That commodity is coal — which is not supported by at least one group: the Obama administration, which has literally declared war on the American coal industry, and the jobs that come with it.

Last week the Obama administration proposed new measures that will force new electricity generation plants to cut CO2 emissions by 50 per cent and also mandate investment in unaffordable technologies to bury carbon emissions underground. The new proposals would also set the stage for existing coal burning plants to come under the same arrogant EPA mandate whereby compliance would effectively shut them down.

Groups like the Edison Electric Institute have previously warned that the new rules eventually will cost utilities up to $129 billion and force them to retire one-fifth of coal capacity, leading to a surge in coal plant shutdowns and loss of jobs. Americans will be hit with substantially more energy rate hikes even as they struggle to pay their energy bills now.

This is yet another example of the Obama administration circumventing Congress, which in 2010 successfully defeated Obama’s disastrous Cap and Trade climate bill that would have imposed similar measures.

So as his custom, Obama has turned to a regulatory body to do his bidding when Congress fails to support his actions. His latest power grab involves the EPA which has declared CO2, the life-giving gas that plants breathe, to be a deadly poison.

Poison? The Earth’s atmosphere contains roughly (by volume) 78.09 percent nitrogen, 20.95 percent oxygen, 0.93 percent argon, 0.039 percent carbon dioxide, and small amounts of other gases. If carbon dioxide was a poison, mankind would have ended with the Neanderthals.

Should we be surprised by his actions? Not if you were paying attention to Obama’s days as a Senator, when during a 2008 interview with the San Francisco Chronicle, he is quoted as saying: “If somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can, it’s just that it will bankrupt them.”

So it’s OK for Obama to bail out the then bankrupt and dying domestic auto industry while bankrupting a thriving coal industry?

An Associated Press story reported that U.S. coal exports reached their highest level in two decades in 2011 as strong demand from Asia and Europe offered an outlet for a fuel that is now under attack here in America.
U.S. Department of Energy data analyzed by The Associated Press reveal that coal exports topped 107 million tons of fuel worth almost $16 billion in 2011. That’s the highest level since 1991, and more than double the export volume from 2006.

Much of the increase went to satisfy power-hungry markets in Asia, especially South Korea (up 81 percent to 10 million tons); India (up 65 percent to 4.5 million tons); and Japan (up 119 percent to 7 million tons).

Exports also were up in Brazil, China and several European nations seeking high-quality coal for steelmaking, according to the Energy Department data.
Peabody Energy calls this increase a “global coal super cycle” that heralds renewed interest in the fuel.

Companies including Arch Coal Inc. have taken a bullish stand on coal, predicting export capacity could reach 245 million tons by 2015. And even the Energy Department forecasts that while coal exports will drop slightly over the next two years, it will reach about 130 million tons annually by 2030. Countries worldwide consume more than 6 billion tons of coal annually.

But this isn’t going to happen if the EPA beats the coal industry into submission.

The U.S. has an unprecedented opportunity to maintain its position as the worldwide leader in coal exports. Competition is down and demand is up. Rich Roffman, radio commentator and cohost of the nationally syndicated radio show Made In America, characterizes the U.S. as “the Saudi Arabia of coal.”

The American public and Congress should be outraged that this war on coal will cause oil prices to continue to rise as electricity generation from coal diminishes.

We all support the war to create jobs, the war to reduce regulations, and the war to reduce taxes. But no one in good conscience should support the war on coal.

There have been two recent situations where secrets are being compromised — both of which will compromise job creation.

The first surrounds the supposed secret deliberations by the Supreme Court over Obamacare. The cost of implementation and compliance with a government controlled healthcare system will be staggering. The estimates escalate each time another layer of regulation is peeled back. Ultimately, this heavy burden will be passed on to American businesses in the form of higher insurance premiums and taxes.

The consequence is that companies are not hiring new employees and will start reducing staff to afford the mandates. This only prolongs the anxiety, pain and suffering of the 25 million Americans that are unemployed or underemployed.

Two days after the Supreme Court heard arguments on both sides of the issue, as is their custom, the justices convened a secret session of deliberations in their chambers. During this time, the justices take an initial non-binding vote and the writing of opinions is assigned. These meetings are restricted to the nine justices and their clerks, and are at the core of the foundation of the Judicial Branch.

Yet, the week after the deliberations began, President Barack Obama took to the airwaves and seemed to come unglued in an ignorant rant that criticized the justices and cast aspersions on the very process.

