Obama Knows Best

I remember watching “Leave it to Beaver” reruns and wondering why my dad wasn’t more like Ward Cleaver.  Wise, kind, and even-handed, he always had good advice to young Beaver and Wally.  He seemed to understand their situation perfectly and knew what to do or say to help his sons.

Fast forward thirty years and I now see the President of the United States acting like he’s Ward Cleaver.  Except that he’s not wise.  He’s only kind to people he thinks will vote for him.  His advice to us is feeble on every front.  And he doesn’t understand the first thing about what is going on in American families right now.

This latest shameful attempt to buy votes from Latinos is an example of his out of touchedness, and his narcissism.

The content of his decision to choose not to enforce immigration law for certain groups of illegal aliens is, on its surface the right thing to do.  If a kid was brought here at age five and has lived here all their life, stayed out of trouble, and done well in school, that kid shouldn’t be deported.  Their parents should, but the kid shouldn’t.  (This brings another problem up.  Stick with me here and I’ll address that, too)  However, his tactics in getting this done are deplorable for a true American president.

President Obama seems to think that he knows best what we the people need.  So what if Congress has passed laws, and he took an oath to uphold those laws?  If Obama feels the laws are unjust,  his justice department simply won’t enforce them.  Period.  He knows better than all of those Congressmen and women that came before him.  He is, after all, the smartest man in the room.  He just can’t seem to do math when it comes to job creation, debt, and taxes.  He knows what America needs, and by golly, he is not going to let the Constitution get in his way.

This doesn’t sound like a president to me.  Presidents lead.  They try to join groups of people together.  They solve problems.  They listen.  Rulers make up laws as they see fit, their word being the final word in any situation.  And I think we can agree that the president hasn’t done a whole lot to join anyone together.  He hasn’t solved any problems.  He has blamed everyone from ATM’s to the Grinch for the problems his failed policies have beset upon us.  This guy sounds like he thinks he’s Ceasar or something.

The idea that kids should be deported if they are here illegally, even if they don’t have family in their homeland, is preposterous.  These kids are American everywhere except on paper.  Their parents are illegal, and should be deported.  But we know that the American government isn’t in the business of breaking up families, unless the family is black.  So, maybe the parents get to stay too.  Here’s how I think they should get to stay:

1.  Turn yourself in and immediately start the immigration process to become US citizens.  Give them three months or six months to do this.  If they don’t, the next time you get pulled over for running a redlight, your butt in on a bus back to wherever it is you came from.

2.  If you brought a kid here, the kid can declare to the immigration department that they are here and intend to stay and become citizens, once they turn 18.  If they turn 18 and don’t do this, they are committing a crime and will be punished for doing so.

3.  Secure the borders with Mexico and Canada.  Once that’s done and we have control over who’s coming into the country, set up stations to process illegals.  Guest worker cards, green cards, and the legal immigration process can be started at these TEMPORARY stations.  These stations can be set up anywhere they are needed.  President Obama loves government workers, and here’s a chance to hire a boat load of them.  Anyone who does not cooperate with this step is a criminal and will be punished as a criminal.

Note, I did not say pay fifty grand in back taxes or fees, or anything like that.  Hey, you got over on us for how many ever years you were here.  From this point, you follow the law.  If you don’t, you get punished.  Up to and including deportation.

If you commit crimes in the US, you get locked up until the border is secured, then you get deported.

That brings us to the kids.  Parents and kids get to stay here if the kid was brought here before age sixteen, if the parents declare this to the government.  At age sixteen, the kid can get a work permit.  At age eighteen, the must choose America or their home land.  If they choose America, they start the citizenship process.  If not, they go home.

I’m not the smartest man in the room.   These steps seem pretty simple to me.   It lets people stay who want to be citizens.  It lets them stay here, even if they don’t want to be citizens, until their kid is eighteen.

But President Obama is not the one to put this plan in place.  Congress is.  That’s what the Constitution says.  Congress makes laws.  The Executive Branch enforces them.

