Presidential politics

Is my calendar correct …. we are still in 2011? I am reading all these news stories about how the next 10 days will decide who the Republican nominee will be … when not even the first election has been held, much less the convention … and the presidential election isn’t for another 11 months.

Somebody needs to yank the chains of the national news media.

A. Public opinion polls do not decide primary elections … or at least they shouldn’t.

B. Please stop the horse race crap … and let the people decide and then report the results … gee, that would be novel reporting … rather than  hyperventilating over the latest poll numbers or the latest gaffe or the most recent scintillating tidbit that really has no bearing on anything.

Profit

I may be a bit old fashioned, but when did the word “profit” become obscene. I obviously missed something in my education long ago, but I was taught it was alright to try to profit, whether it was from your individual labors or as part of a team or group.

But it seems that I am wrong, or at least it appears that way from various and sundry news stories that have appeared lately.

HuffPo hilights an article pointing out the Presidential wannabe Newt Gingrinch profits from the sales of his many books and videos as he wanders the campaign trail. And they have a problem with this?

I guess I just am backward and born in the wrong era.

Happy Halloween

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/45087391#45087391

I don’t know about the rest of America, but this is getting scary (and just in time for Halloween)

In the above link, President Obama says that if Congress won’t pass his proposed jobs legislation, then he will do the same things by executive order.

Hello, does that not bother anyone. It bothers me, a lot.

Constitutionally, a president does not make the law, he enforces the law. He proposes,  Congress disposes.

I find it exceedingly uncomfortable when a president starts acting on domestic matters via executive fiat.

I am not sure, but I would hope our members in Congress would rise to this challenge and seek to restore the checks and balances that make the United States practically unique. Yes, those checks and balances make for gridlock. Yes, they make the government look inefficient and slow moving. But, honestly, that is more prudent than acting on impulse or seeking immediate gratification.

I think President Obama is wrong in seeking to enact his plans by executive order. Not because the policies are necessarily bad, misguided or wrong, but because it should not be in any president’s power to do so.

Whose business is it anyway?

I was reading a story/commentary on MSNBC about eight corporate executives who, in the author’s judgment, apparently are not worth the very large compensation packages they receive.

OK, other than pointing out that the people who invest in these publicly held  corporations are not getting what they probably should, what is the point? If you don’t hold common stock/voting stock in the company, then your interests are pretty much zero.

OOPS, my bad. That is right, we are supposed to resent others who have more than we do and demand that we get our share of the pie.

Greed

I really feel like running screaming into the streets.

What is greed? Would someone please define it, as Pappy used to say, in words of one syllable or less so us old farts can understand it.

Now we have a US congressman proposing that the US government put 15 million unemployed on the government payroll at $40k per year and use another $200 billion to bail out local and state governments.

Did I miss something or did the world go blind?

Now, it seems the US media is giving big play to the “occupy” movement going worldwide. With all due respect to the young people involved, but there ain’t nuthin’ that comes free in life and it ain’t gonna be given to you.

Skepticism

Ok, folks. Something doesn’t quite add up here.

I have been trying to piece together exactly what the plot to kill the Saudi ambassador was all about and how it supposedly was to come about.

Either there are some IRGC Al Quds people who are incredibly stupid or these guys make some of the crackpot schemes of the CIA look absolutely brilliant.

First, I admit I am never going to see any of the NSA intercepts that may be linked to this, but it sort of beggar’s belief that some Iranian sleeper is going to go down to Mexico to link up with somebody he doesn’t know from Adam but is supposed to be from one of that nation’s drug cartels and offer them $1.5 million (do you want that in small bills or in opium) to off the ambassador. If I was some Mexican cartel guy, I would have tossed this yahoo in a heartbeat. Shooting up ICE and Border Patrol people is one thing, but I would think that the Mexican drug lords have got enough on their plate to even contemplate getting involved in that sort of international shenanigans. And then it turns out that the cartel contact is a DEA informant …  like great choice Iran.

