philanthropically-inclined people, on the history of the world.

We are a nation of faith. America was first discovered, in a profound act of faith, by an explorer, Columbus, who sailed west at a time when most people believed the world was flat. Columbus’ belief, that the world was not flat, was an act of faith that made our great nation possible.

The colonists who came to America had faith that the new world would be different than the old world. They had faith that with hard work and perseverance, they could build a better life for themselves and their family.

Our founding fathers showed their faith in the principles that founded this great nation—to the point where they were willing to lay down their lives to break from England in a belief that the American system of government that they were creating was worth the sacrifice and would stand the test of time. But, Obama doesn’t seem to have any faith in the founding fathers’ belief in limited government.

Abraham Lincoln had faith in the union of the states and fought harder than any during the civil war to keep the nation together, insisting on pardons for Confederate soldiers and determined to move the nation past the great divide of the civil war.

Our nation showed its faith when we sent men to the moon, in an act of faith, so daring, so breathtaking in its scope that it is heartbreaking that our current, faithless presidential leadership has now cancelled the program.

Faith in the future, faith in our children, faith in a better life, faith that one man can make a difference—these are some of the immeasurable gifts that our country gives to the world each day. Our country, its origins, its innovation and its continued success inspire others to action and offers hope to the oppressed throughout the world. Our country is a beacon that attracts people from countless nations to our shores in the hopes of a better life.

Our great leaders and past presidents understood that America is a nation of faith and called upon that faith to bolster the nation during times of hardship.

On the eve of the D-Day Invasion, knowing that America was involved in a great struggle President Roosevelt prayed not for a quick victory, but for faith:”Oh Lord, give us faith. Give us faith in thee; faith in our sons; faith in each other; faith in our united crusade. Let not the keenness of our spirit ever be dulled."

There is a wide and growing gulf between our current president and the American people, and that chasm is all about faith, for clearly, Obama has little faith in Americans as a people, capable of all things great and good.

Faith is frightening to Obama because with faith comes hope, and with hope comes independence and a belief in the future, a belief that difficult deeds can be done, and frontiers can be conquered. In sharp contrast, Barack Obama believes that Americans should place all of their hope and faith in the government rather than in themselves.

America is a faith-based nation, and whether the president likes it or not, our country is all the better for it.

Lurita Doan

Lurita Alexis Doan is an African American conservative commentator who writes about issues affecting the federal government.

Lurita has been involved in the business community through participation in many trade associations, membership in business organizations including the Young Entrepreneurs' Organization (now Entrepreneurs' Organization) and Young Presidents' Organization, and involvement on charitable community activities.

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Lurita Doan - Friends of Obama Allowed to Opt Out

Emigrant Bank was recently identified to receive a waiver that would allow the bank to opt out of rigorous Dodd-Frank requirements. These of course are the same new rules and regulations that Barack deems essential to the nation. Yet when the bank’s owner, Howard Milstein, who is a close friend and was a bundler for President Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign, protested that the new rules would seriously crimp operations of his bank, the Obama Administration worked with members of congress to grant him a waiver from the new rules.

Other financial institutions and banks have consistently and vehemently argued that the Dodd-Frank Legislation that Obama championed is seriously flawed and will bring a raft of unintended consequence--but they were not friends of Barack Obama. These many other banks and institutions are not deemed worthy of a waiver.

Sadly, the case of Emigrant Bank is not the only example of the Obama Administration’s mercurial application of our nation’s laws. There is the obvious case, now being decided by the Supreme Court, of Obamacare, in which some (Nebraska´s Cornhusker’s Kickback or Louisiana’s Purchase) are allowed full exemption from the law’s requirements. What those who are exempted have in common is that, once again, friends of Obama can expect special exemptions from the rules and laws that others must follow.

There seem to be two sets of rules. The special, privileged class of people and businesses (Friends of Obama -FOO) can expect to be granted unique waivers, carve outs and shameful side deals designed to escape, to dodge, and to be exempted from much of the overreaching, poorly conceived legislation and administrative orders that Obama’s White House pushes with utter conviction on the rest of the nation.

On the other hand, if an organization, such as the Catholic Church, that is not a FOO, seeks a principled exemption to an emerging national policy, the organization is ridiculed, dismissed, and ignored.

This disgraceful double standard is becoming a standard practice in the Obama Administration.

