If 41 cents of every dollar you made was going on your credit card, would you keep doing it?

According to the Department of the Treasury, 41 cents of every dollar spent by the federal government of the United States was borrowed. 

Think about that. Think about that long and hard. Can you imagine that any sane person can possibly think that this kind of reckless spending can be sustained?  This is the equivalent of a private person making about $25,500 spending $50,000 dollars every year. That means that they had to put $20,500 on the credit card in a single year to hit the same ridiculous deficit spending percentage our government has.

The Bi-partisan Debt Commission report has come out. It's harsh. It's going to ask Americans to accept deep cuts in many of the entitlements that we hold dear. It holds nothing back. Deep cuts are found in health and human services, Social Security, the Department of Defense, all of which been "untouchable" and "third rail issues" until now.

So its surprise to me that the commission itself was only able to get 11 of 17 to support the conclusions of the commission. 

Two examples:
Max Baucus of Montana refused to support it because of the proposed gasoline tax hike that would damage the agriculture industry.  That's nothing. If it were me I would end farm subsidies and let farmers grow whatever the heck they want in quantities they want.

Andy Stern, the president of Service Employees International Union (SEIU) also refused to support it, because it would have deep consequences for federal government employee union pension plans.

As long as people continue to think "Think not what I can do for my country, think what my country can do for me" we are going to head down the road of national insolvency.  When will We, the People, wake up and realize that we've allowed our politicians to walk us down a path paved with the false glitter of lies and promises right to the very trapdoor of financial hell?  When will we stop demanding that our government take money from some and give it to others, when in fact there just isn't any more money to take?  Yeah, the rich are rich, but there aren't enough of them nor do they make enough that by themselves they could pull us out of this mess we are in.  We have to reduce spending. All across the board.

Because unlike you or I who have our mortgage company or credit card company to send us into bankrupty, the federal government instead gets to answer to China and Qatar and the United Kingdom.  And they aren't likely to be any more understanding than your local debt collector. What kind of a debt collector would China use, anyway? Do we really want to find out?

Glenn Beck cranks up the culture wars.

Rich Benjamin, in an article on cnn.com (click here) made a series of arguments designed to support the position that Glenn Beck, the wildly popular conservative pseudo-religious radio and talk-show host, has "cranked up" the culture wars.

His first argument is based on the claim that despite Beck's assertions to the contrary, the August 28th rally in on the Washington Mall was a political rally. He points to the presence of a rally participant wearing a t-shirt with the message "If you can't love America, move back to Kenya."  Even though Beck specifically directed the attendees to not bring signs of any kind.  Even though not one speaker mentioned President Obama by name, or the Democratic party. It's reaching way down into the barrel to label this a patriotic rally based on a few t-shirt slogans. 

With regards to the "tea-party" opinion that President Obama is a marxist/socialist, well, it does seem to be that way. The massive expansion of nationalized health care at the same time that 47% of American workers (the majority who are in the poor, lower income and lower middle income brackets) do not pay any income taxes at all is seen by most fiscal conservatives as redistribution of wealth, a fundamental tenet of socialism.  He also rammed cash for clunkers down our throats, encouraging people to buy cars with taxpayer subsidies. Again, money moving from those who pay taxes to many who do not.  This was followed by cash for toasters, encouraging people to buy new appliances with... you guessed it... taxpayer subsidies. 

And for good measure let us not forget the first time homebuyer credit of $8,000 dollars (in 2009) and homebuyer assistance program of $6,500 dollars, again targeting those in the lower income brackets (most of whom pay no or little in income taxes) with money taken from the income tax payers.

There's lots more where that came from, but I think that the citations above are a clear indication of a political motivation on the part of the president and his party to move money from those who can afford to pay taxes to those who cannot. Is, or is that not socialism?

He further claims that the claims on the part of the conservative factions that President Obama is a communist or marxist or socialist is similar to admittedly similar claims against Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr in the 1960's  The huge difference is that the attacks against Dr. King where clearly fueled by racist hatred, especially in the South.  But in the case of President Obama, we only have to look at the record of legislation passed during his administration to see what is plainly written.

As an aside, Reverend Al Shaprton claimed that the push by the "tea party" to restore "state's rights" is a direct assault on the civil rights movement and is a conscious effort to rollback those hard won gains.In this case the US federal government through civil-rights legislation signed in the late 60's forced states to accept a federally mandated standard for guaranteeing the protection of the civil liberties and rights of minorities.  There is no question that under the guise of state's rights, many states (again especially in the South) implemented legislation that unarguably were designed to deny or obstruct the rights of minorities, and particularly blacks, to vote, equal access to education and government services. 

But today, the resurgence of state's rights advocacy is couched firmly in the US federal government's failure to uphold its end of the contract that binds the states of our union together.  The federal government continues to spend more and more and yet services seem to decline or fail altogether. Immigration laws, especially with respect to the prosecution and deportation of aliens living here illegally, including border security is one aspect of the federal failure. Another is the inability of the government to respond quickly to natural disasters. The 2005 hurricane Katrina disaster clearly demonstrated the red-tape that obstructs swift response by the federal government as well as the complete and utter lack of coordination between federal, state and local emergency response agencies.  Our national infrastructure is coming apart. Roads, bridges and dams are falling into disrepair before our very eyes, and yet there is no money to fix them!  People who genuinely need government assistance can't get it while shysters and thieves who have studied the system collect "overpayments" from the government with impunity. The US Dept of Education consumes more tax revenue than ever and yet our nation continues its slide into mediocre scholastic performance among industrialized nations.

States are understandably outraged.  They are being forced by federal mandate to spend more money on federal programs and yet they do not have the access to print more money when their budgets are bled dry.  Not to mention that progressive legislation in states like Michigan, California, Arizona and Ohio have literally bankrupted them. States and local communities would very much like to have more say in the standards of education and welfare that they provide to their citizens, but are continually stymied by an outrageous and bloated bureaucracy that is reflected in the HUGE amount of regulatory law that those bureaucracies are expected to enforce. 

I understand the need for regulations, but when the process for getting FDA approval to get a drug to market can cost multiple billions of dollars. And yet, after getting such approval, a drug company is completely unprotected against expensive lawsuits when unknown side-effects not discovered during the FDA approval process inevitably arise. Question: If the FDA won't stand behind its approval process by helping to defend the pharmaceuticals, why in the hell do we force them to seek FDA approval? 

With regard to Mr. Benjamin's concern that a third of the nation thinks that President Obama is a muslim. Well, I don't get that either.  And we further agree that birthers are idiots. 

But I think that the charge of the current administration's movement of the nation to a more socialist government is completely founded and beyond debate.

