Tag Archives: Republicans

Budget Minded Republicans……

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budgetI know the current version of the Republican party is supposed to be all about fiscal austerity but I have trouble actually seeing them live out that concept. When it comes to the safety net and so-called “entitlement” issues they scream about needing to cut back or at least for total accountability. But when it comes to the bloated military expenses, homeland security and tax breaks for the rich they appear to throw that concept out the window. Of course that means that their austerity programs, if they are implemented as they suggest, will end up being done on the backs of the poor as almost everything else is “off the table”.

We spend more than the other 96% of the world combines on our supposed security. Our military budgets eat up so much of our prosperity as to force future looking programs off the stove.  Education, our R&D forces, and our colleges suffer as a result of our insistence that to be safe we must spend so much on our war machine. In fact we throw so much money into the military that they don’t even bother to try to determine if it is going to the best place. For that matter they really don’t even try to categorize where it is even spent.  But that doesn’t seem to phase the Republican senators and congressmen in Washington. They continue to demand more and more of our precious resource for this bloated machine.

For that reason I have little confidence that my budgeted minded friends are really serious about budgets but are really more concerned in reducing or even eliminating the very function of government or at least making sure that 47% don’t get things they supposedly haven’t earned.  If they were really serious about our current deficits they would be looking at  our war machine first not last.  When you throw trillions of dollars into a black hole you dictate that much of it will be spent unwisely or even fraudulently.  They demand total accountability for agencies supporting our safety net and nothing for our industrial/ military complex. How strange is that???

Republicans and Innate Goodness….

Money, Off The Top, Politics • Tags: , ,

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Source: http://rjscorner.net/2012/02/27/where-are-you-john-sherman-when-we-need-you/

PrintIt seems literally impossible for another Republican to take charge of these types of matters (controlling fraud and abuse). Most of those folks are just too beholding to big business to ever try to reign them in. So, currently that leaves the Democratic party to take up the mantel. I don’t see that as much of a possibility either. Where all this “too big to fail” will end I just don’t know.

I don’t find myself quoting myself very often but when I re-read this post from almost a year ago about how Republicans have been the party of big business in Will Rogers day and are even more so today it got me to thinking.  Republicans seem to believe in the innate goodness of our corporations. I don’t know how else you can explain their deregulation fever of the last three decades.

When Ronald Reagan came into office the first thing he did besides firing everyone who belonged to the Air Traffic Controllers Union was to finish up removing almost all regulations from the savings and loan industry. Here is what Wikipedia says about that:

The deregulation of S&Ls in 1980 gave them many of the capabilities of banks, without the same regulations as banks. Savings and loan associations could choose to be under either a state or a federal charter. Immediately after deregulation of the federally chartered thrifts, state-chartered thrifts rushed to become federally chartered, because of the advantages associated with a federal charter. In response, states such as California and Texas changed their regulations to be similar to federal regulations.

Of course we also know that within ten years the S&L industry almost disintegrated with fraud and abuse and it cost us taxpayers billions to bail them out. But that would not be the last time our friends in government showed their belief in the innate goodness of business. Soon after we recovered from the S&L fiasco they went about  you guessed it, de-regulating the entire banking sector. Again within a short period of time the banks “too big to fail” cost us about a trillion dollars to clean up their abuse of the mortgage business. After these two meltdowns the Democrats put back a few of the necessary regulation via Dodd/Frank bill  but the Republicans fought it tooth and nail. That I just don’t understand. Why do that seem to be totally ignore history, even recent history?

How can these guys in Washington continue to put their total faith in the innate goodness of an unbridled business sector. Profits are approaching all time highs while wages have remained stagnant for the last three decades! Given that fact, how else can you explain how they never seem to see a regulation that they don’t want to eliminate. It seems like they would eventually learn that capitalism depends on brisk and stringent regulations to contain the innate greed, not goodness,  that is built into the system.

Before my conservative friends attack me here I want to declare that I believe capitalism is the best system in the world but it only works when it is adequately regulated.  To my friends that think I am too critical at times I am really questioning the idea of almost total de-regulation mantra of Republicans. Do they really believe that regulations have no place in our business world? I would really like to know? Their two failed attempts at de-regulating our financial sector seem to say something. Or is that just me?