Want more examples? Arne Duncan has recently allowed some 10 states to have exemptions from No Child Left Behind. No doubt the Teachers’ Unions in these states, critical to Obama’s reelection, were keen to ditch the pesky requirements for improved accountability. How much easier to call up friend in the White House and demand an exemption from rules and regulations that are not popular with Union members!

Consider too, the case of government-backed loans to Solyndra. Typically, in a government-backed loan, the government’s is the first debt that must be settled. But if one is a FOO, the rules are different. In that kind of situation, the debt to the federal government (read American taxpayer) is subrogated to that of a friend of Obama—not only friend, but, one of his largest campaign contributors. Other organizations and companies cannot expect similar sweetheart deals--they are not FOO.

Consider also, the case of the revolving door. The law for the Standards of Ethical Conduct for Employees of the Executive Branch, is very clear. The statute mandates a two year ban on any kind of direct involvement with a previous employer, client or co-worker. Unless, it seems, if one is a FOO. In that case, the rules are different, which seems to have exempted Craig Becker, former counsel for the Service employees International Union (SEIU) who, through an Obama Administration recess appointment, served as a member of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and who moved directly from there to his current position serving as general counsel to the AFL-CIO.

No time off or recusal needed for FOOs.

What does it mean for the country that the Obama Administration spends so much time exempting certain privileged individuals and businesses from the law?

Under Obama, will the United States devolve into a nation where laws are negotiable and will be applied differently for different people, as long as they belong to a special interest group that wants to opt out of the law and that also happens to be a friend of the president?

Our nation could once proudly boast of our national adherence to the Rule of Law. Every American should expect and demand equal treatment under the law, and special friends of the president should not expect or apply a different set of laws for themselves.

But, Barack Obama doesn’t seem to understand this basic principle that governs our nation, and , instead, seems to think that laws are flexible and the rules apply to others. (“Others” means anyone who is not a Friend of Obama-FOO).

Somewhere inside the White House, it is likely that yet another czar is employed to process the many requests for special treatment and waivers from the many new rules and regulations that Barack Obama has inflicted on the rest of the nation.

FOO have learned to expect special exemptions. The unlucky others are not only expected to follow those same rules, but to do so knowing full well that other, more connected FOO are escaping the burdensome new costs, and can avoid the intrusive requirements.

What a deal.

Lurita Doan

Lurita Alexis Doan is an African American conservative commentator who writes about issues affecting the federal government.

Lurita has been involved in the business community through participation in many trade associations, membership in business organizations including the Young Entrepreneurs' Organization (now Entrepreneurs' Organization) and Young Presidents' Organization, and involvement on charitable community activities.

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PJTV - Chicagoland Shakedown: Why It's Impossible to Run A Business Without Breaking the Law

Istria Cafe is a small business in Chicago, one of the most over-regulated cities in America. PJTV's Alexis Garcia interviews the Pribaz brothers, the owners of Istria Cafe, to show you how regulations are destroying businesses and jobs. Would you believe that it is almost impossible to run a business in Chicago without violating rules and regulations, and paying extraordinary fines? From utilities, to health care Alexis Garcia tells you why some businesses might not survive in the down economy.

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TSA Nude Body Scanners Boondoggle

This video is here to demonstrate that the TSA’s insistence that the nude body scanner program is effective and necessary is nothing but a fraud, just like their claims that the program is safe (radiation what?) and non-invasive (nude pictures who?). The scanners are now effectively worthless, as anyone can beat them with virtually no effort. The TSA has been provided this video in advance of it being made public to give them an opportunity to turn off the scanners and revert to the metal detectors. I personally believe they now have no choice but to turn them off.

Please share this video with your family, friends, and most importantly, elected officials in federal government. Make sure they understand that your vote is contingent on them fixing the abuse that 200,000 passengers face from the TSA on a daily basis.

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Lurita Doan - Team Obama Continues Regulatory Juggernaut

While Republicans focus on skewering GOP presidential candidates in primaries, Team Obama’s regulatory juggernaut continues to destroy the American way of life. Small businesses, entrepreneurs, and job creators are already groaning from the weight of the many and new regulations Obama has initiated in the past three years.

Even more regulations are on the way. However, many of the regulations are masked as "initiatives", where the actual regulation is buried in various appropriations bills sent to congress in the President's 2013 budget.

One of the most recent examples is the recently announced Education Department "Together For Tomorrow" initiative that shifts accountability for student education achievement outcomes away from teachers.