I don’t normally subscribe to conspiracy theories, but in this case, one has to wonder whether the president was informed the majority vote was to strike down his signature legislative accomplishment in these supposedly secret meetings. He certainly acted like someone in serious trouble as he went on the offensive for some damage control.

This would make a mockery of the secret deliberations and diminishes the office of the president. There’s a reason the founding fathers separated the Executive Branch from the Judicial Branch to prevent this kind of corruption of the Supreme Court’s role as the defender and ultimate interpreter of our Constitution.

An equally menacing corruption of secrets is taking place in the work force. Unions are trying to push through Card Check, even though it was resoundingly defeated when presented to Congress.

As a reminder, Card Check gets rid of the sanctity of the secret ballot, which is fundamental to American democracy. It forces employees to divulge their vote publicly when union elections are being held in a place of business.

The corruption of the secret vote — a constitutional right — is being promoted so unions can intimidate workers and force them to accept unionization even if they object.

This insidious process forces companies into a game of chance where the game is rigged and the house (unions) has the advantage.

Workers that had not previously wanted to be unionized are beset by union representatives that demand that employees vote to unionize. Unions force employers to hand over the names of all employees including home addresses, home and cell phone numbers and personal email addresses.

Then union representatives begin badgering employees at their homes to determine how they will vote. This process strongly portends that reprisals will be waged upon those that don’t fall into line with union demands.

Meanwhile, employers that have been blindsided by the union’s encroachment must scramble to estimate the costs, retain legal counsel, create an alternative plan to unionization and meet with employees to make their case.

This current process calls for union elections to take place within 40 days of contact by the union, even though the NLRB estimates that 90 percent of union elections take at least 56 days. And now unions are trying to impose a policy whereby union elections must take place within 7-10 days, giving employers a distinct disadvantage. It takes employers out of the game.

Ending the secret ballot starts with union elections, but could soon spill over into local or national elections. If history has taught us anything, when the people lose their ability to retain the secret vote, an empire cannot stand.

The historical record for the secret ballot traces back to ancient Rome, where the laws regulating elections were collectively known as Tabellariae Leges, the first of which was introduced in 139 BC. The French Constitution of 1795 states that “All elections are to be held by secret ballot.”

In the United Kingdom, the secret ballot was introduced in the Ballot Act 1872, and the United States adopted the secret ballot in 1891. The first president of the United States elected completely under the secret ballot was President Grover Cleveland in 1892.

James Buchanan, our 15th president once wrote: “The ballot box is the surest arbiter of disputes among free men.”

You would think that after 100 years of presidents respecting secret ballots and judicial deliberations, that our current president, a supposed constitutional lawyer, would have understood the sanctity of this constitutional right.

If we do nothing more than restore the tenets of the constitution in this election by electing a new president, then we will have come a long way toward establishing an environment for vigorous job creation while strengthening our democracy and rule of government.

Gasoline prices are rapidly rising attributed to uncertainty about Iran and the loss of Iranian oil supplies to the world market or a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, through which 17 million barrels of oil, or about 20 percent of total world production, flow each day.

Already, the national average price of regular unleaded gasoline today is $3.76, an 8-cent increase from last week. According to AAA, Florida’s average of $3.79 and Georgia’s average of $3.70 both increased 5 cents from last week. Tennessee’s average price of $3.59 rose 3 cents from last week.

Yes, Iran poses a problem for the U.S. on many fronts, but the U.S. doesn’t import any oil from Iran, and hasn’t for some time. In fact, about half of U.S. petroleum imports come from the Western Hemisphere, not from the Middle East, where we only import about 16 percent of our crude oil and petroleum products.

So why hasn’t President Barack Obama done anything to increase oil supplies to alleviate the pressure of escalading gas prices? Because he is willing to give American consumers a painful lesson on why they need to support his Green energy program.

He has said: “As we recover from this recession, the transition to clean energy has the potential to grow our economy and create millions of jobs — but only if we accelerate that transition. Only if we seize the moment.”

Well, he seized the moment – to generate some good press coverage. He vowed that the goal of his green energy program was to train 124,893 people and place them in new green jobs. But according to Climate Depot, “After 17 months, the results of the green jobs program indicate that only 52,762 were trained, and only 8,035 got green jobs – each job costs tax payers about $62,000…the Administration’s reliance upon green jobs was just another failed progressive dream and pandering to the eco-vote.”

A Washington Post analysis has found that $3.9 billion in federal grants and financing flowed to 21 companies backed by firms with connections to five Obama administration staffers and advisers.

Have we forgotten about the Solyndra debacle when the Obama administration authorized a $535 million loan guarantee only to see the company go belly up?