Some Advice From A Liberal Friend… 6

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I sympathize with my conservative friends. 2012 was just not a very good year for you in the political realm. So, in the spirit of cooperation I want to give you a very serious (well sort of serious) New Years Resolution.

Quit Being The Party Of The Rich

RichThat one thing alone probably cost you the presidency and several other of your recent political defeats. Let’s face it Paul Ryan’s drastic budget cuts to the nation’s safety net in order to give millionaires bigger tax breaks was the death knell of your hopes for the White House.  Mr. Romney’s 47% remark certainly didn’t help any either. You have got to realize that as the disparity between the rich and the poor widens as it surely will you are in a no-win situation.

I know distancing yourselves from your rich donors will be difficult to do. After all you have depended on them for at least a century now. Let’s just look at a few of the quotes that my hero Will Rogers said about that about some eighty years ago: More…

The Pro-Scrooge Christmas Story…. 2

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Banner - Aside 2Source:  Conservatives urge GOP leaders to be bold, prepare to go over cliff – The Hill’s On The Money.

Scrooge“I think Obama is very mindful of his legacy and is horrified of going over the cliff,” said Andy Roth of the Club for Growth. “Going over the cliff might be a signal that needs to be sent to the president, that he needs to play ball.”

He argued that President Clinton was forced to become a less liberal president after Speaker Newt Gingrich shut down the government in 1995.

“Clinton would not play ball with Newt until Newt shut the government down,” Roth said.

We all know the story “The Christmas Carol” about Scrooge who was a greedy money-mindful person who after being visited by the ghosts of Christmas past and Christmas to come turned around his life and started treating people, not his money, with love. More…

Those Words…. 1

Cultures, In The News, Politics • Tags: , , ,

Source: Sojourner Mail November 16, 2012

Hearts & Minds by Jim Wallis

The day after the election, Southern Baptist Seminary President Albert Mohler said, “I think this was an evangelical disaster.” 

Not really. But it was a disaster for the religious right, which had again tied its faith to the partisan political agenda of the Republican Party — which did lose the election. But Nov. 6 was an even deeper disaster for the religious right’s leaders, because they will no longer be able to control or easily co-opt the meaning of the term “evangelical.” 

During this election, much of the media continued to use the word as a political term — as a key constituency of the Republican conservative base. But what the media really means when they use term “evangelical” is “conservative white evangelical.” All other kinds of evangelicals are just never counted.

Just as the 2012 electoral results finally revealed the demographic transformation of America — which has been occurring for quite some time — it also dramatically demonstrated how the meaning of the word “evangelical” is being transformed.  More…

The Light at the End of the Tunnel…. Finally….. 2

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Here we are twelve days away from the election! I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. It seems that each election, especially when a president is on the ballot, gets uglier and uglier. There just seems to be so much hate in our country now and that is truly scares me at times.

Twelve days and we will finally be finished with all these negative ads costing billions of dollars telling us why we should be against someone but little about why we should vote for the other guy on the ballot. I just saw some yard signs like the picture here in several yards in my neighborhood.  The Republican party’s mascot is the elephant and of course we all know that an elephant never forgets (all of us believe in all those clichés don’t we).  As I am getting older in years I definitely am forgetting things but I don’t forget who caused so much of our current problems. More…

Rice – Just Too Moderate…. 1

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source: Rice: World is ‘chaotic and dangerous’ with a weak USA – USATODAY.com.

Although Rice, who served under President George W. Bush, praised the Republican ticket of Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, she offered the delegates no political red meat. Unlike virtually every other speaker of the night, she did not mention President Obama or his office….

However, she was regarded by most observers as too moderate. She’s called herself “mildly pro-choice” — anathema to many in the Republican Party’s conservative base who still suspect the sincerity of Romney’s stated opposition to abortion.

Rice also is out of step with many Republicans on immigration; she has called the failure of President George W. Bush’s plan for a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants one of her biggest regrets.