Like so many other Obama inspired regulations, this one, too, starts with a wonderful title, “Together For Tomorrow”. It certainly sounds like a good idea—increase national community volunteer service corps (Americorps) involvement in the education of American children. The "initiative" is connected to a "regulation" that is buried in a Department of Education budget request, which eliminates accountability.

Anyone willing to take a harder look and get passed the winning title can see that the "Together for Tomorrow" plan is just another, blatant political strategy to reward loyalists, such as the teachers unions. The only “togetherness” that Team Obama is interested in, is in building a collation for his 2012 bid for re-election.

The two-page, Department of Education takes vagueness to new levels and outlines few of the initiative’s strategies, though the Department of Education’s budget, in particular, the CNCS’ budget outlines the need for increases, in order to support the program. Of course, more spending on education, with little or no accountability has been the perennial goal of teachers unions for years.

So, the Teachers Unions, who consistently and almost exclusively vote and donate to Democrats, are to be given even more resources with little or no accountability. Nowhere in the Department of Education announcement does Team Obama address Americans’ concern regarding teacher incompetence in the classroom. Nor does the initiative allow for evaluation of teacher outcomes versus student outcomes.

Under the current Team Obama plan, all responsibility for student accountability and student outcomes lies with some vague entity termed the “community”, despite the growing trend in the country to question what exactly is going on in classrooms across the nation.

Startling and sad statistics confront Americans about our nation’s education system. Over 30% of all students in the United States do not graduate from high school. Within minority communities, another startling and dangerous statistic emerges—over 50% of minorities do not graduate from high school.

Yet, 90% of all high-paying jobs require a high school education, and some post-secondary education. How, as a nation, can we possibly hope to “Win the Future” when our next generation cannot even earn a high school diploma?

That is why, across the nation, even Democrats are finally joining Republicans in confronting the iron grip of the teachers’ unions on education. Even Barack Obama’s former Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, as the Mayor of Chicago is finally confronting the intransigence and incompetence of the teachers’ unions and demanding more accountability for outcomes.

But not Team Obama.

Even more shamefully, buried on page 11 of the CNCS’ Budget Authorization document is the request to delete a rule that requires both accountability and public notice of “significant changes to program requirements, service delivery or policy only through public notice and comment rulemaking.”

The Department of Education claims that requiring public notice and a public comment period “infringes on the prerogatives of the Executive Branch in carrying out programs consistent with the authorizing statute.” Put another way, what Team Obama seems to be telling us is that they are going to reward teacher union loyalists, and there is nothing citizens can do about it.”

Most troubling of all is that Team Obama has decided to buck the trend for increased accountability in our schools. Obama makes the task of education reform all the more difficult and delays again the urgent necessity to honestly deal with the many schools that are failing our children.

Team Obama, once again, slides regulatory over-reach up to new levels, all while avoiding congressional mandates and congressional debates.

Congress is fighting against Team Obama's tendency to avoid accountability, but Team Obama continues to circumvent the constitution and congressional authority by continuing to issue a plethora of Executive Orders creating "initiatives" that increase regulations on all Americans, stifle economic and individual growth, without full congressional approval or budget authority to do so.

‘Together For Tomorrow” is just another Obama sham. Our President hopes to masquerade his policy to reward loyalists, like the Teachers Unions at the expense of the future of the nation. Obama lacks the courage to join the honest reform of an education system that is failing millions of American children. Instead, he is completely focused on his own re-election. And so, yet another terrible Obama executive order goes out that advances a trend that will put another generation of American children at risk.

Barack Obama needs the votes, and the teachers' unions need the money; so, America is stuck with the latest in a long string of Team Obama initiatives, a sham called “Together for Tomorrow”.

Lurita Doan

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Lurita Alexis Doan is an African American conservative commentator who writes about issues affecting the federal government.

Lurita has been involved in the business community through participation in many trade associations, membership in business organizations including the Young Entrepreneurs' Organization (now Entrepreneurs' Organization) and Young Presidents' Organization, and involvement on charitable community activities.

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Lurita Doan - The Consequences of Federal Regulatory Overreach

Over the past ten years, Democrats have held a singular belief that almost all problems in America could be solved with more regulations and more oversight. Team Obama came to power and a Democrat-led congress immediately pushed through reams of new regulations. Hidden within thousands of pages of legislation for stimulus, financial regulatory reform, home mortgage reform and various small business jobs’ acts, were government regulations that are now strangling American entrepreneurship, American exceptionalism and American independence.