Or how about Beacon Power Corp., an energy-storage company that filed for bankruptcy after receiving $43 million in backing from the same U.S. program that funded Solyndra?

More recently, Ener1, which makes electric car batteries, filed for bankruptcy protection after receiving a $118 million grant from the federal government in 2009.

Then there’s the president’s goal of putting 1 million advanced vehicles on the road by 2015. How’s that working out? General Motors has instituted a five-week production suspension of the Chevrolet Volt because of oversupply.

The analysts at Edmonds indicated that “The price premium on the Volt just doesn’t make economic sense for the average consumer when there are so many fuel-efficient gasoline cars available, typically for thousands of dollars less.”

So the question becomes: If the American people aren’t ready to dive into Green energy, why isn’t the administration willing to do more to reduce gas prices at the pump for current car owners?

The answer is that Obama and his staff are just plain defiant when it comes to supporting their policies. The American people didn’t want Obamacare but it was shoved down their throats anyway.

The American people aren’t embracing his Green energy program either. But that hasn’t stopped his relentless drumbeat for green energy support.

Don’t get me wrong, an alternative energy program is a good idea because it reduces our reliance on foreign oil, but it has to be combined with a domestic energy program that includes clean coal, domestic drilling, and natural gas.

If the American people aren’t yet ready for his green policy, why does he not listen to them and move on to something they do passionately care about: gas prices.

Rising oil prices put increased pressure on household budgets that have already been stretched to the limit. Any relief they received from the extension of the payroll tax reduction has been more than offset by raising energy costs.

Raising energy costs also impacts the cost to run a business. That reduces job creation when we can least afford it.

Mr. President, for a change, give the American people what they need, not what you want.

The survey found 5 percent of current manufacturing jobs are unfilled due to lack of qualified candidates, 67 percent of manufacturers have a moderate to severe shortage of qualified workers, and 56 percent expect the shortage to increase in the next three to five years as older workers retire.

Most of these unfilled jobs are in the skilled production category — positions such as machinists, operators, craft workers, logistics managers and technicians.

How did the U.S. manufacturing industry – historically and currently the worldwide leader in manufacturing — lose its mojo? (Yes, the United States is the largest manufacturing country in the world and until recently the largest exporter). There are 14 million unemployed U.S. workers while there are more than a half –million job vacancies.

How did we get into this situation?

It comes down to two largely preventable trends.

The first is that the U.S. manufacturing industry has done a lousy PR job to attract today’s work force. Most people still envision workers bathed in sweat manually hauling raw materials to create appliances, cars, steel and other durable goods. But that no longer represents today’s manufacturing.

Advanced Manufacturing is the buzzword today. The Department of Labor’s Employment and Training Administration’s definition is as follows: “Advanced Manufacturing is the accelerated use of high-tech processes in the manufacturing plant.”

That means manufacturing workers today are relying on computerization, robotics and emerging technologies. This requires brain power, not brawn. This is the stuff that workers in the 20th century could never even imagine.

This is a story about innovation and creativity that isn’t being told to today’s younger workforce. It’s time that U.S. manufacturers sponsor road shows across the country to excite young people about manufacturing. They have a good story to tell: great jobs, great compensation and benefits, and great opportunities. And this must begin today if we are to catch up to the needs we face in filling high tech manufacturing jobs.

This takes us to the second preventable trend: taking the onus off of trade and technical schools. At one time, the U.S. had apprentice programs where workers trained to become craftsmen and skilled artisans. Yesterday’s apprentice programs are today’s trade and technical schools.

Unlike traditional colleges, where students must complete a wide variety of courses, many of which are unrelated to their desired jobs, a trade school offers a highly focused curriculum devoted exclusively to preparing a student for their job of choice. A trade school student will generally earn their degree in a shorter amount of time than in a traditional college and at a much lower cost.

Yet, even as enrollment in trade schools is increasing, the Obama administration seeks to reduce funding for vocational training by 20 percent, while concentrating primarily on the Pell Grant program that offers financial aid for college and university attendance. If you look at the millions of college graduates that are unemployed or under employed, why wouldn’t the government want to put more emphasis on trade school students, who tend to be from lower income backgrounds and thus more dependent, directly or indirectly, on government assistance?

According to data, England, Germany, Japan and Sweden invest as heavily in the education and training of work-bound youth as they do for each college-bound youth. This puts the U.S. at a disadvantage when it comes to filling and creating today’s manufacturing jobs.