More…

My Word…. 3

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It used to be that a man’s word was the primary definition of his character. If you didn’t keep your word how could you be trusted with anything else? A man’s word was his word. But it seems that somehow this idea has been lost in America or at least in the Republican party.

When the super-committee, one of whose members is the current GOP vice-presidential candidate, was formed everyone in congress gave their word that if they could not reach a compromise on how to reign in the deficit then all of discretionary spending budgets would take a 10% hit. Every member of congress put his word on the line by passing this compromise resolution.

Now it seems that almost all Republicans and even some Democrats want to renege  on that promise and go back on their word. They say that our military can’t possibly take a 10% cut without threatening our security. Of course if you have read much of anything on the blog you know I think that is hogwash. We, five percent of the world’s population, currently spend more on our war machine than the rest of the world combined. If we only quit being the policemen of the world and left part of that task to the people of the affected region then we could reduce our military budgets by many more times that the ten percent promise.

So here we are with a building full of the people’s representatives who can not be trusted. What should we do about this situation? In my mind we should remove all those who can’t be trusted to keep their word. If you agree then watch in the coming months how your representatives in congress address this issue. If they go against their word then toss them out. We can only bring back integrity to our political institutions when we can trust our representatives and yes they should answer to us and not their political leadership. They speak for us while they are in Washington.

But what do I know…..

Ayn Rand – Mr. Ryans Hero….

Cultures, Government, In The News • Tags: , , , , , ,

Source: Ayn Rand Railed Against Government Benefits, But Grabbed Social Security and Medicare When She Needed Them | Alternet.


Ayn Rand was not only a schlock novelist, she was also the progenitor of a sweeping “moral philosophy” that justifies the privilege of the wealthy and demonizes not only the slothful, undeserving poor but the lackluster middle-classes as well.

Her books provided wide-ranging parables of “parasites,” “looters” and “moochers” using the levers of government to steal the fruits of her heroes’ labor. In the real world, however, Rand herself received Social Security payments and Medicare benefits under the name of Ann O’Connor (her husband was Frank O’Connor).

As Michael Ford of Xavier University’s Center for the Study of the American Dream wrote, “In the end, Miss Rand was a hypocrite but she could never be faulted for failing to act in her own self-interest.”

This is an ongoing study of the new vice presidential candidate in the Republican party. It is well-known that Mr. Ryan, like several others in his party, is a huge fan of Ayn Rand. He says when his loses his focus he picks up her books to rejuvenate his path in life.  So, I wanted to learn a little more about his hero. I knew from hearing about her in college in the 60′s that she was a radical and an enthusiastic McCarthy supporter. But what I have learned about her since is even more telling.

One of her most famous quotes is:

Until and unless you discover that money is the root of all good, you ask for your own destruction. – Ayn Rand

I don’t know if, being an avowed atheist, she was mocking Christ who basically said the opposite or just what were the circumstances of this quote but I just can’t put a benevolent spin on it in any circumstance .

A final quote I want to present of Ms. Rand is her beliefs about altruism. For those of you who might not know what an altruist is the definition is  person unselfishly concerned for or devoted to the welfare of others. Here is the quote:

If any civilization is to survive, it is the morality of altruism that men have to reject.

I know Ayn Rand is also a hero of an elder in the Lutheran church where I was a member a few years ago.  He prided himself in his beliefs that he got from her that there are two types of people in this world  ”makers” and “takers”. The makers produce things and the takers are just a drain our society. He included everyone in government service as a “taker”. His philosophy, which seemed to be agreed upon by several others there, was one of the reasons I decided to not challenge my expulsion from that congregation due to theological differences (I think the earth is more than six thousand years old and  the Bible contains stories that are not always literal and without error).

Ayn Rand seems to almost be the anti-thesis of Jesus Christ who she loathed so much. It seems totally ironic to now see Ms. Rand as a hero of the political party who deems themselves to be so Christian. How can this be?

So, here I am looking for reasons why a very good clergy friend of mine from the past has such a high regard to Mr. Ryan. Could my friend be one of those one-issue voters? Paul Ryan is very consistent in his opposition to abortion even in the case of rape and incest. Could that be the sole reason for my friend’s endorsement?  I hope not….

