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Friday, February 26, 2010

Wake Up and Do the Math

Wake Up Call

Ok, let’s cut to the chase. Whatever the U.S. Government says something is going to cost-- I don‘t care if it‘s aircraft, aircraft carriers, trips to the moon or any new entitlement--you can just about triple it….going in.

However, if you’d have told Franklin Roosevelt 80 years ago that in 2010, Social Security would have an unfunded liability of over 6 trillion dollars, he would have said, “not to worry, we are going to war with Japan, blow them to smithereens, then make them loan us money to pay for our Grand Plan.

I suppose if you would have told Lyndon Johnson that, in less than 40 years, the Medicare Bill he signed in 1965, would have unfunded liabilities in excess of $34 trillion, he would probably have told you he would not run for re-election, then he’d blow the crap out of Vietnam, so that a Republican could be blamed for it and everything else Democrats have done to drive America into the dirt.

So I don’t think it would be much of a stretch to tell Barack Obama that his “revenue neutral” Obamacare would cost America closer to 30 trillion in the next 20 years. Or in other words, what do you think will happen when a hundred million people find out that 30 or 40 million are going to get handed free medical care, just for asking. Yeah, I didn’t think you thought about this.

Well, there’s just one little problem…..money. There isn’t enough money to pull this off, if you bankrupt every wealthy person in this country. And you can forget about the middle class, because without an upper class, you don’t have a middle class.

You see, when you hold up these schemes to the ‘mirror of history’, the reflections don’t look so rosy.

Of course, Hugo Chavez has pulled off the perfect solution. But I doubt Americans will go that way without a fight.

Who is Obama

There’s a lot of moderate Republicans and Independents that are bending over backwards trying to relate--read understand--the thinking of President Obama. After a year of campaigning and another year at the helm, some just can’t understand the man and what he’s trying to accomplish. Even Fox’s Bill O’Reilly has turned himself into a pretzel giving latitude for our leader’s painful and destructive executive style.

Let’s review: Obama admits his formative years were influenced by terrorists, communists and Left Wing zealots. His only private sector experience was practicing law for a multi-millionaire slum lord and an army of community organizers. He spent all of six months as a State Senator, (before he began running for President) where he voted “present” 90% of the time.

He ran for President on a platform of HOPE and CHANGE, but openly admitted he was for re-distribution of wealth. His first act as President was ordering the closing of GITMO and his second act was to borrow $826 billion from the Chinese and hand it over to unions, state employees and States to shore up their Medicaid liabilities. Since he has been in office, his every venture is to pay back political hacks, enrich union pensions, expand the role of unions in America, pad trial lawyers, a take over of the private sector and make Federal Government and its cost bigger and bigger.

In fact our president has done nothing to lower the cost--or size-- of government; nothing to lower the taxes, obstacles or anxiety confronting private sector businesses; nothing to wean the States off Federal dependency; nothing to calm the fears of non-union, non-government Americans; and most certainly nothing to garner the respect or admiration of those respecting the Constitution.

Call him a Socialist, Fascist or Obamanist, but you can’t call him a pro-Capitalist, smaller government, fiscally responsible, non-intrusive, fan of America and her values.

And his Harvard education not withstanding, hasn’t helped Bill O’Reilly see what is painfully clear to the rest of us.

Obama’s Business Plan

Social Security, which was developed to provide a safety net for workers after their retirement, hardly resembles it’s original intent. It has been morphed, modified and mangled so that it has become a gargantuan agency unaccountable, uncontrollable and omnipresent to the extent that it now harbors well over $5 trillion in unfunded (and I would argue unfundable) obligations. Includes SSI…. Social Security’s ugly stepchild.

Medicare/Medicaid, Medicare, was created as a safety net for senior citizens with or without medical insurance, to ease the blow of medical costs in retirement.

It now provides basic medical services, under Medicaid, to include many who have spent a lifetime abusing their bodies with drugs, alcohol and tobacco. Them along with those who spent all their money on tattoos, gambling and body piercing now have Carte Blanche access to almost any procedure the rest of America has been paying insurance for their whole lives.

Medicare/Medicaid has over $34 trillion in unfunded obligations and it is growing at billions per month.