When 600,000 jobs are unfilled and 14 million unemployed, this nation must re-evaluate its commitment to manufacturing. It has been the backbone of this country from its very founding and to allow the U.S. to slip behind other countries in manufacturing superiority is unconscionable.

The United States must re-claim its manufacturing leadership. We have the smarts, we have the workers, and we have the resources. What we lack is the will.

And again, nothing has happened, or will happen.

From the very beginning of his administration, he has failed to grasp the realities of America’s 21st century energy requirements and their relationship to jobs and the economy.

Now rising oil prices (the average price of a gallon of regular gasoline has jumped 13.1 cents to $3.518 in the past month, according to auto club AAA) comes at a bad time – just when companies are starting to hire.

Manufacturers face lower profit margins as they pay more to get their products to market and face higher costs for plastics and other petroleum-based materials. And higher prices at the pump force consumers to cut spending on discretionary items like dining out, home improvements and family vacations, hurting those industries. Dwindling profits mean dwindling hiring opportunities.

For the oil industry, Obama offered new leases in the Gulf of Mexico and promised to open 75 percent of the country’s resources for drilling. This was exactly what he proposed in 2007, but not much has happened since.

Why is a sound energy policy so linked to jobs?

According to a study by Wood Mackenzie (an energy consulting firm), the development of new and existing resources could, by 2018, increase domestic oil and gas production by millions of barrels a day and support a million new jobs.

Another study, by IHS Global Insight, estimates that returning permitting approvals to their historic levels before the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico would generate 230,000 jobs in 2012. And these are mainly high paying, blue-collar jobs that would immediately make a huge difference for millions of American households.

House Republicans agree and have proposed an active jobs plan to significantly expand American energy production offshore, onshore and in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve. With bipartisan support, their plan would create more than 1 million American jobs, generate billions of dollars in revenue and reduce America’s reliance on increasingly unstable Middle Eastern oil.

It would make energy more affordable for our manufacturers and for our consumers. Energy prices heading downwards would help relieve anxiety and hopelessness over our economic future.

Let’s not forget Obama’s rejection of the Keystone XL pipeline, which would have created 20,000 jobs during the pipeline’s initial construction phase and up to a half-million more over time. The Keystone XL would play a major part in full utilization of Canada’s oil sands that would be refined and distributed in the United States.

But Obama isn’t the only Democrat who doesn’t grasp the relationship between domestic oil production and jobs. New Jersey’s Senator Robert Menendez, who has submitted a new amendment in the Senate Finance Committee that would impose over $43 billion in new tax hikes on the oil and natural gas industry, is clearly out of step with even his own party. Such a policy would punish the very oil and natural gas industries that could create millions of employment opportunities. Is anyone awake in Washington?

According to a report in Forbes, oil and gas companies directly employ more than 2 million Americans, from blue-collar workers to well-trained scientists and engineers. In addition, the industry supports millions of manufacturing, construction, mining and other indirect jobs — about 9 million of them in all.

“To the extent the industry is allowed to drill here, it creates and keeps jobs here. If oil and gas companies were allowed to explore in more domestic areas currently off limits, it would create an estimated 1 million more jobs — and those jobs wouldn’t cost the taxpayers a dime. Indeed, those companies would be paying millions of dollars in taxes.”

The question then becomes: Why doesn’t Congress put more urgency behind an energy policy to create jobs? It looks like there is significant bi-partisan support for more domestic drilling. So what’s the hang up?

Congress is too busy fighting to get things done. For example, putting money behind infrastructure has merit to repair crumbling bridges and roads. But why spend billions of Federal dollars on “shovel ready” jobs when a stroke of the pen would put millions of Americans back to work on domestic energy programs? This work would be done by private energy companies without the Federal government having to spend its own money.

Oil is a precious commodity. But so are American jobs. There must be a way to put these on equal footing. It is this simple: by supporting domestic energy production, we support domestic job creation.

If he were sitting in the House chamber during President Barack Obama’s State of the Union Address, Churchill would have been flabbergasted by the contention that a “wealth gap” was the cause of the nation’s woes.

It’s not a wealth gap that is slowing recovery – it’s a crisis of confidence in Obama’s ability to lead the nation.

Some of history’s most accomplished leaders, like Churchill, got their inspiration from time honored thought leaders and statesmen. In his State of the Union Address, Obama got his inspiration from the Occupy movement, and catered to this largely discredited group.

This agenda is fraught with peril.

It is clear that rather than face the lingering unemployment numbers, Obama has decided to embrace a Pro-Poverty vs. Pro-Growth philosophy.

Looking to win reelection by instigating class war is immoral and inexcusable.

