Word of Mouth by Ryan Ryles

"Lame Duck Congress"-how lame.

2010-12-08T16:57:00.000-05:00

Since the elections a little over a month ago, the term Lame Duck Congress has been used a lot lately. For those who don't know, it's simply a metaphor used to describe a Congress that is seeing a large turnover in membership, making the exiting members not exactly interested in doing their job properly, and more inclined to be a part of the problem instead of being a part of the solution(s). Lame Duck Congresses generally get little, if anything, done and more often than not, they do harm but delaying sometimes much needed and important legislation on their way out...

This term, and the way, and reasoning behind, how these Congress's act bothers me greatly-as it should all Americans. How do you think you would look if, you were given a 60 day notice of termination of your job, and you decided that, since you were getting fired anyway, you weren't going to even try to do your job for that last 2 months? Worse yet-what if you decided you were going to deliberately get in the way of others trying to do their jobs? Not only would you most likely be fired out right, and immediately, but you would (and should) have a snowballs chance in hell of finding employment relatively soon after. I mean, who wants to hire an employee that is going to bail on them as soon as the proverbial chips are down, and make the situation worse by doing your best to make everyone still working there, have as much difficulty as possible? But this is exactly how our elected officials act, and think, when in the situation of not being reelected to another term in office-they simply don't care, and, instead of being adults about it, they go a step further and deliberately try to impede, or kill, all legislation which they are working on in the last 2 to 3 months of their last term. Not only is it bad, and childish, politics, but it sends a message to the nation as a whole which gives the general population the sense of entitlement that they can act the same way when in similar situations-instead of trying, and persevering, they just give up because "politicians are allowed to do it, why can't I?".
To me, this is the not only the reason, but the substance, behind how the entitlement class grew to the proportions it has over the last 40 years.
Members of a "Lame Duck" Congress need to grow the hell up. They need to do their freaking jobs to the bitter end, and do them well, and justly-as the people who originally elected them to office expect. If they don't, then they deserve every bit of anger and loath the citizens of our country (and especially those who first voted for them) can dish out on them.
And the excuse of "since I'm leaving, my say doesn't really matter anymore-especially since whatever I approve of now can all be changed by those coming in" never has, and never will, fly with me. That is a cowards, and poor mans, way of thinking; and it can be directly attributed to the current state of our nations culture and economic situation...

I digress...The whole thought disgusts me to no end. In my opinion, the only thing lame about a "Lame Duck" Congress are the actions of those exiting members who, by their actions, show just how pathetically lame they are.

The "Tea Party effect"

2010-11-29T11:38:00.000-05:00

(The combination of a busy month, along with some writers fatigue (not to be confused with writers block), lead me to take a month away from posting on my politics/philosophy blog)...

Was anyone really surprised by the election results earlier this month? I know I wasn't, and all of my friends who I had warned that this would happen, came around to apologize to me afterwards for thinking I was off my rocker that the Tea Party could have the impact which they had.
I make secret about my differences with the Tea Party: I side with their general position on the Constitution, and their economic ideologies, but I take great issue with their insistence on bringing religion-specifically Christianity-into every one of their positions, and as the basis for many of their arguments. But, like the Tea Party or not, you have to respect them for the much needed change which they are bringing to the political climate here in America. Whether it is a change that will be beneficial to our country is yet to be seen, but it is a change which we needed decades ago-that of the people dictating to Congress, and not the other way around...

The truth of the matter is that state and nationally elected leaders had grown corrupt, complacent and entitled to their positions. Many had become what the founding fathers of our Constitution warned us against-Aristocrats. They ran on their name recognition alone, and nothing more. They presented no real ideas for fixing the plethora of problems our nation faces, while lining their pockets with special interest dollars. In sum, they were the problem.
This months elections proved that the Tea Party had struck a cord-particularly among registered independents; and even though Democrats managed to get most of their entitlement class out to vote, they were not match for the masses of Independent voters who agreed with the Tea Party in that the problem with national politics was the career politicians who obviously had no ones interests at heart, except their own. Fortunately, for all of us, the effect of the Tea Party carried only so far as to cause wholesale changes in the House of Representatives-where we saw the greatest turn over in representation since the Great Depression. It is in the House where most of the problems with our national politics reside, and it was in the House where the Independent voters had the greatest impact-knocking out nearly every incumbent seeking reelection (too bad Nancy Pelosi couldn't have been sent packing, but you can't win them all). Had the Tea Party effect carried into the Senate, I would have some serious reasons to be just as concerned about the direction our country was heading into, as I do now about the direction is it already heading down. Luckily, the Independent voters got it right, and, for the most part, only made wholesale changes to that branch of our national legislature which is meant to represent us-the people...

My only hope is that the Tea Party doesn't let this success go to their heads.
I hope they keep their grass roots status and pay homage to those which they owe their recent electoral success too-the Independents. I hope that they stick to their guns, so to speak (no pun intended), and stay on those whom they helped elect to stay true to their campaign words of adhering to the will of the people.
I also hope that they are willing to drop their religious positions in their politics. If they are willing to do these 3 things, then the Tea Party is, in my opinion, exactly the force of will and passion our nation needs right now to turn our country around.

A letter to Americans

2010-10-31T14:12:00.000-04:00

As we prepare to vote in the coming week all across our nation, I would like all Americans to consider what it is that makes us all "American": It is not bipartisanship. It is not Democrats vs. Republicans, or Liberals vs. Conservates. It not entitlements or governmental control and influence in every part of our lives.
It is individuality and peronsal liberty from governmental involvement in every aspect of our lives; the strength of the human spirit to persevere; and the desire to earn a modest to luxurious living through hard work, and the dedication and determination it takes to succeed. These are the qualities which define America, and they are the qualities we should all look for, when possible, as we choose this next wave of people to represent us all in Congress...

It is time for us to take our country back-back from the corruption in corporate America, and, especially, back from the corruption and ignorance that plague our national and state governments.
For too many decades, too many of us have sat idly by, choosing not to participate in society other than by simply getting up and working every day: these people haven't voted, they haven't taken an active role in the raising of their kids, they haven't even taken an active role in their own lives except to survive until the next day-caring not one bit about what the day will look like so long as their own self destructive needs are met. It is too these people-the ones who believe that they can have no effect on "politics" and society in America.
It is to you, this "silent majority", who I am reaching out too.
Vote.
Express your opinion.
Let our current Congress people, and the newly elected ones, know that you will no longer stand idly by. That you will be heard. That you will be respected. And that you will no longer be trodden on and/or ignored because a select group of special interest groups, lobbyists and corporate interests are subverting your liberty via their influence over our elected leaders.
This is not a call for rebellion or separation, it is a call for you to take your respect and your liberty back as Individuals and members of our national and local societies by your choice.
It is time you are heard. Your country, and your fellow citizens, need you to speak, or else there may not be anything left for us to stand up, and speak for.
RR

A Letter to Liberals

2010-10-20T12:12:00.001-04:00

There was a time in my life when I considered myself one of you-a "liberal", but it didn't take me long to realize just how anti liberal modern liberals really are.
As I...matured...I grew to understand your particular ideology more, and realized that, as a whole, Liberals really have no clue what being a Liberal-by political definition-actually means. Personal liberty and responsibility, individuality, independence, small government, the freedom to keep what you earn, all these things mean nothing to you. Liberalism, to you, means nothing more than standing opposite of Conservatives...
Conservatives believe in the 2nd amendment, but you believe that guns, not people, kill people; therefore the 2nd amendment is outdated and needs replacement or a massive alteration...
Conservatives believe in less taxes, but you see all Conservatives as being the top 10% of all income earners in our country; therefore, you see cutting taxes as only being for those that would affect the "evil rich"...
Conservatives, due to their religion, do not believe that homosexuality should be treated equality by all laws; Liberals, believe it should be, but, instead of supporting the rights of each state to determine such things-as the Constitution designs-you would have the Federal Government force the nation to allow something which many people morally and ethically oppose...
Conservatives believe in earning financial equality through hard work, and creating an economic system which allows for that; Liberals believe that everyone is entitled to financial equality...
Conservatives believe that a greater, intangible, power known as "God" has ultimate control over everything; Liberals believe that the more tangible power of "Government" should control everything...
As a group, you propose no economic solutions to our nations problems that do not include the Federal Government as the primary solution; you propose no solutions to our cultural and societal problems which do not include Federal legislation; and you propose no solutions to our growing welfare and national debt problems, than to have the Fed print more money to throw at them...
Even worse, about your ideology today, is that the lack of National pride and cultural identity America has today can be directly attributed to you. Over the years you have demonized American culture and having pride in our nation by focusing on the flaws of our past and making Capitalism out to be a engine of greed which only a few are able to take advantage of, at the expense of others.
The only thing which can be loosely considered "liberal" about your ideological beliefs are the positions you take regarding issues like the environment, animal rights, and issues of equality in society-positions which most would support you on if you weren't so willing to toss logic aside and go to such idiotic extremes that you take unrealistic positions which you expect to hold everyone too expect your leaders.

You, just like Conservatives, fail to understand human nature at its core. You fail to understand that human nature is firstly the individual, and secondly the member of society. You see people as just the opposite: humans are firstly members of a society-one mandated and controlled by government; and secondly, that society allows us to be individuals-but only under terms which that society says are acceptable.
That time when I considered myself a member of your ideology is, of course, now long behind me-it is nothing of it used to be, and nothing of what I thought it would be-an ideology that would back and support my individuality; protect me from "big brother"; and support me in my pursuit of financial and personal liberty.
No, I see your ideology for what it truly is, which is little more than Socialism-an ideology which is a known destructor of, not just the individual, but societies as well.

A Letter to Conservatives

2010-10-20T12:11:00.000-04:00

It may be arrogant of me to say the things I'm about too, but someone has too-someone has to be willing to point out your flaws...
You see, there are many people just like me who would support you, who would be on your side, but you just can't give up the religious rhetoric, can you? Why can't you state your positions without always having to bring "God" into the picture? Why, when you refer to America, and "American" ideals, does it always have to be "God and country", or the "Christian American" ideals? Are you even aware that such talk is completely hypocritical to the positions you hold regarding our economy and the Constitution? And that it parallels you in not so subtle ways to the theocratic dictatorships which dominate the political structures of the countries which are our sworn enemies?...

This is what I mean: you support the Constitution-as it is. This is a position which, easily, the vast majority of Americans would support if not for your apparent disregard for the 1st amendment. You know that amendment, don't you? You know, the one that guarantees a separation of church and state? This is important because, based on your religious rhetoric, you would have it otherwise. Based on the things your ideology says, and the basis for the moral positions you believe all Americans should have, if you had your way, Christianity, and its bible, would be the basis for all legislative policy at the national level. Not only is this contradictory to the Constitution, but it also contradictory to your position on the economy.
You believe in as few regulatory controls over our economy as possible-another position which the majority of Americans would support. The problem is that Capitalism is the greatest vehicle ever created, by which people can achieve the most personal liberty possible. This includes exercising personal choices, like lifestyles relating to sexual orientation and other religious belief systems-both of which you don't approve of because of your religious views.
Even worse, you don't stand out against the more radical of your believers, in most cases, you choose silence. You refuse to comment, or properly disassociate yourself from the religious fanatics of your belief system that would bomb abortion clinics, label gays and lesbians as something other than human beings, or would otherwise threaten physical force on those who aren't "in line" with your religious beliefs.

Don't you understand that, just as you believe that the federal government has no right to tell you how to live your life; has no right to dictate how much of your income you should have to give in taxes; has no right attempting to legislate every aspect of American society and culture; that you don't have the right to tell anyone what to believe or how to believe in what they do, just because you disagree?
What of the greatest things about America is that we actually have the right to agree to disagree. In fact, part of your ideology supports that position-except when it comes to your religious views, views which you, for some inhumane reason, believe should be the basis for all legislation in our nation.
In no way am I implying that you should not have the right to exercise your religious beliefs, but I will stand against you attempting to force those beliefs on those who would disagree, at the point of a political, and legislative, gun.
You claim to be for the Constitution, and to be supporters of Capitalism-2 aspects of American culture which promote individuality and independence, and yet your religious beliefs make you appear otherwise. Your religious beliefs cloud your judgment and breed their own form of individuality crushing collectivism. If you can only see that you must separate your personal beliefs, from the legislative guidelines proper for our Federal Government, just as the Constitution is built to do-limit the reach and power of our National Government-you would find many more Americans calling themselves "conservative", as opposed to standing by and shaking their heads at you in disbelief and disgust over your obvious hypocrisy...

You, just like Liberals, fail to understand human nature at its core. You fail to understand that human nature is firstly the individual, and secondly the member of society. You see people as just the opposite: humans are firstly members of your society-a society based on religious principles; and secondly, that society allows us to be individuals-but only under conditions that your society says is acceptable.
Stop dragging your religion and morality into every issue, and stop letting Liberals drag you down to their level of ignorance and they will be easily exposed, and you will have much greater support from Americans than you do now.

Nauseating campaign ads

2010-10-13T18:17:00.000-04:00

Is it me, or are the campaign ads for those running for public office not just ridiculous and nauseating, but full of meaningless attacks on the person running against the person whose campaign paid for the ad?
At their core, all the ads are the same-they are personal attacks on an oppenent, based on actions they took in the past, or on ideological positions they hold-regardless of who the ad is targeting, there really isn't a difference; and all that these ads do is highlight the fact that has helped to create a silent majority within our country: that those who aspire to run for public office, or those already holding that public office, are, in some way, corrupt, corrupted or corruptable.
In the end all these ads do is turn off the majority of people from voting, and tell us nothing about the candidate who paid for the ad....

Wouldn't it be nice if one day, we all woke up to find that these ads disappeared, to be replaced by ads stating the positions the candidats held on the most important issues of the time?
Wouldn't it be nice if the people who ran for public office actually held the capacity to directly answer a question when in a debate?...

In physics, it can be mathematicaly proved that anything is possible...I can only hope that that includes politics and politicians, because then, maybe, we have some hope.

American political ideologies-Conclusion: finding common ground.

2010-10-09T20:41:00.000-04:00

For the most of the last 20 years, ever since my passion for such things was born, I began silently keeping track of what the typical, average American wants in an elected official at the Federal level. I began doing this during the Bush/Clinton/Perot Presidential race in 1992 after reading a poll a few weeks before the election showing Bush as the leader. This poll made no sense to me given that the vast majority of people I knew-regardless of age-were going to vote for Perot. Granted, I only had a relatively small sample of people to go on, but it was a pretty diverse sample and amongst that sample 2/3 of the people were planning on voting for Perot. This disparity, between what the media said and the truth about the world around me, motivated me to find out for myself, at election times, who, and what, people really supported. Over the years, this has evolved into a general understanding of what it is that most Americans expect, and want, in their nationally elected leaders...

Given the convoluted, and diluted, political ideologies in America, where is the middle ground? Where are the things that all, or a clear majority, of Americans can agree on? Not too long ago, these questions had answers, but I'm not so sure anymore.
Commonalities as a culture and society must start in the home and our educational institutions, today both of these institutions are ethically bankrupt: the family unit has disintegrated due to a high divorce rate and the improper use of liberality in the home, and America's primary educational institutions have, over the decades, taken away the focus on what makes all Americans, Americans, and what it took to make our form of government the best the planet.
America's primary educational institutions are divided into so-called "public" and "private" schools. Public schools are union run, and, though it varies some by state, the union dictation of our educational system has lead to it being more about job protection, than educating our youth. The private school system in America is primarily theologically based and, on the surface, caters to what the general public considers "the elite class". Neither of these educational institutions have American history and culture as a core theme throughout their curriculum; true, they teach American history, but it is a diluted history of simple facts and focuses on the wars and military actions of our nation, as opposed to the cultural upheavals, technological advancements and great thinkers and inventors that made our country the greatest in the world for most of the 19th and 20th centuries.
The family unit issues in America are a topic to be addressed separately, but with so much distress and dysfunction in the home, how can we expect any reinforcement at home of the principles which make up the fabric of American culture, much less a solid, humanly based moral and ethical code?
The bottom line is that modern Americans lack any sense of national pride, we lack any attachment to our "roots", much less to each other through the cultural ties which bound us all during the formation and growth of our country. We have forgotten what it means to be American. Between modern liberals (socialists) interpreting the Constitution to fit their own needs, Conservatives (Theocrats) attempting to force their own theologically based morality on the country, and the majority of Americans sitting on the sidelines, unwilling to participate in their own future while complaining about it, is it any surprise that America is so divided that we cannot even unite long enough to find a solution to any problem facing us today?
As a nation, we have to get back to the basics of the Constitution-the Constitution, and the rights that it guarantees us, are the back bone of American culture and society, and we have gotten away from it.
We have to stop letting modern liberals and conservatives try to force their interpretations, of how things should be run in our country, on us. We must all remember, every election cycle, that they serve the people, not themselves, and that it is to us-the people who make up the United States of America-whom they are responsible too.
The middle ground for all Americans, hasn't been lost-it has simply been buried in the illogical bureaucracy created and supported by the extreme fringes of the ideological left and right, and the greed of a select few who consciously take advantage of Capitalism at the expense of our society because most of us fail to actively participate in it by simply voting every chance we get. That middle ground is in our Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and in the free market principles that our particular form of Capitalism gives all Americans-principles which give all in America the opportunity to succeed through hard work, dedication and determination. All we have to do to bring that middle ground back into the forefront of our state and national legislative practices, is for Americans to get involved and care again: care about ourselves, our country and community, and the future that we are leaving for the generations after us...

Twenty years worth of research has lead me to these conclusions about the American people as it concerns the ideology they would like to see represented at the Federal level: adhering to the Constitution (though many don't fully understand it, they still support it) and the Bill of Rights as they are written; social liberality-meaning the Federal Government has no role in legislating issues of personal choice (i.e. homosexual marriage, right to die, drug laws, health care standards, religious and moral preferences, etc...); and simple common sense and simplicity in our laws. This, by asking 1000's of people throughout my life, is what I have learned that most Americans ideologically support, but this will never be reflected by those we elect so long as a majority of us continue to sit idly by, and not take an active role in the formation of the laws of our nation, by voting for those who are supposed to represent us when creating them.

Rubio, Christ and Meeks-let the war for the Florida Senate seat begin.

2010-10-06T20:21:00.000-04:00

Citizens of Florida got to witness a debate tonight between the 3 candidates running to represent our state in the Senate, and as is the norm for such debates, we saw a lot of fluff and no substance-from any of the candidates.
What we witnessed in this debate was a battle of 3 entrenched politicians-one of which is supported by a group who is vociferously against the status quo politician in this country. To be fair to Mr. Rubio, he spoke a very good game and obviously did his homework, but all he could honestly do was partake in the game of one upmanship displayed by all 3 parties during this debate. From 2 of the 3, we constantly heard about how broken D.C. is and how it needs to be fixed but; and as usual, we heard not one solution-viable or otherwise-from either of them.
Of the 3, Meeks obviously stands for nothing but the status quo-between his ignorant support of "Obamacare" and his insistence the he stands for the "working man"-a person he seemed incapable of actually defining, it was obvious that his only real position is that of an"anti conservative" and basher of the elite...Of the 3, he is the most obvious "politician" of the 3, and, in my view, definitely represents most of what is wrong with politics in Washington today.
Rubio, the Tea Party poster boy, spoke well, but supports positions which are anti individual-positions which are blatantly hypocritical to his general position on the Constitution. He gets credit for understanding economic theory and why the current tax cuts placed into law by Bush work(ed), but he failed to do little else but place personal attacks on his main rival, Charlie Crist, throughout much of the debate. Rubio, in my opinion, failed to prove any of his positions beyond a reasonable doubt and failed to prove (to me) that he would do what was in the best interests of the state of Florida.
Crist, the "npa" candidate who left the Republican party due to ideological differences, was the only one, at any time, who provided any actual solutions to any question at all. It was only one time-when speaking about how to shore up Social Security-and I disagreed with his answer, but he at least provided something of an idea to one of the problems facing our society today. Placed between such extremes, all Crist really had to do to win this debate running away, was avoid falling into the typical bickering that happens during all such debates-something he either couldn't, or refused, to do...

Personally, I saw nothing out of these 3 candidates, in this format, which gives me any hope that any of them could do the job of a Senator properly. But, if I had to grade the 3 on a pass/fail system, only one would pass-Crist.
Why? Because the position of Senator has nothing to do with the people of this country. The position of Senator has to do with the states, and states rights, in our country. 97 years ago, the 17th amendment went a long way to stripping the individual states of our country of their states rights-which is one of the primary reasons why our national political scene is in the mess it is today; and throughout this debate, the moderators continuously made the mistake of asking these men questions which had nothing to do with states rights. They continuously asked questions trying to pull at the heart strings of people and all 3 continuously fell into the trap-showing that they really have no clue what the position they are essentially applying for is supposed to represent...I digress; Crist wins because, of the 3, as a (soon to be former?) governor he is the only one truly capable of understanding what "states rights" really means-whether he was given a chance to show that in this debate or not...

Before this debate, I was certain of who I was going to vote for to represent Florida in the Senate, after this debacle, I'm not so sure anymore. I did, however, learn one thing from this debate that my more conservative friends won't like seeing me say: when you get down to it, Rubio really isn't any better than Meeks. The only difference between the 2 is that, too Meeks, the Federal Government is a God capable of solving all our nations problems; and to Rubio, God is an intangible entity defined by the religion of his choice, and should lead our government in the direction of solving all our nations problems. Both of these ideologies become anti individual when "push comes to shove", and therefore I cannot support either of them...

American political ideologies part 5: the melting pot boiling over

2010-10-04T14:49:00.001-04:00

Of all of the political and social ideologies in America today, the 2 we hear most about are Liberalism and Conservatism. Though these 2 ideologies, in their modern form, represent, at most, 30% of our populace, there is little question that they are responsible for the direction of all legislative policy at the Federal and state levels in our country. Worse, is that this 30% is comprised of the most wealthy of our country, and therefore stand the most to gain, or lose, within any legislation.
The direction that this segment of our society tends to lead us in is as extreme a direction-on either side of the political spectrum-as it is representative of our society: whether it be the utilization of our military for "police actions" in a distant foreign nation, or the financial bail out of corporations deemed "to big to fail", our Federal and state legislative bodies have increasing written, and passed, legislation within the last decade that is disagreed with by a majority of the general public-whether they are registered voters or not. This direction is a direct result of all the aforementioned political ideologies colluding together to create chaos within our society, and providing corporate entities and special interests the "perfect storm" through which they can dictate legislative policy at the Federal and state levels: With a majority of Americans sitting on the side lines of each election cycle and the majority of those who actually participate not being associated with any strong central leadership or ideology; and Liberals and Conservatives now in control of their respective political parties, Corporations and special interest groups, lead by their lobbying arms, have taken control of our Federal and state legislative bodies with nothing more than money and the threat of pulling their support of one candidate or another.