This perfect storm of increased regulations and increased oversight has had a ruinous effect. For example, during the Bush Administration, Congressman Henry Waxman often pummeled the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), demanding more oversight and more regulatory reviews in an unrealistic quest to find perfect, risk-free medications.

When Barack Obama became president, Democrat acolytes took over the FDA and implemented the strategy of excessive regulatory control that Waxman had advocated. And what was the effect?

New pharmaceutical development, once an American competitive edge, has slowed to a crawl and the nation is in danger of losing its leadership in new drug development. In 1996, the FDA approved approximately 45 new drugs—and the world clamored to buy American pharmaceuticals. Now, despite larger budgets, increased manpower and more sophisticated technology, the FDA approves only 20 new drugs each year.

Our competitive edge is eroding. And, in America, the entrepreneurs that once created the world’s most innovative products have been stymied. Inventors and investors worry that no new medical product, regardless of its effectiveness, can navigate the bizarre and expensive FDA path to approval. Americans can thank Henry Waxman for developing the strategy and they can thank Team Obama for the implementation.

The evidence of excessive federal regulation is everywhere and certainly not limited to the FDA. The Economist just ran a cover story, “Tangled Up In Green Tape” lambasting excessive and confusing, EPA regulations in the United States.

In the oil and gas industry, innovation and entrepreneurs discovered new and better ways to tap oil and gas resources that were once trapped and unrecoverable. Fracking, and other new technologies, all developed by private companies, gave our nation a new ability to recover natural gas and oil and production has boomed. But apparently, the added domestic energy and the jobs that have been created are in jeopardy as the Obama Administration starts to marshal fringe and environmental extremists, to reduce, or shut down the new production.

As a recent Wall Street Journal report noted, drilling permits are harder, more expensive and take longer to obtain, if at all. The regulatory clamp is strangling gas and oil production, and Team Obama hopes to tighten it still. Perhaps worst of all, Congressman Waxman and Congressman Markey, who apparently believe that gas prices in America are too low, have recently called for new taxes on oil and gas production and a national tax on carbon.

It seems that, having crippled Americans’ edge in the development of pharmaceuticals, Mr. Waxman and Mr. Obama now have moved on to do the same to domestic oil and gas producers.

For small businesses, the regulatory burden has become a killer. The United States was once one of the easiest places in the world to start a new business, and our culture of entrepreneurial energy was the envy of the world.

No longer.

Throughout America, small companies are struggling under the new, job-killing burdens imposed by the Obama Administration., which seems oblivious to the damage it has caused. Across the nation, new, start-up companies and entrepreneurs with the next big idea are finding it increasingly difficult to attract the capital needed to fund their ventures. Furthermore, the uncertainty that prevails when legislation is proposed, passed, challenged, and then, ultimately sent to the courts for resolution is bad for business.

Even young kids, budding entrepreneurs, are learning that setting up a simple lemonade stand requires government approvals, oversight, and permits.

The explosion in new, regulatory changes that have been pushed through by the Obama Administration are killing job growth and innovation. Sadly, the full crippling effect of these many regulations has not yet been felt. Week by week and month by month, more regulations are enforced that will further constrict our productive abilities.

Democrats and Team Obama seem to believe that more government influence and increased government interference is a preferable situation. They seem to think that all issues are improved and all problems can be made better only by government’s heavy hand.

Some may argue that not all regulations are destructive to our economy, and they’d be correct. But, the Obama Administration’subiquitous level of federal government involvement in almost every aspect of the lives of American citizens seems anti-democratic and certainly anti-liberty. Government overregulation and overreach is killing our economy and destroying the entrepreneurship that built our nation.

Have we not had enough?

I would like to suggest our government impose an immediate moratorium on any new regulations, and consider the damage being done to this great nation. We need to be encourage our job creators and reignite our entrepreneurial spirit.

Maybe, too, it is time for Mr. Obama to resist the most strident demands of those pushing for even more burdensome regulations from the government, and, instead go out and visit (providing the White House can locate one) a kid’s lemonade stand.

Mr. Obama could learn a lot by talking to the kid running it.

Lurita Doan

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Lurita Alexis Doan is an African American conservative commentator who writes about issues affecting the federal government.

Lurita has been involved in the business community through participation in many trade associations, membership in business organizations including the Young Entrepreneurs' Organization (now Entrepreneurs' Organization) and Young Presidents' Organization, and involvement on charitable community activities.

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