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Thoughts at Large

If Obama did things differently...

Recently I was aked "Do you think President Obama can take America to a new level if he and his adminstration gets the job act passed? And the government, Big Brother puts a halt to unnecessary spending, create a new educational system, a go completely green and bridge a gap between the classes if he is elected another term." My answer was simply:

YES

However that new level that is mentioned will be at a level below of the one we are at today. The question should be whether President Obama will improve America by taking the actions below and the answer to that question is NO. Let’s take the points one by one.

The jobs act bill…As touted the only thing that the jobs act bill will do is create an even larger government at all levels and take money out of the private economy to pay for it. The jobs act bill will only create jobs in the public sector by hiring more police, firemen, teachers and the like, employees that depend on the private sectors taxes to pay for it. Make no mistake by believing that a tax on the rich will pay for these jobs. Taxes trickle down to all of us whether we pay them directly or not. If you don’t own your own home you don’t pay property taxes, right?....wrong! You pay it in the form of higher rent. Higher corporate taxes are paid by increased cost of goods that are paid by consumers.

Now if we add a thousands of new police, fire and teachers what do they produce that can be sold at a profit to pay for their salaries? Nothing! I am not saying that they are not necessary I am just saying that they don’t pay their own way, we, the working people will pay their salaries through higher taxes leaving us with less money to buy products. Buying products is the economic engine, not government spending which only reduces the amount you and I have to spend on products that have to be manufactured that produces manufacturing jobs that require associated services that increases the economic base. Can I make it clearer than that? Remember that government cannot give you anything that it hasn’t taken away from you first.
Government stopping unnecessary spending? Impossible! Government has turned into a junkie with spending as its heroin. It can’t stop without fundamental changes in its structure and change of its political character, i.e., by replacing the politicians we now have and imposing term limits. Yes, I know that the founding fathers did not put term limits on Congress but they had not imagined for a moment that it would have warped into the “professional politician” form it has taking today. These are career jobs for most of them and their only concern is getting re-elected. Spending your money is their way of buying votes. They can stand and say I brought you government money to buy that shiny new train, or build that shiny new government building or shiny new bridge and we continue to fall for the claim of “free government money” in the form of grants and subsidies. It is not government money, government has no money! It is money that they take from you as taxes or borrow with the pledge that you will pay back with interest. For example:

a) During fiscal year 2011, the U.S. government spent 3.7 trillion dollars but it only brought in 2.4 trillion dollars
b) The U.S. government spent over 454 billion dollars just on interest on the national debt during fiscal 2011.
c) 1f you divide up the national debt equally among all U.S. taxpayers, each taxpayer would owe approximately $134,685.
d) Mandatory federal spending surpassed total federal revenue for the first time ever in fiscal 2011. That was not supposed to happen until 50 years from now.
e) U.S. households are now actually receiving more money directly from the U.S. government than they are paying to the government in taxes.
f) The U.S. national debt is now more than 5000 times larger than it was when the Federal Reserve was created back in 1913.
Create a new education system? The federal government needs to get out of education. It has no constitutional authority to mandate regulations to the states in regards to education. There is no clause in the Constitution that gives the federal government the power to regulate education and given that no power as such exits then by the constitution itself it reserves those rights to the individual states. Instead of taking tax money from the states, (the people) paying for a bloated bureaucracy and return a little back to the states, let the states keep and use their education money as they see fit for their own people. North Carolina, by the way, has in its constitution that it must provide for the education of its citizens.
Going Green…..What does going green mean? Do you like getting in your car and driving to work, listening to the radio on the way? Do you like sitting in a warm or air conditioned office without having to put a few lumps of coal in a stove to keep warm and having a candle by your desk to be able to see while writing with a pen made of a goose quill that you have to keep dipping in ink? Do you like going home in the evening and flipping on the light after putting your car in the garage using the remote controlled garage door opener? Do you like turning on your oven to cook a dinner with a flip of a switch and taking the ingredients that have been stored safely in the cold refrigerator? If you like all these things then “going green” is not for you. It is impossible and impractical to turn back the technological clock and stop using fossil fuels to generate our electricity, warm our houses, and run our factories.