The result is something that is obvious to most social and political observers: the American body politic boiling over with anger at career politicians who are chipping away at personal freedoms and their wallets; who are catering to corporate demands; and who are embarrassing our nation internationally as they rapidly spend America into bankruptcy while making themselves rich at the expense of the general public.
It has taken 30 or so years, but this anger has finally manifested itself into at least one popular movement-the Tea Party.

The Tea Party is widely considered a Conservative movement due to it being created and based around Conservatives who had had enough of their fellow Republicans spending habits, support of big government, and coziness with corporate special interests in D.C. Despite their obvious theological undertones, it is unfair to call the movement "conservative"-given what they support.
Conservative, at least in part, would imply some sense of preserving the status quo, which would be maintaining the system as it is being used today-with massive corporate influence and corruption at the Federal and state level. This, however, is not what the Tea Party wants: they want change, and not the socialistic change that Barack Obama has brought to the White House, and Congress, since his election. The change they want is one back to the original Constitutional principles-principles which create a small Federal government beholden to the general public. They want career politicians out of the office; they spending at the Federal level curbed dramatically; and, unfortunately, they want their religion, that of Christianity, to be the lead of all social ideals-legislatively and ethically. These beliefs could be considered more radical (and theocratic) than they are conservative, given the distance that current Federal legislative policy has strayed from the Constitutional principles our nation is supposed to be based on.
Outside of the obvious theological flaw, the Tea Party suffers from one other weakness: competition. There is none.
Since their creation a little over 2 years ago, the Tea Party has gained, and been hurt by, a lack of any counter movement against them. People have tried to rally support for a counter movement to the Tea Party, but the reality is that, to the vast majority of Americans, the Tea Party is right on many points. The only thing preventing the Tea Party from being a run away train, capable of taking back national politics for all Americans, is their insistence on believing that they are right, not because of their logic, but because of their faith, as well as their desire to make their faith the basis for all domestic social policy in America. (This contradicts their general position on the Constitution-which promotes a distinct separation of church and state. This contradiction, or hypocrisy as some would say, is obvious to many and turns them off to the movement).

Despite the Tea Party's current popularity, the bulk of Americans remain restless and angry. Seeing no eminent change in legislative ideology on the horizon, and viewing the Tea Party as little more than a band of rich elitists trying to take control of the the Federal Government away from Liberals for their own interests, to them, their vote either "still doesn't count", or remains "the lesser of 2 evils". This anger is still building, and with no outlet, and the political establishment not willing to listen or change for the better, it is destined to implode our society: America, the once great "melting pot", is boiling over...

Parents insuring their kids till they are 26? A bad message to send.

2010-09-28T14:01:00.000-04:00

Last week, the first aspects of Obamacare went into effect. Most of America, including myself, is dreading the day, a couple years from now, when the bulk of the bill actually goes into affect (assuming it passes the Constitutionality test it faces in the Supreme Court), but the "patients bill of rights", as it is called, aspect of the legislation, which is what went into effect last Thursday, is the only part of the legislation I actually liked-except for children being allowed to stay on their parents health insurance until the age of 26...

I am a Gen X'er, and, as I was taught, one of the early steps that I had to take in becoming an adult, was in getting a job which provided me with my own health insurance. It was at this point that "mommy and daddy" no longer had to "take care of me" and that I could not only provide money for myself, but was self sufficient enough that I could also provide for my own health when needed. What concerns me is the message we are sending to our future generations by saying they don't have to worry about health insurance until well into adulthood.
Becoming an adult is all about personal responsibility and achieving independence, and a big part of that is being able to provide for your own health. Human nature tends towards laziness (unless nurtured otherwise at an early age); by giving the option to not need health insurance until 26 years of age, we are nurturing that part of humanity that is detrimental to a healthy, vibrant and successful society; and, in a small way, we are telling children that adulthood can wait. This in turn could breed a much broader lack of responsibility regarding personal choices like drug use, sex, and money management.
It may also cause social conflict within children once they reach the age of 18-when law considers them an adult: we have seen for decades the conflict that 18-20 year olds have when they consider they are old enough to vote and die for our country in combat, but not old enough to enjoy a beer and burger with their friends and family. What are they to think about their place in life when all need to be independent at the "legal" age of being an adult is removed? Are we to expect them to be ready for the responsibility of raising a family, owning and taking care of a home, and managing a household and career, when all the little steps at being prepared for such things are removed or pushed later and later into adulthood?...

We can hope that this legislation, 20 years from now, will not lead to such social and personal strife and inevitable economic stresses; then again, we were told in the mid 20th century that Welfare wouldn't produce an entire segment of society dependent on government hand outs for their existence.

American political ideologies Part 4: Democrats, Republicans and Libertarians.

2010-09-27T12:18:00.001-04:00

Today, the core ideologies which were once the basis for the Democrat and Republican parties, have been high jacked by Liberalism and Conservatism, respectively. This high jacking of ideologies which nearly all Americans could identify with, has lead them to be forced into taking back seats to Liberalism and Conservatism. They still exist, but only as shadows of their former selves....

It may surprise many to learn that the Democrat and Republican parties were both born of the Anti Federalist party, which lasted into the first quarter of the 19th century. Essentially, the Anti Federalists were those who opposed the Constitution on the grounds that it would create an Aristocracy within the national legislature (particularly in the Senate), which would shut out state and individual rights, eventually leading to a large, corrupt and tyrannical central government comprised of an elite class of businessmen and industrialists-something not very far from where our national government is today.
Of greater irony, is what the Democratic party used to stand for: states rights, following the Constitution to the letter (after it was amended in 1791 with the Bill of Rights, many of the fears the Anti Federalists had concerning the original document were laid to rest), and they opposed a national-or central-bank to go along with their dislike and distrust of the wealthy.
Compare their original beliefs and policies to what they are today, and the only similarity is their apparent dislike of the wealthy: controlled by the Liberal extremists of their party, Democrats have all but given away states rights and attempt to subvert the Constitution and the Bill of Rights every chance they get, by loosely interpreting the Constitution through the "necessary and proper" clause as decided in Maryland vs. McCullough in the early 19th century...

The Republican Party was formed in the mid 19th century, just prior to the outbreak of the Civil War. Formed of Anti Slavery activists and disenchanted members of the Whig Party, the core ideals mirrored those of the Democrats: a support of states rights and a strict following of the Constitution. It strayed from the Democrats at the issues of a central bank, favoring the wealthy in legislation, and, the obvious, anti slavery position they held.
Like the Democrats, the Republicans have strayed far from their original beliefs due to its so called 'conservative base': giving up on states rights and attempting to interpret the Constitution along its theological doctrine, despite the Constitution being explicit about a separation of church and state...

Unlike today, where most of the electorate see their presidential and congressional choices as a decision between "the lesser of 2 evils", the Democratic and Republican parties had real legislative ideological platforms to stand on. Historically, politics and politicians have always come at a price to society relative to how they are viewed by the general populace, but for most of our first 150 years of existence, neither party, or the ideologies they were born of, would consider taking national positions on obvious social issues-issues our Constitution clearly and distinctly leaves to the States to legislate; but over the last 75 years, both parties have allowed themselves to be taken over by the fringes of their ideologies-Liberals and Conservatives-which have progressively screamed louder that it is, in fact, the job of the Federal Government to legislate social policy and limit the personal decisions which individuals have a right to make; they have allowed them to dictate the direction of their respective parties ideologies-directions which have on constitutional grounds, despite what the average American may think.
As a result of this high-jacking of their political platforms by Liberals and Conservatives, the main stream Democratic and Republican political ideologies-those which represented the vast majority of Americans and dominated our political landscape for generations-are all but dead in America, not because of societal or ideological evolution, but, more seemingly, out of the desire for power over the people, at the expense of the people.
Today, the Democratic and Republican parties survive in name only-mere shadows of themselves, with neither being truly representative of the principles which they were originally founded on, and neither truly having the best interests of our nation, or our people, at heart...

American political ideologies part 3: Independents, Moderates, and the Silent Majority

2010-09-22T10:00:00.000-04:00

Independents, Moderates and the (so called) Silent Majority all share a similar attitude towards politics, and politicians, in general: all view the political establishment as being corrupt and not to be trusted. All 3 also share many of the same basic ideologies, relative to the legislation that the Federal and State levels of government should be involved in. Their primary differences lie in their actions, and not in their beliefs...

When you get down to it, there is not much difference between a Moderate and Independent, but just 25 years ago, so called "independents" didn't exist in America as a political ideology. That all changed in the presidential election of 1992 when billionaire businessman Ross Perot decided to run for president with no party affiliation. Needing to get on the ballot of every state in the union, the "Independent" party quickly formed around Perot. But, possessing no real political agenda, or platform, other than an anti establishment attitude, the "party" has never been able to gain any real political power despite it being representative of the vast majority of Americans beliefs and political attitudes.

Independents and Moderates tend to believe in a persons right to choice on all issue's; they prefer the small central government that the founding fathers intended by the creation of our Constitution; the strict following of our Bill of Rights-particularly that of the separation of church and state (the primary reason why most stay away from joining the Republican party); and in their right to keep what they are capable of earning. Because this ideology represents aspects of Liberalism and Conservatism the term "Moderate" is applied to this ideology, as it is seen as an attempt to moderate and pacify both sides of the political spectrum. The term seems to strike a cord of weakness with the post Vietnam generations, which is what allowed for the term "Independent" to be coined in the early 90's-a term which implies the strength of a person to stand on their own, with their own beliefs and to make their own, sometimes educated, decision's regarding issues that affect the greater society around us. It seems that the primary difference between Moderates and Independents is that Independents lack any central platform or unity-each takes pride in their "independence" on issues, where as Moderates are willing to adopt some form of a combination of the current platforms of Democrats and Republicans, as a basis for their political decision making.

For Independents, the lack of unity results in them having little, to any, influence in the actual process of legislation because so few people who run as Independents are able to make it to a State or National office. For Moderates, the indecisiveness leads to the perception of being "wishy washy" on the various social issues that take precedence during any given campaign cycle, making them look weak to those who would otherwise see their general platform as being logical...

The Silent Majority refers to that segment of Americans which do not exercise their right to vote. Generally speaking, it is a rarity when more than 50% of eligible Americans turn out to vote in any Presidential election year-hence the term "silent" majority. (Even in years where more than half of Americans turn out to vote, once that number is divided between the 2 political parties and Independents, by percentages, those who didn't vote outnumber those who did when taken as a group). With almost always more than half of Americans not turning out to vote, and thereby expressing their opinions on matters of public interest, elected officials can easily ignore the wishes of almost half of our country. This in turn allows for the mass corruption that appears rampant in all levels of public office.

By and large, the Silent Majority have many of the same beliefs as Moderates and Independents do, the difference is that they have been disenfranchised by the "establishment": they believe their vote doesn't count and that they are powerless to effect any change to a governmental system which they feel is not truly representative of them, due, in large part, to the influence of corporate America and special interest groups-which they see as possessing all the political power and influence in America (at the same time, many of these people are the very same who scream the loudest, and quickest to blame politicians for their financial troubles-a hypocrisy which rivals those of Liberals and Conservatives). Unfortunately, the politicians in power all over our country have done little, if anything at all, to help alleviate the feelings of the Silent Majority: between the voting scandals of both of George W Bush's elections, the obvious corruption of Congress by foreign and domestic corporations, and a seating president whose citizenship has yet to be properly validated, the Silent Majority have more reasons than ever to stay "silent".

The primary difference between the Silent Majority and Moderates/Independents seems to be education: most of the silent majority have no formal education outside of high school, where as Independents and Moderates possess some type of education beyond that of a high school diploma, whether it be some collegiate level courses, or the completion of trade schooling of some kind. This apparent difference points to the importance of being further educated after the completion high school: as citizens of any society, one of the most important things we all do, relative to each other, is our cumulative participation in electing those public officials who will legislate our society...

American political ideologies part 2: Conservativism and the Tea Party

2010-09-18T11:00:00.000-04:00

As with modern Liberalism, Conservatism in America also suffers from an identity crisis of sorts. In short, to conserve something means to preserve what exists or what used to exist. Certain aspects of American Conservatism fit this simple definition, others, however, do not, and can be said to be just as radical-if not more so-than those of modern liberalism...

As near as can be deciphered, what Americans call Conservatism today was born during the early Vietnam war era as a counter to the hippie generation's "free love" movement. So called "conservatives", wanted to protect and preserve the family unit and religious beliefs which they saw as being under attack by the hippie generation's attitudes towards sex, drugs, relationships and their general laissez fair attitude toward life. Though initially evolved under good intentions, and with the best interests of all at heart, Conservatives quickly infiltrated the Republican party, taking over their political platform and using their influence as the "older" generation to install a theocratic political agenda within a party whose original basis was the protection of the government which our Constitution created and the free market capitalistic economy which gives all of those who live and work in America the chance to be financially successful.

However, Conservatism suffers from 2 fatal flaws, which turn off the vast majority of people in America: It's insistence on basing all of its social ideology on the Christian moral code and the hypocrisy which this causes with its positions regarding the Constitution and Capitalism.

Religion, of any type, is little more than a subversive form of collectivism. Under any religious doctrine, the main goal is obedience to its "teachings" through the fear that not doing so will lead to a painful life and-especially-afterlife. Due to its collectivist end game, and that it takes force-of some kind-to convince people to obey the teachings, all religions are anti humanistic at their core: i.e. it is human nature to seek liberty, independence, and to find its own individuality-not only from other people and governments, but from anything which seeks to "control" or shape it in an image that is not of its own design.
Under the Christian religious doctrine, individuality-which is supported and encouraged, by design, in both our Constitution and economic system-is, in many ways, prohibited. Things like making choices for yourself, which others may find morally reprehensible, are strictly forbidden: a persons right to do what they want with their body (abortion, tattoo's, piercings, drug usage), the use of non manufactured drugs, homosexual relationships, controlling how you die, should you be in a situation to do so, and many more issues that are personal in nature, are all frowned upon or strictly prohibited-not because these decisions are physically, mentally, or emotionally unhealthy, but because they say they are. The Conservative desire to influence decisions at the personal level is so strong (because their beliefs are right and yours is wrong) that they allow it too dictate their national domestic policy: favoring national legislation which prevents all Americans from being allowed to even have the option of making such personal decisions for themselves.
This theocratic, Napoleon like complex to "do things our way or no way at all", is as radical a belief system as can be found and is in direct conflict with their position on our Constitution and economy-positions which are logical and, without question, in the best interests of all Americans. Their religious position vs. their Constitutional position is particularly baffling given the strict separation of church and state guaranteed within the Constitution itself...

Conservatives support a small Federal Government-as originally designed (pre 17th amendment) by our Founding Fathers; they also support as little regulatory controls over our economy and as few taxes as possible, so as to allow as many people the best opportunity at financial success, through which a person is able to achieve the most personal and individual liberty. However, the only way they could ever accomplish their ideal of installing their Christian doctrine as the backbone of all social and domestic policy in America, would be through an expansive Federal Bureaucracy and strict regulatory control of our economy-to the point that our economy would be more Socialistic, than Capitalistic and our society would be controlled via a strict theological doctrine that would require dictatorial leadership to enforce.
This obvious hypocrisy, combined with the religious message they are intent on sending out every time they speak, present Conservatives as stuffy-old-rich-guys with too much time and money on their hands, who fear any movement towards a progressive future and want to control America...

Today, Conservatism has had something of a resurgence through a movement known as the Tea Party. The Tea Party got its start a little over 2 years ago after Conservatives saw their parent party-the Republicans-straying farther and farther from the Constitution via their (apparent) support of a large federal bureaucracy and their (apparent) distancing from the core Christian values which this "conservative base" of the Republican party, takes credit for.
The Tea Party's message has been one based around original Constitutional principles, anti political establishment, a return to a small federal bureaucracy and limited taxes. It is a message that has rung true with many Americans-regardless of sex, sexual orientation, age, ethnic background, or socio-economic status. However, the Tea Party movement embodies the same hypocrisy which Conservatives have historically held: combining their theological doctrine with their political and economic beliefs.
Though seemingly tempered within the Tea Party movement-most likely due to its broader socio-economic and ethnic make up-the Conservative control of the Tea Party places its theological message at, or near, the roots of all of its positions. Every chance it gets, the Tea Party makes it known that their base values are still those of the Christian religious doctrine and that their beliefs are the right and only way to live ones life by. The result is the same as with traditional conservatism: the vast majority of logical, and rational, thinkers are turned off by the undertones of the "my way or the highway" rhetoric found in what is otherwise a very solid, and easy to embrace, political ideology.

American political ideologies part 1: Liberalism

2010-09-15T13:19:00.000-04:00

There is little question that the dominate political ideology in American politics today is what is called Liberalism-it has taken over the Democratic party, and proponents of it currently hold the highest political seats in our country: President Barack Obama, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Senate majority leader Harry Reid are all Democrats, and all claim to be Liberals. On it's face, being "liberal" is a good thing-originally it stood for a persons sovereign right to their liberty against authortative governments-or any government, or other, institution which tried, through law or other means, to limit a person's liberty. The problem with modern Liberalism is that it has nothing to do with what Liberalism actually stands for...

To be specific, American Liberalism is based on the work On Liberty, by John Stuart Mill. Throughout the work, Mill struggles with his belief that a person has a right to their liberty from the authority of governments, against his belief of utilitarianism-which is liberty's exact opposite, and 19th century's American version of socialism. Liberalism, true liberalism, is about an individual's right, and the responsibility of excercizing that right, in society, of their soveriegn liberty from government. True, governments are necessary, but they are a necessary "evil", truly only needed to protect the citizens who agree to be ruled by them, for protection from themselves and outside forces, and for the providing of those services which private enterprise and individuals prove to not be able to provide better for themselves. A close examination of today's Liberals-those who claim to be followers of Liberalism-shows just how far from Liberalism today's followers are, and how they are more Socialists, or Utilitarianists, than followers of Liberalism.

When studying the works of Mill, and particularly On Liberty, it is obvious that the founder of what could, today, be called Liberalism, would cringe at what it has become. One need look no further than what followers of Liberalism today support: government involvement nearly every aspect of an individuals life.

"Every function superadded to those already excersized by the government,
causes its influence over hopes and fears to be more widely diffused, and
converts, more and more, the active and ambitious part of the public into
hangers-on of the government, or of some party which aims at becoming the
government."

These are the words of Mill as it relates directly to allowing government-of any level-to have more and more say, over more and more aspects, of our society; and todays Liberals in America are doing exactly what he warns against by supporting things like government mandated, and provided for, health care; goverment bail outs of companies deemed "to big to fail"; the printing off and buying up of currency to support programs and spending sprees by our Federal Government on programs and agencies we as a nation have no true need for; further "benefits" for the those said to be living below the poverty level; the Supreme Court broadly interrupting the Constituion so as to allow for broader and broader legislative policy from Congress. Even worse is that all of these things are leading American society and culture down a path that is decidedly based on Socialism.

There are many opinions and theories about what truly constitutes Socialism, but all of them are based around-to some extent-government ownership, and control, of all private industry; and society based loosely around a 2 class structure: the "haves" and "have nots".

Our Constitution places very strict guidelines on how much influence the Federal Government can (is supposed too) have over our economy and society, limiting it to 18 or 19 very specific things and, despite an improper ruling by the Supreme Court in McCulloch vs. Maryland in 1819, our Federal Government actually does not have the authority to pass any law that it wants. Thanks in large part to that ruling, Congress, with the support of modern Liberalism, has all the support it has ever needed over the last 2 centuries to attack the Constitution, weakening its built in protections the people once had against Government, while at the same time expanding their power over us all.

On top of its political influences, Liberalism has also had a striking effect on the culture of American society. At the core of modern Liberalism (it must be specified as such because it now resembles very little of what it was originally based on) is a mentality based on avoiding conflict, harm and the desire to make life "easy" for every one-particularly our children. Originally born out of the great depression/World War II generation, this last ideal-that of "making life easier for the next generation"-had good intentions: that generation, perhaps, saw the greatest hardships of any other generation of Americans-besides those who first settled our land in the 16th-17th centuries. Originally meant as a rallying cry to prevent things like another depression and world war from happening through hard work, family values and education, "making life easier"-in the world of Modern Liberalism-has become an entitlement and pacifists mentality. Things such "Obamacare" and the welfare state represent the entitlement aspect of this mentality, while the abolishment of traditional school yard activities like dodge ball, stripping a parent from their right to properly discipline their children while at the same time allowing kids to avoid anything they think is "hard"; as well as allowing basic educational institutions to grade on "bell curves" or tossing out grading scales completely in favor of a simple pass/fail system. The result of the implementation of these ideals on such broad levels has helped to produce 30 years worth of Americans who have no concept of what it means to achieve through hard work; have little to no concept of what can be learned from losing to a close rival; or having the effort it takes to "excel" at anything (except, perhaps, in sports).

A secondary effect of this is that excellence and achievement have also become vilified: those at young ages who strive to stand out are seen as being "weird" or "abnormal", and are placed in so called "advanced" classes, which label them as social outcasts in their school and neighborhood. This segragation also prevents them from having any positive influence over their fellow classmates.
These social and culture ideals are also socialistic: in Socialism, everyone is to be treated as an equal. In cultures based on Socialism, there are 2 classes of people: the ruling class, and every one else. To secure this separation, societies which have historically been based on Socialism, have built their culture and institutions around many of the same ideals that modern Liberals today, in America, support...

Inherently, there is nothing wrong with traditional Liberalism-that which was defined and supported by Mill in 1859. In fact, traditional Liberalism is largely a good thing for people, societies, and cultures to embrace. As it was when Mill first defined it in political and social terms, it became the backbone of the ideals that made America great. That Liberalism would have supported a persons right to choose-concerning everything-without sacrificing human natures natural desire to better itself through effort, hard work, and failure and success through trial and error. That form of Liberalism, traditional Liberalism, was at the heart of our individual spirit, our entrepreneuralship and the responsibility we all once held over our own successes and failures and it would have supported giving people hand ups, not hand outs, from the government. Today, however, Modern Liberalism is little more than Socialism attempting to disguise itself by a word with a better image, and meaning, than that which those using the word today really believe in.

American political ideologies: Introduction

2010-09-13T09:11:00.000-04:00

For over 20 years I have been an observer and student of the relationship between government and society. Though I have no formal education in the subjects of politics, philosophy, economics, social economic theory and the American Constitution and Constitutional theory, I have studied all of these as hobbies since my teens. Studying these subjects as I have, has, I believe, provided me with one serious advantage over those who are formally educated in them: I approach all of my studies without the bias of a 3rd party influence. Many may not take my opinions seriously-which is their right; but I have had my self education validated by those who are are formally educated in these topics. Do I still have much to learn regarding these topics? Absolutely, and I continue to do so, but that does not take away what I have learned up too now concerning these topics....
Over the coming weeks I am going to lay out what I believe are the 4 primary political and social ideologies which dominate America today in a 5 or 6 part series (as of this introduction I am undecided as to how many parts I want), how they interact with each other, and how they have helped to lead our country to the precipice of social, economic, and political collapse we are at today.
I hope those who come back to read them all do so with as open a mind as possible: America's greatest strengths have always been our unity and individuality-traits based on freedoms we are granted by our Constitution. These traits are what lead to the many great inventions and our being able to overcome all the many obstacles our nation and society faced through the end of WWII. These strengths have left our society, economy and culture over the last 40 years, and hopefully, in writing the following series, I will do my small part to remind all who read them, to help bring them back as the back bone of what America is all about.
RR

The Detroit fires: a dicotomy of governmental failure.