A Crack in the Armor??? 2

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Source: Boehner joins criticism of Bachmann over Clinton aide comments | World news | guardian.co.uk

John Boehner, the leading Republican in Congress, has chastised his colleague Michele Bachmann over allegations she made linking a key aide of Hillary Clinton to Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood.

Boehner said on Thursday that the comments – made in a letter from Bachmann to the state department and Minnesota congressman Keith Ellison – about the family of Huma Abedin were “pretty dangerous”.

He joins John McCain in rebuking Bachmann over claims that Abedin’s father, mother and brother were connected to the Islamist group.

I know I am on vacation and have sworn off politics to a certain degree but going head-to-head with my conservative friend on FaceBook in the last day or so has already tarnished an otherwise great vacation so I thought what the heck when I saw this article.

Is this the long-awaited crack in the armor for the Republican party. Up until this point there seems to be nothing no matter how nasty or untrue any Republican could say about any Democrat that would raise a rebuke from a fellow Republican. No matter how absurd the words fellow Republicans just didn’t do that.  So, it came as a total surprise that two congressmen are chastising another over comments made.

I would love to think that this is the beginning of some sanity in our political processes but dare I even think that especially during the beginnings of this mud-slinging season.  Is civility an archaic word now or can it be resurrected? We can only hope that this is finally a crack in the armor….

But what do I know

Gaming The System…… 5

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Source: Get personalized help to max out Social Security.

Social Security Solutions’ optimization plan calls for my wife to file for her own benefits at age 67 but immediately suspend her payments — a perfectly legal strategy known as a file-and-suspend.

We start getting some Social Security benefits immediately when I apply (at age 66) to receive a spousal benefit based on her earnings record, half of what she could receive.

At age 70, my wife starts her own benefits; a year later, I switch to my own benefit when I turn 70. Both of our benefits are now at the maximum monthly level possible for the rest of our lives. Later on, after I (gulp) die first, my wife switches to a survivor benefit, which is 100 percent of my benefit…..

I’m sure all this stuff above is legal but, come on,  finding all the loop holes to get the most possible is carrying it too far in my mind.  Of course this article came from a large financial company.  They are used to gaming the system. These guys I’m sure have a large lobbying group in D.C. and make sure that these sort of loop holes are written into our laws.

Our government needs to adopt my current mantra in life and that is Simplify. If we could somehow get rid of all those lawyers around and put this stuff back into common folk’s hands I’m sure our laws would be simpler and with many less loop holes. But maybe the world has just gotten too complicated for simplicity?

Putting the level of social security benefits that you get related to what you paid in makes sense but it seems that the system has just spurned too may other conditions. I know that about one-third of those collecting benefits are not the seniors who paid into them. If the Republicans insist of changing the system then let’s put those folks in a different payout pool and take social security back to the insurance it was meant to be.  But I’m sure this would do little to placate my conservative friends who would be very happy to see social security go the way of the horse and buggy. In their minds if government is involved then it must be wrong.

Is the Republican Party Insuring Its Own Demise?? 6

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Is the Republican Party insuring its own demise by it continuing to focus on a narrower and narrower core group.  I want to believe this is the case as the alternative is that we as a country are now dominated by exclusion.  Being against things, particularly different groups of people, is what has been driving the Republican primaries lately. It has pushed their final candidate over to the extreme right of the political spectrum. Can the Republicans maintain a party that far off the center of American Politics?

It seems like everyday the Republican party members alienate yet another group of voters.

  • They are for rounding up all the people in this country without the proper papers and shipping them out of the country.  They seem to have no compassion for those who are just trying to provide for their families. This is alienating most Spanish-speaking voters.
  • They are against birth control. This is alienating many women voters.
  • They are against continuing to fund Medicare. They want to turn it over to the private insurance companies. This is alienating many senior citizen voters (and they are the most active voters around)
  • They are against providing medical care via Medicaid to the poorest of the poor.  Even though this group is not a strong voting block there are those who do vote and have compassion for this group.
  • They are against religious diversity. They say this is a “Christian” nation. By this they are alienating Muslims, Hindi, Buddhists, and other non-Christian religious groups.
  • They are against Social Security. They want to make each person entirely on their own during their senior years. This is a double whammy for us seniors.