Well, It's Time to Fight.

In a fifteen minute speech today in front of several lab-coat wearing health care professionals, President Obama called for the end game by rejecting GOP suggestions to "start over" on health care reform.

“The American people want to know if it’s still possible for Washington to look out for their interests and their future,” Mr. Obama said. “They are waiting for us to act. They are waiting for us to lead. And as long as I hold this office, I intend to provide that leadership. I don’t know how this plays politically, but I know it’s right. And so I ask Congress to finish its work, and I look forward to signing this reform into law.”

President Obama clearly believes that this health care legislation now has enough bipartisan elements to it that they can get the votes to pass it.

Even though it does not contain federal-level tort and frivolous lawsuit reform.

Even though it does not hold the FDA and HHS departments accountable for their internal spending or even allow them to be co-litigants when procedures and medicines approved by THEM through an incredibly expensive regulation process are then the targets of class-action lawsuits. Lawsuits that are equally expensive and therefore cost big pharma and health care providers with HUGE malpractice/errors and omissions policies. Cost that are passed to the end consumer.

Even though it does not address how the current health care system can possibly afford to insure pre-existing conditions without driving up costs. President Obama and his Democratic compadres apparently don't realize that only 5% of heavy users of the medical system consume 50% of the resources

Even though it does not accurately estimate how pre-existing conditions or no caps on benefits will effect all of us who use insurance.

Even though it does not address how to deal with the shortfall of medical services that will be available when the so-called "31 million" will flood the system. Doctors, nurses and technicians already work long weeks. How will they become less overworked by adding 1 new insured for every 6 already on the system.? How will costs be kept down when services will go into even greater demand with a proportionally smaller supply?

Even though the current bill steals from Medicare Advantage to pay for part of it's costs.

Even though the current bill gives the HHS secretary HUGE new powers to mandate oversights that, if wielded unjustly, can be used to cause companies to go bankrupt.

Even though the CBO does not agree with the Democrats that the current legislation will not add any further money to the federal debt.

Even though current polls show that over 2/3 of the American electorate do not want this bill to be passed into law. 87% of Americans are currently satisfied with their current coverage and costs, but they believe that if this bill passes then they will either have to accept reduced benefits or higher costs and more likely a combination of the two. Even though most Americans understand that our country cannot afford the deficits that this bill will bring, and that we are at the tipping point of no longer being able to pay back the debt we owe.


The Democrats paid only lip service to including the Republicans and their ideas in this bill. Concessions came too little and far far far too late. While there may be 'bipartisan' elements in it, it is primarily a Democratic boondoggle intended to take direct control of the $2.7 trillion health care industry in this nation.

I will now vote with my wallet as well as my phone. The GOP needs to stand firm. If even one Republican Senator votes for this farce and blatant anti-free market, and arguably unconstitutional bill then they will be electorally crucified in November.

I hate this partisan bullcrap but we simply can't afford this now.

Trent Lott and Harry Reid. There Is a Difference.

While attending the 100th birthday celebration for Dixie-crat Senator Strom Thurmond in 2002 then Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott stated in essence that the United States would be "better off" had Strom Thurmond won the 1948 presidential election. Mr. Lott was pilloried not only by the Democrats but even by his own GOP, which ultimately resulted in Mr. Lott stepping down as Majority Leader.

Now, a new controversy has arisen concerning the current Senate Majority Leader, Mr. Harry Reid who is the senior Senator from Nevada and a Democrat. In a book titled "Game Change", Mr. Reid claimed that the reason that then-candidate Barack Obama had a good chance of becoming the first African-American U.S. President was because he was "light-skinned" and did not speak with a "Negro dialect" unless he chose to do so.

Republicans are now crying "racist!" while Democrats circle the wagons around the "inartfully articulating" Senator Reid. The Republicans are furious that when Sen. Lott made his "inartful" toast to Strom in 2002, they stood against his comments and were a major force in his resignation from the Senate Majority Leader position. By contrast, the Democrats, instead of declaring their abhorrence at Senator Reid's "racist" statements are in fact standing behind him.

I'm a member of the Heritage foundation and a reluctant supporter of the Republican party. But I think that in this case that the Republicans are trying to create a controversy that doesn't exist.

When Trent Lott made his famous statement, he essentially said that he supported Strom Thurmond's 1948 "pro-segregation" Dixiecrat platform. Equal but separate. How could any modern politician think that he could publicly articulate such an opinion and then not be held to account for it? Not to mention that segregation has been proven to be bad policy.

Senator Reid, by contrast, was stating a painful fact about American politics. White Americans in general are more comfortable with black politicians that speak Harvard English and whose appearance more closely correlates with their own. Senator Reid has been a strong supporter of civil rights legislation, especially as seen by the NAACP and the Black Congressional Caucus.

A far more appropriate subject for comparison would be Rush Limbaugh, who lost his NFL commentator position when he stated his opinion that the mainstream press was motivated to overstate Donovan McNabb's accomplishments in order to support the position that black quarterbacks can perform as well as whites, who at that time dominated the quarterback position. He later clarified that he felt that Donovan McNabb had the potential to be a great NFL quarterback but that at that time he did not deserve the praise that was being given him by the press.

In any case, I believe that the Republicans are making a case that is not supported by the facts or public opinion. Trying to equate Lott's comments that essentially said that a pro-segregationist president would have produced a better America with Harry Reid's analysis that Barack Obama, as a light skinned African-American who spoke very precise English are not even remotely the same class of comments.

In this situation, I think that the GOP needs to figure out that "this dog won't hunt".

2009 Christmas Thoughts

As I write this, according to NORADSANTA.ORG, Santa Clause has distributed over a billion gifts to little boys and girls throughout the world and he is currently in the Maldive Islands.

For hundreds of millions of Christians the Christmas season has become perverted by rampant consumerism, boxes, wrapping paper and bows. We annually tally up thousands of dollars of consumer debt so that when our kids return to school after the holiday break they aren't left out of the "WhadidyagitferChristmas?" conversations. Simple games and clothes have given way to game consoles, cell phones and other electronic gadgets.

Our family decided this year that it was out of hand. So we threw names into a hat, and we each drew a name. The budget: Get as close to $100.00 as you can. That doesn't necessarily include stocking stuffers and the annual Christmas jammies. My own budget will probably come to about $200.00 because my mom, who now lives with us and hasn't participated in our Christmas traditions, hasn't quite caught on this year. So between the five of us, that's about $600.00 bucks. That's down considerably from the two-thousand we spent last year and the three-thousand the year before that.

And this year, I don't think one electronic doohickey was purchased. I know that my own Christmas list this year was for some nice shirts, some new socks and some really nice tobacco for my pipe.