2010-09-11T09:25:00.000-04:00

Early this past week, a shocking event that many local Detroiters referred too as a "natural disaster" occurred. It was an event that I believe underscores the many failures that the various levels of our government are blamable for today...
What started as severe thunderstorms, quickly turned into a raging fire storm, as downed power lines fell throughout the city, igniting as many as 10 individual fires in different parts of the city, which then spread, and burned 85 structures-many to the ground-in a 4 hour period.
The blame for which something like this could be allowed to happen, is easily spread around, but it all falls squarely on the hands of one governmental agency or another.
The first to be blamed is DTE-the semi private utility company which supplies energy to the city of Detroit and many surrounding areas. (I call it "semi" private, because all energy companies are very reliant on government regulations). DTE's blame lies with the thousands of power lines which fell down that day-many of those lines were reported by residents as being potential fire hazards because they were already hanging so low, but DTE is cash strapped due to their inability (due to governmental controls and regulations) to raise rates, to raise the funds, to make the improvements to their electrical grid that are so desperately needed.
Its been almost 10 years since I lived in metropolitan Detroit-sagging power lines due to age was a problem then, and it will continue to be a problem until DTE is allowed to raise rates so that they can afford to fix and upgrade a system built, and based, on technology developed in the first half of the 20th century.
Second on the list of blame is the city of Detroit itself.
Like most cities these days, Detroit is facing serious budget short falls. As a result, all services were cut-including the fire department. On top of laying off firemen, the city also also "deactivates" between 8 and 12 fire companies daily due to budgets constraints. The result of these cut backs was that what initially started out as 10 individual small fires, turned into blocks of burning buildings because response times were as long as 2 to 3 hours.
Another failure on the list was the 9-1-1 service in Detroit.
Many complained that when they called in, they were treated rudely and with disrespect. Frustrated 911 operators, overwhelmed by the events and other emergencies happening around the city due to under staffing-also related to budget issues-were unable to handle the situation they were presented with.
Defenders of government would say that this is just a sad reality of today's economy, but I disagree.
One of the standing theories about government's role in society is that they are to do things which private citizens and corporations have proved unable to do for themselves. To uphold this role, governments should be prepared for economic downturns. Many corporations do this (see Ford and why they didn't need a government bailout 2 years ago), why can't governments? Why is it that governments have only 2 options when our economy takes its inevitable downturns: raise taxes and/or cut services? (I actually have an idea to solve this problem, but people won't listen to me when I speak of it).

Add it all up and you get a perfect picture of why and how governmental bodies can and will fail: This, perhaps, could have happened to any government, run by any ideology, but it has to be pointed out that Detroit has long been a bastion of Democratic and Socialistic ideals, and has been control by Democratic politicians for the last 100 years, and in that time just about every socialistic program you can think of has been tried there, and they have all failed. The cumulative result of these failures has lead the city to where it is today: financially bankrupt; unable to provide its citizens with basic services, and such rampant corruption that many of its past, and present, democratic leaders are already in jail for corruption; facing prosecution for corruption; or mired in controversy due to suspected corrupt activities.
I point all this out because the same sort of people who have politically controlled Detroit over the last 100 years are now in power in our Federal Government-people like Pelosi, Reid, Obama, and Mrs Clinton. People who believe in 'sharing the wealth', giving to the "poor" without getting anything in return. People who believe in punishing the successful because they make a certain amount of money. These people over step their constitutional and legislative bounds on a daily basis and they, on the heels of the Bush administration (which covertly upheld the same socialistic ideals), will do the same to our nation as their counterparts in Detroit have done to that once great and proud city-lead it down the inevitable path of collapse and destruction.

The media's influence on American politics and society.

2010-09-09T14:05:00.001-04:00

Being a freelance writer and broadcaster, I take a great risk when I speak out against the current practices and influence of print, television and radio media outlets in America. In fact, I am quite certain that my doing so has cost me both work and respect in the local market which I do most of my work in; but I am nothing if I do not voice my opinions: in my opinion, the influence of media on the general public is far beyond being out of control, and someone within the "industry" must be willing to speak out against it to put it back in its rightful place in society. If that person must be me, a small time freelance sports writer in a top 75 American market, so be it; but it should be someone who has an inside knowledge of how and why the industry operates the way it does...

The founding fathers of our nation believed that a "free press" was the surest way that a body politic would keep its elected leaders in check and to be informed of their goings on. In sum, they believed that a free press was essential to keeping any government from attempting tyrannical control over its people.

For almost 150 years, the media in our country generally served this role-as a check on government: making sure that our state and federal governments weren't over stepping their bounds relative to the Constitution. Some time in the early half of the 20th century this all changed. Whether it was the advent of radio and television, which in turn lead to the creation of the FCC to monitor and regulate the "content" of our airwaves, I don't know; but in and around this time the whole purpose of our media changed from being primarily a source of information, to being a source of opinion formation-and by extension, legislative policy making. All of a sudden the general public started caring more about what a writer or broadcaster-usually a person with no more practical knowledge of legislative policy than themselves-thought, than getting the information themselves and forming their own opinion, and media outlets were quick to feed the public what they wanted.

Televisions shows like 60 minutes and 20/20 sprung up over night; entire radio stations were dedicated to news gathering and giving of opinion; editorials in newspapers were moved from the back pages to the prominent "top half" of the first page. At first, all these new mediums did their best to base their opinions on the facts at hand, but they rapidly learned that the public really doesn't care about the facts. The more over the top, and "far out there" the opinions and positions were, the more people listened or read; and the more that people listened or read, the more money "journalistic" institutions made. The more money they made, the more political influence they would wield...

There was a time when all media outlets were bound, in some cases by law, but in all cases by "journalistic integrity", to go out of their way to not overly attempt to influence people, but the profession has given up that ideology en masse. Today, the "news" and media outlets would rather impress their views upon people, than to simply present the facts, and the people don't seem to care.
To be fair, the news media are businesses, and as such they are only responding to market trends-that being the desire of consumers for "opinionated" programing; but the media, just like any business which serves the public at large, has a duty to the public to at least provide some balance to the opinions they put out for public consumption, but they do not. In fact, nearly all outlets are deliberately slanted towards one ideology, which, in general, is "liberal". Compounding the issue is that nowadays, media outlets no longer take any pains to hide who they support for state and national offices, thereby providing the public a false representation of which candidates are most "popular".

There is no real solution to the pathetic nature of our media today.
So long as the masses prefer ignorance over fact. So long as the masses prefer entertainment value over substance. So long as the masses "dont care", the media in our country will continue to be a contributor to our nations political and social woes, as opposed to a leader in finding solutions to our problems.

Another Obama speech full of lies

2010-09-08T14:24:00.000-04:00

Today in Ohio, President Obama spoke on the economy with the purpose of improving our economy-an economy that he, his administration, and his political party, have failed miserably at helping despite literally printing money and throwing it at it hoping against all hope it would stick. And, like all good politicians, Mr. Obama got up in front of (what looked like) hundreds of people and told well spun tale of lies and almost truths, without actually giving any real, tangible solutions to our nations economic woes. No, instead, our president took the opportunity to point the finger of blame, and chastise the other party for all their mistakes-essentially, he did the same thing that he and his party accuse the other of doing right now. All the while he did this, he told a series of glaring lies, among them were that the Republicans, "who are responsible" for the economic mess we are in now, were "in power for 8 years" (they were in power for 6 under Bush, Dems had it the last 2), that he believes in a "small, efficient federal government", and that he believes that its the "entrepreneurs who are the backbone our economy". He told others among his string of well spoken political rhetoric, but these 3 stood out most too me.
Why? Because they are so obviously lies to anyone with a half a brain in their head.
Only the the ignorant, bottom feeding, kool aid drinking, easy to manipulate masses who lap up everything Obama says like thirsty dogs at the trough, believing what this man says is gospel everytime. Yes, it is mean to call so many people, such ridiculous names; but look at the proof of what this president has done since he has been in office: he has supported health care legislation that, by some estimates, will put hundreds of thousands out of work; force a rationing of health care for the elderly and definitely increase the size of the Federal bureaucracy by at least 10%; and he supports tax increases that are detrimental to business creation.
Despite all this and the obvious hypocrisy between what he says and what he does, millions of people are still willing to support him just because he speaks well at a podium.

Mr. Obama spoke at length, in this speech, about how believes we need to stop allowing jobs to be shipped over seas; about how we should be buying products made in America, by Americans, with our money-instead of products made over seas, but out of the same side of his mouth he says he stands against corporate tax breaks, which is where Obama shows his ignorance. Mr. Obama claims that he wants to create jobs in America, and that he wants companies to start producing and distributing the products we buy, then he must learn that the easist way to do that is-like it or not-through corporate tax breaks.
Mr. Obama claims to be for entreprenuralship, but seems to fail to realize that that means people have to go into business for themselves; which means that if he wants entreprenuralship to returen in mass to America, the best way is-cut taxes.
Mr. Obama claims to be worried about the size of our national deficit, and yet every bill he passes adds to it...

I will digress...My dislike for the our Presidents fiscal ideologies is well known to all those who know me, but there was one thing that Obama said that I did agree with: that it is the job of the government to do for people and business, what they can't do better for themselves.
There is just one problem with that statement though: in the almost 225 years we have been governed under the Constitution, governmental agencies have yet to prove that they can do anything better than private enterprise-except spend money.

"Burning the Quran day"-a bad example of 1st amendment rights

2010-09-07T16:58:00.000-04:00

One of the many great aspects of living in America is that we have freedom of speech and expression. At the same time that this is a great freedom, it is also one of the most abused freedoms we have. Of course, you will never hear me say that our 1st amendments should be changed in any way what so ever, but unfortunately for America, we will always get idiots like a Christian minister in Gainsville, Florida:
Pastor Terry Jones of Dove World Church has decided that he wants September 11th to be known as "Quran burning day" because of the 9/11 attacks of 2001 and the insistance of Muslims to build a Mosque near the 9/11 site in New York City. In sum, Paster Jones believes that it is time that we "stand up against Muslims", and this his way of wanting to stand up against that culture and their religious beliefs.
There are, of course, better ways of "standing up" to a cultures belief system which you believe is a danger to the world-like proving that your belief system, through actions based on their teachings, is better....
Pastor Jones' intentions may be good, but they certainly are not refective of the moral character and virtue the religion he preaches attempts to teach, nor are they logical given the attitude that radical Muslims have against "western" civilization in general. All Pastor Jones actions will do is anger that society of people further-giving them more reasons to hate America, and her political and economic allies; it also gives a black eye to a religion that has yet to fully distance itself from the pedophilia scandals that have rocked its sister religion, Catholicism.

There is a line that people have to learn to draw when utilizing their 1st amendments rights in America-a line that Liberals have taught society to blur more and more as each generation passes. With the freedoms that American's have, comes great responsibility-the responsibility to utilize them properly and at the right times, and using an anniversary representative of one of the saddest days of American history is not the time, or place, for such a thing as making a statement against another religion.
Fortunately, it is obvious that Pastor Jones' actions will back fire horribly on him as many of America's leaders are speaking out against his desire to go through with making September 11th "burning the Quran day". Sure, he may have 8000 or so supporters on Face Book, but they are a vast minority of Americans. Fortunately we have the right speak out against Pastor Jones' idea. Fortunately, many of us can let the world know that, despite having no love for the radical Muslimic beliefs that lead to the 9/11 attacks on our country, there are many more of us who dont support this person's actions, and that we believe there are better, more appropriate and responsible ways, to express our anger towards radical Islam....
The best way, I think, to fight idea's and people like Pastor Jones is by ignoring them-by not giving them the time of day, by not recognizing them, by simply looking past them. By recognizing Pastor Jones and his idea, and giving it all this attention, all we are doing is giving it an importance that these sort of ideas do not deserve; we make it out to be worthy our first amendment rights, when it really isn't. In the end, all we do by giving ideas like these the time of day, is to give freedom of speech a black eye.

Perspectives and politics part 2

2010-09-03T16:37:00.000-04:00

With our leaders' positions so illogically based, and those we elect focused more on what they can do for the themselves, or for special interests, and not on specifically doing what is proper for the nation as a whole, it is no wonder that America's Federal Government has become incompetent and unable to pass even the most basic of all legislation without finding the need to write that legislation to include ridiculous add on's and riders which have nothing to do with the actual legislation that the premise of the bill was written for.
No other proof needs to be offered of the ineptitude of our Nations leadership than the statements of Harry Reid in the summer of 2009. Senator Reid (D) was asked about the health care legislation (known as Obamacare) that was before Congress at that time. Specifically, he was asked about the monstrous length of the bill-some 2000 plus pages-and if he had bothered to read every page. Mr. Reid's reply: that he believed that most of Congress does not read "most" of the legislation they adopt, nor did he believe that "80%" of Congress could even "understand" legislative language.
Why is this important as it relates to perspectives? Because perspectives are the basis for all our decision making: if even supporters of Obamacare didn't bother read the bill, or couldn't understand it, then how could they have even had a perspective from which to decide on whether to vote yes or no in passing the legislation?
What could possibly be the perspective of Congress, in regards to the American people-the people they are hired by us to serve-when they pass such monstrous and incoherent legislation such as Obamacare, and most of those who vote for it aren't even able to understand it?
Health care legislation aside, what about the other 2 large issues facing America today?
There are those in Congress, and Mr. Obama himself, who stand against the Arizona law to help fight the illegal immigration problem in their state. Why? From what perspective are they basing their opinions concerning the matter? It certainly isn't from a Constitutionally legal perspective (the U.S. Constitution is very clear that States have the right to enforce laws that the Federal Government to be incapable of enforcing, and in the case of the securing our border with Mexico it has proven unable to do so), and they refuse to explain why except to say something to the effect that we should welcome "all who seek the freedoms America offers".
How about our economy? On what economic basis are the opinions of Congress regarding current job and economic growth, as idea after idea they have to turn our economy around and create job growth fails miserably, and is only making the situation worse down the road?

This is why perspectives become important: a perspective with a basis in poor logic, leads to an opinion based on poor logic, which can lead to a bad idea being passionately supported by those who don't fully comprehend it because it is too illogical to understand rationally-but it "sounds" like a good idea.
I believe solving the problem is easy: we, the people, must be diligent when it comes to who we elect to public office-of all levels.
The surest way is to never stop asking them "why" and "how" they believe what they believe will work: "why" will their idea for fixing things work better than another idea; "how" will they implement it; etc...
I've watched many a debate, and many a question and answer session of politicians at all levels of government, and few reporters, journalists or people ever ask questions that start with "why" or "how". And on those few occasions that such questions are asked and the standard political double speak is given, you never hear a "what" question for further, and simple, explanation, and even why that question is asked, and the standard political double speak is given again, the reporter or person asking generally gives up-they stop pressing for a proper and adequate answer to their question.
We should never stop asking them.
We should never stop forcing them to answer.
We should never take double talk as an answer.
And we should never accept "no" and never stop asking until we are satisfied that whoever the politician is we are speaking too, has given as much of an answer as they are capable of giving.

The vast majority of "we" the people don't realize the power we wield over the politicians we elect to public office, but they do; and it is why they continue to hold power despite have no real perspective of what they are trying to do for us.

Perspectives and politics

2010-08-29T20:09:00.000-04:00

Historically, most of what are considered the most influential philosophers of western civilization have skirted around the issue of how, and why, people percieve things the way they do. David Hume probably spends the most time talking about a persons perspectives in his book A Treatise of Human Nature. Hume, preferring to use the word "perception", never went so far as to discuss how a person forms their perceptions of the world around them. (To be clear, the words perception and perspective are synonomous: their difference in meaning is only in dialectic position-the former is third person, the later is first person. For the purpose of this essay I will stray between both words as determined by context). By and large, the rest of the greatest thinkers of western civilization either completely avoided the issue entirely, or creatively tried to ignore it in such a manner that their logic contained serious holes once it was realized what they were trying to avoid...

For as long as I can remember, I have always believed that one of the biggest things which differentiate, and separate, one person, and groups of people, from others is our "perspectives"-our personal "takes" on things; how we "see" things"; the side or positions we take on issues; our point of view; etc. In sum, it is our perspective on things which directly forms the opinions we all develop regarding all issues. The problem with this, in my opinion, is that people have no cognition for why they have the points of view on issues that they have: i.e. they can't explain themselves. When pressed, most people can't actually explain their opinions-regardless of where they are "coming from".
As we have progressed further into the Obama presidency, and America as a whole has become more and more polarized ideologically on all issues, this problem has become more apparent to me-particularly given the fact that the extreme fringes of our political spectrum are in control: Socialists, disguising themselves as Liberals, on the left; and Religious Collectivists, disguising themselves as Conservatives, on the right.

We are lucky in that we live in the greatest country on Earth. We have the right to hold and express any opinion, from any perspective, we wish. But what good are those opinions-our points of view-if you can't explain them? If you can't explain what makes yours more right than anothers?
Liberals, led by their President of "change" claim to be for the working man. They claim to be for helping out the poor; for the betterment of society; for social equality-yet they support programs that are destructive to all those ideals. And when pressed for explanations they fall back on claims of racism and conspiracy theories, and then go on to spin their own words over and over again, in a fruitless effort to confuse those listening.
Conservatives claim to be supportive of Free Market Capitalism and to support the Constitution as it was originally written-which means allowing people the freedom of choice that comes with being an American. But the minute that freedom of choice conflicts with their religious zealousy they forgot what they say; the minute that passing legislation which would bring financial equality to all means a lessening of their financial clout, they suddenly back pedal; the minute that their words means bringing those who they dont like, up to their level, they suddenly change their tune.
Due to the inabilities of both sides to communicate and express themselves logically on all issues, the masses-those vast majority of us in "the middle"-just tune out those in power, because neither makes sense:
How can Mr. Obama, and his political party, stand against immigration legislation in Arizona that does nothing but help enforce the laws regarding the issue found in the Constitution?
How can Republicans be for freedom of choice and personal responsibility, when they rail so hard against issues like abortion and religious freedoms?
How can Democrats be for lowering taxes on the "middle class", when their over all economic policies reduce incomes as a whole, while increasing the welfare state?
How can Republicans claim to be for peace when they are the first to offer our military for "support" for any one who asks for it?...

Using our perspectives to form our opinions is only natural-and fortunately we have a right to do so in America; but what good is doing so if those opinions are going to be illogically based and hypocritical? What good are the opinions of our leaders if even the most simplest of thinkers have no way to rationalize them?

A year of study

2010-08-29T19:58:00.000-04:00

It has been almost a year since I last wrote on my blog. My year of absense was intentional and put to good use: in studying philosophy, politics, economics and socio economic theory. I was fortunate in that I had the time to devote to learning more about such 4 intense and complicated subjects so as to provide better content and educated opinions in my writings.
The time has also allowed my passion for expressing and sharing my personal views to come back...

Catching up with the NFL: Do my Lions have some hope?!

2009-11-27T00:50:00.000-05:00

Before making any assumptions about the NFL season (and the Detroit Lions) I took the high road this year and waited until after the Thanksgiving games before making any "official" decisions on any one team. Sure, it may be the middle of a week of the NFL schedule, but, considering I'm a Lions fan (yeah, I know, but at least I can admit it) it makes some sense.

Since I have a lot to say about the Lions-and their latest Thanksgiving Day fiasco-I'll get to everything else in the NFL first.

Let's face it-there really isn't very much parody in the NFL this year. Through 10 and a half weeks we have 4 really good football teams: the Patriots (as always this century), the Colts (likewise), the Saints, and the Vi-queens (sorry, I can't help it-they are my most hated team of the NFC North).

On the flip side we have twice as many lousy teams: the Lions (as always in the 21st century), the Buc's (really not surprised), the Rams (ditto on the lack of surprise), the Seahawks (just goes to show you how important depth is in the face of massive injuries), the Redskins (wtf happened here?), the Browns (like my Lions, as expected), the Bills (Owens really proved to be the "missing link" there, hasn't he?) and the Raiders (so much for talent).

The remaining 20 teams are lumped in the middle. the Bengals (!!!?) are the only real surprise of the group-they will most likely end up sweeping their divisional games. The only question left is whether they will get a home play off game because they aren't catching the Colts or the Patriots.

Denver-come on, did we really think Kyle Orton was that good? I didn't, and I knew it was only a matter of time before he proved what he was: a lousy quarterback. If he had a good running back this year, all he would have had to do is "manage" the game, but with no running game defenses can easily confuse him. Therefore, pencil in the Chargers as that divisions winner-again.

Chicago-way to high of expectations by Cutler given they have no other weapons around him and a mediocre offensive line at best; and losing Urlanbacher guaranteed they had no chance of making the playoffs.

The Cardinals are still the Cardinals-great passing game, little running game, but do have an improved D. All in all, they have the luxury of taking advantage of a lousy division.

Green Bay seems to be coming on, but, come on: anyone with my home team on their schedule twice (for now I hope) should have a good chance of making the playoffs.

Nice to see V. Young grow up-but how the Titans could start off 0-6 still baffles me.

The Steelers will have difficulty defending their title given that they will most likely be competing for a wild card slot given the emergence of the Bengals (!!!!?) as their Division's powerhouse.

The rest aren't worthy of conversation-they are what they are-mediocre, at best, football teams.

Now for my Lions…I have a lot to say about my home team.

I'll start with their rookie class of draft picks.

--Matthew Stafford: it took me 4 games before I started to believe in him ,and when he was hurt and Culpepper had to play it became very obvious to me why he won the starting job: Culpepper is done like a Brit cooks their meat. Stafford has already had a game or 2 that he played really well in, and showed us Lion faithful what the future could have in store for us. I only hope that they can keep him up right and healthy.

--Brandon Pettigrew: I hated his pick. How they could draft a TE with the 20th overall pick while having so many needs on defense I'll never know. It took me until their win against the Browns to see why they chose him…From the beginning I liked Pettigrew's ability to pass block, but the perpetual drops were too much for me to say that the was 'worth" the trade for Roy Williams. However, after watching him settle in and finally develop some chemistry with Stafford (they are both rookies after all, and Stafford did miss 3 weeks) I get why they drafted him. And, if the Lions coaching staff can continue to make him an important part of the offense, opponents will have a hard time keeping their safeties back to cover CJ on the deep ball.