The Republicans seem to be against so much and for so little how can they maintain a Republican base? It seems that one of the only groups they are not alienating are white evangelical Christians , particularly those ironically who lack compassion for their fellow-man. Someday this group might even take to heart the commands of Jesus, their founder, and at least some a minimal amount of compassion for the “least of these”.

Another group who they are not presently alienating are those that see governments only role in society is to provide for our war machine.  Everything else to this particular group is deemed unconstitutional. We have a female who is running for congress in my district who proudly announces that she is home schooled on the constitution. She basically says after her self study she has determined that the federal government’s only role is to provide for defense. Everything else, according to her, is unconstitutional!

The last and maybe the biggest group of supporters to the current Republican party are those that just want the government out of their pocket books.  Today they are known as the “Tea Party” but have had many other names through the years. They don’t see  ”providing for the general welfare”, as a necessary role for their government to be involved in. They seem to care little about anyone but themselves.

Where will future Republicans come from? If they end up having no core support can they even exist?

Deserves a Second Showing….

In The News, Politics, Silliness • Tags: , , ,

I am bringing back one of my favorite posts for January of last year. It seems appropriate given all we have learned from the twenty-odd, and I mean odd, Republican debates we have had to endure so far. I’m sure that if the topic had come up during one of their debates they would all have throughly backed this theme.

From January 11, 2011

Source:http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/20110118/cm_csm/354973;_ylt=At28KK0Z7OndNM3vfaeRt82s0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTFlZW4ybXNuBHBvcwMyMTcEc2VjA2FjY29yZGlvbl9vcGluaW9uBHNsawNiYXJyaWVydG9iZXQ-

The first words of this article caught my attention today.  Let’s pull a few quotes from the article; they are in blue below. If you want to see the original article by Anthony Schlaff click on the link above.

“If traffic lights were invented today, the Republican Party would be against them. After all, aren’t traffic lights a perfect symbol for government imposition on individual freedom? The government takes our money to build and maintain them, and then uses them to tell us when we can stop and when we can go.”

If I didn’t know better I would have bet that the above quote was from Will Rogers. Congratulations Anthony for getting him down pat.  The people who currently have control of the Republican Party, and I do mean control,  don’t seem to believe there is anything called social responsibility! They think everything should be left up to each of them (only the radical right) to determine. Put that belief to its fullest extent and get rid of all stoplights! If they do get rid of stoplights than I guess police are next. After all what do police do but keep people from doing what they want to do :)

What kind of freedom do we really want? The answer becomes clear when we consider the kinds of “freedom” that the status quo – a lack of such government involvement – imparts. How many of us want the freedom to face medical bankruptcy, or the freedom to be denied coverage (and care) because of a preexisting condition? And how many of us see dying, due to lack of insurance, from a treatable or curable disease as an acceptable cost of individual liberty?As with traffic lights, there is a trade-off; we cannot get something for nothing. The only way to have a system that guarantees necessary care for those in need – to give us the freedom to live our lives without that fear – is to make sure everyone is included in the system. Many of us, after all, choose to marry. This decision substantially restricts us and increases our responsibilities. Yet the responsibilities marriage entails also give new meaning to our lives. Liberating ourselves from every commitment and every shared responsibility would not be freedom. It would leave us each isolated and unfulfilled: freedom as truly nothing left to lose.

According to the simplified notion of personal responsibility [as espoused by many Republicans], people should take it upon themselves to get educated, keep their water clean, and properly dispose of household waste. It sounds good in theory, but would you live in a town that had no schools, and no water or sewer treatment, but gave every household the “freedom” to manage these concerns on their own? Probably not. Thankfully, citizens across America have the freedom – through government – to manage these problems collectively. A century ago, that is what they did, and we are all the freer for having school, water, and sewer systems run by our cities and towns.