Nuclear fuel with its associated dangers cannot and will never replace fossil fuels. It won’t power our cars or run our lawn mowers. If we stopped using oil and gas we would choke on wood smoke that we would have to use to cook our food and warm our homes and quite possible strip our forests bare as was done in Haiti to provide cooking fuel. We can’t use cow pies as in India, we don’t have enough cows running free. Wind power works only to a limited degree and only when the wind is blowing. Solar power works only when the sun is shining and for it to be practical the solar panel on our cars would have to be larger than the footprint of the car itself and we would not be able to go anywhere at night. And…how do you manufacture wind turbines and solar panels without the basic ingredients that oil furnishes in the forms of plastics and other materials. With what do you mine for the metals necessary without the machinery required? Picks and shovels? We would all go back to the dark ages where famine and disease would wipe out more than half of the population.
Bridging a gap between the classes? Not on Obama’s watch. As a president he has done more to alienate the classes than any president I know, and I go back to the Eisenhower administration. Boy if that doesn’t show my age! His rhetoric about making the rich “pay their fair share” is as phony as the 3 dollar bill. He cozies up to rich wall street bankers that are financing his campaign while at the same time decries that the rich are not paying a fair share. What is a fair share? A fair share, in my opinion, would be for everybody regardless of income pay the same percentage of their income in taxes. Let everyone, rich and poor alike pay the same percentage in taxes. After all a poor person making $20,000 a year at a 10% rate would pay $2,000 in taxes while a “rich” person making $250,000 a year would pay $25,000 in taxes. Isn’t that fair enough? Why should the “rich” person pay even more? Because he can afford it, because he worked harder for it? Because his business was successful? What if his business failed? Would the government step in and help him out? No, because he wasn’t rich enough or had enough political pull or had not made large enough political contributions to have been put on the governments “most favored” “too big to fail” list.

I saw some talking head on television the other night, an economist that said that 50, 60 or 70% income tax on the rich would not be unreasonable since they have so much money anyway> What a crock. Let’s assume that a person making $500,000 a year ( that’s twice the amount that Obama claims is rich) is subject to a 60% tax rate as this so-called economist claims is fair. Let’s do the math. At a minimum 6% of that $500,000 would be subject to payroll taxes (if the current administration has their way) leaving $470,000. Then let’s take away 60% of the $500,000 for income tax, that leaves $170,000. $500,000 – 30,000 – 300000 = $170,000. Now if I was a small businessman why would I want to grow my business to that level, hire employees with the associated headaches, only to have the government confiscate, yes I said confiscate, my hard earned earnings? Hell, I would be better off making less and collecting welfare payments in the form of earned income credits and the like.
Which Republican candidate would do the most? In my opinion the only candidate in the Republican field that truly stands out is Ron Paul. Do I think he stands a chance against Obama? Probably not. Obama’s too slick and Ron Paul has his age and appearance against him. I think that Newt Gingrich would decimate Obama in a debate but he has too much baggage and the other candidates have offered too much ammunition to the Democrats for them to use against him. Mitt Romney? He has the best chance to get the nomination but I do not see a clear difference between him and the present administration. He has done much in Massachusetts that this administration has done in Washington and Massachusetts is a financial basket case. His business credentials? Another wall street guy that has no real business experience. I’m talking nuts and bolts business experience here, someone that has developed business from the ground up, worked at getting his hands dirty, knows what it takes to manufacture or produce a product, hire and manage employees, know what it is like to meet a payroll and produce and ship a product on time to meet his customers requirements. Not someone that takes over a company, strips it of its assets and sells off the remainder to the highest bidder.
Rick Santorum, Rick Perry, Jon Huntsman just don’t excite me. I can’t see a difference between the three that is truly distinctive but more “me too”. The Republicans had 3 years to develop a viable candidate for president and they failed to do so. They ruined their chances last time by nominating John McCain who didn’t have a snowballs chance against the smooth Obama. So the question is, what am I going to do? Well, in the primaries, I think I will vote for Ron Paul. In past primaries I have voted for Alan Keyes and Steve Forbes, both of which never made it but were the closest in political philosophy to mine. This time I had contributed to Herman Cain’s campaign and there went money down the drain. So as you can see I am not one that can predict the winner, but at least I vote my conscious and my convictions.
In the general election, I don’t know. I know for certain that I will not vote for Obama but whether I vote for the Republican nominee or the Libertarian I have not yet made up my mind. My belief is that we do need to get away from the two party system in the United States. The Democrats and the Republicans have become so entrenched that there is hardly a dimes worth of difference between them. However, I don’t think that the main stream media will allow that to happen. They know that they can twist our way of thinking into supporting candidates of their choice and reporting on third parties will dilute their influence and that is something they are loath to do. After all, John McCain was losing badly as a nominee until the media got behind him. They knew he would lose against Obama and that is just why they started supporting his candidacy.
It is personal responsibility that has faded away from this country and in its political arena that has to come back into play. We have become the nanny state and government wants to interfere in everything you do from what you put into your own body to how you raise and discipline your children. More and more laws are passed that interfere with your personal liberties in the pretense that they are protecting you when in reality they only want more control over you. By offering you more and more they know that you will become more and more dependent on the government for your basic subsistence and then they can control everything about you. Am I being paranoid? I don’t think so. Examples of this are everywhere but we just don’t want to be bothered to see. As long as governments keep building us arenas so we can watch our favorite gladiators fight in our favorite sporting events, who cares. Bread and circuses….isn’t that what the Romans did to keep their citizens appeased? The Roman empire crumbled from within and Rome burned while Nero played his fiddle. Our present politicians are taking theirs out of their cases and rosining their bows.