--Aaron Brown: late round draft pick with mad speed. When he touches the ball things seem to happen, I only wish they could find ways to use him more right now.

--Louis Delmas: I love this guy. I love him from the beginning. He is the Bob Sanders/Troy Polamalu of the Detroit Lions. The guy loves laying the wood on anyone who comes over the middle of the field. That causes fear in your opponents-something only Barry Sanders ever caused Lions opponents; so, needless to say, that is saying a lot.

--Sammie Hill and DeAndre Levy: Hill isn't a starter. I don't care what the coaching staff "thinks", but he doesn't have the talent. Against the best guards and partial double teams he disappears-there was obviously a reason why he didn't get drafted early; but, this just goes to show you how little talent the Lions have on their D-line: that a mid round draft pick could start for them there. Levy looks to be making Earnie Sims expendable. Levy is great at blitzing and has a nose for the ball. I only hope that if the Lions can trade Sims (I don't know his contract status) they can get something for him. If not, at least they can cut him loose to make room for their high draft pick next year.

--Kevin Smith, Calvin Johnson and Gosder Cherilus: Smith and Johnson have disappointed me this year. CJ seems to all but disappear-this could simply be because the rest of the receiving corp suck major you know what, or because he is not as good as we all thought he was. Either way, I think he needs to step it up. The same goes for Smith-the guy is a work horse, and I love his toughness, but he is not the breakaway running threat that we need at running back. He is an excellent pass catcher, but we need a real runner back there. I mention Cherilus because he was our 1st round draft pick last year and, besides the surprising Manny Ramirez, is our best OL.

Thanksgiving game: How much longer are we Lions fans going to have to put up with lousy Thanksgiving Day performances? I see much hope in the team for the future, but saying this year in and year out is getting old really quick.

Anyways, I have a lot of questions to ask about this game:

To start with: why was Stafford still in that game when it was already a lost cause? I appreciate the guys toughness, but if he is the future of this franchise and you want him to get as much real game experience this year as possible, why would you risk him by playing him-already injured-when the game is already decided?

--What happened to Aaron Brown? The guy was a huge reason for helping Stafford get the win against the Browns but he never got the ball against the Pack. The guy shows great potential and, as I said, things happen when he touches the ball on offense-so why aren't they giving him a bigger role?

--Why don't they blitz Julian Peterson more? The one time they blitzed him all he did get a sack and force a fumble, why can't they do that 5-6 times a game with him from different LB spots throughout the game?

--Could our defensive line be any worse? Good lord! How much time can you give a QB to throw the ball? They are so bad that I think they should play 4 CB's, 2 safeties and 6 LB's-forget putting DL out there: the ones they have are useless. They get no pass rush and me and 5 of my 150lb-when-soaking-wet-with-cloths-on-friends could hold them off long enough for a QB to find an open receiver. Calling them terrible is the understatement of the year.

--Can anyone else besides Pettigrew catch a ball? B. Johnson was supposedly this great addition-a former high draft pick who some say wasn't given a fair chance; but now we know the truth: the guy is lousy. So is Northcutt. It's a shame that 4th rounder Derrick Williams got hurt, otherwise he may be starting in place of either of these 2 lackey's.

OK, I've rambled long enough about my Lions. I see some potential-unfortunately almost all of it is associated with their 09' draft class. I do think that Pettigrew going down in the first series screwed their offense: he is proving to be the real deal now that he has learned to catch a ball from Stafford, and I think that the Lions would have given Green Bay a much better game if he hadn't of gotten hurt as his presence frees up CJ over the top and he is a great blocker. Regardless, injuries are a big part of the NFL, and if you don’t' have depth, then you are effed-just like every one else in the league.

Hopefully the Lions will pull out another win or 2 this year. It's unlikely, but as a Lions fan all I have had for the last decade is hope-which got old 5 years ago-but with some of the pieces they have in place right now, their does look to be a light at the end of our very long and dark tunnel…But, lets be honest-I'm only hoping.

Congrats to Lou Dobbs

2009-11-12T00:12:00.000-05:00

Lou Dobbs shocked America last night when he announced that he was leaving CNN because "it has become increasing clear that strong winds of change have become buffeting our country" and, apparently some high up people have convinced him to help construct solutions to these problems…

I have to admit-I'm impressed.

I was never a huge watcher of his show, but, whenever I did catch it, I was always impressed by his lack of partisanship and moderate attitude, while working for what could arguably be called one of the more Democratically and Liberal leaning news organizations of the last 20 years. Dobbs was always level headed and based his arguments firmly around the facts. That he was able to survive, from it's inception, at a news group which showed its bias on a regular basis is testament to a strength of character that I never knew he had-and if I did, I most certainly would have made the effort to watch more of his show.

In parting, Dobbs makes some rather interesting comments about "winds of change", and, though I hate putting intentional spins on things such as this, it makes you wonder what he see's as "winds of change" and what his idea's for bracing us against them. In his parting speech he makes specific mention of the partisanship in D.C., Global Warming/Climate Change, the war in Afghanistan and Health Care…I wish I could say that I had watched enough of his show to know where he stood on these issues, however, seeing the class he portrayed on his way out, and knowing his moderate nature on most issues, I can trust that Dobbs will be, at the very least, logical and reasonable in his approach to helping to seek solutions to these issues. As such, I will be watching closely to see what comes of this…

Till then, I raise my glass to you Lou: I didn't know you well, but, after seeing your parting words, I wish I did….

America sends a message to Obama-but is it the right one?

2009-11-04T11:45:00.000-05:00

I think that it is fair to say that a message was sent to the Democratic party and, specifically, Barack Obama in last nights elections: that we will no longer tolerate the huge spending, big government, socialist ideal which he and his party are putting forth as the solution to our nations problems.

Republican governors were elected in New Jersey and Virginia, soundly defeating their Democratic rivals; and in Maine a law that had yet to be enacted giving Gays the right to marry in that state was defeated. These decidedly Conservative results come thanks too a large percentage of Independents turning out to vote, apparently in an effort to show that they don’t believe in the Obama administration’s idea of “change” for our country.

My question is: Is it the “right” message?

This sudden change of ideological direction in these 3 states worries me because our legislative leadership in Washington D.C. has been suffering from the “pong” effect for far too long now: meaning, our national legislative and decision making has been moving from one ideological extreme to the other-a trend that is destroying our nation.

America needs an ideological middle ground leadership to move forward into the future: leaders who will keep their decision making logical and based on the facts at hand; leaders who will leave the social policy to State and local legislation. Leaders who will-dare I say it-be smart with our money; leaders who won’t mortgage our children’s future, and their grandchildren’s future-without even having a real plan to create economic stability for near future-much less the long term one. In sum, we need leadership with not just intelligence and common sense, but also the long range foresight required to put American in a good economic place for the future, and right now, we don’t have any such leader available to us.

What the electorate did yesterday was voice their displeasure at the current leadership by turning to the only other “viable” option available to them: the Republican Party, and, by extension, a Conservative agenda. This, I think, is a knee jerk and premature reaction to the far left, Socialistic Liberal agenda being pushed on us currently by D.C. and the Obama administration-a reaction which I feel is just as bad for the future America.

Talking about Marijuana

2009-10-23T15:14:00.000-04:00

It hasn't been missed by me the amount of attention Marijuana has been getting in the news lately. Most of this attention is the result of California looking into possibly ending the general prohibition of the drug within its borders so as to tax it and create much needed state revenues, and, more recently, from the Obama administration changing the Federal stance on the subject-no longer will the Fed pursue legal action against individuals who grow, distribute or sell Marijuana for medicinal purposes in states where medicinal Marijuana has been made legal. This new stance is important because during the recent Bush administration there was a zero tolerance policy in effect which lead to many messy and expensive legal battles which never turned out in the Fed's favor due to a lack of state cooperation, and also raised the issue of states rights under the 10th amendment to our Constitution.

As those close to me know, I am a big proponent for ending the prohibition of Cannabis, which includes both Marijuana and Hemp. This distinction is important for many reasons and needs to be pointed to when addressing this issue, for both Marijuana and Hemp offer multiple benefits socially and economically to our society should Cannabis ever be legalized in our country.

The myths and false propaganda put forth about Marijuana by the various levels of government in our country have long distorted the true effects of the use of the "drug" for recreational purposes. Such lies as it will cause a person to be lazy, depressed, anxious and paranoid and that it is a "gateway" drug to the usage of other, much more dangerous, illegal narcotics have been used to paint an ugly picture of a substance that, for those who do use it, are known to be untrue.

The assumption that there is a lot of crime associated with it's usage is another falsehood propagated by our government. The truth is that when you take away the fact that it's possession, distribution and manufacture are illegal, there is little associated criminal activity around Marijuana. On those rare occasions when a story makes the media that a shooting or robbery occurs where Marijuana is involved, it is never because of the drug itself, but normally for the money associated with the drug; you never hear of someone getting stoned and robbing a store or beating up their wife and kids; and you rarely hear of someone smoking "pot", getting behind the wheel of their vehicle and causing a fatal vehicle crash-in fact, in most cases when this happens there is typically also alcohol involved leading one to question which drug was responsible for the accident to begin with.

For many of us who use the drug recreationally it is known that Marijuana "produces" nothing but a state of relaxation and heightened awareness that, if misunderstood, can be easily be mistaken and turned into paranoia. In my experience I have never met anyone who was physically addicted to Marijuana, but, as with any substance or activity that is abused, it can become habit forming and mentally addictive. When recognized for what it is, the heightened sense of awareness which Marijuana causes creates a great tool when someone needs to have "tunnel vision" or high levels of focus to accomplish a certain task.

Medicinal Marijuana usage is another thing entirely.

As is being proved more and more each day in those states of our country which have legalized Marijuana for medicinal purposes, it is being found to be a better substance when dealing with pain of various nature and as preferred treatment for those on chemo therapy for cancer as it reduces vomiting and the severe headaches many experience while under such treatments, and it also increases a person's appetite, thereby helping to speed up the healing process for patients. As one popular comedic movie of the Marijuana subculture points out, medicinal Marijuana can replace as many as 10-20 pharmaceutical drugs for those receiving chemo therapy for their cancer.

Hemp is the third, and the most important economic aspect, to ending Cannabis and Marijuana prohibition. Industrial Hemp has over 25,000 known manufacturing applications-from plastics to clothing; and, in most cases is usage produces a superior product at a cheaper cost to manufacture. Further, Hemp produces 10 times the ethanol per acre as that of corn, making it a more viable solution for a domestic gasoline replacement for future generations of vehicles. It also has a higher burning point than oil, and is believed to have a higher viscosity, making it a better lubricant for hydraulics and other machinery than oil.

According to some figures, our nation spends $100 billion annually policing, fighting and criminalizing Marijuana and Hemp. Conservative estimates put the economic value of Industrial Hemp as an industry to be worth $25-40 billion annually. As for the economic benefits of medicinal Marijuana and its recreational usage, we cannot be sure; but conservative estimates place both industries in the billions: $5-10 for medicinal usage as a pharmaceutical, and $1-$2 billion for retail sales related to its recreational usage.

What we do know is that California estimates that it can collect between $1.2 and $1.5 billion in taxes if it broadly legalizes Marijuana for both recreational and medicinally purposes, which would make Marijuana California's #1 cash crop.

Further, Hemp is also nature's perfect "bumper" crop-nearly anything can be grown after it, making it invaluable to farmers, and because it can be grown in almost any climate, making our agricultural industry 25-40% more productive.

There are many more aspects to legalizing Cannabis and ending it's prohibition, and for those with an open enough mind to consider it, the question should be asked, that, if even some of the above is true, why has prohibition against it yet to end?

Most of the reasons for its continued prohibition today can be most likely be attributed to pure politics and lobbying by the oil, pharmaceutical and tobacco industries which all stand to loss billions if it were made legal once again.

But for Cannabis to be legal again, I believe the movement needs to focus on the economic and social benefits; instead of simply trying to prove the governments position wrong.

2 questions that need to be asked-of all issues.

2009-10-23T14:40:00.000-04:00

With the nation becoming more and more politically polarized because of the desires and demands of the Liberal movement for more and more Socialist policy by the Obama administration, a realization about people, and how they think, has become apparent to me...

In the world of Journalism there are a set of criteria for which all stories are based; they are 6 questions: Who, What, Where, When, Why, and How. Two of these represent the most basic of all starts to forming any sort of philosophy and/or opinion about a topic: Why and How.
As I sit back, watch, and sometimes comment, on all that is happening in American politics today thanks to the overt Socialistic policies of the Obama administration, it has become very obvious to me that those who support these policies fail to ask these 2 fundamental questions; it is not just those that support these policies who fail to ask these questions, but those on the other side-that of the so called "Conservative" movement.
It is obvious to me that these 2 questions are never asked due to the proposals put forth by all parties as solutions to the various problems we face in America today.
Take the current health care "crisis" and the solutions for it being proposed as examples.
The current proposals include 2 dominant "solutions": a government "option" and/or a "commission" to establish some form of universal standards for providing health care. Neither of these proposals address what is wrong with our current health care system; such as the outrageous costs of malpractice insurance for doctors and what is termed "preventative" care or medicine. These are just 2 of many things which are responsible for the escalating costs of health care and insurance in our country, and 2 things which no plan currently in front of Congress (that I know of) addresses.
Sure, a current plan does away with insurance companies from declaring people ineligible for preexisting conditions, but it took the nation as a whole to scream about the first bill (known as Obamacare) not covering this very relevant and poor practice on the part of our health insurers. Regardless, demanding that insurers can deny coverage for preexisting conditions and creating a "government health insurance option" will do nothing to control the increasing costs of health care.

In these "solutions" for health care can be easily seen lacking the 2 questions of Why? and How?

If it had been asked, "Why does health care in our country cost so much?"; and the correlary, "Why is the cost of health insurance rising disproportionately to wages and inflation?", real explanations would have been found which would not have included either of the 2 primary "options" for "fixing" this "crisis" that are currently before our Congress.
Further, after asking Why?, our Congressional leaders would have then been able to ask to ask How do we fix it? and would have been able to find concrete solutions to the problems they found once they asked "why'"?

These 2 questions shouldn't just be limited to the current health care debate-they need to be asked of all issues we face, and yet they are not-particularly by those who are on the side of "liberalism". This is obvious to me because if you ask these 2 questions of every issue, they lead to the where the problem originate's, and therefore lead to solutions that fix the problem at its root causes-not in solutions which simply brush over the cause by giving "hand outs" after the effects of the cause have been felt.

Before we can solve anything, we must ask "Why"; that will lead us to "How"; which will lead us to the best solutions for all our country's problems. This is why, I believe, our Federal Government, in particular, always fails to provide any sustainable solutions to our nations problems.
I can only hope that one day this changes, and our national Congressional leaders learn to ask these 2 most important questions of every issue, but given the current political climate and social divisions within our country today, it's hard to see when that day may come.

Is Obama driving a wedge between American's?

2009-10-15T22:10:00.000-04:00

This is a question that may shock some-after all Barack Obama has only been our President for 9 months. But given all that has taken place with Tea Party’s, demonstrations at Town Hall meetings, and other “counter” movements to Obama seemingly starting every day, it is one that begs to already be asked: is Obama dividing our nation? Perhaps, even, irreparably?

For many, this is an absolutely ludicrous question to ask of a president whose predecessor was one of the most hated in our history. But an argument could be made the George Bush brought us together as one as a president has never before: early in his first term he did it through the patriotism we all felt following the 9/11 attacks; and from the midway point of his 2^nd term on, he did so through the universal hate and anger we all felt towards a man whose politics and cronyism had made us the global “bad guy”-hated by nearly every nation on Earth.

But, this isn’t about any defense of what George Bush did-there is no defense for him-no this is about Obama, and what he is doing to us now.

Obama’s policies are, without question, Socialist; and to all American’s who have awoken to this, Socialism is not what America represents. And, despite what Liberals and Democrats would like to have the global community think, Socialism is not an ideology supported by most American’s.

The proof of this can be found in Obama’s and Congress’s approval ratings since Obama was elected.

Two weeks after Obama was elected he enjoyed as high as a 76% approval rating in a CNN poll, and Congress a 39% approval rating in a Fox News poll.

Eight and a half months later? Fox News’ most recent poll has Obama’s approval at 49%-the lowest it has been since his election; and Congress? The same day Obama got his lowest approval rating, so did they, with a pathetic 24% of American’s approving of how our Congressional leaders are conducting their jobs.

(The Congressional approval rating is just as important as Obama’s because Congress is currently controlled by the same party that Obama is from, and, as President, Obama is that parties unanimous leader so long as he remains president).

Needless to say, most American’s are not happy-and I am one of them.

We are not happy that Obama has socialized 2 of America’s Big 3 auto’s; we are not happy that as part of his health care reform he is trying to force a government option on us (therefore attempting to Socialize that industry); we are not happy that he has pandered to our enemies and refuses to help the U.N. enforce sanctions against North Korea and Iran; we are unhappy that he is not keeping his word in Afghanistan, and seems ready to allow it to become another “Vietnam”; we are unhappy that he is saddling our children, our children’s children, and their children, with $100’s of thousands of debt each before they are born; we are unhappy that he was awarded something (the Nobel Peace prize) without earning it; we are unhappy that he seems to be tearing apart all that was once great about America and that there are nearly 50% of us out there gullible enough to buy into his rhetoric.

Obama ran on a platform of “Change you can believe in”, but for many of those who voted for him, the platform wasn’t supposed to start with the destruction of all that was American first; that platform wasn’t believed to be capable of dividing America so decisively that people who have never voted before, much less attended at town hall style meeting, appeared at Town Hall meetings all over America to get into the faces of their representatives and demand that they stop Socializing American industries. And, as I see it his ideologies, and his policies, are driving a wedge between all Americans: on one side are those who still believe in the traditional American values of hard work, self reliance and responsibility, and a small Federal Government; and on the other are those who want the easy way out-the way of Big Government intervention and control, the way of a Universal Equality that can only be achieved by Government controls and Dictatorship.

I know which side I stand on, do you?

No "peace" in this years Nobel prize winner

2009-10-12T20:50:00.000-04:00

The whole world was shocked last Friday when President Obama was chosen as this year’s Nobel Peace prize winner. Globally the response was overwhelmingly negative in the sense that people failed to understand what he had done exactly to earn the reward. Here in the United States the response was also mostly negative, both for the aforementioned reason and because Obama’s policies and ideologies are seen as being extreme on the “socialistic” side of things.

In explaining the decision, the Nobel Committee which awards the prize said that Obama received the award for what he “represents” and for what his policies could lead too in terms of future world peace. To those of us who believed that the award had to be earned, we also learned that there was president for winning the award without actually earning it or having any relating accomplishments…

As a result of Obama’s “winning” the Nobel peace prize, we have learned 2 important things about the Nobel’s: first, that you don’t have to actually do anything to win one and secondly, if this is how they are going to be awarded they have no meaning what so ever.

It is a thorough joke that Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace prize, and the reasoning of the Nobel commission doesn’t fly on me. Barack Obama’s ideologies are not avenues for peace. His ideologies are based on socialistic tendencies which history has proven to us to be “anti” peace. Socialism breeds both corruption and envy, which inevitably leads to conflict and class warfare. Take a look at the history of any society on our planet which was purely socialistic and these truths become evident.

Obama’s ideologies stand for peace? Hardly, and if more proof is needed, look no further than America where we have become more divided than ever before.

The illiterate U.S. Congress

2009-10-08T18:35:00.000-04:00

In case you missed it last week, a few stories made news stations which told what many American’s already knew-that members of Congress do not read the legislation they are attempting to make into law.

Where this sudden “enlightenment”, last week, about members of Congress not actually reading the bills they are supposed to sign into law came from I don’t know, but it can perhaps be traced back to an interview conducted last Friday with Senator Thomas Carper, a Democrat out of Delaware.

In this interview, Carper states that, in commission, bills are written in “plain English” (i.e. laymen’s terms), but when they come up for vote they are written in “legislative language. Amongst his many comments while discussing what is apparently health care legislation, he goes on to say that he understood little to nothing of the verbiage of the bill as it was written for law, and believes that no one else could understand it either. He also implies that he doesn’t believe anyone who says they can understand these bills-as they are written before Congress-is lying to themselves and anyone who asks them directly. In case you don’t believe me, you can find the portion of the interview which I reference here: http://michellemalkin.com/2009/10/02/democrat-sen-tom-carper-read-the-bill-are-you-kidding-me/.

Of course, this begs me to ask a lot of questions such as Why are our members of Congress not able understand “legislative language”? Isn’t this the job we have hired them for?; and How do they expect anyone to be able to obey, follow and enforce a law which they themselves do not understand?; or If legislative language is so hard to understand, why are bills written in it to begin with?

Further, if our Congress is writing legislation in a manner which they can’t understand themselves, then isn’t it a natural assumption that these people aren’t qualified to do the job we have hired them for and, even more importantly, fail to understand the job which they are supposed to do?; and Why aren’t they simply written in the “plain English” under which they are originally written in while in committee?

(This last question could possibly be answered by saying “it’s for legal purposes and enforcement”, to which I would say bull shit: If there is a law that says “you can’t pee on the side of a public building”, there are no legal or enforcement justifications for why those 10 simple words are rewritten into 30 confusing ones for the adoption of the law. In fact, the only reason I can think of is that legislatures intentionally write these laws so that the vast majority of people cannot understand them. Why this would be, I can only suppose and form conjecture on, but seeing as how there is no other logical reason for our national, state and local laws to be written in such a confusing manner, I am left with no other explanation than that it is done intentionally so that government corruption can always exist in a manner which is hard at best, and impossible at worst, to discover and eliminate).

Of all the questions I could pose, the most troubling to me is assumption to be drawn about our elected officials’ ability to do their job. It’s a serious assumption that deserves to be addressed: if Congress doesn’t even understand these bills as they are written, how can we assume that they even understand the basic requirements of their job?

One thing that must be clarified is that this isn’t restricted to just those members of Congress who are Democrats; it is obvious that Republicans (and the lone Independent) have this problem too-otherwise, why would we have proposed legislation like H.R. 3200 (i.e. Obamacare) proposed by John Dingle of Michigan make it out of a bipartisan committee?

As it just so happens, unlike most-including, apparently, our members of Congress-I can understand “legislative language”, this of course doesn’t help those who can’t because even in the effort of explaining these pieces of legislation to people, important aspects of them are lost; and despite those earlier posed questions this all leads to the most important ones of all: How is it that we, the American public, the ones who are supposed to live and conform to these various laws and legislative members; how is it that we have not only allowed ourselves to elect Representatives and Senators who fail to understand the laws they have written but also allowed so many of them to stay in office for so many years?

Logic vs. Common Sense

2009-10-06T17:04:00.000-04:00

Logic[1]: 1. the scientific study of the principles of reasoning, especially of the method and validity of deductive reasoning; 2. valid reasoning; 3. A particular system or method of reasoning.