If public schools or public drinking water and sewer systems were invented today, would Republicans oppose them, along with the traffic lights?

Let’s all get on the Radical Right bandwagon. Look at all the money we can save by eliminating all this “social responsibility” stuff. Everyone should have a right to die young if they don’t “choose” to have any money to do otherwise. To the RR government has no place in our society except to protect their guns and their seemingly never ending wars to use them. Let’s don’t tell them but all this has been already tried; it’s called anarchy. But what do I know. This type of thinking would all be very funny if it were not so tragically sorrowful.

All I know is what I read in the headlines……

Smart But Don’t Know Much…

Government, In The News, Quotes, Will's Quotes • Tags: , , ,

There is something about a Republican politician, they are smart but they just don’t know much. – July 4, 1934  Will Rogers

I’m totally convinced that Will would also include most of today’s Democrat politicians in this quote. I’m sure those yahoos in congress, or at least most of them, are pretty smart fellas when it comes to book learning.  But when it comes to the everyday life of the common man I don’t think they know much.

I find it hard to believe that those in the top 1% , and that includes the majority of those in our congress, even have a clue as to what it feels like to have to choose between food and your medicine. They can’t begin to imagine the grief caused by being in the process of losing your home to the bank because you lost what you thought was a forever job. They can’t begin to understand what it is like to spend the rest of your life trying to pay the bills for just one major medical event when you don’t have, and cannot afford, insurance. Most of the folks who represent us in congress just have no idea of what our lives are really about.

The trouble is that it seems impossible to get anyone with any amount of understanding about our everyday issues into Washington DC.  The money required to buy an office in the Rayburn building is just beyond the means of most of us.

We have to realize that even though we rile against the rich that it is the rich who  for the most part control our destinies and that includes government actions. It used to be that one-man-one-vote evened the playing field a little bit but the recent Supreme court decision even took that away from us.  Now the one with the money controls the ballot box.

But what do I know….

Just Because You Write a Book… 2

In The News • Tags: , ,

Source: Ford’s Theatre, citing errors, refuses to carry Bill O’Reilly’s ‘Killing Lincoln’ – CSMonitor.com.

Just because you write a book doesn’t mean you are an expert in something. Fox New’s Bill O’Reilly I’m sure has a large following on his news show. I know he rants and raves just like most do on that network. He often mentions that he is a self-proclaimed expert on Lincoln who was the founder of the Republican party. However, it seems that his book on the subject of Lincoln’s assassination will not be sold in Ford’s Theatre where the killing took place. The historians there say there is just too many errors in the Reilly account to be sold there. They don’t want the historic site to lose credence.

It sounds like Reilly was no more true to facts about Lincoln than the current day Republicans are to the party that he founded.  Lincoln was if nothing else a president for the people. His words and actions backed up that world view. Today’s Republicans have given up that mantle to the Democratic party. I don’t know exactly when that happened but it is fully obvious today. The Republican party’s mantra now seems to be “I got mine so screw you”.  They are now the party of big money, ultra-conservative fundamentalists, and not much else.

But we can’t really put any of the errors in the book on Bill O’Reilly himself as he “co-authored” the book with someone else. Who is to know what percentage of contributions he actually made? I always wonder about that whenever I see two names on a book. Is one there for name recognition only in order to sell more books? I’m sure this is not the first time that errors appear in supposedly historical works. I recently read  the book by Herndon, who was Lincoln’s business partner in Springfield. When it came out it was scorned by many of the current historians as it had places where Lincoln was not shown in the best light. In fact Mrs. Lincoln was depicted at a downright “loony”. It has only been in the last forty years or so that the book has gained respect.

Maybe someday the book by whichever person on the cover actually wrote it will get respect. The current denouncement of it by some noted scholars just gives Fox News something else to yell about with the “liberal” press. As if they don’t have enough ;)

But what do I know….

An Investment Strategy No One Talks About…. 2

In The News, Money, Politics • Tags: , , ,

Source: Wolfram Blog : Stock Market Returns by Presidential Party.