And yet, the tree still has lots of presents under it.

But more importantly -- I will be spending Christmas with four of the seven most important people in my world right now: Laura (my wife), Mom, Heather (my daughter) and Mat (her husband). Chris is stationed in Norfolk Virginia and his girlfriend, Alex, is spending the holiday with her folks in Salt Lake City.

We will eat holiday ham and I will enjoy hot buttered rums and smoke my pipe while enjoying the company of my family while we sit in front of the fire and watch "A Christmas Story", "It's A Wonderful Life" and "The Greatest Story Ever Told".


But just as importantly, that's twelve-hundred less credit card debt than the previous year. Which means that we are that much closer to completely getting rid of all our credit card debt, which will take at least a couple more years.

Here's my Christmas wish list for the future.
1) That we all stay healthy.
2) That we all continue to keep our jobs.
3) That after we get rid of this credit card debt, that I can give Laura the following:
3.1) A decent kitchen.
3.2) A nicer living room.
3.3) Finish the front yard.
4) Be able to afford to contribute more money to charity that really counts:
4.1) Shriner's hospitals
4.2) Fraternal Order of Police
4.3) Modest Needs (a new charity that I really think is on the right track).
4.4) Order of DeMolay (a young man's organization).
And I'd like to start tithing. I just haven't figured out which church yet...

No new cars, no new computers, no new games. I'd like to fix the place I live in a little bit and then really ramp up the contributions to charities that I already support.

I don't need the Federal government to be charitable. They're not good at it anyway. They don't hold themselves nearly accountable enough. But every American who has some extra coin in their pocket should be asking themselves... "How can I help? How can I give back?"

Freemasons have been doing this for over four hundred years (and longer if you believe the "myth" of Freemasonry). I strongly suggest to anybody that reads this blog that you should become more active in your church charity programs. If you aren't currently active in a church, please, please, please consider joining a Fraternal Organization (like Freemasons, The Elks, The Eagles, The Moose, Knights of Columbus, Fraternal Order of Police, Volunteer Firefighters) or simply contribute to charities.

Christmas is not about wrapping paper and gifts under the tree, although the smile of a child on Christmas morning is hard to beat.

But consider this: How about the smile of a child in a burn ward who got the care she needed because men like Shriner's care? And how about the smile on a young man's face when he graduates from college because the Marine Corps-Law Enforcement fund paid for his education after his parent list his/her life on the streets of Chicago or in the fields of Afghanistan? Or the single mother of two who received enough money from Modest Needs to be able to put down the security deposit on an apartment so that she has a safe, warm place for her kids to live? Or how about the smile of your mother who is grateful that you have given her a place to live in your own home? I get that smile every morning.

Those smiles might be even better to see on a Christmas morning.

Christmas should be about caring for the people in our families and communities that are less fortunate than ourselves. It's about taking on their burdens, putting our shoulders to the wheel and making our communities a little better place because we care.

Isn't that what Jesus did?

Bad Bankers, Bad Bad Bankers.

President Barack Obama appears to be a little irritated. First, it appears that the major lending institutions that took TARP money are paying it back faster than expected. Those institutions, such as Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley now find themselves newly liberated from the onerous and vindictive eye of the Federal government, specifically the glaring spotlight from the U.S. "Pay Czar" Kenneth Feinberg.

This means that these same institutions that were literally saved by the American tax-payer can now get on with the business of paying effusive bonuses to their beleagured and misunderstood executives. Last report: $22 billion. Yes, that's a "b", not an "m".

Considering that over seven million American workers are out of work right now, the populist view is that these "fat cat" bonuses seem to be out of synch with the struggles of the American common laborer and that this money would be better directed towards programs that will funnel money towards the unwashed masses.

As offended as I am by these bonuses (have these people no shame?) I am equally offended by the tone of President Obama's current rhetoric with regards to our financial sector.

"I did not run for office to be helping out a bunch of fat cat bankers on Wall Street", said the Presdident in a CBS "60 Minutes" interview. Senior White House Advisor David Axelrod further stated "What the president is going to say to the bankers is, you guys were part of the problem, you helped create an economic crisis here that cost 7 million Americans their jobs and now you have to be part of the solution."

There is a growing resistance movement among the bankers, especially with regards to the creation of a government office called the "Consumer Financial Protection Agency". "He can say what he wants, but we're not going back to the kind of lending that put us in this mess" said a person who is helping to prepare the bankers for the meeting but who spoke anonymously because of lack of authority to discuss the plans.

We are told that executives at the highest levels of the mega corporations justify their enormous compensation because they "risk the most". But we've seen that they feel no pain in bad times. They keep making enormous salaries and receive extravagant even as they send pink slips to thousands of employees who watch as their pension funds shrink or disappear entirely.

But the US financial ship of state has been victimized in two ways. First, it was helmed by executives that were willing to pursue imprudent strategies because there was (is?) no perception of personal risk of loss if things went wrong. If you are looking for a poster-child for this kind of executive, look no further than Dick Fuld, the "Gorilla of Wall Street". Second, it foundered into a storm was of our government's own making. Many of those squalls and icebergs that disabled our hypothetical ship were the result of Federal politicians literally FORCING them to relax the very lending standards and practices that would have avoided much of the pain we have seen in the last four years.

The government insisted that banks lend to people that could not be reasonably expected to pay back the loans that they were taking out. The reasoning behind this was two-fold: First, loaning money to a poor family to buy a house so they can move out of a project not only feels good but also looks good on your political resume, especially on the first Tuesday in November. But good financial policy conflicts with touchy-feely politics. Secondly, by making loans available to a larger pool of borrowers, the residential housing manufacturing industry remained white-hot when much of the rest of the economy had cooled or even reversed. Even back in 2003-2004, many U.S. Senators and Representatives were beginning to discern the threat on the horizon and tried to get somebody, anybody, to take a real interest in the risk and IRRESPONSIBLE lending practices at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. But with the housing sector the only bright spot in a gloomy economy, nobody really wanted to look at it too closely.

And just like the Titanic, by the time anybody realized the danger, it was too late. Give President Bush credit, he tried to get Congress to look at it early in his administration. Then give him a whack on the head because he failed.

Now President Obama is insisting that the lending institutions, especially those that took taxpayer assistance TARP monies, needs to help by boosting lending to small businesses. The problem is that President Obama and his advisors seem to think that if they make money easily available to small businesses that they will just rush in to take advantage of it and begin creating new jobs.

Uh, did ANYBODY in the administration take Economics 101?