It threatens to break the very social fabric of this country. And some groups are starting to buy into this toxicity.

Politico recently revealed that the number of times the media mentioned the phrase “income inequality” increased nearly five-fold during the first two months of the Occupy protests.

In a late 2011 poll by the congressional daily newspaper The Hill, data showed that almost 75 percent of Americans believe that inequality is a problem for the United States.

In his State of the Union Address, the president suggested that: “We can either settle for a country where a shrinking number of people do really well, while a growing number of Americans barely get by. Or we can restore an economy where everyone gets a fair shot, everyone does their fair share, and everyone plays by the same set of rules.”

This is his reference to the “Buffett Rule,” a proclamation by Warren Buffett that his tax rate is less than his secretary. And if to drive the message home, Buffett’s secretary Debbie Bosanek, was sitting near Michelle Obama.

This issue is misleading because Obama continues to equate the capital gains tax rate with the ordinary income tax rate. These are two different taxes.

For Buffett or any other person, before having capital to invest you have to first earn it, which leads to higher personal income rates. But these funds are being redeployed and invested into all sorts of enterprises, small and large, new and old, at a lower tax rate to encourage, inspire and create a class of risk takers. Without risk takers, there can be no job creation.

Now Obama is suggesting that a tax rate of 30 percent be imposed on the wealthy. But if you listen closely, the definition of wealthy keeps changing.

Remember when the wealthy were once Americans with annual incomes of $250,000? Now they are described as “millionaires and billionaires.” If this is supposed to mollify most Americans, it will be an utter failure.

The late comedian George Carlin once remarked: “Conservatives say if you don’t give the rich more money, they will lose their incentive to invest. As for the poor, they tell us they’ve lost all incentive because we’ve given them too much money.”

Does he honestly think that Congress will be amenable to altering the current tax code during an election year? Understanding we have a serious problem with our tax code, it is going to take far more than a couple of tweaks to fix it. This is pure political rhetoric.

It is also a self-fulfilling prophecy. Obama cannot mention jobs without raising taxes, growing the size of government and increasing regulations. These are not compatible to job creation; something he would have instinctively known if had ever had to create jobs, or even included job creators in his inner circle.

In his State of the Union Address, the president boasted that: “If you’re an American manufacturer, you should get a bigger tax cut. If you’re a high-tech manufacturer, we should double the tax deduction you get for making products here.”

It sounds like a practical idea, but most economists contend that tax breaks to encourage specific investment decisions are a bad idea, and are rarely effective. Tax breaks given in the past actually diminished investment by the technology sector. Instead, it is generally agreed that the key to investments and job creation is reducing corporate taxes.

It is obvious that a desperate Obama will try throwing everything and anything against the wall to see what sticks. Promising more handouts? Sure.

Castigating the wealthy as the scourge of the earth? Sure. Creating class war? Sure. Creating jobs? Not so fast!

The Obama State of the Union Address was nothing more than a stump speech that he will be making across the country. And he got the networks to help him get his reelection bid out to America. But this time people are listening and they don’t like what they hear.

According to Kantar Media, which studied the tuning behavior of 100,000 households across the United States in the moments leading up to, during, and after President Obama’s State of the Union address, during the first five minutes of the address, 27 percent of the audience tuned away.

The bottom line for Obama: no jobs, no votes.

Nothing could be farther from the truth.

If you listen closely, he will side-step the priorities he failed to accomplish in his three years in office, and won’t accomplish in 2012. They all have one thing in common: They are needed like blood to resuscitate a hemorrhaging economy where flat lining job creation is beyond the hope of recovery anytime soon.

Here are the five issues he must address to create jobs but will fail to act on.

1. Using tax reform as a competitive advantage

When a company spends its energy wading through and complying with an onerous and confusing tax code, it creates uncertainty. Uncertainty kills jobs. To suggest as Obama often does, that American businesses believe they are not paying enough taxes, is absurd.

Our tax code forces our manufacturers to move operations overseas where it favors foreign producers, even as it discriminates against American producers hiring American workers. It is time that the U.S. tax code stop infringing on American business prosperity, and instead institute a tax code that gives us a competitive advantage to bring our factories home and to grow jobs in the United States.

During the Reagan years, from 1981 to 1989, tax reform helped make this period the most prosperous in American history, creating some 17 million new jobs.

President Ronald Reagan understood that by simplifying the tax code and reducing corporate taxes, it incentivizes our job creators.

There are some promising ideas circulating such as the Flat Tax and the Fair Tax. But these are being ignored by an administration that isn’t willing to fix our current broken tax code other than piling on new taxes. We need tax reform that works with us, not against us.