The New York Times recently published an “Op-Chart” by Tommy McCall on its Opinion page showing what your returns would have been had you started with $10,000 in 1929 and invested it in the stock market, but only during the administrations of either Democratic or Republican presidents. His calculations showed that if you had invested only during Republican administrations you would now have $11,733 while if you had invested only during Democratic administrations you would now have $300,671. Twenty-five times as much!

This must be one of those deep dark secrets that the Republicans don’t want anyone to know about! Isn’t the Republican party now the party of the purse and the Democrats the party of the people?   Someone need to tell our radical right friends that if they were to vote for Democrats that their purses would likely get much fatter. Isn’t more money what life is all about by those yahoos?  Every time they vote for a Republican president they end up either losing their precious money or at the best not getting any windfalls except for an occasional tax break for a few of them.

I think the Republican party has just lost its way the last fifty years or so.  When the party was invented by the Lincoln folks they were very much the people’s party; where did the big change happen? So all you guys who want to rake in the big bucks in the coming years vote the Obama ticket in 2012. You might have to swallow your pride but according to a hundred years of history your wallet will thank you.

But what do I know……


I’m Against It Because He’s For It…..

In The News, Politics • Tags: , ,

Source:  GOP shifts away from payroll tax cut – The Boston Globe.

The title words are part of the post above. It basically give the true meaning of why the Republicans are now against the payroll tax cut that would put an additional $240 billion into the economy. I had a glimmer of hope that we were starting to put this foolishness behind us but I guess that is not the case.

“It’s not going to add any jobs” according to a Utah Senator. I guess that yahoo only believes that tax cuts to millionaires are the ones to create jobs. Give it to the ordinary guy and it, for some reason won’t. If you ask me I would say that the people getting  payroll tax cuts are much more likely to turn around and use the extra money to buy things that they need; the millionaires would just put it in the cash reserves of their favorite money fund.

I’m sure the real reason Republicans are now against payroll tax cuts is because a Democratic president is for them.  They say it will raise the deficit but won’t giving millionaires big tax cuts do the exactly the same thing? Here are some words in the above article that kind of makes sense to me.

Many economists see the payroll tax cuts as a kind of chicken soup remedy for the ailing economy – one that can’t hurt and might help. It could mildly boost the economy by putting extra money into the pockets of employees, with a greater benefit going to low- and middle-income workers.

Yeah, lets give people some chicken soup. It might not totally cure their money problems but it would make them feel good. I’m not one to believe that the government can spend their way out of problems hurting the economy but a little chicken soup can’t hurt.

Come on my Republican friends don’t just be against it because he’s for it.The first thing you should be asking is it good for the country not whether it is good for my political agenda. If you can’t latch on to that idea then we are, and will continue to be, in BIG trouble!!

But what do I know..

I Just Don’t Belong….

In The News, Politics • Tags: , , ,

I started out my adult life as a Republican who voted for Richard Nixon in 1972 but after Reagan became president in 1980 I was pushed into the Democrat party by all his radical and anti-people policies. Things like “trickle down” and “cutting taxes to increase taxes” just made no sense to me and ended up being total nonsense in its practice.  He was probably the original modern day deficit king. I’m not sure who I voted for in 1988; neither candidate seemed to be really qualified. It was a boring election.

In 1992 I voted for Clinton and then for him again four years later. Those were certainly prosperous times for all of us. We seemed to be able to do no wrong as a country.  Yeah there were the usual embarrassing events that we get ourselves into but at least we seemed to be able to get along together. As a result of the Clinton years I felt very comfortable in calling myself a Democrat.  Then Mr. Bush (the junior version) did nothing but reinforce my Democratic leanings.  In 2008 I voted for Mr. Obama but have since become leery of his continuous spending with little or no effect.

I am a fiscal conservative and a social progressive so that puts me somewhere between the two established parties. So it seems I don’t really belong to either party anymore. The Tea Party is the exact opposite of who I am so just call me one of those ornery Independents from now on. At least until someone brings some sanity back into the political processes.