Common Sense[2]: beliefs that people in common would agree on; that which they "sense" as their common natural understanding and used to refer to beliefs or proposition that most people would consider “prudent” and “of sound judgment” without relying on knowledge relating to the object or topic in question, but based upon knowledge that can be seen as “common”.

Those who know me well know that much of the political and social philosophies I believe in are derived from conclusions I have reached through my use of logic. Throughout much of my life, when I have been asked about my use of logic to draw the political and social conclusions which I do, I have been challenged that “that’s just common sense”, to which I am forced to reply that, “if it is, then why isn’t (it) accepted as such?”.

To me, as a student of logic, the differences between logic and common sense are obvious, but as I learned recently from a friend they are seen as one and the same by most people. This same friend challenged me to explain the difference between the 2…He asked and so he shall receive. I hope the following helps himself and others learn to not only recognize the differences between the 2, but to understand just how much it takes to establish theories and solutions by one, and to simply use the other when it’s appropriate…

The definitions at the top of this discourse lay bare the basic difference between the 2: one requires education (of some kind), the other does not; however the differences go much deeper than just this simple difference.

In the case of Common Sense, it is both regional and cultural and many times can be based on a person’s field of mastery. For example, to the tribal huntsmen in Africa, it is “common sense” to never leave your home with out your preferred method of hunting or protection; in an industrialized nation with police forces to protect us (in general), it is common sense to never leave home with out a means of communication (as in your cell phone); to the parent whose child breaks their arm, it is common sense to first call your spouse (or your child’s other parent) before heading off to the hospital; to the doctor uncle who was watching over his nephew or niece, it would be common sense to first exam the arm before contacting their parents and headed off to the doctor.

In each of these examples, and any others I could come up with, the “common” theme to the reactions of each situations is what would be considered as being natural to the person or people involved: To someone who has drove a car for 10 or more years, its natural to check around you before proceeding with a turn; to the new driver on the road they have to remind themselves, or be reminded by others, to look before turning.

In the case of the Logic, there is little that is “natural” or “common”.

Logic is-as the book definition says-something of a science. It’s the deduction of a solution relative to the facts and knowledge at hand; it is a distinct process that requires conscience thought and effort. It’s use and application can be most easily defined and found in the mathematical formula’s many learn in algebra, geometry, calculus and the various sciences of physics and astronomy. (This is not to say that “learning” Logic makes one use it all the time, just that its use can be found there. Using and applying it to everyday and theoretical situations is another thing entirely).

In the above driver analogy Logic would tell both the experienced and inexperienced driver to look before turning because you can (as opposed to “may”) be hit by another car if you did not do so.

Like common sense, Logic is situational; unlike common sense, Logic can be applied to every situation-Common Sense is specific, Logic is not.

It can be said that there are components of common sense to logic, but most times, there is no “common sense” to logic. As example, the common sense of a drug dealer going to pick up his supply of drugs: it is common sense to be “packing” a weapon of some kind when doing so for protection; logic would say that you shouldn’t be a “drug dealer” to begin with because the potential risks are not worth the potential rewards.

There was a time when I really did believe that to be “logical” was “natural”, but as I have gotten older, I have learned that this is not the case at all. In fact, the ability to use logic, much less master it in any way, is a rather unique and rare gift: unique because most people lack the patience to think things through before acting; rare because, even those who know of logic-and/or are practiced in it use-fail to use it regularly.

Therefore, it can be said that perhaps the biggest difference between Common Sense and Logic isn’t the thought processes or knowledge involved, but the simplicity in acknowledging that one is “common” and the other is not.

[1] Take from Riverside Webster’s II Dictionary.

[2] Taken from Wikipedia and edited and paraphrased for content by myself.

Obama's first loss-but Rio does deserve it..

2009-10-02T14:55:00.000-04:00

It's most likely not His first, but i think it's His biggest loss so far-Obama not convincing the IOC that their host city should be Chicago for the 2012 games; so that Obama has a place to "celebrate (his) election" and, I'm sure, so that he can show the world "how far we've come" during his administration...Now i suppose if "you" agree with "his" idea of what the responsibilities of the Federal Government should be, then you want His policies in place, and because there are enough supporters of his opinion out there, he thought it was a slam dunk. Not so...Besides, Rio and South America finally have their chance and hopefully they will do it right.

Too bad for Obama...Guess he wasn't as popular overseas as everybody, including himself, thought he was. It will be interesting to see what his foreign policy towards Brazil will be like in the future, after what will probaly be an entertaining media "field day" that will get us no where and only seek to muddy the picture even more.
Unfortunately, lost in all of this will be Rio De Janiero, which, even based on my limited knowledge, deserves to have it's "day in the sun". What Beijing did for the '08 games was amazing-it literally changed a culture-with 5 times the population the Chinese are only just now learning about Capitalism, and then there is India, in some ways much farther along than China is.
Brazil, and South America are largely forgotten about.
Rio is one of the Worlds largest cities and has much in the way of culture to offer...But I digress...I'm gonna sit back and enjoy what I'm hoping will be an entertaining show.

It all starts with 1!

2009-09-28T16:13:00.000-04:00

For almost a decade now, it has been down right embarrassing to let it be known if you are a fan of the Detroit Lions. As one myself I haven't hid it, but I certainly haven't broadcast it-especially given there really hasn't been a reason too.
That isn't to say that just because the Lions finally ended their 19 game losing streak yesterday changes everything and you will not find me on street corners wearing signs and practicing new cheers for the team. No, it doesn't do any of that; but what it does do is show the signs of improvement that observers like myself have noticed in all 3 of their games this season: they don't give up like they used too as soon as their opponent scores; they are tougher up front on both sides of the ball despite their obvious lack of talent; from the looks of it, they do have that elusive franchise QB in Stafford-his improvement from game 1 to game 3 is blatant; for the first time since Barry was on the team, it looks as if they have a running game-so long as Kevin Smith can stay healthy; and it looks as if they have a core of young players on which to build around in Calvin Johnson, Kevin Smith, Gosder Cherilous, Brandon Pettigrew and of course Stafford, on offense, and on defense Louis Delmas, Jason Hunter-a suprise pick up off the waiver wire-and Sammie Hill (if he can stay healthy) give them something to build off of on that side of the ball.
They are still talent deficient relative to the rest of the league, but at least now you can't say they are the worst team in the NFL.
Regardless, the most important thing of all is that, after nearly 2 years of ineptitude, they finally won a game. Yes, its just one game, but you can't learn to run before you learn to walk can you? And for team veterans such as Dominic Raiola and Jeff Backus who have never had a winning season, last year was the culmination of 8 seasons of futility, during which the entire organization had forgotten how to win.
Does this one win change anything within the organization? Of course not, but for those changes to happen they have to start with that first win-which, for this years version of the Detroit Lions, came much sooner, rather than later and hopefully it is the precurser of things to come in the not so distant future.

Backhanded compliments for Obama

2009-09-24T12:26:00.000-04:00

I have to say that I was a little impressed with some comments made by Obama earlier this week before the general assembly of the U.N. in New York.
Obama actually had the balls to come out and say what many of those who stand against him belie;f; in sum he said that other nations needed to learn to take more responsibility and control over their own problems and to stop relying and expecting help from the U.S. for them.
I say this only impressed me a "little" because if it had come from any other President before GWB I would have did back flips of joy and screamed from the roof tops; but, after hearing the way in which Mr. Obama said these things, andd given his blatant socialistic tendancies, it makes me wonder...
If you have ever studied philosophy and/or economic and political theories, then you may know that history has proven that to enforce socialism and socistic policies a dictatorship is necessary; and
if you listen closely to the way in which Mr. Obama says these things to the U.N. general assembly you can hear the dictator in him come out.
It's the way in which he emphasizes his words-he emphasizes the "us" in his statements and not the "them"; he emphasizes the "effect" and not the "cause". Now, perhaps this is just my own perceptions relative to our current president-after all it is no secret that I am, to put it mildly, suspicious and critical of his policies-but instead of being able to praise him for a well spoken, and much needed to be said, point before the U.N., I am forced to wonder if we are finally starting to see the dictator in Obama coming out.
Whether we are seeing this side of him or not, only time will tell. For now I will guardedly give Obama a high five and a job well done for standing up to the beggers of the U.N.

A bright light at the end of the Lions dark tunnel

2009-09-21T11:25:00.000-04:00

As anyone who reads me regularly knows, I am from metro Detroit and am, unabashedly, a sports homer relative to most of the pro sports teams native to that area...

For the last decade it's been embarrassing to be considered a Lions fan, but, what can I say, I am. But I was really going to give up on the team this year and not pay much attention to them when they decided to start their rookie QB over Dante Culpepper, but it was just enough to get me to at least watch their first couple of games this year-which I have actually done.
Unlike most people who watched Drew Brees and slice and dice their defense in week 1, I didn't see it so much as a bad performance by the Lions. I saw it more as the performances of 2 teams who shouldn't be on the field together at the same time. The Lions are in more than a "rebuilding" phase, and the Saints could be the best team in Football this year in my opinion. But after that game I saw one major positive out of the Lions: they were aggressive on both sides of the ball to the bitter end (unlike years past when they just simply gave up after the first 10 minutes). And after yesterday's loss at home to the Vikings, I took that same positive (and others) away from the Lions performance that makes me think that we Lions fans really do have something to look forward too in the near future with this current coaching staff and a couple of key players-assuming they can keep them on the team for more than a couple of years.
But, what I see that I like more than anything else out of the Lions is the apparent plan out of the coaching staff. During yesterday's loss it was obvious to me the plan that the coaching staff has in place to make the Lions better.
If you watched the Lions first 2 games as I did, it was obvious that the Lions biggest problems weren't scheme's, play calling, or toughness (as it was in years past)-it was talent. Plan and simple talent. Despite all of those top 10, first round picks over the last decade, the Lions are devoid of any real talent. Fortunately they have drafted some good offensive players the last 4 years, but on defense and up front on both sides of the ball they are just talentless. To that end I think I see was Coach Jim Schwartz's plan is.
Simply put, the focus appears to be to just get better.
The logic makes sense to me: if you focus on getting better each and every week wins will come; but if all you do is focus on winning each game as it comes, then you have no guarantees of taking anything positive away from even a bad outcome.
There is a saying that says practice can only get so good at something through practice and to really excel at it, you have to be doing it when it really counts.
To me, yesterdays game against the Vikings proves all of this to me.
For the first 30 minutes of football, the Lions not only hung with the Vikings (by many considered to be Superbowl contenders this year), but the Lions were actually dominating them-especially in the running game which was the obvious focus on offense for the Lions throughout the game despite the score. The 2nd half ended up being a different story of course, but Schwartz conceded it to the Vikings, instead preferring to stick to "getting better" at one aspect of the game-the running game. This was obvious to me because despite falling 14 points behind Minnesota during the forth quarter Schwartz kept pounding the rock even though it wasn't producing any big plays.
Further evidence can be found in the play calling-rounghly 3/4ths of which were running plays.
It was also very obvious that Schwartz had a much more limited passing game installed for Stafford after his 3 interception performance in week one. The limited play book for the passing game didn't help Stafford much-he still threw 2 picks-but the obvious focus on the running game on both sides of the ball was worth the effort I think.
For the Lions part, Kevin Smith rushed well against one of the better run defenses in the league and the Lions D held the leagues best runner in Adrian Peterson to under 100 yards, although he still found the end zone against them. The defense also showed its toughness throughout the contest and perhaps saw the emergence of a couple of players in Manuel and a DE by the name of Hunter whose name was called way to often in the first half of the game to not get noticed by opposing offensive coordinators in upcoming contests.
As far as their rookie QB is concerned I still think they should have kept him on the bench until after the bye week, but now that I have discerned exactly what Schwartz's plan is I say leave him in there. He obviously has the talent, but he needs to experience what he is experiencing now-the bad throws leading to the interceptions-to get better (this also will force the defense to get better which, if you noticed on Sunday, they will because it falls on them to keep those turnovers, which will happen, from becoming points). At some point-probably week 4 or 5-Schwartz will put the offensive focus on the passing game as far as what to work on for the week; but football is a complicated game, and with the serious lack of talent which it is now obvious that the Lions have (not), Schwartz is going to have to take his time rebuilding this team-picking one aspect of the team each week to work on and get better at and it will probably depend on the type of opponent the Lions are facing as it relates to what that focus will be on.
That all said, what do I think I have learned about the Lions after only 2 games? That there is, without question, a light at the end of their very long and dark tunnel. In fact, I think that light is very bright and we will have an idea of how bright that light will be during the 2nd half of the season.
For now, we Lions fans must learn to watch each game for what it is: work towards an end product that will be better.

U of M thrashes WMU 31-7

2009-09-05T19:51:00.000-04:00

AHHHH…All is well in Wolverine territory-at least for the next week anyways.

After a rough week during which several “unnamed” players tried to call out 2^nd year Michigan Football head coach Rich Rodriguez for disobeying NCAA rules concerning practice time, the Wolverines needed a win-especially given the fact that they were coming off the worst year in school history.

Not only did they need a win, but they needed a convincing one at that-especially over an opponent as historically inferior as today’s-Western Michigan.

Low and behold, that is exactly what they delivered-a convincing thrashing of an inferior opponent.

I have to admit-after last year’s pathetic 3-9 campaign; I was a bit worried about the Michigan Football program. I know enough to have recognized that Rodriguez didn’t have the type of players he wanted for the type of system which he likes to run, but to see the pathetic effort that was put forth on the field last year during the few games I was able to watch (I live in Florida now) well, needless to say, I had my doubts, but at least I know that the program won’t be a complete disaster for the duration of Rodriguez’s tenure-speaking of which, he probably saved his job today.

Don’t think I’m gullible-I know this is just one game, and it was against an inferior opponent. But the dominance displayed on both sides of the ball by the Wolverines was reminiscent of years gone by, and, even though “Rich Rod” wasn’t the traditional type of coach that Wolverines fans were used too, we can now see why he was hired…

Go Blue!!

Why all the fuss for Obama's plans on "addressing" the kids?

2009-09-05T18:49:00.000-04:00

It was announced last week that Mr. Obama was going to “address” our country’s school children on closed circuit television this Tuesday-a move that naturally got all Conservatives and Republican’s up in arms. They, Republicans and Conservatives, are saying this is an attempt by Mr. Obama to “indoctrinate our nation’s youth to his socialistic policies”.

And, not surprising, Liberals are asking why? Why all the fuss? Presidents have spent time in class rooms for decades now-it’s a Presidential tradition?

Personally, as non partisan observer, I find it very obvious why there is so much controversy amongst certain segments of our society about Mr. Obama’s desire to speak directly to our youth.

For one, I can’t recall one any other president in my lifetime who spoke to all of the nation’s youth privately, for no other reason than to simply speak to them. George Bush addressed our nation’s youth in 1991, but his speech was broadcast live on CNN, PBS and other national cable and local stations. According to last weeks press release announcing this event, Mr. Obama’s address will be on “closed circuit” television-i.e. only available in schools and in those classrooms who wish to turn their TV’s on at the time of his speech.

Secondly, after all of the very socialistic policy making on the part of Obama’s administration during the first 8 months of his tenure, many people, regardless of party affiliation, are rather leery of Mr. Obama’s intentions, and for a number of reasons: Why address the nation’s youth now and for what purpose?

If’s it’s a speech as innocuous as the White House claims it will be about (staying in school, getting good grades, etc), then why make this speech on closed circuit TV, in school, and away from the influence of their parents? And if that is his message, wouldn’t it be better served as part of a national advertising campaign for one of the multitude of national organizations whose purpose it is to help kids stay in school?

These questions aren’t controversial, they are legitimate question’s to ask-particularly of a “president” whose policies, in less than his first year in office, have strayed farther from the intentions of our Constitution than any other holder of his office.

Many people are scared-and rightfully so-that Mr. Obama is openly attempting to prepare some sort of radical socialistic transformation of our Nation, and, in preparation for it, he must speak directly to our children on this, and on the importance of “staying in school”.

Don’t get me wrong, staying in school very important. In fact, it is one of the few ways to defeat socialism-not just staying in school, but staying in school, doing well while you are there, and then going on to college to secure your future.

So, if this is all there is to his message, and his intentions are only as innocuous as the White House claims, then Mr. President, why say so on closed circuit TV, away from the parents who can enforce the message, and, even worse, within the confines of one of the most socialistic institutions in our country-the nations public school system?

I could go on and on with questions about why he is doing this, and that, is specifically the point that people are making. Fortunately, Mr. Obama isn’t able to “force” all school kids to watch this “address”, however, the point that he is even desirous of addressing our children, away from the influence of their parents, is a scary thought-just another in a series of actions and statements by this president which make those of us who still possess the capacity to think freely wonder exactly what his intentions are for our nation.

As seen through my eyes: American Culture

2009-09-01T15:44:00.000-04:00

I have noticed it for some time: the degradation of American society.

Over the last 20 years or so this degradation has showed itself every few months. Events like the Columbine shootings in 1999, the Virginia Tech campus shootings in 2007, the Branch Davidian Cult massacre in 1993, and the Northern Illinois University shooting in 2008 are just a few of the mass murders which have garnered national and international headlines by our country over the last 2 decades.

This year, in particular, there seems to be many mass murders, shootings and uniquely violent events, and this weekend the mass murder of 8 people in south Georgia and the discovery of missing person Jaycee Dugard in California who was missing for 18 years have lead me to ask once again: what is happening to our society?

Why is American culture crumbling around us?

With this past weekend’s events fresh in my mind I have chosen to post something which I wrote some months ago when dwelling on the “state of American culture” today...

There was a time not too long ago when it was easy to identify exactly what encompassed American culture. A time when other cultures wanted to be just like ours: hard working, free, democratic and full of accomplishments. But, in less than 50 years, what was once the envy of the world has become a relative laughingstock on the global stage.

Crime and corruption across all professions, socio-economic and ethnic boundaries lead our national newscasts, while a generation of suer’s and suees point fingers and attempt to place blame on others for actions which they refuse to take responsibility for and for which our Federal Government says they shouldn’t have too.

The ideology of political correctness is being forced down our throats and is segmenting our once great society. No long are we all “American’s”, part of the once great melting pot that was our society. No, now we all have to be “African” Americans, “Mexican” Americans, “Asian” Americans, or some other of a countless hyphenated, watered down version of an American.

Along with the loss of domestic cultural identity, this period of being “PC” has brought with it an unsurprising lack of international cultural feats.

The last great national cultural accomplishment that America and lay claim too which had global significance was that of landing a man on the moon in 1969. Since that time we have done nothing else culturally while nations such as China, Japan, Brazil and all of Europe (to name a few) have produced cultural and technical feats with a global impact; and all the while, we in America can’t even unite well enough to decide how and what to replace the fallen World Trade Center towers with so as to help wash away the scars of 9/11.

Even worse are the things today which are said to define American Culture: American Idol-the “reality” TV show with its back landed slap in the face via the fact that more people cast a vote for its winner than in our presidential elections; our economy, which thanks to American Corporate greed, helped lead the global recession; and our sports leagues and organizations which, no matter how hard they try, cannot seem to get rid of the specter’s of cheating and crime that permeate through them.

American Culture? Where it is I sure don’t see it.

Sure, ethnic groups have their own sub cultures, but the largest of these-the “African” American’s-is so narrow minded that it fails to see its own self destructive nature.

If there is an American Culture left somewhere that would make me stand up and be proud to be American again then somebody please let me know because, as an American, I am tired of hanging my head in shame to be called an American over the embarrassment at what my once great country as has become.

Controversy at Big Blue? I think not!

2009-09-01T15:20:00.000-04:00

It just so happened that I was up in Michigan this past weekend when the story about possible NCAA rules violations concerning the amount of practice time which student athletes for the Michigan Wolverine Football program participate in. It came out that, supposedly, 2^nd year coach Rich Rodriquez was making players practice or show up to watch film more than the 20 hours that the NCAA allows programs to assign per week…I have to echo the words of many on this issue: you’re kidding right? This is a joke, right?

The program has it’s worst year ever last year and a couple of pussified players who didn’t make the team last year (one of them is a transfer to a school on the west coast this year) come out crying like little bitches about how Rich Rod is “working us too hard-beyond what the N-C-A-A would allowwww”.

This kind of shit pisses me off-it’s just so pathetic that it infuriates me.

Anyone who knows anything about sports-at any level-knows that to make “the team” you have to put in extra effort. Now, because of NCAA rules no student athlete can practice more than the aforementioned 20 hours per week, so programs have “voluntary practices” and video sessions which athletes may, or may not, participate in. Of course, if you want to make the team, or be a starter on the team, you are going to participate in as many of these voluntary activities as possible. I

Only losers who don’t care, or whiny little bitches like those who are causing trouble for Big Blue, would not participate in these extra activities-they are a part of life for the student athlete who wishes to make the team and a necessity for those student athletes who want to start for their team.

Unfortunately, U of M is now going to be investigated by the NCAA-causing unnecessary grief and stress for a program that needs to focus on getting better and winning football games and not on the “controversy” which now surrounds it…Controversy my ass…This reeks of “whinyness” and the cry baby attitude of those who weren’t good enough or who didn’t possess the determination and willingness it took/takes to be a winner. I hope that the NCAA see’s what all of us outsiders see-that this is a farce and a waste of time to “investigate”.

On the passing of Ted Kennedy

2009-09-01T15:17:00.000-04:00

NOTE: Originally written on August 28^th but a combination of computer issues and a vacation prevented me from posting it appropriately. My apologies…

I admittedly did not know very much about “Teddy” Kennedy and what I knew of the man I didn’t like very much, but, in his death I have to ask: What did he do that was so great?

I know that he was considered a leader of the modern Liberal ideology, but what is that doing for us? Destroying our society by breeding generation after generation of Americans to depend on the Federal Government to “take care of them” as opposed to learning to think and produce for themselves.

I know he was considered a “champion” of the poor, but how many did he help? As far as I could tell, Ted Kennedy helped create not one policy which improved the overall status of the “poor” in our country. Oh sure, he increased the size of their entitlements, but nowhere do I see one thing that he did which really helped the poor to not be poor anymore. In fact, I would say he helped to make it easier to STAY poor-if anything at all.

Further, I know of no policies for which his backing allowed for a “bridge” between our 2 dominant political parties so as to pass important Legislation, so, needless to say, to me Ted Kennedy was far from “great”.

I am, of course, no fan of Liberalism, and so it should come as no surprise to anyone that I am so critical of Ted Kennedy but, I am impartial as it comes to critiquing the individual accomplishments of people and their relevant importance to others and with Ted Kennedy I just don’t see it. Personally, all that I saw in Ted Kennedy was a man who despised the success and achievements of anyone outside of himself, his friends and his family and a man who seemed willing and wanting to go to any length necessary to prevent people of becoming independently successful-just so long as it didn’t cost him or the “poor” anything.