Afghanistan Today

A recent newspaper article described an attack in Afghanistan on a group of our soldiers. Pinned down by withering enemy fire they called for artillery. The response by our own forces; under new rules we can't do that, we may accidentally hurt a civilian. Helicopters arrived an hour late for support even though they were promised to be only 5 minutes away. Shades of Viet Nam! I remember the same crap going on over there as civilians back home determined how the soldiers at the front could conduct the war. We watched helplessly at times as our troops were being slaughtered but we were not allowed to offer assistance because we may step on "sacred ground".

Enough is enough. If we are not there to win by whatever means necessary then it is time to pull our troops out. You either fight to win, or don't fight at all. If we don't have the conviction to do what is necessary then we deserve to fail and the consequences that will come with our failure. We saw congress join hands and sing shortly after 9/11 and then splinter into a bickering group of schoolchildren. Those are our leaders. A bunch of little children fighting for their own self interests and the chance to be reelected to a do nothing job with great benefits.

Congratulations people, Democrats and Republicans alike, you voted these self-centered ego driven politicians into office and you continue keeping them there buying their lies and promises and giving them your votes. I hope you are happy with what your gullibility has gotten you.

Obama's New Fuel Standards

The new rules would bring new cars and trucks sold in the United States to an average of 35.5 miles per gallon, about 10 mpg more than today's standards. Passenger cars will be required to get 39 mpg, light trucks 30 mpg and costing the consumer about $1300 more to purchase a vehicle that they don't really want. In effect, some soccer moms will have to give up their SUVs. Carpenters will still haul materials around in pickup trucks, but they will cost more. Nearly everybody else will drive smaller cars. Yes, more government meddling in our lives that is supposed to help us but in fact will cost us more money and aggravation. just so the present administration can reshape America into their vision of what America is supposed to be.

This will also reduce consumption of fuel, and I'm all for that, however what happens when people buy less gas. It happened recently during the economic slowdown and with all the layoffs people started driving less. The politicians immediately started whining that gas tax revenues were down and we would have to have alternative sources of revenue, political speak for new taxes. They started considering taxing us on the mileage we drive. They would keep the gas tax in place and additionally tax us on mileage. There goes the rest of any savings.