Manufacturing and services are always a waterfall economic indicator. Increases in production, which will spur increased employment, won't happen until AFTER there are clear signs that consumers will open their wallets again. News flash to Congress and the Administration, we have 10.2% unemployment (estimated by some organizations to be closer to 17% when you include those who are seriously underemployed). Further, for the first time in 40 years, the American consumer is starting to cut debt and save their earnings instead. In 1982 the average American had 60% of their annual income in some form of debt, much of it revolving. In 2007, the most recent reporting year) Americans were carrying 130% of their annual income in debt. So it will take TIME for us to get out of the hole we're in.

It seems that President Obama and staff seems to think that the US economy is going to swiftly return to the heady levels of 2004. Don't count on it. All indications are that down economy has handed the American consumer harsh lesson about high levels of personal debt. And regardless of all of the hippies that voted for "hope and change" in 2008, the traditional American wants to live a freer life. Debt is a shackle we put on ourselves.

If I'm right, American consumers will not start spending more soon. If true, then all of President Obama's ideas are barking up the wrong tree. He's focusing on getting more jobs by making it easier for small business to borrow. But no sane small business man is going to borrow money when he has no evidence that he can sell the increased capacity. Instead, he needs to keep more of the money that he currently makes now, so that he can invest it into his company or better yet, avoid becoming an additional statistic in the unemployment report.

CBS Airs "Dirty Frosty the Snowman" ads.

I'm not going to link to anything. Look it up if you don't believe me. Simply put, CBS ad executives have aired a couple of voice-overs of snippets of the beloved Christmas classic cartoon "Frosty the Snowman" that are ads for their child-inappropriate comedies Two and A-half Men" and "How I Met Your Mother".

Millions of children will now have to be shielded from YouTube searches for "Frosty" that have him talking about his "Porn stash" and other inappropriate topics.

Thanks CBS. As much as I love "CSI", I'll catch it on reruns now. You won't see another minute of my viewer time.

Wind Power and the Threat of Eminent Domain

Wind Power and the Threat of Eminent Domain

No American citizen who turns on a TV, radio or reads the news can be unaware of the current push by the Obama Administration to fast track “green” energy projects. Further, in light of the questions raised by the possibility of man-caused global warming, it is prudent that we continue to develop these technologies. But a news item that I recently scanned causes me to be even more deeply concerned over the continued loss of individual freedom and abuse of government power for the “greater good”.

Most Americans are somewhat familiar with property rights. In rural areas, landowners not only own the surface of the land, but they also own the air above it and whatever is below it, all the way to the core of the earth (although for obvious practical reasons, nobody really enforces that ownership beyond man’s ability to reach downward into the earth’s crust). Simply put, if water, oil, natural gas are found under private land it belongs to the landowner and any company or city wanting to develop that resource must either buy the land or buy the rights to the resource from the landowner.

Similarly, if somebody were to build a structure near the property line that overhung private property, the landowner could force the owner of the structure to modify it so that it does not extend over his property.

Enter the city of New Ulm, Minnesota, which has proposed to construct a 237 acre, 8 megawatt wind farm. The city has already acquired the easements for the installation of the wind turbines. However, the State of Minnesota compels wind farm operators to obtain the “wind” rights from the landowners of a nearly equal amount of acreage in the direction of the prevailing winds. These landowners have so far refused to grant the easement, which has stalled the $16-18 million project.

The city of New Ulm has applied for a variance in order to proceed with the project without getting the easement from these recalcitrant landowners. If we were talking about water, this would be unthinkable. Instead, the developers of the project would be forced to buy the water rights from those that lived upstream to their project.

The New Ulm city attorney, Hugh Nierengarten, stated that “it will be necessary for the City of New Ulm to exercise its powers of eminent domain to secure such rights and move this vital project forward.”

The sticky wicket in this whole situation is the fact that the wind farm site isn’t located in the same county. This means that the objecting landowners have no way to hold the politicians and their legal representatives at bay. Jeff Franta, one of the farmers refusing to sign the easement and chief organizer of the opposition stated that it is within their right to refuse to grant easements to a project that could have a potential negative effect on the value of their property. He further stated “Wind rights are property rights like oil, water or a gravel pit. Wind is like oil in the sky so to speak. How can you use eminent domain to get something that can produce profit?”

The use of eminent domain is an important but volatile concept in American politics. Eminent domain gives a municipality the right to seize privately held land if the land will be used for "public use", and even then the landowner must be compensated fairly. This concept is based primarily on the following clause of the fifth amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which says: “…nor be deprived of life, liberty or property without the due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.”

The most prominent recent case of eminent domain was Kelo vs. the City of New London, which was decided by the United State Supreme Court in June of 2005. The majority opinion, which decided in favor of the City of New London, chose to interpret the fifth amendment term “public use” to mean “public purpose”, citing the 1984 case of Hawaii Housing Authority v. Midkiff.

The dissenting opinion held that by using the “public purpose” interpretation this would enable a sort of reverse Robin Hood scheme whereby wealthy developers with political influence would be able to take property from the poor and middle-classes at below-market values. Further the distinction between private and public use of property would be so blurred as to effectively render inconsequential any protection provided by the fifth amendment with regards to usurpation by the government of private land rights.

To illustrate the difference, public use would imply the construction of a facility that would be run by the municipality that would be actually USED by the public. Examples include public schools and libraries, court buildings, city halls, and roadways. Public purpose has a much broader definition and implies any project that could benefit the public, usually financially. An example would be condemning a depressed urban area (homeowners) in order to develop an economic project (like a shopping mall or a factory) because it would bring increased tax revenues or provide new jobs, which would benefit the community (public purpose).

In conclusion, were the City of New Ulm to successfully either a) execute eminent domain on the farmers or b) get a waiver on the requirement to get the wind rights easement from the farmers, the City of New Ulm would then stand to profit from the new wind power farm while the farmers would derive no benefit as they do not live in the same county as the City of New Ulm.

Which leads me to ask two closing questions, the first of which is “Have you tried offering the farmers royalties or subsidies for the use of the wind that flows over their private property?” The second question would only need to be asked if the farmers lose their fight. “Will the Kennedy’s then be forced to accept the wind farm proposal on the Massachusetts coastline that they fought because it would ‘lower property values’?”

57% of American's Want Tort Reform for Medical Malpractice Suits

Read the Rasmussen poll report here.

On August 12, August 18 and August 27 I bloviated expansively about the House version of the United States National Health Care act (USNHC). Specifically, I wondered how any act put before Congress that does not make any effort whatsoever to set limits on malpractice lawsuits, commonly called "tort" reform could actually claim to be a comprehensive plan to reduce the cost of health care to America's citizens.