In fact, I don’t see why the entire Kennedy family is so “well liked” at all-especially if you look at their history.

To a person, every prominent male member of the Kennedy family had controversy.

We all know of JFK’s “supposed” infidelities and his cut throat, take no prisoners attitude towards politics, and then there were Robert’s borderline criminal pursuits of the Mafia which eventually lead to his murder. As for Ted himself, he suffered from his own controversies in the 1970’s which ruined his presidential bid of that time and “delayed” his rise through the political ranks until the later half of the 1980’s. We also know that the family has a whole were/are some of the best at working the closed door political scene that we have ever had in our country-willing to do whatever is necessary to pass legislation which they deem necessary, whether its needed or not.

When viewed openly, the Kennedy family appears to be some of the more corrupt people in the country and not the “champions” of righteous they are seemingly held up as.

I digress…I know that it’s not fair to talk about those who have long since past by us, but Ted was a Kennedy after all, and he sure lived up to all that his namesake meant, and it is my opinion that we-those of us who seek to strive for the betterment of ourselves and our society through our hard work-should be glad that we are rid of him.

Health Insurance: Privilege or Right?

2009-08-24T09:45:00.000-04:00

Another of the arguments by proponents[1] for a Federally subsidized health care “option” is that health insurance is a right. This position forces me to question what exactly what is a “privilege” and what is a “right”.

Without pulling out Miriam Websters, a right is a universally accepted morality which all citizens of a particular society are in agreement of being entitled too.

A privilege is anything that can be afforded which is not a necessity and which is considered beyond the income of those who make the median income of those within a given country.

I don’t think anyone would argue that providing health care is a moral virtue on the order of a right, which any society should practice and provide. And it just so happens that in America we do, in fact, provide health care-free of charge if necessary-to any who need it. But the idea that insurance, of any kind, is a right, I have to question.

This time quoting Websters, the definition which applies is “a protective or compensatory measure”.

Traditionally, insurances-whether they be for a car, a life, a home or a body- have been considered luxuries. When “health” insurance was popularized by the unionization of American workers in the early 20^th century it was seen as another great accomplishment of American society reflective of America’s overall wealth relative to the rest of the world, in that jobs were so plentiful, and paid so well, that workers and employers could “afford” health insurance. And even though most, if not all, American workers had health insurance throughout most of the 20^th century. The fact that Americans, as individuals, could afford the luxury of health insurance for most of the 20^th century became lost out of a laissez faire attitude towards our collective health being insured because it was “guaranteed” via full time employment.

And so now we have a political movement afoot to provide a governmentally subsidized health care plan, through which all Americans will have health insurance, and one of the arguments used by supporters of this idea is that health insurance is a right.

If all American’s were to agree that health insurance is a right, then there would need to be a universal concurrence of opinion as to what that right should entail: how much coverage do we all deserve and what quality of basic services are we entitled too. But more so, if we were to all agree that health insurance is a right, and no longer a privilege, then we would be compelled to also agree on what level of “health” we should all strive for.

Knowing that those who are obese and whom smoke cigarettes and who drink too much alcohol have more health expenses-particularly when they get older-would have to be addressed as a nation. The costs of these behaviors being so high as it relates to our health, there would be a need to regulate them to some degree, if for no other reason than to control costs.

A further concern is that in America our rights are guaranteed by law within our Constitution. Therefore, if we were to deem it necessary for health insurance to be considered a right, to guarantee that right an amendment to our Constitution would be required for its maintenance.

Under these criteria, how could we as a nation ever expect to classify health insurance as a right?

The fact of the matter is, health insurance has never been, and never should be, a right. Health insurance has always been a privilege-a privilege traditionally reserved for the wealthy who could afford to “insure” things against loss or damage, for those who could afford to take risks with things-including their health. Our health has never been guaranteed-not from day one and certainly not when measured against the lifestyle decisions most make through out the course of their lives. Based on these realities it is a wonder how so many people can believe that they have a right to health insurance.

[1] I have been told that I should stop referring to those who support the current health care reform option as “lefties” or liberals for a multitude of reasons. Needless to say, based on journalistic integrity alone (I am a professional writer after all) I should not be so biased or derogatory towards proponents of a federally subsidized health care plan.

On death panels and "exchanges"

2009-08-23T21:34:00.000-04:00

It was with much self restraint that I had to take a break from putting in words my thoughts on H.R. 3200-the bill on health care currently in Congress commonly known as Obama-care.

My lack of words on the subject, however, didn’t keep me from paying attention to what specifics of the bill were being discussed in the media and at various town hall meetings nationwide. Particularly, I took note of Mr. Obama’s appearance on the Michael Smerconish radio show this past Thursday. Obama’s appearance was in an effort to “woo right wing” thinkers to his health care plan. Unfortunately, despite his party affiliation, Smerconish is an Obama supporter and therefore failed to press our President about specifics of the bill and screened callers-in so that most of the hard questions were filtered out before they could be posed.

Regardless, there were 2 aspects about Obama-care which dominated the press this last week: the idea of “death panels” being a part of the bill, and that H.R. 3200 will make the Health Insurance marketplace more competitive through the creation of its “exchange”.

Personally, I find it funny that so many people think that there are “death panels” in this bill. No where in the bill does it define such a thing as a “death panel”. The supposition is drawn from language in the bill which provides for “end of life counseling”. Much of the language for this so called counseling is vague, and can be easily misunderstood to mean that the Fed wants to “guide you into the after life”. Although I wouldn’t put it past the Liberals and Democrats to have the intentions of having actual death panels so has to dictate how and when we can die, I don’t think that, today at least, they are brazen enough to try so-perhaps in the future, but not today at least.

The “Exchange Commission” created by H.R. 3200 is another matter entirely.

I listened all week long as Obama tried to tell people that this aspect of the bill will not effect whether or not we will be able to keep our current doctors, insurance providers, etc and that it will provide “competition in the marketplace”. Mr. Obama sounded really good saying all this and, for about 2 seconds he even had me believing what he had to say was true, until I remembered what that portion of the bill says.

Sections 141-144 of the bill deal with the creation of this so called Exchange and the duties of its Commissioner, but it is within section 142 to which Mr. Obama’s belief that this bill will provide “competition in the marketplace” becomes an out right lie.

Section 142: Duties Authorities of the Commissioner; Part (b) titled Promoting Accountability, subpart (2) Compliance Explanation and Audits (a) says that “in general the commissioner shall, in coordination with States, conduct audits of qualified health benefits plan compliance with Federal requirements. Such audits may include random compliance audits and targeted audits in response to complaints or other suspected non-compliance.”

This can all be taken a couple of ways, but the inclusion of the words “qualified health benefits plan compliance with Federal reguirements”, at the very least, implies that some health insurance plans may not qualify. If this is so, then how does said exchange provide for more competition in the marketplace if it is going to exclude some of that competition?

Needless to say, Mr. Obama’s definition of “providing for a more competitive marketplace” as it relates to our health insurance options falls on shaky ground, which leads me to ask-why? Why, if it is Mr. Obama’s desire to make the health insurance marketplace more competitive, would he support a commission which would effect regulations (i.e. impose restrictions) into said exchange? Logically this makes no sense owing to the fact that any such bodies which impose regulations on their membership become exclusive, thereby leading to easy collusion, or actually limiting the competition-which I believe is exactly what Mr. Obama is after.

As we all know, Mr. Obama is vastly quoted as saying that he would not support any health care reform if it didn’t eventually lead to a single payer system-which is exactly what this exchange is designed to do.

You gotta be kidding me-Favre returns for another year?!

2009-08-19T15:30:00.000-04:00

When I first heard it yesterday, I couldn’t really believe what I was seeing and hearing: Brett Favre returning to play for, of all teams, the Minnesota Vi-queens?!!!!

But, yup, it’s true, Brett Favre is back…

ESPN must have thought many people wouldn’t believe it because they even had footage of him getting off the plane in Minnesota and being met by representatives of the Vi-queens at the airport.

This is a bad move-for all involved. Not only does this continue to tarnish Favre’s legacy and make him look greedy as all sin (he is getting $12 mill this year with an option for another $13 mill next year if he should resign), but it also makes the Vi-queens look desperate beyond all measures. Further, what sort of sign does this give not just the other 2 QB’s on this team who thought they were competing for the starting job, but to the rest of the team who had been fed a daily dose of “Favre coming” to their team “wasn’t going to happen”, and it’s “all about integrity and honesty”? After all of this, Favre coming to the Vi-queens just completely shoots down any credibility the coaching staff had built up with that team-regardless of whether they go far in the playoffs or not.

Of course, that is why the Vi-queens did this-they believed they were just one person away from getting too, and winning, the Superbowl-which is laughable in my opinion. There is a reason why in Football they say “Any given Sunday”, and that isn’t going to change just because the Vi-queens went out and got an over the hill quarterback who needs to stay retired…

Brett, what are you doing? Why won’t you stay retired? You are ruining a legacy which you spent 16 years building in Green Bay, and all for what? One more shot at glory? One more big pay day? As if you need either of those. You already had a ring plus another trip to the big dance and, until all this, you had one of the best reputations in all of professional sports. I’m not even a “packer backer”, in fact I’m a Detroit fan, and as such I’m supposed to hate you on principle, but how could I not at the very least respect you for all you have accomplished and the way in which you accomplished all that you did? But now, now you are just another washed up, over the hill, greedy athlete to me, who refuses to hang up the cleats and move on in life. How sad…

The imminent death of Obamacare leaves some questions to be answered

2009-08-17T18:38:00.000-04:00

Apparently the message has gotten through loud and clear to the Obama administration that we, the average people of America, don’t want the Federal Government butting it’s Pinocchio like nose into our health care via a federally subsidized health insurance “option”. In case you missed it, it was first announced yesterday by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, and then reported as breaking news on all the cable news stations, that the “public option” of H.R. 3200 (commonly called Obamacare) was “not essential to health care reform”. This announcement (and his words that “the public option is just a sliver of the proposed health care reform”) was cheered by those of us who vociferously spoke against H.R. 3200, means that Mr. Obama finally gets it that most American’s want no part of federally subsidized health care. And is saying this, H.R. 3200 is all but dead and maybe Mr. Obama will give up on trying to force his version of health care upon us-for now anyways.

But this backing off of what was obviously bad legislation leads me to ask why?

Why propose this bill at all if the so called public option wasn’t “necessary to the importance of passing health care reform”?

If it wasn’t necessary to passing health care reform then why was it so prominently displayed in H.R. 3200 that it comprised most of the bill’s 1000 plus pages?

And if it was so irrelevant why were the various aspects of this “public option” the ones put forth to Americans as the evidence of what the Obama administration viewed as “reform” of the health care industry?...

We most likely will never get any answers to these questions because A) no matter how much Obama claims he wants “transparency” during his presidency we know better than to expect 100% of it and B) because those journalists who cover the White House and the Obama administration for the large news organizations are too big of pussies to ask the hard questions and really confront our Congressional leaders when they try to pass such blatantly subversive legislation on the American people.

I digress...Obamacare isn’t completely dead yet, but it sure looks to be headed that way quickly. My hope is that many of us learned a lesson out of this which I have known for most of my life: that it is up to us, the public, to keep watch over what our elected officials are doing because if we hadn’t of done so in this case, and then spoke out by the 100’s of thousands against it, just think what could have been?

Tiger Woods: Human after all.

2009-08-17T00:07:00.000-04:00

There is a part in all of us which loves perfection, and it is that part of us which I believe draws everyone-golf fans or not-to watch Tiger Woods.

Of course it’s not just Tiger’s talent on the golf course which draws us to him but also the quiet way in which he goes about his life and manages to stay out of the public eye without things such as drunken nights at a strip club or shooting himself in the leg with an illegally registered gun drawing unnecessary, and negative, publicity to himself.

That all said, those who watched this weekends PGA Championship saw history as it relates to Tiger Woods. For the first time, we saw that Tiger is human.

14 times prior, in the professional golf tournaments known as majors, we witnessed Woods carry a 54 hole lead on to a win after 72 holes. This constant level of perfection and the countless amazing shots we have seen him make at the highest levels of competition in his chosen profession is what enabled us all to view Tiger as a godlike figure on the golf course-perfect and indestructible when in the lead. This past Sunday was the 15^th time that Tiger was in such a situation, leading a major golf tournament after 54 holes, and it was the first time in which he failed to deliver on what we have all come to expect when he was in the lead-a victory.

In the coming days there will be much talk about the man who beat Woods this weekend, 37 year old Y.E. Yang of South Korea, and particularly about how Tiger failed for the first time in his career to deliver when leading a golf tournament after 54 holes. Some will say that Tiger is losing his touch (and may even try to diminish his greatness) because, if you watched him play Sunday, he wasn’t beaten by Yang, he beat himself. But those who are more understanding and knowledgeable of Golf will recognize that all this loss by Tiger proves is A) Just how hard Golf is-even for the best player in the world, and B) That Tiger Woods, just like all us, is not perfect, which means that even he will have to fail sometimes.

Tiger Woods, after all, is human.

Vick to the...Eagles?!!!

2009-08-14T19:07:00.000-04:00

When I first heard that Michael Vick was signed by the Philadelphia Eagles last night I did a double take: the Eagles?! Nahhhhh, couldn’t be!

Why would they take him? There is no need. They have McNabb and a their QB of the future already set up, so why on earth would they take Vick?

Well, here we are 24 hours later, and it’s true-the Eagles signed Mike Vick to a 2 year deal with the 2^nd year being optional. McNabb supposedly spearheaded this idea, helping to convince this Coach-Andy Reid-that they could use Vick. For what exactly I don’t know. But apparently they can see some need for him, but what need could that be?

All the writers and “pundits” have already stated the obvious about how all it will take is for McNabb to have one or 2 bad games and then those stupid Philly fans will be screaming for Vick to start at QB and that there is the obvious circus that is going to surround him with PETA watching his every move and the humane society making sure he keeps his word as it relates to his new found love of animals and hatred towards those who are cruel to them (snicker, cough, cough)…

If I’ve said it 100 times I haven’t said it enough: I just don’t get this signing. It makes no sense for the Eagles-of all teams!-to sign him. They don’t have the need at any position which he could fill: not at Wide Out nor at Running Back, and certainly not at the QB spot, so why pick him up? Ok, ok, so Vick is a supreme athlete and you are getting him at a steal of a price (just $1.6 mill for the first year), but he hasn’t played ball for over 2 years now so who knows what sort of football shape his body or his mind is in. Not to mention his reinstatement is “conditional”. The earliest he could play in a game for Philly is their 3^rd exhibition game.

Heck I don’t even think the guy deserves another shot. He is a convicted felon, and in my opinion felons do not deserve to have jobs which put them in the public spotlight-it sends the wrong sort of message to young people. Besides that, he hadn’t accomplished anything on the field anyways. Oh sure, he was a dynamic QB and could do things with a football that we had never seen before from that position, but all that talent got him was a year ticket in prison.

But I digress…Oh well, I guess this is just another one of those head scratching idiotic things which can only take place in the world of pro sports.

Rock Star Obama shows up at Town Hall meeting in New Hampshire

2009-08-11T14:53:00.000-04:00

It amazes me how much politicians can lie.

I just wasted an hour of my day watching the Obama Town Hall meeting in New Hampshire and what I saw and heard was the "Rock Star" in Mr. Obama come out and spew nothing but a bunch of lies. I watched as the Rock Star said that everything people speaking out against H.R. 3200 are saying a bunch of “lies and myths”. Does Mr. Obama take us to be ignorant, illiterate fools? Does he actually think this is a “conservative vs. liberal” issue? Is Mr. Obama unable to see that many-if not most-of these people, showing up at these Town Hall meetings are independents who do not like the direction in which our country is going or the ridiculous amount of intrusion this bill provides for into our daily lives?

I don't know if Mr. Obama believes in these things, but the Rock Star I saw on TV this afternoon apparently does.

The lies that Mr. Obama spread about made me sick. One of the bigger ones was his saying that he didn’t believe that anyone but ourselves “should be able to choose their own health care options”, but that is not what his bill says. In his words, he calls the government plan another health care “option”, but that is not what it is. H.R. 3200 rewrites-from top to bottom-what sort of coverage we are allowed to have and if you don't believe me then read it for yourself.

Mr. Obama says that it is his intention to provide a healthcare “option” to people that we citizens can afford, but to still have the freedom to choose which option we want. He says that all his bill does is to provide a low cost option-but that is not how H.R. 3200 is written.

H.R. 3200-what we commonly call Obamacare-establishes a health insurance exchange through which the Federal Government determines what health insurance plans meet their criteria for membership. The plan blatantly leaves out what will happen to those insurances which do not “qualify” for the exchange but goes on to say that those businesses which continue to carry non-qualifying plans will be taxed an additional two to six percent depending upon gross payrolls.

Mr. Obama further said that Medicare recipients and seniors have nothing to fear from Obamacare, but that is not what the bill says. The bill makes it very plain that coverage for seniors is going to be limited and that for H.R. 25 to work Medicare, at least in part, will have to be absorbed into the new government “option”.

As if all of these lies weren’t enough, Mr. Obama continues to claim that his plan will not increase our federal budget or deficit, to which I ask how? How is it possible that the Federal Government is going to provide a “government option” to healthcare which, apparently, will be provided (i.e. paid for) by the Fed without it increasing our deficit?

Even worse was the tone Mr. Obama seemed to take throughout his Town Hall address towards those who have vociferously spoken out against “his” plan. He talked about these people as if they either had no clue what they were talking about or had no business speaking. To make matters worse, Mr. Obama spoke of these people with an attitude that bespoke of an “us vs. them” mentality-i.e. Liberals vs. Conservatives.

Mr. Obama, don't you not get it? Do you not get that those who believe in the Constitution; that those who believe in the principles of which our great nation were founded; that those who believe in small government; that those who believe in taking responsibility for themselves do not want this plan? Do you not see that these people far out number those who do want or like your health insurance “option”? Further, Mr. Obama, do you not see that all of these people are not just conservatives or republicans, but are independents and individuals such as myself?

I digress…

One thing I believe that we can all agree on, however, is that we do need health insurance reform in our country, but that doesn’t mean that we need a “government provided option”-which is obviously what the Liberals and the democratic party take it to mean, and, unfortunately with our “rock star” president what we could end up with isn’t reform, but more government intrusion into our daily lives than we want.

Arlen Specters Town Hall meeting in Lebanon, PA

2009-08-11T11:16:00.000-04:00

It would be nice if I knew what was going to be worth watching and what wasn’t as it relates to what is on TV regarding political issues, this is why I rarely watch channels like Fox News, HLN or CNN early in the morning because, to be frank, not only are they boring, but they lack any real substance to their reporting at those times (true, they lack any real substance 99.9% of the time, but its particularly noticeable to me early in the day). So it was to my great surprise when I stumbled upon a town hall meeting on CNN (and Fox News) for Arlen Specter in Pennsylvania.

Let me just say that I learned a lot.

I learned that our elected officials are NOT as smart or INFORMED as many of those who elected them to office.

I learned that, at least in the case of Mr. Specter, there should be an age limit as to how old are elected officials should be.

I learned that there is quite a lot of anger in our nation right now as to how the Obama administration is running things in our country and that that anger seems to cross all political ideologies, socio-economic and age groups.

I also learned Mr. Specter is a first rate politician-answering questions without really answering them and deflecting things which he didn’t understand without letting anyone know that he didn’t understand them-which is why, I’m sure, that Mr. Specter has been in Congress for as long as he has.

During this particular Town Hall meeting, Specter allowed only 30 people to ask questions of him. Of those 30 the best wasn’t a question per se, but more of a statement. This gentleman asked Mr. Specter if it were possible to make it public who writes these bills because, in the case of the current health care proposal before the house, they do not seem to be very American. This same gentleman also asked Mr. Specter to propose that, if American citizens really wanted Federally subsidized health care, that it be put on the ballot in 2010. Needless to say, Mr. Specter was unable to properly respond to this man, he did however say that he would take the idea of putting health care on the ballot referendum for people to vote on en mass in 2010. Personally, I’m not keeping my fingers crossed.

What surprised me more than anything else, while watching this meeting, was how uninformed Mr. Specter was. It was obvious from the first question that Mr. Specter had absolutely no idea what the language is which makes up what we call Obamacare. It was amazing to me that, as question after question was fired at Mr. Specter regarding this legislation, he had no real response to them-at least not one based on fact or policy. As a result he was left with no other recourse but to agree with these people-that they were right and that he wasn’t going to support any bill which apparently said the things which this bill does.

In sum, watching the Town Hall meeting in Lebanon, PA this morning was quite the realization for me as to how poorly informed our Congressional leaders are.

There is a larger Town Hall meeting scheduled for later today in Maine, this one involves Mr. Obama himself, and he is expected to address many of the same issues which were brought up at Mr. Specter’s meeting-particularly those on the health care bill. If I can, and if it is televised, I will be watching and will have my say later…

Saying goodbye to the Obama platform of "change we can believe in"

2009-08-10T18:29:00.000-04:00

I don’t always catch everything which goes on in the news, and fortunately I have a good group of friends who are always willing to pass things along to me which I may have missed.

Such was the case earlier today when I received an email from a friend of mine pertaining to a yahoo news story which was published online yesterday detailing a “back door” deal that Mr. Obama made with lobbyists of the Pharmaceutical industry. The story details how Obama worked a deal out with “Big Pharma’s” chief lobbyist, a Billy Tauzin, in which the Fed would forgo Medicare drug price bargaining and allowing the importation of cheaper pharmaceutical drugs from Canada in exchange for $80 billion in cost savings (apparently on pharmaceuticals for Medicare) and financial backing of the “pro reform campaign”.

This deal between Obama and Tauzin apparently took place late last week but since then House Democrats have gotten a little peeved at Mr. Obama and forced him to back off on the deal-somewhat.

Regardless of whether or not this “deal” actually happened, I would like to know about that change which Mr. Obama promised us when he ran for president. Wasn’t one of the positions under his platform of “change” that he wouldn’t be bullied by the lobbyists in Washington? That he wouldn’t allow them to influence any of his policy making decisions? That he wouldn’t “play old school political games” (or something similar)?

It has been obvious to me, at least, from the beginning of Mr. Obama’s presidency that his version of “change” was not one that I agreed with. I am definitely no conservative, but I am no liberal socialist either-which is exactly what Mr. Obama is and which is why I refuse to call him “President” on principle. Our President is supposed to represent the majority of the opinion in our country, and as time has gone on Obama has proven time and time again that he does not represent the majority in our country. In fact, the more time that passes the more and more people I encounter who voted for Mr. Obama but who now regret their decision as they continue to see how socialist Mr. Obama really is. At least as his socialist policies were concerned, we could legitimately say that Obama was all about “change”. But now we can say that he is a liar too, because his form of change was supposed to be about not playing partisan politics and not pandering to special interests and lobbyists, but here we have Obama working a major deal with one of the most powerful lobbyists in Washington to secure support for his healthcare package commonly known as Obamacare…

So much for “change we can believe in”, particularly since it’s now obvious that Obama doesn’t even believe in that garbage himself.