I am waiting to see who comes out of this Republican presidential field but I can’t really imagine voting for any of those yahoos. Their social policies (Every person for themselves or worse!) is just way beyond where I am in that regard.  And then there is the one who is calling Social Security a Ponsi scheme.  I don’t want that guy anywhere near the Oval office; I depend too much on my social security check to risk that.  Also after Johnson and Bush I can’t imagine I will ever vote to put another Texan in the White House.

But, I am not very enthusiastic for the current version of Mr. Obama either.  Too bad the 2008 version of him can’t run against the 2011 version. Maybe it really doesn’t matter who is in the White House now as I don’t see the 24 hour bickering to ever come to an end any time soon.

But what do I know….

All I Know — Ignoring History…

In The News, Politics, Quotes • Tags: , , ,

source: GOP ignores growth despite ’90s tax hikes – USATODAY.com.

As I have mentioned several times before I am a history buff and have been for more than fifty years now.  So, I am a believer in the saying “Those who ignore history are bound to repeat it“. With that in mind here is a quote from the above article (click on the link above to see the whole article):

Early in his first term, President Clinton raised taxes on the wealthiest Americans, and the increase was met by doomsday predictions from Republicans — similar to the right-wing clamor of today. Despite the dire claims, the economy prospered for nearly a decade. 

By comparison, while the Bush-era tax cuts have been in place for a decade, private-sector job growth has been stagnant and the nation’s debt has exploded. After 10 years of this failed approach, Boehner and Cantor are now recommending more of the same.

It seems those yahoos who are currently in charge of the Republican party have very short memories and they are counting on all of us to have the same. I hope there are a lot of history buffs like me around to remind them of the facts at next years election. Now I am not saying that the Democrats are doing a super job with handling all our messes but at least they won’t make it worse by ignoring history.

Let’s finish up this post with a quote from one of my heroes, Will Rogers:

The whole trouble with the Republicans is their fear of an increase in income tax, especially on higher incomes. -February 27, 1931

Get over it my Republican friends. Trickle down didn’t work when it was invented by you guys almost thirty years ago and it absolutely doesn’t work now.

On The Road — On a Sunday Morning…

On the road, Travels • Tags: , , , ,

Here I am sitting in our hotel room on a Sunday morning blogging again. Somewhere along my long life path I became a morning person; I do my best thinking then. It would be nice to read a paper, I mean the actual paper kind, that just seems to be more soothing for Sundays but since we could only discover the french version that isn’t happening. I’m looking out the window at a twelve lane road going into Montreal and it is hard to believe that it really is Sunday morning. Wait a minute I had better check on the date; yeah it is Sunday ;)

We decided to go into Montreal this morning and visit a few places, particularly Mont Royale and Olympic Park. They are right off the highway so we shouldn’t get too lost.  I want to see a few things in Quebec too so we thought the dash-in, dash-out approach would be a good one.  We don’t want to spend our entire vacations in the big cities. The purpose of this trip was to travel along the St. Lawrence seaway and visit Nova Scotia; that is country stuff not city stuff.  So in a few hours we will be on our way. That is if I can get myself moving.  I forgot to shave yesterday and Yvonne didn’t appreciate that so that is a must on my morning agenda today.

For those of you who read more than the “On the Road” stuff, you can see that I posted something about the Republicans and their debt stuff here.  Well that got me to thinking about a similarity between the French here in Quebec and the Republicans.  I don’t mean to necessarily insult either group by this sameness but I probably have insulted both.  Anyway, here goes. The French in Canada are pretty much the same as the Republicans in the U.S. in that they want it totally their way.  The french want french speaking signs everywhere in Canada but just a few English signs here in their providence. The Republicans want to solve this debt problems that primarily they got us into with only their solutions and won’t accept anything that they don’t like.

My wife said “Don’t go comparing the French Canadians to the Republicans; the french love President Obama and you might hurt their feelings!”  Well first of all my readership might be sizeable but I don’t think too many french are readers of my blog. And secondly I am just a guy who likes to poke fun at all my friends; even my french and especially my Republican ones. :)

Anyway I had better get moving now and get the beard shaved and shower taken so we can be on the road.  Oh just one more difference we have discovered in Canada, they don’t offer free breakfasts here or anything else free for that matter.

But what do I know…..