Apparently I am now one of a clear majority of polled voters who feel the same way. According to a Rasmussen poll published on December 2nd, 2009 57% of voters favor limiting monetary rewards to medical lawsuit plaintiffs, with 29% disagreeing and 14% not sure. 47% of voter respondents to the poll believe that limiting monetary awards would "significantly reduce the cost of health care in the United States", with 28% disagreeing and 25% unsure.

Finally, 60% of the respondents believe USNHC will increase the Federal deficit and a larger number believe it will result in higher taxes on the middle-class.

As I've said many times before, I believe that dramatic changes need to be made in our health care system.

Here's some of my list of items that need to be addressed by USNHC. Note that I'm not saying that we should abandon USNHC, only that if we truly want to believe that it will be a comprehensive bill to control the cost of health care to the U.S. consumer, then I think these issues need to be considered and added:

Have you talked to a health-care professional recently? A surgical doctor? A registered nurse? An emergency room technician? Did you ask them about the hours they work? I know very few health-care professionals that work LESS than 50 hours a week, and I know some that work over 80 hours a week. The old market rule applies in this case. If demand is high and supply is low, cost increases. How does USNHC plan to add more people to the medical profession? And if you think those resources are scarce now imagine when we add the so-called 47 million (I say so-called because it's been proven that there are not that many people with no medical insurance at any one time) to the insurance rolls? Now that somebody else (you and I) will be helping to pay for their care, you can bet that they will flood the system with requests for care.

The FDA approval process for pharmaceuticals adds exorbitant costs to the process of bringing new drugs to market. By itself, I don't have a problem with that. I like the fact that my government is trying to ensure that only high quality medicines make it to the consumer. But if the FDA is going to justify the hoops, the red-tape and the cost associated, then how come drugs keep getting pulled from the shelf and we keep seeing class-action lawsuits against drug manufacturers for drugs that were approved by the FDA? It's gotta be either one way or the other. Either the FDA stands by their approval and accepts some of the risk for their stamp of approval, or they need to admit that there's no way to test for all possible factors associated with drug use, in which case lawsuits against manufacturers for claims against FDA approved drugs should not be admitted to court.

Tort reform. All levels of the health care profession pay a LOT of money to insurers to protect themselves against lawsuits. But with America being the most litigious society on Earth, and there being nearly non-existent controls on both the validity of lawsuits and the rewards being sought, insurance premiums have skyrocketed. Reduce the cost of lawsuits and you reduce the cost of insurance paid by providers, the savings which can be passed on to the consumer. This is not to say that lawsuits aren't necessary. But a plaintiff shouldn't expect to profit from a mistake made or even malfeasance made by a provider. However, neither should they bear the loss. Basic market principle here is that if costs associated with a service or product can be reduced in a competitive market, the provider will reduce the cost to the consumer in order to remain competitive.

Increase competition between insurance companies by allowing consumers (businesses and individuals) to purchase insurance plans from across state lines. Basic market principle. Increased competition reduces cost as competitors seek to gain advantages on price through reduced profitability or improved efficiencies in doing business.

Provide incentives for the formation of benefit cooperatives that can cater to people employed by small businesses that cannot afford to provide health care from traditional insurance companies. Kind of like a medical version of a credit union. These coops, if run well, could really give traditional insurance companies a run for their money, and in so doing create an environment that would force insurance companies to compete or go out of business. Have you noticed that very few credit unions have been caught up in the current financial crisis? This is because they are run for the benefit of their shareholders, not stock holders. There is little incentive for credit unions to engage in risky and speculative financial practices. The same should be true for health care benefit coops, since their primary focus is to provide health care benefits at the lowest possible cost to their shareholders. How many hundreds of thousands (millions?) of Americans would take advantage of health care coops if they existed?

So why don't progressives want to talk about these ideas? Because none of them give the government more control over your individual liberty.

Jon Kyl has a Point, but is Anybody Paying Attention?

During a discussion of an amendment to the Baucus health care reform bill, Senator Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) stated that insurers should be required to provide basic maternity care. Senator Jon Kyl (R-AZ) responded: "“I don’t need maternity care, so requiring that on my insurance policy is something that I don’t need and will make the policy more expensive.”

Of course, this sounds like the typical kind of mean and hurtful and insensitive rhetoric that liberals expect to fall from the mouths of evil old conservative Republicans.

What Senator Kyl is trying to point out here, and nobody is bothering to listen, is that it makes no sense for a male insured to have basic maternity care covered on his policy as there is ZERO chance that any man will need to use it. What Senator Kyl is trying to say but nobody is listening is that the government should encourage that whatever comes out of the Baucus plan should be able to be tailored to each insured.

I'll bet if somebody were to ask Senator Jon Kyl if women should have an expectation to have basic maternity care covered in a general health care insurance plan, he'd probably be much more supportive.

Remember folks, insurance is supposed to transfer risk of disasters that you can't afford to a large group that can. We don't use health insurance that way.

In my opinion (and off-topic, by the way) health care insurance should be called something else, like health care benefits plan. It's NOT insurance.

Comparing Joe Wilson's "You Lie" to the "New Face of the KKK". You've Gotta Be Kidding Me!

Representative Hank Johnson (D-GA) has now taken the political debate to yet a new low, showing that the Black Congressional Caucus and the Democratic Party is completely prepared to throw the "race card" down on the table at any time that it looks like it might create political advantage.

Representative Joe Wilson (R-SC) blurted out "You lie!" during President Barack Obama's September 9th speech promoting his health care reform plan to Congress. Wilson personally apologized to the President the following day, and that apology was accepted.

However, since Congress is a tank of sharks that just love the smell of blood, and partisan rhetoric is just as rancid and raucous as ever, the Democrats wasted no time in debating and then voting on a censure of Wilson today (September 15th). Of course CNN was there to cover this debate (where were they on Van Jones, ACORN, All the President's Czars, etc?). CNN caught Johnson on camera and he had this to say:

"He did not help the cause of diversity and tolerance with his remarks. If I were a betting man, I would say it instigated more racist sentiment and feeling. 'It's OK. You don't have to bury it now. You can bring it out and talk about it fully.' And so I guess we'll probably have folks putting on uh, white hoods and white uniforms again, riding through the countryside intimidating people. And uh, you know, that's the logical conclusion if this kind of attitude, uh, is not rebuked. If Congressman Wilson represents, uh, he's the face of it."

I've never cussed on this blog before. But I'm going to now. You've got to be shitting me. Joe Wilson is now the face of racial intolerance and hatred in the United States of America because he disagrees with the President's assertion that SR3200 will not prevent illegal immigrants from receiving health care benefits? You got all that from two words?. In my opinion that's one helluva stretch. This just demonstrates and proves what Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Michelle Malkin and all the other conservative talkers have been saying since Obama started campaigning for election, which is that you cannot disagree with the President on any topic and then avoid being charged with opposing the President because you are a racist and he is an African-American.