Federal Deficit : The Federal deficit is somewhere north of $14 trillion and now moving at warp speed. With the most recent fiscal year at only 3 months young, and Congress was already out of money and raising the debt ceiling another $1.9 trillion just to keep the lights on. Now in theory this should keep the heat on till the November elections, when either sanity prevails at the polls or (God Help Us all) the Democrats hold congress.

So now we are staring Obamacare right in the face. Two trillion just for starters and everyone knows any estimates by the Congress will be multiplied by 3.

Then it’s Katy bar the door, throw away the cork and fire up the Barby because there’s gonna be the biggest going away party you’ve ever seen

Please Remind Me

“Please remind me again why it’s a crime for us to lie to our elected representatives, but it is not illegal for them to lie to us.”

There has been a lot of chatter lately about the U.S. Constitution. Most of the hubbub is about how we are veering off the path painstakingly prepared for us by some very smart, courageous and patriotic Americans. Americans determined to NOT repeat the mistakes of The Articles of Confederation, other governments or civilizations, all the way back to the Sumerians.

Now I don’t want to give anyone a history lesson here on the Constitution, but rather an idea of what it took to create and execute it.

In May of 1787, after it was determined that the Articles of Confederation wasn’t getting the job done, the Framers gathered in Philadelphia to hammer out, what would arguably be, the finest governing document ever written. It wasn’t until September 1787, four months later, that the Constitution was completed. Later, New Hampshire was the 9th (and necessary) “state” to ratify the Constitution, in June 1788. But it wouldn’t be until March 1789 that the new governance was to go into effect.

So, it took 22 months to draft then adopt our governing system. Folks, we can’t bring a “confessed” murderer to trial in that amount of time, thanks to the laws, lawmakers and lawyers and we have today. And the Framers crafted it with such economy (with small print) you could write the entire Constitution on a tee shirt.

History reveals that the Articles of Confederation was a far more Libertarian system. So in typical legislative fashion, before the ink was dry, on the new Constitution, lawmakers began bastardizing it. Nevertheless, “The Articles” are to our Constitution what a daisy air rifle is to a WMD. However, neither is worth a Tinker’s damn, if our representatives don’t adhere to it.

There is no argument that our Framers created the finest Constitution of any country, in the world, even with 200 years of butchering. No wonder Barack Hussein Obama wants, “to change it”.

Saturday, February 20, 2010

Stack’s Last Stand

It’s only been a day since a Texan flew his Cessna into an IRS office in Austin, and I’m already sick of the story. Sick because it has already been politicized and segmented into sound bites that are virtually unrecognizable from reality.

As the story goes in the MSM, he was angry at the IRS. Well folks, he was --by his own words--mad at a lot of people, including but not limited to George Bush, the Tea Party, Congress (for not passing Obamacare), Republicans, Libertarians and a host of other conservative people and organizations. And not to digress, but who isn’t mad at the IRS?

However, if you click on over to MSNBC or the Left Wing Blogs, you will be hand fed the notion that he was a disgruntled Right Wing Nut, with Tea Party affiliations and a compulsion to destroy Dick Cheney. Unfortunately, the IRS office was closer and easier to hit with a Cherokee.

No, the facts are clearly spelled out in his manifesto. He was an angry, hateful, clearly suicidal victim of the IRS, and more clearly, himself. Not unlike many of us, he was a casualty of an economy NOT necessarily of his own making. But the cold reality is, is that there are tens of thousands out there in the same boat as him, who will at some point consider, if not act, toward an outcome much like his.

People, the road Mr. Stack took was not built on anger or violence. It was his path of despair paved with the absence of hope. It was the concept of hope that kept him clinging to his illusions, long after the rest of us figured out the Ship of State, have abandon it, and are now drifting in our life boats.

Thursday, February 18, 2010

Palin Not Qualified?

Palin Not Qualified
So our latest narrative by Liberals is that, “Sarah Palin just isn’t ready to be president”. I say they are absolutely right.

She isn’t ready to raise taxes or the debt ceiling. She isn’t ready to make a mockery of our war on terror, by trying foreign terrorists in Federal Court, with all rights granted to our citizens. She isn’t ready to funnel hundreds of billions “just” to unions and union dominated jobs. She doesn’t owe trial lawyers, the SEIU, UAW and AFL-CIO anything. She doesn’t owe political hacks, domestic terrorists or mobsters anything.