Next, I admit I don’t have any inside dope on the machinations of the Iranian regime or the theocrats who pull the strings, but this sounds about as dopey a plan as a poor novel plot or movie script. It takes a certain suspension of disbelief to think someone really thought it might work.

Let’s assume what has been reported is true. Some low to mid-level functionary at Al Quds decides to enhance his career and go rogue. He contacts his American cousin and tells him to hoof it down to Mexico to see if he can troll up someone in the Mexican mafia to provide a hit man/team.  This guy in Al Quds obviously has some pull, cause he is able shift $100 K electronically to some bank account.

But why use a Mexican cutout? They  don’t have any reason to play square and a lot of reasons not to.

It would seem cheaper and more reliable to get a Jihadi to do it.

And the blowback on this hit is going to be intense. If you are going to try something like this, you better have something better than just plausible deniability going for you, especially when you are coming from the Dark Side as far as the US and its erstwhile friends seeing things.

It all just tends to make one wonder why any Persian with more than two functioning brain cells (and these people really do go way back in the smarts department,  chess versus checkers anyone) would do this without having some really important goal in mind. It doesn’t make whole lot of sense.

Occupy what?

I have been trying to understand and follow the “Occupy Wall Street”  protests of the last three-plus weeks (and its various stepchildren around the country) and I have yet to figure exactly what point the protesters are trying to make.

That corporations are “bad” … all a corporation is is a voluntary – yes, I said voluntary – legal construct to allow people to unite for some purpose while limiting their liability. This limited liability is part of the reason for the success of the modern world because those who voluntarily invest in any corporation, of whatever size, shape or purpose, are only liable to the extent they are invested in the corporation. That actually serves a good economic purpose, rather than bad … in my humble estimation.

If you eliminate the corporations, then what are you left with? I am not sure anyone has an answer to that or at least I am not hearing any.

Ok, so five percent of the nation controls most of the nation’s wealth … since when is that news. It always has been that way, and besides, most of that wealth these days is on paper and is not real “wealth” … however you want to define that.

So the people who manage corporations are “greedy” … so what? First of all, I wish someone would give me a practical working definition of what greedy means, because I am not sure what it means.

Are we saying that individuals can’t own their own labor and profit from it or leverage it to their advantage? That they are not allowed to exchange the fruits of their own talents and labors for whatever the market will bear? If that is your viewpoint, then you have seriously missed out on the historical lessons of the last three centuries. By granting the individual the right to own their own labors (and the results of that labor) and to exchange it is the reason why millions –if not billions - of people are not living at subsistence levels, particularly in the US,

The biggest problem I have with the devotees of the concept that society/government  owes individuals the satisfaction of their “needs” is that nobody ever gets around to defining exactly what satisfying those “needs” means. At what point do needs become merely desires or even luxuries?

If you mean survival, then a shirt, coat, pants, socks, shoes, a puptent, a blanket, a portapottie (1 for every hundred people or so) and maybe 2,000 calories a day should do the trick … anything more than that and you are getting into discriminatory choices that differentiate individuals and then we are not treating people equal.

Oh, that is the point. We all are supposed to be equal … but in what way? We should be equal before the law (the law should be blind to our differences and our treatment therefore should be equal) … But that doesn’t happen because we happen to be individuals, different and unique, and discriminatory by nature.

Equal outcomes (incomes, etc.) are about as fallacious as anything that can be proposed. If you are not happy where you are, then change something … usually starting with yourself.

Anyway, so much for my ramblings.

Who said life was fair?

Whomever said life was fair was selling a bill of goods. Life isn’t fair. Nothing is fair, except when everyone plays by the same set of rules, and then varying abilities make it unfair.

It appalls me to see certain political types calling for this group or that group to play fair or pay their “fair” share. Give me a flipping break.

Take taxes: Unless everybody pays the same rate, then the tax is not being fair. Somebody is paying more than someone else. Given all the tinkering that is done with the US, state, county, municipal and other tax codes. no one is being treated “fairly” in my estimation.

See that is the problem: No longer are we equal before the law. As Napoleon the Pig decreed in Animal Farm, “some animals are more equal than others.”