I'm sure that were I to have an opportunity to speak directly to Representative Johnson, and he were willing to actually waste his time defending himself to me, that he could come up with some convoluted explanation about how he can rationalize the connection between Rep. Wilson to the KKK by the evidence of the two words "You lie!" In my opinion, this can only be rationally explained by Saul Alinsky rule #12: "Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it and polarize it." By portraying Wilson as a personalized face of racism, Johnson successfully demonizes Wilson and weakens him and what he stands for. The simplest explanation is the most likely, and this certainly fits the data.

Political discourse in this country is dying. And the rules are skewed. Nobody will defend Wilson against this ridiculous, baseless and from my point of view, irresponsible charge because no white guy is going to get fair representation.

ObamaCare: Single Payer is Ultimate Goal.

View this video.
View this video.
View this video.

From these videos highlighting President Obama and other influential thinkers behind the migration of the U.S. citizen from "employer" based to "socialized" healthcare plans.

President Obama has stated several times that were he to have the benefit of starting "from scratch" on the U.S. healthcare system, he would implement an "single-payer" system. Government subsidized.

President Obama, Jacob Hacker and other influential Democrats such as D-IL Jan Schakowsky have stated that the United States, under their direction, will "eventually" get to a single-payer system. However, they acknowledge that it will take time.

Yet the big lie that is expressed in these videos is the fact that they will not do it by "scaring" people into thinking that they will lose their option for private insurance. President Obama and Jacob Hacker both state that it will take 10, 15 or even 20 years in order to achieve this goal.

But make no mistake... the goal is socialized single-payer system.

After you watch the videos, how could you possibly refute what I have posted?

Cash For Clunkers a Preview of Things to Come.

There are a whole lot of things about "Cash for Clunkers" that I don't like.

One thing I don't like about it is that they are basically taking $3,500 or $4,500 from the average American taxpayer and basically GIVE IT to somebody else. That is redistribution of wealth, period. That's socialism.

However, what I hate even more is the fact that this program, which was estimated to run through November 1 of this year, is already being cancelled because it's running out of money.

What I hate even more is that this morning, Congress indicated that they will add 2 billion to the program. That's more socialism.

What I hate the most... Our government couldn't even manage this relatively simple little program predictably or competently. Yet that same government thinks that they can somehow rush into law a seriously complicated health care reform that is arguably flawed and definitely not fully understood by anybody, and expect us to believe that they can manage this program any better than Cash for Clunkers.

Let's just see. Congress originally estimated that the Cash for Clunkers would run from August to November at a cost of $1 billion. One week into the program (1/12th of the total program period), they had to add $2 billion more to meet the demand.

Let's extrapolate that to the health care overhaul...

Palin Quits.

Governor Sarah Palin announced on July 3 that she will step down as Alaska's governor. She claimed she wanted to spare her family from continuing media-spawned attacks on her and her family's character as well as her state from more "pain and expense"as ongoing ethics investigations continue to shadow her administration.

The "chatting classes" speculated all weekend on what this might mean. Is this her opening gambit for a 2012 Presidential election run? Is she seeking to hide from an FBI investigation?

Well, for me, it simply means that she is a quitter. I say this very sadly because I thought she was the only true conservative voice in the McCain campaign. But politics in America is pain. Politicians and regrettably, their families are targets of malicious lies and super focused scrutiny that practically no household could endure. She knew this when she was Mayor of Wasilla, and she knew it when she took the Governor's Oath of Office.

When she accepted the nomination and later the actual vote of the people of Alaska she made a contract with them that she would see this through. She has now welched on that contract.

I cannot in good conscience vote for a candidate who has proven that they will not see it through to the bitter end. George Bush, for all of his perceived faults, stuck to his principles right to the last day of his administration.

Good bye, Sarah Palin. Don't count on my vote in 2012.

HR 2454 - Taxing American Business to Oblivion

HR 2454 (ACES - American Clean Energy and Security Act) is purported to potentially save every American household, on average, $750 by year 2020 and $3,900 by year 2030. This declaration came from the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE).

An important claim is that the energy efficiency provisions in the bill will reduce the transitional costs of capping carbon pollution, with the saving from reduced energy usage to be reinvested locally. This reinvestment purports to generate both economic activity and jobs. These claims were made by Steven Nadel, the Executive Director of ACEEE.

"Cap and Trade" is an important provision in this legislation, and is similar to the Clean Air Act provisions of 1990.

The idea behind Cap and Trade is that every business will be limited to the amount of greenhouse gases that can be emitted into the environment, and which will be regulated by "emissions permits" for every ton of CO2 released into the atmosphere. The "cap" is the enforceable maximum limit that the company can emit. The "trade" is that some companies will be able to comply or transition with less expense than others. For those companies that emit less than their "cap", they can "trade" that deficit with other companies (probably for a fee). This theoretically results in an overall reduction in "greenhouse gas" emissions while reducing the risk for some companies that cannot quickly transition without incurring huge penalties levied by the Federal Government.

Over a LONG period of time, the theoretical goal is to reduce U.S. generated "greenhouse gas" emissions by 80 percent by 2050 (42 years from today). Here's the kicker though. It is estimated by organizations friendly to this legislation (like The Center for American Progress) that the taxes (or fines) have the potential to generate $50 billion to $300 billion annually! This is above and beyond all of the new taxes that are being contemplated at both the federal and state level to cope with the current tax revenue shortages being experienced by ever level of government. This is also not to mention an aggressive new implementation for an nationalized health-care option or system that will cost $1.1 trillion over ten years.

The problems are manifold. Cap and Trade has been used in Europe for years and what happened was that relatively "green" West European manufacturers happily sold carbon "credits" to their really dirty East European counterparts who then happily went on polluting to their heart's content. Net result, it wasn't until the recession kicked everybody in the teeth in 2007 that carbon emissions in Europe finally started to drop. But the reason was because fewer people were purchasing products manufactured in Europe, not because their industries were any more "green".

I am not against green technologies. I am very much for them. But make no mistake, the vast majority of so-called "green" energy production schemes (fuel-cell, wind power, geo-thermal, solar, etc) are still immature or implemented on such a small scale as to barely make a dent in the overall power demands of the American consumer. Consider this information: According to the U.S. Department of Energy the breakdown of energy production was: Petroleum (39%), Natural Gas (23%), Coal (22%), Nuclear Electric Power (8%) and "Renewable" (7%). If we break down the "Renewable" category, we find that Solar represents 1%, Hydroelectric 36%, Geothermal 5%, Biomass 53% and Wind 5%.