Her college transcripts, private sector employment, political accomplishments, her love life, her family foibles and clothing choices are all a matter of record (thanks to flaming Liberals and a smoking hot book). In fact, short of her gynecological exams, we know just about everything there is to know about Sarah Palin.

And what we do know certainly disqualifies her to be president. For instance: She wants America to become energy independent by tapping our own vast energy reserves. She wants to lower taxes to spur business development and innovation. She wants to stop the endless, senseless and prohibitive environmental obstructions that thwart initiation, development and expansion of viable businesses. And most of all, she wants to end the abusive influences that comes with the incestuous relationship between big business and big government.

And as the Dumbplumber sees it, Palin wants to return to the Constitution with a smaller “limited” federal government, and more “States Rights” and “Individual Rights”. Now that’s the death knell to any politician today.

Yessir, Palin is definitely not cut out to be a president. She knows there are 50 states (not 57), she knows the difference between corpsman and “corpesman” and she knows that the upcoming Obama “recess” appointments and executive orders will be his test run as the Dictator-in-Chief.

Jumping Ship

With Evan Bayh jumping ship, there isn’t much time for the rest of them. In fact, there’s about another 529 (give or take) that need to go before November. Whoooa. With less than 270 days left, incumbents need to pick up the pace soon. I mean if we don’t see some piggy backing very soon, the “resignations, retirements, moving to the private sector and spending more time with the family” leavings will soon sound more like the Mormon Tabernacle Choir than the well spaced exits being taken by some very savvy politicians. Can we say “Rats leaving a sinking ship”?

On the other hand, getting rid of 535 incumbent lawmakers (complete with pensions and health benefits) is a better deal than leaving them there to finish the job they started, turning us into a 3rd world dictatorship.

Daily Ditties: Miscellaneous Thoughts

So, let me get this straight. Eighty percent of the Stimulus money already spent--which is from 40 to 60% of the $826 billion approved--went to saving government jobs(cops, firemen, office workers, etc.), paying for Medicaid to the states, padding existing programs and basically throwing money around to the usual suspects. If you don’t want your head to explode, don’t read the following:
http://www.propublica.org/special/the-stimulus-plan-a-detailed-list-of-spending

Ah, nothing quite like the smell of burning tax dollars in the morning.
………………………………........................

I don’t usually disagree with Stuart Varney or Fox Business, but this morning was one of those times. Mr. Varney made the statement that over $1trillion is needed, by the states, to fulfill pension promises to retirees.

Well now, ain’t that special. When you say “promises” in the same sentence as “labor negotiations” or the very warm and fuzzy term, “collective bargaining”, you could also refer to Somali pirates as unregistered guests on hijacked cruise ships.

The “promises” go something like this, “If you don’t guarantee my union employees a defined benefit pension plan (where member pension losses due to economic downturns will be made whole by taxpayers), we will call for a strike against you and take your business or government to a grinding halt until our demands are met. Have a nice day.”

So you see (as Mr. Varney does NOT) that “promises” mean different things to different people. Moreover, as luck would have it, these “promises” are usually extracted from either very large companies or public entities, where either taxpayers or stockholders have too much to lose to deny the demands.

Well, we now see what happens when “promises” are made that don’t consider the perfect storm of high unemployment, poor revenues or taxes, a recession and an Administration planting barriers to optimism at every turn.

Saturday, February 13, 2010

I Told You So!

Told You So
Here’s the word of the day that you won’t hear anywhere near Washington, D.C. ,or Sacramento for that matter….“unsustainable“. There, now I’ve said it. The word’s out, no taking it back.

You would probably like to know how I discovered this word. Well, to make a long story short, I heard it from my wife (a financial advisor) about 2 years ago, when she described to me the meaning of, “Defined Benefit Pension Plan”. It was put into the context of the reason why the State of California, her counties and her cities were all going bankrupt. To be more specific, it was about when Vallejo, Ca. was planning bankruptcy.