Let's consider an alternative since the so called goal is to reduce greenhouse gas and reduce our dependence on foreign oil. We have a proven technology, hydrogen fuel cells. What we don't have is the infrastructure to deliver the hydrogen fuel and at present is too expensive for private enterprise to take on. Instead of spending all this stimulus money on non sustainable projects let's spend it on creating the infrastructure required to have readily available hydrogen outlets at existing filling stations. The government could license the stations and receive a portion of the proceeds to pay off the money spent. This would encourage the production of the hydrogen powered vehicles, decrease greenhouse emissions, decrease dependence on foreign oil and create sustainable employment for thousands of people in a new industry, and replace the government revenues that is based on gas taxes. A win-win for everyone. Please explain to me where am I wrong in this scenario. Oh, I know, that would take money away from the pet projects the politicians need to get votes and stay in power....I knew there was a reason this wouldn't work.

Bank of America & Ken Lewis

The Merrill Lynch deal is what did Lewis in. Not that the deal was a good one or a bad one. It was the public perception of the Merrill Lynch bonuses and Ken Lewis not preventing them that fueled the outrage. I am willing to bet that many of the protesters that called for Lewis' firing did not even own any BOA stock. I believe they were organized by activist groups, and Lewis was their current whipping boy.

Having said all of that, I don't believe that a CEO should also be the Chairman of the Board unless he also happens to be a majority stockholder.

However, for those of you that think that Lewis should have just said "NO" when the government asked him to purchase Merrill Lynch, let me inform you that he had no choice. He also had no choice but to take the TARP money. He and other bankers were told that they either do what the government wanted done or the FDIC would proclaim that the bank was undercapitalized. Then, without the ability to raise capital in the private markets because of economic conditions the Fed would have taken over the bank and in turn would have reduced stockholder equity to zero. A complete destruction of BOA, just as what almost happened at Wachovia, and what did happen to many banks across the country.

Be careful about calling for more regulation of the banking system, you just might get what you ask for. It was the regulators that caused much of the financial crises and not the lack of regulation. The mark-to-market regulation is a prime example. In simple terms, if you have an asset that you cannot sell you must mark the value of that asset to zero, even if it is a performing asset, and that affects your capitalization or net worth. For example, you own a rental property that you bought for $100,000 and receive a $1000 a month rent from, but no one wants to buy it due to market conditions. The regulators say since the market value of that property is zero you must reduce the net asset value of your holdings down by $100,000 since there is no market value for it, even though it is a performing asset and you are receiving your rents in a timely basis. This reduces your net assets and may cause you to appear undercapitalized, giving the Fed an excuse to take over all your assets and distribute them to others. Regulation can be a beautiful thing, if your hell bent on socialism.

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On the Bailout

Let's make this bailout fair for everybody....... Nobody gets anything. That is as fair as it can get. That means government won't rack up all this deficit spending, we can eliminate all the grants, ridiculous social services and get back to what government is supposed to do. This way the government wouldn't need all this tax money it is getting from the populous, we could keep it and we would save some and spend some which would stimulate the economy.

The federal government could go back collecting money from where it was supposed to in the first place ...tariffs. This in effect would increase the cost of foreign, i.e., Chinese goods and would provide a level playing field for American industry. Sure, you may have to pay a few dollars more at Walmart, but you would have job and an income to be able to pay a little more. Let's see now, a shirt for $8.00 with no job, or a shirt for $10.00 with a job, which is really cheaper? ...I heard the politicians say that if we gave money to people, which really means if we let them keep some of their money, they would save it, not spend it and wouldn't stimulate the economy. Now that is pure Bull Hockey! If you owe me, the bank, $1,000 and you pay off that $1000, I now have a $1,000 to loan to another person that may need to invest in his business or to make a purchase. So tell me how saving that money is not a stimulus. In today's marketplace, spending only stimulates the Chinese economy not ours since most manufacturing is there.

So, people, keep shopping at Big Box Mart, pay no attention to where the products you are buying are manufactured, and then cry to Obama, "Help me", "Help me", when your job is eliminated.