2. Passing healthcare reform that establishes an efficiently run healthcare system

We all agree that the current healthcare system is a convoluted mess. It is too costly and too fragmented to be effective. It rattles the mind to realize the cost of healthcare is increasing each year at six times the cost of inflation. If left unchecked this alone is enough to turn an economic superpower into one resembling a third-world country.

The Supreme Court by mid-year will rule that imposing personal mandates to purchase insurance is unconstitutional, thereby tossing Obamacare into the trash bin.

The question is what comes next?

It will take a new administration not encumbered by the embarrassment and folly of Obamacare to keep America competitive by finally presenting healthcare reform that focuses on affordability, accessibility and predictability.

3. Immigration reform that builds our economy by attracting the world’s best talent

Obama promised immigration reform, but when highly skilled immigrants who have received degrees at our universities are punished instead of being recruited to boost U.S. technology and innovation, America loses. Foreign students come to the U.S. to take advantage of our exceptional higher education system. We need to retain that knowledge here through a visa program that allows them to contribute in a significant way to our economy.

Truth be told, some of the world’s best minds and most talented entrepreneurs are lining up each morning at our embassies hoping to come to America to invest their talent, education and resources. Sadly they are being turned away in record numbers. Just seven percent of our permanent visas are given to people whose skills could reinvigorate our global leadership. Unfortunately we are losing the recruitment battle to countries like Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

We must stop denigrating illegal immigration and focus on legal immigration.

4. Regulation reform that reduces the burden on our job creators

Though Obama has given lip service to the excessive regulation being thrown at our job creators at the federal, state and local levels, he has done little about it. The best he could do was find $10 billion in cuts out of the $1.7 trillion each year our businesses spend in compliance costs. That’s more than they pay in taxes!

Instead of spending $800 billion on a failed stimulus, for which every dollar we had to borrow, we should reduce the cost of regulation. We would not need to borrow a penny and it would be a boon to job creation.

5. Education reform that puts equal emphasize on vocation.

The Obama administration is populated with Ivy League alums. Besides having no connection to our job creators, they have no connection to other types of education. Specifically, they fail to recognize the relationship between education and vocation. That’s why they have ignored data that projects that over half the jobs generated over the next decade will not require a college education but technical training. Technical jobs pay well and are in high demand.

To balance our educational needs, it will take a new leader with vision that understands job creation at its most basic level. We have one of the smartest and hardest working workforces in the world. We need to ensure they are equipped to compete. We have not done well in tapping into the inherent skills of our workforce to fill today’s technical jobs and those of tomorrow. .

As the election draws nearer, the Obama administration’s glaring missteps in job creation and righting the economy will become increasingly clearer to the American people. In 2012 there will be no legions of believers lined up several blocks to vote. They have tired of the rhetoric without action and have found that Obama’s vision and leadership were no sturdier than the backdrop of faux Roman pillars at Mile High Stadium where he accepted the Democratic nomination.

What’s worse, in order to get re-elected he cannot run on his record. No more lofty ideals and pretending to be the “President of all Americans.”

Even his supporters are disenchanted, recognizing that his ideals were merely campaign fodder. In order to win he will need to go on the offensive and run the most negative, cringe-worthy campaign in American history.

This will redefine gutter politics.

He once ran as an immortal, now he is just running scared.

Ironically, that’s how much time American taxpayers spent this year fumbling through stacks of confusing IRS forms. Americans spend about $300 billion a year in tax-preparation costs traversing a mind-bursting 3.4 million word tax code.

The net effect of this archaic tax system is not only its compliance cost, but it ultimately punishes companies for being successful and discourages them from hiring. Taxing our corporations and businesses is a giant hoax. Taxes and tax related costs paid by our companies are simply passed on to the consumer.

Those being impacted most from corporate taxes are the poor who have less to spend. The best way to protect the poor (and the middle class) is to ensure they have good paying jobs and keep more of their hard-earned money. It is estimated if corporate taxes were eliminated consumer prices would be reduced by 25 percent. This would vastly improve the quality of life for all Americans.

Fortunately, some fresh thinking has the potential for turning the onerous U.S. tax code into an engine for job creation and to put millions of our people to work. These ideas can be implemented quickly and thus be a positive force in difficult times.

The two leading options for tax reform are the flat tax and the consumption tax. Both would raise $2.4 trillion, the current level of tax revenue being collected, while vastly improving America’s productivity and competitiveness.