You see, these “Plans” began when Public Employee Union goons figured out that they could extort criminally exorbitant benefits from negotiators who represented taxpayers in employee “collective bargaining” sessions. (Ah, collective bargaining. Sounds so sweet doesn’t it?)

Collective Bargaining is the moral equivalent of making a condemned man chose between the gas chamber, the electric chair, firing squad or the noose. No matter what, the outcome is the same. Seems that those highly educated, shingle packing, pencil pushing economists missed that day in class when the lesson was about, combining an exploding retirement class, a lowered retirement age, a double dipping employment epidemic and an economic downturn…together.

Yeah, we’re figuring it out now. Right? But we’re figuring it out with a platoon of Harvard lawyers reminding us that these people now have “contracts”. Unbreakable. Unbendable. Never ending. Pay up or get sued!!

Well, Public Employee unions have done something that no other entity has ever done. And they have done it with conviction. They have forced many very intelligent people to consider having the State of California secede from the Union. They are considering it because by statute California cannot go bankrupt, so the only other alternative is to return to a Territory to eliminate these “unsustainable” benefits.

Now that’s a lesson in civics. I told you so, Bruce Ross.

Hatfields and McCoys: Political Environment

I don’t know about the rest of you folks, but all this conversation over political bi-partisanship, civil debate, unimpassioned discourse and constructive discussion is just a bunch of “bull“. I mean since the teams were drawn up during the Bush administration where the Conservatives were on one side and the Liberal loons were on the other, with the rest of us in the middle paying the bills and sucking eggs , we haven’t had a reasonable conversation about anything.

I mean, the train has left the station, the Hatfields are staring down the barrel at the McCoys and Bufford T. Justice just watched the Bandit steal his daughter-in-law to be. So I think that the chances of a constructive dialog between today’s polar political opposites is about as likely as Elvis walking into a Burger King in Butte, Montana and ordering up a Bacon Burger and fries. And here’s why.

Fox News and Conservative Talk Radio is why. For years CNN, MSNBC and the MSM had a field day creating and controlling the narrative. They were feeding us crap sandwiches and we were swallowing them, lock, stock and pimento loaf. Talk Radio has been warning the rest of us of what middle America has known for decades: “We are moving toward Socialism people, Wake up!” However with the entrance of Fox News (the only conservative voice on television) the lines were redrawn. Now American patriots are getting a front row seat on television, a glimpse if you will, of just how they have been manipulated by both ends. So, as the polls show, it isn’t a pretty picture for those on either end now.

Oh, we will continue to be abused by Corporate Pigs and Bureaucratic bagmen for years to come, but now at least their mystical powers of deception will be recognized and rewarded with the failures they deserve. We will at once be the masters of our destiny and the executioners of the purveyors of our fears. The cat’s out of the bag, the fat lady is singing and the curtain has been pulled back on the man at the controls of Oz.

You would think that somebody would be reading the tea leaves, but with moderate Republicans crossing the isle to kiss Harry Reid’s ring, the bloodbath in November is now a sure thing.

Bracelet Bruhaha

This latest observation speaks volumes about the PHS (Palin Hatred Syndrome) From Pajamas TV:

“In the latest manifestation of the long-running phenomenon known as Palin-hatred, several liberal and left sites have excoriated her for wearing what they assumed was a black memorial bracelet meant to commemorate a member of the military killed in action, but bearing the name of her very-much-alive son Track who has served in Iraq.

The venom unleashed was of the usual variety:
[Wearing such a bracelet] demonstrates a horrifying contempt for those who gave their last full measure of devotion or an almost unbelievable ignorance of the importance of symbols in American history.

But it turns out it was actually the Palin-haters who demonstrated the horrifying contempt and the almost unbelievable ignorance — or at the very least, a failure to use Google. In fact, Palin was wearing something known as a Deployed HeroBracelet, meant to honor the service of a loved one who is still living. Palin’s bracelet was not even black but bronze, and was given her as a gift by the makers, who also presented one to Joe Biden in his son’s name.

The author of the original piece about the bracelet, Eric Robinson, at least had the grace to apologize. But not before a torrent of contemptuous hatred had already been displayed in the comments sections of several left-wing blogs.