Words of caution as the healthcare debate ramps up

2009-08-10T17:47:00.000-04:00

Unless you have been living under a rock the last week or so then you have seen and heard many of the same things I have regarding the debate over what is commonly referred to as Obamacare-the current government subsidized healthcare proposal currently before our Congress…

I must say that I am disappointed by the people who are blatantly attacking their elected officials for trying to force this bill on us. Emotions are running very high all over the nation over this bill, but yelling and screaming and losing our heads over it will do nothing but make those of us who stand against this bill out to be villainous. However, the most ridiculous aspect to all of these debates is the things being said from supporters of Obamacare.

Supporters are claiming that Obamacare will not restrict what sort of benefits we can have under this plan; that this plan does not limit the benefits of “special needs” patients; that this bill will not destroy our health care system as we know it.

They are also sticking to their claims that this bill is intended to level the playing field on health care so that all have it and that it is affordable to all, and that it will, in the long term, make the industry better for all of us.

To those who make these claims I have a question for you: have you read this bill? Do you have any clue as to what this bill says? You obviously haven’t and since that appears to be blatantly true then I strongly recommend that you do. At the very least look down a couple of posts on my blog to my post of a few days ago in which I actually attempted to debunk 10 accusations made against Obamacare only to find that, yes, they were TRUE!! Every last one of them, in at least a small way, could be true. In fact, most of them were 100% true and those who are claiming otherwise are full of shit up to their eye balls (that’s right I swore, get over it):

They’ve never read where the bill says that it will establish an “exchange” through which all-that’s right all-health care plans must conform too or be punished in some way.

They have obviously never read where the bill says that coverage is limited to $10,000 a year per family and $5000 per individual a year (to start).

They have obviously not read on page 50 of the bill where it says that, under this bill, providers cannot discriminate in providing coverage for any reason.

They have obviously not seen where providers of Obamacare will not be able to reinvest in their own businesses-this includes hospitals.

These few things are just the tip of the ice berg of this bill.

Even more ridiculous is Mr. Obama himself coming out saying that the accusations made against this bill-specifically that it will leave out health care for “special needs” citizens and ration it for everyone else-were false.

Is he deluded or what? Obviously Obama hasn’t read this bill either-otherwise I’d have a hard time believing that he could so ignorantly say such things…

Experts, on both sides of this issue are now coming out and stating quite plainly that implementing this bill will effective destroy the health care industry in our country. One such expert claimed that Obama care could result in nearly 85 million people becoming uninsured due to soaring costs or their own plan not “qualifying” under the exchange established by Obamacare.

For those who are trying their hardest to get it through the thick skulls of those Congressional members of the Democratic party who are determined to push this bill through, I ask you to please use more patience and be calm when addressing them.

If you cannot carry a copy of the bill with you, then have your facts straight; know them point for point and make our elected leaders address them directly-either debunking them or trying to excuse them away.

What we need right now are cooler heads to prevail.

All this screaming and yelling and making idiots of ourselves will get us no where in the long run.

The economic "recovery"??

2009-08-07T18:31:00.000-04:00

So, tell me: do you think the recession is over? Do you think that our economy is beginning its recovery process? Further, do you think the so called “economic stimulus” package, which Barack Obama so highly touted in the first 100 days of his presidency, has anything to do with the positive economic signs we have seen lately?

Personally, I think the answers to these questions are all incomplete-as of right now that is.

The reason for the optimism is a result of several positive pieces of economic news to come out this week. Firstly, the DJIA had its best July ever (as a proportionate percentage of growth), going from just over 8000 points to over 9000 to start off August. Next came some better than expected news from the housing sector and losses, and earnings for that matter, which beat Wallstreet expectations. All this combined with a jobs report today which showed that, for the first time in a while now, the national unemployment rate went down-from 9.5 to 9.4%.

That whopping .1% may not seem like a whole lot to you (or me), but it is a huge improvement considering how many jobs that we, as a nation, have been shedding over the last 2 years or so. But, the real question here is, have we finally turned the corner on the recession? Are we finally working our way out of the worst economic crisis that our nation has faced since the great depression?

I happen to follow the global economy pretty closely, and what I see so far is promising, but not that promising and I surely wouldn’t go as far as the news media have been the last 2 days with it in saying that the recession is all but over with.

I think the best news that we have gotten out of the last week is that most of the world’s largest stock indexes are up for the year. Further is that the industrial economies of India and China continue to grow at healthy rates. These things, I think, are much more important than what is happening domestically as it relates to turning our economy around because our economy is tied too deeply into the global economy today to think that we, alone, could pull ourselves out of this recession.

That brings us to my 2^nd question: has the Obama stimulus package had any effect? To this I have to give a resounding no.

Barely 10% of the $100’s of billions which Obama promised have made it into our economy, and even that which did went into state public works projects which only provide temporary employment at best. In fact, many municipalities are wondering where the money is that Mr. Obama promised them. The most successful part of his stimulus package-the Cash for Clunkers program-is basically tapped out, and, for me, raises some serious concerns as to the future value of certain cars which we currently are driving. Beyond these 2 things, most of this money is sitting there, waiting to be spent-which is where I’d rather see it.

If all this money manages to make it out into our economy, then these positive signs we have seen lately will be nothing more than a brief lapse; a proverbial calm before the storm of what is to come within our domestic economy, because where is that money coming from? Literally, it is coming from no where. It is being printed based on nothing by the Fed. Therefore, releasing it all into our economy would do nothing but cause massive inflationary pressures that would in turn cause further company closures and job losses.

No, I for one am going to hold some reservations about this supposed “economic turnaround”. What we have seen this week are good things, and hopefully they will provide some temporary peace of mind and hope to many of those out there looking for work or worried about losing their jobs. However, until I see more realistic signs of the economy improving (brisk new home and durable goods sales, moderate but steady gains on Wallstreet and the other major indexes, and a steady lowering of the unemployment rate) then I’m only willing to so far as to say that this is a sign that perhaps the recession as bottomed out, but, nothing more.

Super Bill (Clinton) to the rescue!!!!

2009-08-07T17:56:00.000-04:00

It happened so fast you could have blinked and missed it. Even more surprising is how fast it was quickly worked over and then silenced on, leading me, at least, to wonder: what exactly did he do?

What I am referring too is the release of Journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee this past Wednesday after being held for nearly 5 months in North Korea, on suspicion of illegally entering the country, by President Kim Jong Il. Their release came at the hands of former President Bill Clinton, whose presence was requested by leaders in North Koreas capital Pyongyang, to help end the political standoff with Washington over the release of the 2 reporters.

No matter how you view the situation-e.g. whether Ling and Lee were guilty of the crimes they were accused of-I find it very interesting that of all the people Jong Il wanted in North Korea to mediate with was Bill Clinton. Further, I found it amazing how fast Clinton succeeded in obtaining the release of the 2 reporters-it seems as if he had gotten their release the minute he landed in North Korea for negotiations.

So what did he give them in return? Well, we have no idea and since the story died nearly as soon as the women returned home, and Clinton is quoted as saying he cannot talk about what was discussed or what the terms of their release were, one still has to ask, not only what that price was, but was it too high?

Whether or not these women were unfairly held by the North Korean government is beside the point, particularly if the price of their release was something along the lines of the technology needed to launch an intercontinental ballistic missile-which would be too high a price in my opinion.

In all likelihood, Clinton offered something he couldn’t guarantee, which makes me even more nervous seeing as how North Korea is an official nuclear power now and is actively-and defiantly-seeking the technology mentioned above to create a long distance delivery system for the nuclear devices the international community believes them to have, which would make North Korea a threat to nearly every major country on the planet and a bigger worry given their suspected covert support of international terrorists groups like Al Qaeda. Therefore, if Clinton did in fact offer something he couldn’t deliver on, then all this will do is provoke the North Koreans even further, which, if I haven’t said it enough, is more than a little scary.

Are you ready for some Football?!!!

2009-08-07T09:57:00.000-04:00

The NFL’s Hall of Fame game is this Sunday…That’s right baby, the NFL season is upon us!!!

For some reason it didn’t feel as long to me this year. Of course seeing as how my home team was the worst EVER last year, I have nothing to really look forward too, so there hasn’t been any anticipation on my part-which perhaps helped me get through the summer without any football. Regardless, it is upon us now so it’s time to take a look at what is going on, and boy do we have a lot of it.

We have a convict quarterback-Michael Vick-out on parole, reinstated (?!!) by the commish and looking for work. How Vick got re-instated I have no clue. The man is a felon, and in my opinion, felons do not deserve ANY job which permits them a stance in the public spot light. It sends the wrong message to our young people and tells all athletes that you can perpetuate heinous crimes and still, in the long run, “get away with it”. Call me conservative (which I’m not), but to me, that’s just wrong. Hopefully no teams will express a real interest in Vick and he will stay where he belongs: on his couch watching the games like the rest of us “normal guys”…

We have a soon to be convict, and former Superbowl superstar in Plaxico Burress, indefinitely suspended and facing what looks to be a minimum 3 and a half years in prison for shooting himself in the leg (hahahahahahahaha) with an unregistered gun. For some reason Burress, whom I hold no sympathy for after such stupid ass actions, is being head-hunted by the New York state attorney (where this crime took place). You would think that being a New York Giant, Burress would get a free pass for such stupidity but apparently the state has been looking to make an example of someone under their tough gun laws for a while now, and now they have the perfect victim. It’s just lucky for the Giants that Burress’s contract was up so they won’t suffer at the hands of his stupidity…

We had more drama around “TO” this off season, as we witnessed what we all expected-the bitter split between Owens and the Cowboys. Talk about a head case. Terrell Owens is another of those players who doesn’t deserve the stage he gets to perform on every year for 7 months. The man has an ego the size of Jupiter and thinks the NFL world revolves around him. I’m not sure if I should feel sorry for the Buffalo Bills-who signed him to a contract-or chastise them for picking up someone who is going to be an obvious cancer in the locker room. Whatever the Bills are paying Owens, he isn’t worth it. Owens’ skills have fallen dramatically in the last 2 seasons and it’s obvious he is not the playmaker he once was. He, just like that idiot “ocho cinco”, hasn’t been one of the elite receivers since he helped the Eagles get to the Superbowl 5 or 6 years ago. In sum, he needs to fade away and let others have some time in the spotlight, instead of hogging in all to himself through his selfish and stupid actions, and pathetic play.

Draft drama continues with the idiocy of Michael Crabtree-the standout receiver from Texas Tech whom the 49ers drafted 10^th this year. Apparently Crabtree is good friends with Terrell Owens and Ocho Cinco, because one of his “advisors” told the media this week that he, Crabtree, is willing to sit out the entire year and re-enter the draft next year, if the 49ers do not come up with a suitable contract offer for him. Are you kidding me?!! This kid is barely out of diapers and hasn’t proved shit to ANYONE at the pro level and his dumb ass advisors have the audacity to make a statement like this?!!! If I were the 49ers I’d let the dumb fuck sit on principle alone and for being stupid enough to hire such a moronic “advisor”. Give me a break. The guy is a great athlete, but he obviously is either prone to making bad choices as it relates to the people he surrounds himself with, or has an unjustifiably, over inflated opinion of himself…

2 time Superbowl champion QB Ben Roethlisberger showed he is not the clean cut perfect man every Pittsburgh native believes him to be when he was accused this off season of sexual assault in Las Vegas. Due to the time past, Roethlisberger won’t be charged criminally, but the woman is going after his money. This is another case of pro athletes making really, realllllllly bad decisions. I don’t know if “Big Ben” assaulted this women or not (though I doubt it, seeing as how she waited for, like, ever to come out with it) but he obviously put himself into some sort of sticky situation at some point which, in turn, created the environment for these accusations to be made against him. So far, he hasn’t been suspended, but it will be interesting to see if this plays out the way the Kobi Bryant case did a few years back or if there is really something there with this one…

Of course what would the off season have been without any Brett Favre drama. Will he retire? Where will he go? Who is interested in him? Good grief! It was enough to make my stomach turn. Worse, in my opinion, these stupid off season antics of his the last 2 years have tarnished his otherwise excellent perception in the public eye. Fortunately, Favre made the right decision finally, and decided to stay retired despite some obvious interest on the part of the (desparate?) Minnesota Viqueens (teehee)…

We heard residents all over New England sigh with relief at the return of an obviously healthy Tom Brady to the practice field a few weeks ago. This is a nice change to most of the idiot news we seem to get out of pro football these days. Not to build the guy up any more than he already is, but there is a reason why Brady is upheld as the beacon of all that is good and right about pro sports-the man doesn’t fuck it all off like so many others do. He always holds himself up with respect and pride, which carries over into his play both on and off the field. So sorry for the media though because this makes him rather boring to cover, but tough I say; the paparazzi need to get a life and stop hounding people just because they can. Needless to say, the American sports world needs more Tom Brady’s and A LOT fewer Plaxico Burress’s and Michael Vick’s…

And, last, but not least, we have my Let-Downs-the worst team in the history of the league last year (sorry, but I don’t think that point can be expressed enough). The pathetic Lions cannot be any worse can they? Actually, truth be told, they could be. Last year, they managed to win all of their pre season games, so, literally speaking, they won 4 times last season before going 0-fer in the regular season. As everyone by now knows, I never saw the problems with the Lions as stemming from Matt Millen, but from their owner-Moron Ford, Sr. That said, the Lions have made some good moves this year. I am not a fan of their draft picks-how they could draft 2 offensive players in the first round when they fielded the 2^nd worst defense in league history last year I’ll never figure out-but, apparently, those they did draft look pretty good in camp so far. The new coaching staff I like a lot, but, at the risk of sounding like the proverbial broken record, none of it really matters!!!! The Lions will always be the pathetic “let downs” because of their owner-who has no clue to run a business of any kind! Needless to say, I’m not keeping my hopes up that the Lions will pull off what the Dolphins did last year-going from worst to first in their division.

But, I digress…Whew…I know I barely scratched the surface, but obviously, as always in the NFL, there is a lot to talk about and a lot too follow as the season wear’s on-which is why it’s the greatest sport on Earth. So, are you ready for some football?

Analyzing "Obama-care"

2009-08-05T21:11:00.000-04:00

In my previous post I picked 10 accusations made against what has come to be known as Obama-care and compared them to the exact verbiage within the bill that they are drawn from. After doing so, I have also had a chance to better look over this bill and analyze it for myself.

In a word, I am scared-particularly after hearing on a national news program today that Mr. Obama intends to push this bill through with or without the support of the Republican party.

What scares me is that, on close analysis there is both covert and overt intent on the part of our current congressional and presidential leaders to control us and our lives from birth to death. Not only does this bill have the feel of personal control over our daily lives, but it also explicitly looks to direct involve the Federal Government into both our Health Care system by telling us how much and what kinds of care we can have under this bill, and by attempting to reset the standard of health care both by what small and medium sized businesses will offer to their employees and the level of services and care provided under the plans which will be available outside of “Government Healthcare”.

Worse still is that the Fed looks to punish those businesses who do not take on the Government plan by taxing them between 2-6% of their gross payroll’s and further punishing those healthcare providers who do not adjust their plans to comply with the standard set by the Government or which do not join a so called “Health Insurance Exchange”, the purpose of which is, at best, hard to understand.

Regardless of how you feel about our Federal Government becoming even further involved in our Healthcare systems, one of 2 things are going to happen to businesses if this bill makes it through Congress and becomes law: Firstly, if businesses choose to keep their own health insurance, thereby taking on up to an additional 6% tax on their gross payrolls, their prices are going to have to increase to cover that new expense.

For businesses who choose to take the Government option, they can be assured of losing their best employees due to what will be, without question, a far inferior health care plan for themselves and their family. This could also result in many people simply avoiding being employed by companies whose healthcare is that of the federally provided variety because it won’t be too long before it’s known that “Obama-care” is barely care at all.

As far as the bill itself goes, it has many terrible aspects to it.

Healthcare under this bill is limited to only $10,000 per year per family or $5000 per year for one person. Considering that a fracture to just about any limb of the body could max this coverage out in just one visit to the hospital, it’s more than obvious that this plan is horribly inefficient. Compounding the issue of coverage is that under this plan, those doctors and hospitals which are deemed as “eligible” providers are not allowed to invest in or expand upon the places which they work; doctor’s wages are also set to some degree under this plan. These 2 things combined will force young, would-be doctors, into other fields due to the financial incentives being stripped of the profession-e.g. who is going to want to spend 10 years of additional schooling and not be able to be properly reward themselves once they are finished, all the while acquiring $10’s of thousands in debt. This scenario will eliminate the best and brightest among us from ever pursuing a career as a doctor, thereby dumbing down the profession and, in the long wrong, making our health care the worse for it.

Even the auspices under which this bill came into being were false: that our health care system is failing, too expensive, and that nearly 40 million Americans cannot afford health care. As always, the truth wills out in these situations and once the numbers were broken down, the reality of it is that only 10-12 million Americans cannot “afford” health care, and of those who do have health care, a recent study found that 80% of them were happy with the quality of the care they receive.

As for the cost of our health care, there is little question that there is a problem there, but that is more due to the fact that it is law that hospitals provide care to anyone who walks into an emergency room-which they have health insurance or the money to pay or not-and the chronic suer-suee problem we have in this country forcing idiotic lawsuits on people whose insurers end up paying the costs for and then passing that expense down to their policy holders. It’s needless to say that there are better ways to confront the cost of health care in our country than to have the Fed get more involved in “the game”, so to speak.

Then of course there is the cost-which is pointless to bring up because everyone knows that, as a nation, we simply cannot afford the mass providing of Federally subsidized health care.

In sum, “Obama-care” is a horrible idea. Fortunately, most people are aware of the horrors which await us if this bill some how passes and American’s all over the country are speaking out against. The problem right now is that our so call President seems hell bent on passing this bill. Just today it was reported that he will get this bill passed with or without the approval of Republicans. Not only does this speak to a man drunk with power, but also to one on the verge of dictatorial leanings, and if this turns out to be the case with Mr. Obama, then this health care bill is only the beginning of our problems.

The facts about 10 accusations of "Obama-care"

2009-08-05T19:13:00.000-04:00

All of us have gotten at least one email lately about how bad the current federally funded health care plan before Congress is right now, commonly known as “Obama-care”. Most mass media outlets gloss over the negatives in this bill-which appear to be many-and the only legitimate attempt at pointing out even a few of the negatives came in the form of a Yahoo news piece about 2 weeks ago which listed 5 “changes” that we will be forced to accept if Obama-care passes.

As my friends and family all know, I in no way support this health care bill-not so much for what is contained within it, but more because the Fed has no business even attempting such a thing (I mean, come on, look at the mess Medicare is). However, a problem I am having with all of these emails is that they are full of opinion and very light on facts. They all make some very wild claims about what could happen if Obama-care passes without giving us the exact verbiage within the bill which leads them to draw these rather extreme conclusions.

Well, being the inquisitive person that I am, and always wanting to know the facts before I make any formal opinion on anything, I took it upon myself to find out exactly what the proposed healthcare bill says regarding 10 of the more extreme suppositions being drawn from Obama-care.

So here goes, 10 of the crazier suppositions in these emails we are all getting, measured up against the language within in the bill they are drawn from so that you can decide for yourself exactly what “Obama-care” will do to our economy and our healthcare system.

The Fed will have to ration our Healthcare.

Common sense and our Federal Governments past as to how business savvy (cough, cough) they are should tell us that this is an inevitability, so it’s not unfair to assume that this is going to happen at some point. Regardless, the exact verbiage relating to this can be found on page 29 of the bill. It says that there is an annual limitation defined as: Part A “The cost-sharing incurred under the essential benefits package with respect to an individual (or family) for a year does not exceed the applicable level specified in subparagraph; B) The applicable level specified in this subparagraph for Y1 is $5,000 for an individual and $10,000 for a family. Such levels shall be increased (rounded to the nearest $100) for each subsequent year by the annual percentage increase in the Consumer Price Index (United States city average) applicable to such year.

The plan goes on to further define this, and only makes it sound worse. Regardless, I don’t know about you, but it sounds to me as if the max any family can spend on healthcare a year is $10k and for a single person it’s $5k. This sounds worse than rationing to me, but you can decide for yourself.

You will have no choice in what benefits the Fed will choose for you.

Beginning on page 42, section 142, the bill establishes a commissioner whose duties include “Qualified Plan Standards”. No where does the bill say that you have no choice in what benefits you can have, but it does blatantly imply that the Fed will choose what benefits you are entitled too.

Based on everything else found in this bill, however, the supposition is easy to draw that they you wont have any say in the choice of what health care options you will have.

A “Healthcare Exchange is being created to bring all health care plans under government control.

The establishment of this so called “exchange” starts on page 72 of the bill. Although nowhere within its early verbiage does it say anything about bringing all other health care plans under its control, if you read on you can see how, in the future, this may be the intent behind creating this so called “exchange”.

Healthcare will be provided to all non U.S. residents, whether here legally or not.

This is just downright wrong and is what lead me to actually do the research myself. At the bottom of page 50 of the bill is a section titled “Prohibiting discrimination in health care”. The first part of this section says “Except as otherwise explicitly permitted by this Act and by subsequent regulations consistent with this Act, all health care and related services (including insurance coverage and public health activities) covered by this Act shall be provided without regard to personal characteristics extraneous to the provision of high quality health care or related services.”

You can take this for how you want, but it does sound as if you are a provider of governmental health care you cannot prevent someone from getting health “care” for any reason what so ever.

Doctors will be told by the Fed what they can make.

This is actually true. If you read the bill, it specifies on page 127, sub section B “preferred physicians” will receive payment at a “rate established under section 223 (without regard to cost sharing)” as being paid in full for their services. Sub Section C goes on to say that “non-preferred” physicians “agree not to impose charges (in relation to the payment rate described in section 223 for such physicians) that exceed the ratio permitted under section 1848 (g)(2)(c) of the Social Security Act.

I didn’t take a look at the referenced section of the SSA but I did take a look at section 223 of the bill. This section pretty much says that the Secretary in charge of overseeing implementation and collection of the fees and rates has the power to set these rates based on the rates, but that they must be based on the established rates already found in Medicare parts A and B.

6. Employees of the Fed Healthcare Administration will have unlimited access to all Americans financial and personal records.

This is, without question, one of the scarier accusations of all the emails we are getting about this bill. Here is what the healthcare bill says about this on page 195: “IN GENERAL.—The Secretary, upon written request from the Health Choices Commissioner or the head of a State-based health insurance exchange approved for operation under section 208 of the America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009, shall disclose to officers and employees of the Health Choices Administration or such State-based health insurance exchange, as the case may be, return information of any taxpayer whose income is relevant in determining any affordability credit described in subtitle C of title II of the America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009. Such return information shall be limited to (i) taxpayer identity information with respect to such taxpayer, (ii) the filing status of such taxpayer, (iii) the modified adjusted gross income of such taxpayer (as defined in section 59B(e)(5)), (iv) the number of dependents of the taxpayer, (v) such other information as is prescribed by the Secretary by regulation as might indicate whether the taxpayer is eligible for such affordability credits (and the amount thereof), and (vi) the taxable year with respect to which the preceding information relates or, if applicable, the fact that such information is not available.