The flat tax would be filed on a postcard-sized form. The only deductions contemplated would be for charitable contributions, child care and healthcare costs and mortgage interest, which politically are very popular with most tax payers.

According to the Heritage Foundation, adopting a 17 percent flat tax “would lead to significant improvements in U.S. economic performance after the first 10 years of its implementation. Specifically, this new tax system would lead to 3.8 million more jobs by the end of the tenth year; add $545 billion to gross domestic product in the tenth year alone; increase the level of personal savings by 50 percent; raise non-residential investment by 9 percent; and expand the nation’s capital stock from $17.8 trillion in 2014 to $19.1 trillion.”

The flat tax eliminates the tax bias against savings and investment, thereby ensuring better economic performance in a competitive global economy.

The consumption tax is best characterized by the FairTax, a nonpartisan piece of legislation that abolishes all federal personal and corporate income taxes, as well as payroll taxes, estate taxes and capital gains taxes. In their place would be one simple 23 percent national sales tax based on what a consumer spends, not on what they earn.

Tax collection would be the responsibility of each state and imposed on all new purchases of products and services. It enables retirees to keep their entire pensions, refunds in advance the sales tax on purchases of basic necessities up to the poverty level, removes the tax advantage of foreign produced products sold in America, and brings transparency and accountability to tax policy.

Best news of all, it abolishes the IRS.

Under the FairTax the rich naturally pay more.

What the two tax reform programs have in common is they take the uncertainty out of business planning allowing business owners to reduce their high marginal tax rates so they are encouraged to take more risk and create more jobs.

Both tax plans would safeguard Social Security and Medicare.

According to Harvard economist Dale Jorgenson, tax reform would boost national wealth by nearly $5 trillion, by increasing the value of all income-producing assets. Imagine how this wealth would filter through the economy in increased share values and investment capital.

We must incentivize our entrepreneurs to get into the game. There is a faulty perception that business owners keep all the money they make to feather their own nests. This is a myth perpetuated by people who have never started or run a small business.

The current tax system rewards cronyism and penalizes entrepreneurs and small business. Enacting a new tax code would be a boon to these over-taxed, hard-pressed job creators.

If the objective is to stimulate private-sector led economic growth, increase tax receipts, simplify compliance, close loopholes, and promote fairness then it starts with adopting a totally new approach to the U.S. tax code. Options are on the table that every tax payer – especially job seekers — should embrace.

Although encouraged by President Obama’s pledge during the State of the Union Address to double exports and open up new markets, we are not seeing any progress toward meeting these critical objectives. I wish he was being sidetracked by job creation –but that is not the case either.  Once again the Obama administration has failed to understand that the key to stabilizing the economy and job creation rests with supporting the nation’s entrepreneurs, especially small business exporters.  As a public service, let me humbly suggest that there are five initiatives that must be considered in 2010 to move this country forward.

1) Pass the three pending Free Trade Agreements

Did you know that for every dollar invested in exports by small and mid-size companies  through export finance specialists, the results is $500 in export sales?  The Department of Commerce puts the figure at $415 in export sales for every dollar invested.  So think what opportunities are being missed by not passing three major free trade agreements:

Colombia
In Colombia, U.S. exporters have paid $1.3 billion in tariffs that could have been eliminated if the U.S. – Colombian Free Trade Agreement had been voted on by Congress.  Ambassador Schwab noted that since more than 90 percent of Colombian products coming into the U.S. are duty free, U.S. exporters should enjoy a reciprocal agreement with Colombia. Ironically, Colombia supports the agreement and is willing to eliminate most tariffs.

South Korea
U.S. citrus exporters have paid $250 million in tariffs that could have been eliminated had Congress voted on the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement (KORUS-FTA).

Panama
The commercial potential of this agreement for the United States is significant. US companies already export nearly $3 billion annually in merchandise to Panama – and at $2.3 billion, the US merchandise trade surplus with Panama is our fifth largest in the world.

2) Defeat the Cap and Trade Bill

Everybody agrees that the world needs to reduce pollution.  The trouble is that the world cannot agree on how to do it.  A perfect example is the ill-conceived (and slowly dying) Carbon Cap and Trade legislation, which has the government setting a “cap” on the total amount of carbon that can be emitted nationally; companies then buy or sell permits to emit CO2. The cap can be reduced over time to reduce total carbon emissions.

It sounds plausible, but as the cap is tightened and companies are stripped of initial opportunities to “offset” their emissions, the price of the carbon emission permits will skyrocket beyond the current estimate of $28 per ton of carbon. The end result is that the corporate costs of buying these expensive permits will be passed to consumers.  Worse, small businesses will not be able to afford their energy expenses, delaying job creation.  This legislation must not move forward if we want to create jobs in 2010.