Think about that for just a minute... Solar energy production in the U.S. in 2007 generated .07% of our total energy production. Wind produced .35%, or 1/3 of one percent of our total energy needs.

So, here's the grind... Even though I agree with Pres. Obama that there is MUCH potential in the creation of green energy sector jobs I do not see how green technology can possibly replace traditional, well-developed and mature energy sources such as petroleum, coal and natural gas. And during that LONG period of time, the American manufacturer is going to be heavily penalized for failing to cap their CO2 emissions. And since only Europe really makes any effort to enforce CO2 emissions, you can be sure that we will continue to lose jobs to Asian manufacturers.

I personally think this whole thing is just a g-d tax scheme anyway.

Paid Vacation Act of 2009!

Representative Alan Grayson of Flordia (district 8) today is going to introduce legislation on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives.

What do you think it is?

Cap in Trade? Funding to fix our crumbling infrastructure? Tort reform to reduce the cost of health care? Legislation to deal with the problem of the Guantanamo Bay Camp Delta detainees?

Nope.

He is introducing the "Paid Vacation Act", which will require companies that employ more than a certain number of employees to provide those employees with one or two weeks of mandatory paid vacation.

Grayson's district includes Orlando, Florida. This happens to be the location of Walt Disney World, the "Happiest Place on Earth". Hmmm. Nobody thinks that this has anything to do with the legislation, does it?

Let me get this straight. Companies are going bankrupt in record numbers, the ranks of the unemployed have swollen to OVER three million (9.2% as of May 15), margins between loss and profit are shrinking faster than the American dollar, and Mr. Grayson wants to FORCE employers to PAY for one or two week vacations for their entire workforce.

Do you want to guess which political party this guy is affiliated with?

Right-wing Radical Threat Assessment

The Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS) released a 9-page assessment yesterday that included disgruntled former military personnel as a potential for "homegrown terrorism" (ala Timothy McVeigh), especially in light of the sweeping changes in American society and politics and the ascension of a non-white to the Presidency of the United States.

I will not deny that like any other human institution there are people who currently where the military uniform that are capable of performing unspeakable acts of violence against the very people they were sworn to protect. People like Timothy McVeigh, or Lee Harvey Oswald. But the overwhelmingly vast majority of service personnel are people who see the United States as it currently exists as something worth preserving, worth dying for. Without any facts to back me up (because I really have NOT done the research) I would still opine that the very nature of the kind of person that would perform military service makes them far less likely, even with the very specialised training that some of them receive, to perpetrate an act of violence against their own people. The very thought of somebody who is willing to put themselves between their nation and war's desolation then returning home to do damage to the very thing that they risked all for seems pretty far-fetched to me.

As an illustration, look at the video evidence of the confrontation at the Berkely USMC Officer Selection Station between radical leftist organizations like Code Pink and pro-American civilians and military personnel. The leftists were far more likely to be provocative and use abusive language to express their opinions. Also, the acts of vandalism that took place during the pro-USMC rally at Berkely city hall were all by persons that were there to oppose the rally.

Based on this very small, but typical incident, I would assess that while the special training received by certain segments of the military give them a capability to perform domestic violence, I would also include in that assessment that those same individuals are, by their very nature, less likely to do so.

While I am NOT a fan of Dr. Michael Savage or his talk show, he got it right when he said that the DHS is basically saying that they are concerned about people who are concerned about "illegal immigration, the increasing power of the Federal government, gun grabs, abortion and the loss of U.S. national sovereignty. In other words, anyone who is worried about our borders, language or culture is now on 'Big Sis' ' watch-list."

However, I would definitely agree that if the current administration continues to move the nation left towards socialism or smiley-face facism that then the current administration would have a just concern of how the large conservative population (roughly 50% of us) will react. Which simply means that the current administration would do well to not take us very far down that path.

Liberals Don't Understand the Tea Parties.

I am a conservative right-wing political junky. I listen to news radio during the day while I work. I watch CNN, MSNBC and Fox News in the evenings and during my lunch break. I scan websites like DrudgeReport, DailyKOS, DemocracyNow!, FoxNews.com while I'm waiting for test results.

And with the exception of Fox News nearly every news source I've listened to for the last four days are blasting the Tea Parties (tax revolts) that have been organized all over the United States today. Except for Fox, they all say that these "conservatives" are unfairly protesting Democratic spending initiatives while having ignored massive increases in Federal spending that occurred during the hated "W"'s administration.

As an example, on CNN's website the following statements were made:
"Liberal tea party critics aren't buying it. They call the protests "Astroturf," saying they aren't real grassroots events, but are organized by old-fashioned Republican Party bosses."
Sorry, I'm not buying it. The Republican party couldn't organize itself out of a wet paper bag right now, it's in such a sad state. This is truly a grass-roots effort that started with CNBC's Rick Santelli ranting about government spending and transferring wealth to people and businesses that made bad decisions. Go to 912project.com if you don't believe me.

"The White House has plans to counter the tea party message with an event to remind Americans that the president cut taxes in the stimulus package."
Yes, but the President is certainly taking advantage of this situation to push a HUGE social agenda. I actually agree that temporarily that the government is going to have spend tax dollars in order to keep our economy from falling apart, but what he is doing is instituting HUGE legacy social programs that will continue to exist long after this crisis is over. Most fiscal conservatives are against this.

"In remarks in Washington on Wednesday, Obama said he'd been true to campaign promises to lessen the tax burden on most Americans."
To repeat, LESSENING the tax burden is a side-show element of the tea-parties. We are protesting indiscriminate and completely unaccountable government spending.

At least for myself, I acknowledge that a certain level of taxation is necessary to allow government to perform it's necessary functions. But I look at TARP, ARAP, and the Federal Budget proposal for 2009 and what I don't see is a significant investment in our infrastructure. Roads, bridges and dams are all falling apart and there is not nearly enough money for these VERY necessary and Constitutionally mandated government functions. But we seem to have plenty of money allocated to redesign our health care system.

Rasmussen Poll: Democrats Prefer Socialism

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/just_53_say_capitalism_better_than_socialism

Never in my life have I said this. Until now. The American Experiment is over. And it has failed. It has failed.

Nearly 1 out of every 2 American adults now feel that Socialism is better than Capitalism as a means to prosperity.

I am only somewhat assuaged that people that are affiliated with the Republican party, a party that pretends to be conservative are 11 times more likely to prefer Capitalism.

"There is a partisan gap as well. Republicans - by an 11-to-1 margin - favor capitalism. Democrats are much more closely divided: Just 39% say capitalism is better while 30% prefer socialism. As for those not affiliated with either major political party, 48% say capitalism is best, and 21% opt for socialism."