Fortunately this doesn’t say that anyone who works for the Healthcare Administration can look into our personal finances whenever they want and for any reason they want too, but it does say that they can if they are given the authority too by their superiors and under specific guidelines. Those guidelines, however, aren’t really that specific as you can see and could be easily exploited.

Doctors and hospitals are prohibited from investing and/or expanding the facilities in which they work.

This is freakish but completely true. For brevity at this point I won’t go into the specific verbiage the bill goes into, but over pages 316-320 it specifically says that from the day this bill is implemented both Doctors and hospitals can no longer reinvest or continue to invest in their own institutions. You can only assume that this is because the intention of this bill is to make it so that every healthcare facility in the country becomes the sole and explicit property of the Federal Government.

8. There is a restriction as too how many “special needs” people can be on the plan.

Page 354 starts with section 1154, called “Extension of Authority of Special Needs”. The first sub heading of this section is called “Plans to restrict enrollment”.

Enough said.

9. The Fed will plan out “end of life” for all senior citizens.

This is another scary thing which was passed around in the emails and beginning on page 425 with section 1233 of the bill, is titled “Advance care planning consultation. Again, for brevity I will leave it to you to read this section, but it leaves you without a question as to the intent of this part of the bill.

10. The bill effectively ends both Medicare and Medicaid.

No where in the over 1000 pages of this bill will you find anything about the elimination of either of these programs. However, the bill makes it very clear in several places 2 things about both of them: firstly that different aspects of the bill are going to be based, at least in part, on aspects of either or both Medicare and Medicaid. Secondly, the bill does very little to differentiate between this program and Medicare and Medicaid. In the case of Medicaid, the bill explicitly says they plan to force everyone on to Medicaid who is eligible-whether they want Medicaid or not. The bill also says the same for seniors.

Gates arrest: its not about racism, its about a lack of the use of judgment

2009-07-27T10:22:00.000-04:00

I intentionally waited to see how the situation between Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates and the Cambridge police department shook out before commenting on it, when mid of last week, Barack Obama decided to wade in head first without looking. During a speech last week on Health Care reform, our ‘esteemed’ Dict….er, President called out the Cambridge police department saying they were “ignorant” in their actions…

It’s not often that you will find me taking the side of Liberals and our President on an issue, but this time I have to say that I agree with what Obama had to say on this issue and, even more so, how exactly he said it.

For too long now, police departments nationwide (particularly here in Southern Florida) have ‘shot first and asked questions’ later. I understand that those who undertake the difficult job of becoming a police officer deal with things on a daily basis that you and I couldn’t possibly dream of, but it is becoming more and more apparent that those who take up these difficult jobs, lack any common sense themselves, and are perpetually doomed to failure in situations when the use of their better judgment is required.

It doesn’t take a genius to see that Gates, a black man, in no way fits the stereotype that one would associate with someone who is burglarizing a home-particularly in Cambridge, MA. For one, the man was wearing some pretty expensive clothing at the time of his arrest; for two, he was obviously educated and well spoken. These 2 facts alone should have tipped the officer off enough to at least allow the man to prove who he claimed he said he was at the time-that is, the owner of the home he was being accused of 'breaking in' to.

This in turn leads me to the claims by both men which resulted in the eventual arrest of Mr. Gates. For Sergeant James Crowley, the arresting officer, he claims that Mr. Gates was belligerent and aggressive, leading to his making the arrest for disorderly conduct, a charge which has since been dropped. For Mr. Gates’ part, he claims the officer was being rude and aggressive himself, insinuating things with his general tone and demeanor which he found insulting and in turn, obviously felt obligated to defend himself vociferously.

Personally, I am torn on this issue.

Firstly, I hate that this has become an issue of “racism”-a false term in my opinion, and a discussion that I will maybe get into at another time.

On the flip side, I am happy that this is raising some serious questions about how our police officers conduct themselves in situations where their lack of judgment, especially when facing obvious evidence to the contrary, puts them into embarrassing situations with potentially drastic consequences-for both the arresting officer and the accused. As someone who has, unfortunately, been on the ‘wrong side of the law’, it has been obvious to me for some time that most (not all) police officers fail to use any judgment whatsoever in every situation they find themselves in. This behavior is what creates the feelings of distrust and abuse on the part of communities as a whole, relative to their policing agencies, whose job it is to maintain law and order and whose further duties it is to serve and protect the public. Sergeant Crowley showed such poor judgment in his actions that he has again made it all too easy for a large portion of the American public to look down upon our nation’s law enforcement agencies as nothing more than bullies looking for an outlet for their inability to deal with their own personal issues.

Unfortunately, Mr. Gates immediately took the ‘racist’ side of this argument, making it all too easy for many people to look past the obvious mistakes by Sergeant Crowley, thereby giving Crowley some community wide support because such arguments are as socially polarizing as the abortion debate. This in turn takes away from what I see as the real issue: that of the lack of the use of judgment are the part of our “LEO’s”.

So long Sarah (Palin)

2009-07-27T10:00:00.000-04:00

She leaves the national political scene the same way she came into it: suddenly and controversially. Sarah Palin, the attractive former Governor from Alaska, shocked the political world in the summer of 2008 when she was chosen by John McCain as his Vice Presidential nominee. With her striking good looks, well spoken manner and tough, ‘pit bull’ political style, the admittedly Conservative Republican captured the attention of everyone last year and continued to do so in defeat, but then just 3 weeks ago she decided to step down as Alaska’s Governor with 18 months left in her term, leaving us all to ask why?

Question’s and theories abound as to why Palin decided to leave her office prematurely: there are ethics probes and mounting legal bills, all pointing to something sinister in her political background. And then there are the countless rumors of her courtship by Hollywood to host a TV show (perhaps a more republican version of The View?), rumors of book deals and a potential run up to the Republican nomination to run for president in 2012. No matter what her reasons, one thing I think we can all say with certainty is that she isn’t going to go quietly into the night. For better or for worse, we have far from seen the last of Sarah Palin.

Whether this is a good thing, I know not. I was never a huge fan of the McCain/Palin ‘ticket’ last year, but I did like that Sarah Palin spoke well, spoke her mind without remorse, took no bullshit from the establishment and would go as far as necessary to expose corruption where it prevailed-even within the confines of her own party. Her hard conservative beliefs turned me off, but I don’t believe she would have ever tried to force them down anyone’s throats. Personally, I always thought she would lead by example as those things were concerned, which was something I could respect.

Regardless, for now we must say goodbye to Sarah Palin and turn a questioning eye as too why? Why now and what for? Is there some seriousness to some questionable ethics practices on her part in Alaska? Probably, but I have my reasons to doubt that it could be anything worse than we see out of politicians on a daily basis in this country. Whatever her motives may be for her sudden departure from the Alaskan Governorship, we will be questioning why for some time to come, but there are 2 things we can say for certain about it: she leaves the national political scene-most likely temporarily-the same way she came into it-with more questions than answers; and, as a red blooded American male, it’s not a bad thing to watch her walk away…

Cash for Clunkers: another attack on Capitalism by the Fed

2009-07-22T12:23:00.000-04:00

As part of a near $trillion stimulus package our Federal Government-specifically Barack Obama-has stuck in a little bill called “cash for clunkers”. This bill grants up to $3500 in trade in value, towards a new car, for cars that are no more than 25 years old and get 18 mpg or less.

For proper implementation this program is being spearheaded with car dealerships nationwide, which brings me to a serious problem and points out the dangers of our Federal Government getting involved in any direct way with our economy: How is this going to affect the real world values of our cars?

Under this bill all cars which fit the criteria are valued the same. That early 1990’s clunker of a Buick, with 150k and sitting on blocks, is potentially worth the same as your 2001 Hummer that you paid $40K for.

Even worse, the newer your car, the less its value becomes.

Going back to the Hummer-an easy vehicle to pick on in this case-what about all those which are 5-8 years old? They are still blue booked in the area of $10-20k and now dealerships will be giving no more than $3500 for them because there is no incentive to do so. This same logic applies to any and all SUV’s which fit the criteria of a “cash for clunker” because there is NO demand for any of these vehicles currently due to the price of gasoline and economic restraints.

An even worse part of this bill is that all of these cars which are traded in under the “cash for clunkers” bill is that they must be scraped-meaning they can’t be resold as is which makes them all worthless. This, in effect undermines Capitalism at its most basic of levels, making the “cash for clunkers” idea not only a bad one, but just another prime example of why the Federal Government has no clue what being “productive” means and why it needs to be no more than a regulating body for only specific sectors of economy. Needless to say the cash for clunkers bill is a bad one, and we won’t be seeing the ramifications of this “feel good” legislation for years to come. My only hope is that the automotive industry survives it. The Big 3 already have enough issues to deal with, but with the Fed resetting the value of used cars, it will only be harder for the American automotive industry to survive as a private enterprise.

But then, seeing as how the Fed already owns nearly 2/3 of GM and Chrysler, perhaps that is exactly what they want to happen so as to take control of the entire industry themselves.

Of course, the only saving grace of the cash for clunkers program is that it is temporary, but however long it lasts is relevant if the damage to the value of cars becomes permanent.

A problem with crime.

2009-07-19T21:41:00.000-04:00

The general consensus definition of crime is an illegal act committed against an individual or the state, or some such vernacular which says something similar. If you ask any average person on the street as to what makes a criminal a ‘criminal’ more often than not the word violence comes out as a part of the criminal’s actions. For hundreds of years, when it came to defining a criminal or felon, violence seemed to be a prerequisite, with more so called “petty” crimes thought of as civil infractions or public nuisances punishable by a fine or maybe a night in the local jail, but with no permanence of a record attached or negative label to be lived with. As a result, those who were caught on things such as public drunkenness or disorderly conduct of some kind were never branded as being a “criminal” or felon; they were a public nuisance on the level of the stray dog who refused to leave the public square, but they never had to be worried about being thought of in the same light as murders and rapists. Today, in 21^st century America, with all of its liberal socialistic laws, everything short of speeding infractions is considered a “crime”, making it very easy to be branded a “criminal”-at least in the eyes of the states and their laws.

Get arrested for a suspended driver’s license-you are a criminal.

Get caught using a bush to relieve yourself because you couldn’t hold it any longer while waiting in line at the Porta Potty-you’re a criminal.

Get a little loud, but not physical, with your significant other after a bad week, leading to a neighbor calling the police and whomever they determine to arrest becomes, you guessed it, a criminal.

Needless to say, just about anything today that is deemed “punishable” by law or which is considered an “arrestable” offense, makes it all to easy for you, or anyone you know, to become a criminal. There are 10’s of thousands of laws in America which cover every possible “out of the norm” act imaginable, to the point that it is nearly impossible for anyone to not become a criminal. In fact, I’d be willing to bet, that not one American has not committed a “crime” at some point in their life, and the only difference between them and those with a record is that they never got caught.

Compounding matters for people just trying to get by and stay out of legal trouble is the ease with which it now is to become a Felon-if being a criminal wasn’t bad enough, becoming a “felon” is something no one wants to be called.

Felons are considered to be the most heinous of all people in our society. They are the worst of the worst. To be a felon used to mean that you had committed crimes so atrocious, so violent against society, that many of the rights guaranteed to you by our Constitution were stripped from you-leaving you barely half a citizen in the legal sense. Today, however, state and local laws have made it much easier to become a felon. Many states have what are called “habitual” statutes for so call repeat offenders of non violent, lesser crimes (misdemeanors) which, once you are classified as a habitual offender, you become a felon. The problem with many of these laws that you can be habitualized for is the ease with which a person can be arrested for the original offense-particularly as it relates to traffic laws, most commonly driving under a suspended license.

In many states, as here in the state of Florida, once you get 3 arrests for driving with a suspended license, you become a felon-a ridiculous notion given the ease at which states can suspend and keep your license suspended relative to a mode of transit that is unquestionably a necessity in today’s society. In fact, if ever given the opportunity, take a look at the reasons for which your state can suspend a persons license and it will shock you. So vast and varied are the laws for which states can take your license-pretty much for every and anything-that having a valid drivers license is almost entrapment, and its no wonder that very few people ever get only one violation for driving on a suspended license and why so many eventually become a felon over a relatively victimless crime.

Of course state lawmakers would have you think otherwise. They would tell you of the epidemic like proportions as to the number of people driving on a suspended license and the cost that these drivers pass along to everyone else via increases in car insurance rates, all the while ignoring the fact that they have made it many times easier to lose your driving privileges than it is to keep them.

Pointing out the idiocy of license laws is all too easy, but in the state of Florida you can be habitualized for such petty crimes as simple battery (giving someone a black eye) and petty theft (stealing a candy bar) thereby allowing for a whole new genre of felon’s that essentially become wards of the state-dependant on government programs such as welfare, social security and food stamps for survival, which could very well be what our politicians want-a class of people, which they create, dependent on them for survival.

Of course, if you are willing to do the crime you have to be willing to do the time, but there is a rational and logical line that I believe has been crossed by our laws when it becomes easier to become a criminal than to be a productive citizen, and this, I believe, is one of the biggest problems with “crime” in America today-not necessarily the people committing them, but the laws through which you can be made a “criminal”.

The useless U.S. Senate-Why America is becoming progressively Socialistic.

2009-07-19T13:39:00.000-04:00

Due to extensive research I am currently conducting for another project, I am learning some things about the history of our Constitution which I either didn’t know or had forgotten. Among those things which I had forgotten was some of the details concerning the Constitutional debates of 1787 which eventually gave birth to the U.S. Constitution.

When reading those debates, you learn exactly what it was that our nation’s Founding Father’s thought and how they believed our nation’s government should not only be structured, but what the purposes for each branch of our government are. While securing the purpose for each branch of our government, our Founding Fathers also attached each branch of our Federal Government to a different form of election to help preserve that purpose.

The House of Representatives was intended to represent the citizens of America, and therefore was to be elected by popular vote from the districts to which they would represent; members of the Senate represented the states from which they were selected, and were therefore to be elected by each state’s legislature; there was much debate over how to elect the President as his primary job(s) was to serve as commander in chief of our Nation’s armed forces and as a legislative check against both houses of our Congress. In the end, it was decided that so called “electors” would be chosen by popular vote, who would then "elect" our President in the Electoral College. This left the Supreme Court which was to be chosen by the President, with confirmation by Congress.

For over 120 years this is how all 4 branches of our Federal Government were elected and/or selected, as such they served their respective purposes (and electors) dutifully, allowing America to quickly (relative to its age) rise to become the most powerful nation on the planet due to the freedoms and responsibility assumed and espoused upon its citizenry.

But then a fundamental change was approved of to our Constitution in early April of 1913: Senator’s were now to be elected by popular election (the 17th amendment), and so 3 of the 4 branches of our Federal Government were to be, in some way, elected through popular vote (i.e. Democracy).

For students of Philosophy, what happened within the next 20 years, after the passage of the 17^th amendment, should be no surprise: First, the back bone of our economy essentially collapsed in the 1929 Stock Market crash which forced America into what became called The Great Depression. Shortly there after, Franklin Roosevelt was forced to take drastic measures to stabilize the economy and our society by writing a set of bills called The New Deal which established heretofore unacceptable socialist programs regulated from within the Federal Government. From this time on ward it is easy to trace the Socialistic progression of our Federal Government (especially when under control of the Democratic Party) to where it is today.

By now you may be asking what all this history has to do with my perceived “useless”ness of the U.S. Senate. It’s rather simple, really, if you understand how our nation was intended to be governed and what the purpose of each branch of our national government was.

Once our Senate began to be elected by the people at large, it no longer served its intended purpose. In the beginning-and for its first 120 years or so-the U.S. Senate’s purpose was to serve the states, not the people, therefore it’s members were elected by the state governments for which they represented and not the people at large. Once our U.S. Senator’s became elected by the people, this greatly skewed the balance of power, and how legislation was viewed, within our Federal governing body. With each state no longer having an independent say in how legislation was passed, the power of making and creating laws was shifted from one of balance between the people, the republics (i.e. the states) and the greater Federal Government to one nearly completely controlled by the public through Democratic election. By becoming elected through popular election, the purpose of the U.S. Senate became meaningless-they simply became 2 more popularly elected members of the House of Representatives, just under the guise of another name.

For student’s of Philosophy this is very relevant because Democratic elections by popular vote are viewed as not only a predecessor to chaos, but are also seen as base socialistic policy (i.e. Socialism), which is why the current state of our country, and the current socialistic agenda being so readily supported by our current Federally elected leaders, should come as no surprise.

With 3 of the 4 branches of our Government chosen through popular election (i.e. society) is it any wonder that our nation has become progressively socialist since the early 20^th century? With the natural checks and balances of our original Constitution now in large part removed, what was once considered a Democratic Republic (the United States of America), is now a pure Democracy and pure Democracies are doomed to failure due to their tendency towards chaos (and if you don’t see the chaos that dominates our country today, then you are in more trouble than our country is).

Is there a fix? Absolutely.

Is it an easy fix? Easy, no, but it is a simple one.

Will we fix it? Not likely.

Even average every day people like power, and the only power of any kind most people in America will ever experience is the power to elect their local and national leaders, so it would be unrealistic to think that they would ever give up their “right” to elect our Senators.

No, unfortunately, that right (to the states) is gone for good-unless Americans learn to understand what is supposed to make our nation great; why our nation has been losing that greatness over the last 100 years; and how to fix it.

FairTax basics-in laymens terms

2009-07-17T13:18:00.000-04:00

If you have never heard about the FairTax then I strongly encourage you to go to www.fairtax.org or to buy The FairTax Book by John Linder and Neal Boortz, in the meantime, if you read on you will learn the basic’s of it. Before I get started, I am admittedly a huge supporter of the FairTax, but in no way am I being paid to propagate it. I am merely a very vocal supporter and believer in the FairTax, which has the ability to not only turn our economy around instantly, but also put us back were we belong in the global economy-as it’s leader.

The FairTax (known as H.R. 25 in Congressional lingo) is a plan currently before Congress which replaces the current system of taxation in America. Essentially the FairTax is a tax on consumption (i.e. sales tax), but it is not a tax of addition to what we have now, it is a tax of replacement to what we have now. So don’t think that if it were passed things would cost 23% more (the current estimate of the FairTax) than they do now. To the contrary, in many cases-such as medical services-goods and services would cost less.

To properly understand the beauty of the FairTax you have to understand 2 things first: free market capitalism and the fundamentals of our current system of taxes.

In free market capitalism the consumer (i.e. purchaser or buyer) dictates the success and failure of goods and services, as such this ideology puts you, as the purchaser/buyer, in a position of power. Unfortunately, most American’s either do not realize this or are incapable of accepting it as a supposed “leadership” role they do not want. Either way, whether you think it or not, as an American buyer, you have power in our economy, which is a great thing.

The current system of taxation in America is one of taxing income-on individuals and businesses. More properly, it’s a taxation on earnings and/or profits, but I will stick with a taxation based on income because that is an ideology which everyone understands. Something which people are not aware of as it relates to our current system of taxation is that it was illegal until the 16^th amendment was added to our constitution in 1913. In it, the power was granted to our Federal Government to collect and assess taxes on our incomes. To grasp how extreme this idea was, you have to first realize that, to most of the founding fathers of our nation, national governments had no business assessing and collecting taxes on the public at large because this was seen as a symbol of servitude and/or enslavement: only Kings and Dictators collected taxes, they believed, and they weren’t set about creating a government of either. They were creating a government by the people, for the people and of the people. So, needless to say, the idea of setting and collecting an income tax was an extreme one even when the 16^th Amendment was added in 1913.

At first, the American “Income tax” was set as a simple percentage where by American’s took how much they made each year, multiplied it by a set percentage and wrote the Fed a check for that amount. However it wasn’t long before Politicians discovered how vastly so “simple” a system of taxing incomes could be manipulated and once the idea of “withholding” came into being the current 60,000 or so pages of I.R.S. codes and regulations that we know of today were well on its way to reality.

What this has to do with you and the FairTax is quite simple really. You see, everyone-and every business and corporation-is taxed in some way by our Federal Government. Businesses-both large and small-consider taxes an expense and, like all expenses, they are incorporated into the cost of the goods and services that we, the consumers and purchasers, eventually pay for. Now, the people who have been working on the FairTax for the last 20 years or so have hired many an economist (of both a republican and democratic political ideology) to find out exactly how much of the price of goods we pay is in these embedded taxes prior to paying a state sales tax. The number they came up with varied depending on the industry from 22-26%, of which, the writer and supporters of H.R. 25-the FairTax bill-settled on 23%. (When thinking of this number, keep in mind the vast amount of taxes a business pays. Not only do they pay taxes on their incomes, but they also pay payroll taxes, workers compensation taxes and matching social security taxes to name a few other taxes that they have to pay, which is one big reason why it's so hard to start and stay in business in America).

What the FairTax does is this: it rewrites our tax code and removes all of these embedded taxes which you and I, as consumers, pay for anyways, and replaces them with the FairTax. What would happen is that, at the point of sale, the price we pay for goods and services would be cheaper before the FairTax (and your state sales taxes) are added to it. Because that 23% of previously embedded taxes has now been removed from the cost of what you are buying, the price you pay ends up being the same after the fair tax is added back on (in some cases it will be cheaper). One of the neat things is, that your receipt of sale or bill of goods will reflect this price and how much tax you paid to the Federal Government.

So what does it mean for you and I, the consumers? A lot; it means no more filling out of tax forms and filing a return every year. It means no more taxes on “interest earned” or “capital gains. It means that if you make $500 bucks a week, you keep $500 bucks a week. It means that, individually, we have control over how much in taxes we contribute to our Federal Government each year (not owe) because the tax we pay is based on our spending habits and not on our income. In a nutshell, it means real freedom for you and I.

For businesses it means even more (which means more for you and I as well).

For them it means no more payroll and corporate taxes, which would make it very desirable for companies to establish their regional and global headquarters in America (and producing their goods here too), thereby creating 1000’s, if not millions, of new jobs for American’s. It means new industry and growth and it also means economic stability and putting America’s economy ahead of every other economy on the planet. Most importantly, I believe it will mean accountability to us, the voting public, on the part of our nationally elected leaders-which is something they haven't had to worry about in decades.

Of course this is a very scaled down analysis of the FairTax and I’m sure you have many more questions about it, for which I would direct you to www.fairtax.org or The FairTax Book for answers…Hopefully you will become as vocal a supporter of the FairTax as I am, and help to make it reality so that we can take back control of our money from the government.