3) Incentivize Small Business With Tax Breaks
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The current solution to every problem is for the U.S. government to tax our corporations until they flee our shores and tax the rich until they are rich no more. This has left the U.S. as the most over-taxed nation on earth.  Just consider the following:

Nearly half of our states when combining federal and state income taxes already lead the world in the highest corporate tax rates of any industrialized country.  If Iowa, Pennsylvania and Minnesota were countries they would be the top three highest taxed in the world. Massachusetts, Alaska and New Jersey would be four, five and six.

Twenty-four U.S. states have a combined corporate tax rate higher than top ranked Japan. Thirty-two U.S. states have a combined corporate tax rate higher than third ranked Germany. Forty-Six U.S. states have a combined corporate tax rate higher than fourth ranked Canada. All fifty U.S. states have a combined corporate tax rate higher than fifth-ranked France.

Higher taxes are obviously not the answer, because they will only propel jobs and wealth away from America. It does not matter if our taxes were quadrupled; there is not enough money in America to bring redemption to any of these seemingly incurable problems.  We must stop over-taxing small business, the leading source of job creation.

4) Leave NAFTA Alone

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is by far the most beneficial piece of trade legislation Congress has ever passed. At a time of economic upheaval where job creation must be at the heart of our recovery, it is mind-boggling that Congress could contemplate changing or even opting out of the agreement. As supporters of fair market access for American exporters, it is our obligation to push Congress to maintain NAFTA with its current provisions. Since NAFTA was implemented, the U.S. added 30 million new jobs.

Consider that during 2008, the U.S. exported $200 billion to Canada (up 11 percent over 2007) and $115 billion to Mexico (up 13 percent). In fact, 30 percent of all U.S. trade goes to NAFTA partners.

Further, most Americans do not appreciate that today, Canada is America’s biggest trade partner, and it is where the U.S. gets most of its crude oil. It does NOT come from the Middle East.

Consider that Mexico imports more U.S. products than China and Japan combined, and that Mexico is neck-and-neck with Saudi Arabia when it comes to energy exports to the U.S.

NAFTA creates American jobs, so it must not be renegotiated or altered.

5) Restore Faith in Free Enterprise

It’s time to restore America’s belief that this country’s best times are still ahead and that there is a role for everyone.  No nation on Earth can out-think and out-work the American worker.  What is missing is a sense that there is a chorus of like-minded Americans who are looking for answers and the empowerment to make their voices heard.

Entrepreneurs must be given the resources and incentives they require to profitably create new enterprises.   That means tax breaks, opening up new foreign markets, providing greater access to working capital, and supporting programs that restore America’s competitive advantage throughout the world.

This erosion in spirit has been building, and ca not pinned on a single administration, but the time to reverse the trend is NOW.  Americans have a “Conscientious Equity” in the future of this country and along with it, an inherent responsibility to play an active role in shaping how this country sustains free enterprise and economic growth.

Part of this responsibility is making our government representatives accountable for their performance.  Staying loyal to a political party to curry favor with party leaders while ignoring the consequences of ill-advised programs and bills impacting constituents perverts the reason they were elected as our representatives.  The welfare of the nation should be the overriding priority, and those who fail to recognize their responsibility do so at their own political peril.   Our conscientious equity demands that we pay attention to the issues that affect this nation. Feigning ignorance shirks your responsibility as a citizen, and ignoring it constitutes a failure of moral character.

Let’s make 2010 the “Year of Engagement” – when Americans unite to support small business and restore the economy and American jobs.

You know what other jobs will be disappearing? State jobs, because states need to shed workers to deal with huge budget deficits. Already in March, state and local governments shed 9,000 jobs.

Come on folks, the government doesn’t create jobs. We all know that private-sector temporary jobs won’t become permanent unless employers see steady economic growth. And that’s not something we’ve seen with the ineffective stimulus plan.

We all know the solution. We talk about it all the time on the show. It’s very easy to understand. It’s the Neal Asbury Five Step solution:

1. Small business creates 75 percent of all jobs. So Congress needs to increase aid to small business.
2. The Treasury should redeploy bank bailout money for small business loans.
3. Take the crushing tax burden off of small business so they can hire.
4. Open up new foreign markets by passing new free trade agreements and ratifying the three trade agreements languishing in Congress.
5. Give America hope that the American Dream is alive and well and that our best days are ahead of us.