Rugged individualism is apparently on life support in this nation. A capitalistic society requires a citizenry that is willing to take risks, is willing to fail, is willing to learn from failure and take responsibility for failure. For from failure comes the knowledge and wisdom to adapt, overcome and in doing so become a winner.

But apparently, 47% of us want the government to tell them what they will do in life, how they will do it, take half or more of our pay and then give it back to us with social education programs, social healthcare programs, social welfare programs, government housing programs and government-sponsored and governed retirement programs. Because somehow the American people have come to the conclusion that they want a nanny state where Uncle Sam will provide for them from cradle to grave.

OK. So point out which great socialist nation has produced more billionaires and millionaires, produced more medical miracles, produced more food per capita, created greater scientific achievement than the United States? China? Over 1.5 billion of her people live in rural squalor. Russia? Home of the greatest nuclear accident in history. Both countries have ruling elites that live in opulence and luxury while the laboring classes live in tenements and flats. How about Venezuela? Ok, maybe not. How about France? Oh yeah, their socialist system is about to go completely bankrupt because they have more people taking out of the system than are paying into it. Great Britain? Their health care system is so poor for routine medical care that many Britons fly to the U.S. to get their medical needs addressed.

If you look at any nation in the world as a whole and compare that nation to the U.S., you will still not ever find a single example where there are greater opportunities for success than here.

But the current generation of wimpy crybabies wants to suckle at the the government's tit.

I'd love to move somewhere else, because the current generations of American's sickens and disgusts me. Unfortunately, as bad as it is here, it's still not worse than living anywhere else. Even more unfortunately, I do not believe that this will always be so.

When a Wheel-barrow was Needed to Buy a Loaf of Bread.

What does the Chinese Central Bank, the Russian Federation and the United Nations have in common? Answer: They are actively considering dumping the U.S. Dollar as the foreign reserve currency.

Why do they want to do this? What does it mean for us?

Their financial brainiacs are probably looking at grainy pictures of despondent and depressed Germans taking sacks of money to the grocery store to bring home a sack or two of groceries. Pictures that were taken in the 1920's and 1930's.

Since 1945, the United States has taken progressively more drastic steps to decouple our currency to anything of "real" value. Not because of any financial crisis, but because in order to create consumer spending, we first had to create consumer wealth.

Step 1: Right after World War II, the world's leading financial countries decided that they would fix the price of gold at US$35 an ounce. That meant that every dollar printed in the U.S. could buy one dollar's worth of gold (or 35 dollars to the ounce), even if we didn't have enough gold in the treasury at any given time to redeem all of the money we printed. This was because the likelihood was very low that everybody that had a "gold certificate" dollar (remember those?) would want to redeem their cash for gold at the same time.

Step 2: However, during the late 1960's we ran into a real problem. In order to fund the Vietnam War and the many government-run social engineering projects that were collectively known as the "Great Society", we had to accumulate more gold at Fort Knox. A LOT more gold. So in 1971 the U.S. decided to let the price of an ounce of gold to be set by it's market value. Gold suddenly and rapidly became a LOT more valuable, which meant that we could now print more dollars. Get it?

Keep in mind that from the 1940's through about 2005, the U.S. Dollar has been used as a "reserve" currency. In other words, other nations use the dollar the way we used to use gold. If a country accumulates a large quantity of very stable U.S. Dollars that have a good value against other financial instruments, then that country can leverage those dollars to buy things that they can't buy with their own currency. They use those U.S. Dollars just like gold. But part of the reason that these nations were willing to do this is because we essentially made a promise that we would never intentionally debase our currency.

Step 3: Now here we are in 2007-2008-2009 in the midst of a pretty serious financial crisis. Banks and investment firms bought into highly lucrative but also very fragile "mortgage-backed securities", and worse yet, DERIVATIVES of those securities. This was all fine and dandy as long as real estate values kept going up and up and up. In order to keep those home-builders busy, we had to start selling more and more houses to people who were on the edge of qualifying, or worse yet, people who really didn't qualify. But that was OK. We changed the rules to allow them to buy houses anyway. Well, at some point, some of those folks were going to start defaulting. That began the cascade slide: More homes vs. less demand equals falling real estate values, which caused more people to become "upside down" on the mortgages, causing more defaults. At that point, the wheels came off and we started tumbling down the cliff.

In order to kick-start the economy the way it used to be, people have got to start spending money again. So, here's what our govenment has decided to do. Let's just "borrow" against ourselves and print more money. Two Trillion Dollars Worth. The problem is that this solution has been tried before. Just for fun, look up how in the 1920's Germany's Mark (their "dollar") pretty much crumbled and rampant runaway inflation took the country into a dismal financial period. Since neither we (or they) didn't correspondingly create all that wealth what really happened is that all dollars, everywhere, are suddenly worth less. A LOT less.

So now countries that have a LOT of our dollars now have a LOT LESS wealth in their vaults than a few days ago because we just devalued our dollar in the vain hope that by putting more dollars on the market we can get people to start spending. Oh, incidentally, while this makes the dollar less valuable against other currencies, it also makes things manufactured in the U.S. (do we manufacture in the U.S. anymore?) less costly to foreign purchasers. This makes American goods more attractive to foreign buyers because they can buy more of an American product with less of their native currency.

But if WE can see that side-effect benefit, you can darn well bet that the Russian, Chinese and UN financial brainiacs can as well. Which means this: They are positioning themselves to begin to divest themselves of their stockpiles of U.S. dollars. Now, with the dollar not being backed up by something tangible, like a precious metal in a secure vault somewhere, this also means that the dollar is subject to the same market forces that effect all other consumer goods. In this case, as demand for the U.S. Dollar drops, so does it's value unless we reduce the supply. Which means that if the biggest holders of the U.S. Dollar were to 'dump' their holdings this could cause a severe spiral where the dollar becomes like the peso or the yen; nearly worthless on the world market.

And then instead of looking at grainy black and white pictures of despondent and depressed Germans taking sacks of money to buy a couple of meals at the grocery store, we will instead be looking at gorgeous 16 million color digital pix of despondent and depressed Americans taking sacks of money to buy a couple of meals at the grocery store.

Write your congressman. Write your senator. Write your President. Tell them to cutback on government spending. Tell them to stop with the stimulus bills. Tell them to let the free market system work. Failing companies should fail. Companies that are tough, lean and mean will survive. Let's hit bottom and then rebuild. But it will be easier, a LOT easier to do if our U.S. Dollar still has some value to it. It's not only better for us but for the U.S. and the world.