It is hardly surprising, however, that many of Palin’s detractors jumped at the chance to blast her for the bracelet without even bothering to confirm the basic facts. It was a case of assuming the worst, seeing what they expected to see. They considered the incident to be only one more piece of evidence confirming what they believed they already knew, and what they feel should be self-evident to any thinking person: Sarah Palin is a stupid, lying, child-exploiting, shameless, opportunistic right-wing nut. That there might be a more benign explanation for any of her behavior does not even occur to them, and therefore no further fact-checking would be needed.

This rush to judgment is not the exception but rather the rule when criticizing Sarah. Palin-hatred is as old — and as persistent — as her presence on the national scene (that’s “hatred,” as distinguished from mere disagreement on issues). There have been countless explanations for it. If anything, the phenomenon is over-determined, representing a toxic brew of class warfare, misogyny, envy (much of this coming from women), and elitism.”

I particularly like the part where Joe Biden wears a similar bracelet with his son’s name on it and the Libs don’t say a peep. Now that’s fair and balanced whining!

Hoping for Hope

It has always been the belief of the Dumbplumber that, “You have not lost, until you have lost hope”. Because, if you take away hope, what’s left? Now I don’t want to confuse you with the Hope and Change that der Leader has been spreading like fertilizer in Michelle‘s “miracle” garden. I’m talking about the inner hope of the individual.

Having said that, I honestly believe that hope in our future is sadly lacking with the leadership we have today in Washington, D.C., or for that matter, Sacramento. With them, we just hope they will either do nothing, or just go away.

It’s then not too hard to understand why Sarah Palin is such a draw to so many people. She has stripped away all the beltway B.S. and gotten down to brass tacks: Get government out of our businesses; get government off our doctor’s backs; get government out of our gas tanks, out of our bedrooms, out of our kitchens, out of our cars and out of our bathrooms.

In fact, there’s not a room in your home, your business or even your local brothel or beer hall that doesn’t have the stench of government in it somewhere. No wonder the masses have found a leader in Sarah Palin. She’s the closest thing we’ve had to hope in a very long time. No wonder the Left is scared shitless of her.

For instance, what would we do without someone to regulate, harass and otherwise control such evil enterprises as manicurists, plumbers and hot dog carts? I mean when was the last epidemic of plumbers attacking manicurists with bacon wrapped hot dogs? You didn’t, because government was there to stop them.

Moreover, if the idea of limiting government ever catches on, bureaucrats everywhere will be looking for work. And that’s a concept very chilling to those who have lived at the public trough for generations. And the notion of job applicants whose only qualifications are applying pain, misery and suffering to their “customers” is a very scary concept indeed.

Now that’s Hope and Change we can believe in.

Evolve What?

It really started with a question about wolves, yes wolves. The question was, “If all dogs came from wolves, if left without man’s protection, would all dogs revert back to wolves“?

This train of thought stemmed from thinking about species. You often hear the Lefties wailing about the extinction of species, but seldom hear about all living things “evolving” from ponds of slime.

You heard plenty about the extinction of 95% of all species when the “half mile wide”(not created by man) asteroid slammed into the Caribbean 60 million years ago, but hardly a peep about the millions that survived. So just how did these species survived without man’s intervention? Moreover, where DID all the hundreds of thousands of additional species come from since? Anybody.. Anybody.. Beuler…Beuler?

I really find it hard to believe there are millions of types of pond slime. Creationism aside, I find it more unlikely that hundreds of thousands or millions of species of all living things could possibly come from one accidentally formed, single celled amoeba, zapped by random circumstances, on a warm August afternoon, somewhere near Tanzania. I mean, scientists can’t figure out that sun spots affect climate temperatures, so how in the hell can they explain such diversity of life, over millions of years, all over the planet, with nothing more than natural selection making the decisions. Geesh, I have an easier time believing that Shamwows will replace my paper towels.

Which brings me to the howling from Environmentalists about extinction of existing species. Seems to me Enviro-Nazis ought to explain how allegedly threatened species got here in the first place, before we deconstruct all of humanity accommodating a species whose origins are, themselves, ambiguous at best. Moreover, if Evolutionist are correct, we could remove all living things and just start over with pond slime. (Notice how I didn‘t say lawyer once). Then, in a couple hundred million years, they could start whining again.