We as a nation have discovered we can manipulate the tax code and other government policies to pay ourselves money and that is why democratic forms of government fail. Once the people learn they can vote themselves money out of the common treasury then it eventually will collapse. As I have said, someone done let that cat out of the bag already even.

I shudder to think what my grandchildren are going to face, because it ain’t gonna be pretty. I wish I could leave them better, but I don’t have the power.

Beep, wrong answer.

http://money.cnn.com/2011/09/19/news/economy/obama_debt_plan/index.htm?hpt=hp_t1

“A driving principle behind the proposal is that high-income individuals and corporations should pay more in taxes than they do currently so that they will bear some of the burden of debt reduction going forward. “

I have a serious problem with part of that statement and that is that “corporations” should pay more in taxes. Corporations don’t pay taxes because it is the people who purchase the goods or services from the corporation who pay the tax. That is right, the consumer (meaning us ordinary smucks).

Somebody needs to send somebody back to ECON 101. Corporations may appear to “pay” taxes, but any corporate manager/business owner worth his or her salt has calculated the cost of those taxes and included in the price of whatever good or service they provide. If they don’t, then they are incredibly stupid and need to take a course in business planning.

In other words, taxes on corporations really are just hidden taxes paid by us ordinary folks.

I am increasingly disappointed with the current administration’s seeming attacks on business and the wealthy. This is not a “from each according to their ability and to each according to their need” society, but it seems that the current administration is playing like it is.

Electoral College

News report has it that Pennsylvania is considering revamping the way it allocates its electoral votes. Rather than give all the state electoral votes to whomever wins the popular vote, the electoral votes would be apportioned out to the winners of each congressional district and two statewide.

This is about the best way for a change and retain the founders vision of preventing the big populous cities being able to dictate the results.

The Electoral College is there for a very good reason, in that in compels candidates to consider more than one state.

War is not an Option

Saw a bumper sticker on a recent travel: WAR IS NOT AN OPTION and the thought immediately jumped into my mind: Yes, but sadly sometimes it is the only alternative available.

Would that it were true, but unfortunately, human nature being such as it is, war,violence, death, destruction, all are sometimes the only alternative we have if we wish to remain at liberty and live our lives as we have chosen. Of course, we could chose to surrender our liberties …. we could choose to die quietly or be slaves, but that would not be my choice.

If there are those who have sworn to see my death as well as those who I care for or to those who believe as I do in the dignity of the individual above all, then I will fight them … on any and all levels of conflict.

RIP War Powers Act

It seems to me that President Obama is going to get the Libyan operation past Congress without a whimper.

Lord, this strikes me as funny and I wonder where the hue and cry is? The president is acting without Congressional authorization … of any type … and few if any (other than the much derided Fox News)  of the pundits or elected leadership in the Congress seem to be making a major deal out of it.

I guess that is what it means when it is said that elections to make differences. My guess that if our previous administration had ignored at least attempting to follow at least some parts of the 1973 War Powers Act, he probably would have been impeached, or had even more people in the streets.

Well, we get what we deserve … or at least vote for … and it is go0d to remember that democracy only works until the majority figures out it can vote itself money from the common treasury.

New book

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We got him!

Sunday, May 1, 2011, Osama Bin Laden died at the hands of a small group of American Navy SEALS.

Well Done!

It is not the end of the Global War on Islamo-fascistic Terrorists, nor even the end of the beginning, but it is a milestone.

To put it in perspective the World War II generation. This is not the equivalent of the death of Adolf Hitler, but more akin to the death of Isoroku Yamamoto in April 1943. The architect of the attack on the U.S. base at Pearl Harbor and much of the very successful Japanese conquest of the Pacific was dead, was killed by a small group of Army Air Force aviators who flew hundreds of miles on a scrap of intelligence from the U.S. Navy.

It did not end the war in the Pacific, which went on bloodily  for nearly another 2 1/2 years, but it was a major blow to the Japanese and a major victory and morale boost for the Americans.

Such is it today.