Why will you never see something like this enacted?  Libtards and the media will tell you it’s because Republicans hate brown people.  They will tell you that Republicans have blocked the so called Dream Act.  Liberals will not settle for anything else but “Comprehensive Immigration Reform,” which means amnesty for all illegals currently in the country.  They won’t settle for anything less.  Republicans have proposed several immigration reform actions, all of which have not been voted on because of Harry Reid and other senate Democrats.  Any immigration legislation must have “compromise” on the part of Republicans.  Not from Democrats, mind you.  Just Republicans.  And any immigration legislation that does not include amnesty for all illegals will simply be tucked away in Harry Reid’s desk, never to be seen again.

Obama’s speech on Thursday is why this is even being discussed.  The economy was worse than we thought.  ATM’s cost jobs.  It’s Bush’s fault.  It’s the tsunami.  It’s evil greedy rich people sitting on their cash.  The rich aren’t paying their fair share.  Obama had to do something to deflect attention away from his abyssmal record on the economy and jobs.  This immigration vote buying scheme is a diversion from what a pantywaste whiner the most powerful man in the world really is.

Still think he knows best?

Campaigner in Chief Will Say Anything…

Okay, so is there any limit to what a Democrat will say to convince you that his really bad idea is what the United States needs to be successful?  After last week, I can say that the answer to this question is, resoundingly, no. 

The President of the United States invoked the name of Jesus Christ when describing his plan to tax the rich.  He basically said that the rich are duty bound by the Bible to take care of the poor.  And because of this, the rich should pay more in taxes to take care of the poor. 

Wow.  Will this joker say anything. 

First of all, Jesus said that you should render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s, and render unto God that which is God’s.  That means to pay what you owe.  Not to pay what some beareaucrat sitting in Washington DC thinks you should pay.  The law is the law.  You owe what you owe.  Pay what you owe. 

But, since about five months ago, the president and his campaign advisers have been hammering away at the rich.  How many times have we heard “millionaires and billionaires,”  “private jet owners,” and “yacht owners” from the community organizer in chief?  This clown has basically said “The rich have money.  They should give it to the poor.   And if they won’t, we’ll find a way to get them to give the money to the poor.  With or without congress.  Whether or not it’s good for America.  I’m gonna steal this money from those who earned it, and give it to those who did not earn it.”

Now, I’m no biblical scholar, but I’m pretty sure that the bible frowns upon laziness.  I’m pretty sure that it says you should give the poor as much as you can afford to, and that you should not be a borrower nor a lender.  If the bible doesn’t want you to borrow, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t want you to steal from somebody else, especially since the commandments say you shouldn’t desire that which belongs to your neighbor.  Basically, the campaigner in cheif is trying to guilt you into propagating the ridiculous lie that is the liberal idea that taxing the rich is what Jesus wants.  First they said if you didn’t want higher taxes on the rich, you weren’t patriotic.  Now you’re a sinner. 

Hey, Mr. President, give me one good reason that higher taxes on rich shoud be enforced.  I’ll buy it.  But saying that God wants it is a lie.  Saying that it’s not patriotic is a lie.  Tell me it will help the American people.  Tell me that it will help the economy.  Tell me that the survival of our republic depends on it. 

You can’t tell me those things, though, can you?  You know that taxing the rich will hurt the economy, and that we will continue to have high unemployment.  But you have to lie.  You have to tell me that God will punish me if I don’t support taxing the rich guy that hired me.  Why don’t you tell me that I’m going to hell if I don’t vote all Democrat  in the next election?  After all, Democrats have always supported the causes of freedom.  Unless you count that Civil Rights thing.  And the slavery thing.  In fact, Democrats have stood in the way of progress for minorities for years.  Democrats continue to.  But, hey, let’s appeal to the emotions of people and not bother with facts. 

No, Mr. President.  You are a liar.  God wants us to take care of the poor with our money, not yours.  It’s our responsibilty to be charitable.  Unlike you and the rest of your Democrat buddies.  It’s not our responsibilty to give over our hard-earned money to you so you can promote whatever unGodly stuff you want to promote. 

But, hey, it’s an election year.  Anything goes, right?

“Occupy” Movement: A Short Scorecard

Since I’m just getting back to blogging again, I figured I’d let this “Occupy” thing go a little while before commenting on it.  The time has come.

I’ve heard a lot of interviews with these numbskulls on the radio and on TV.  When asked what kind of economy they want, they describe communism, but rarely actually say they want communism.  They have made demands that everyone should get college paid for by the government, that they are entitled to a worry free life of leisure, that they are entitled to the money of others until we are all equal.  Sounds like communism to me. 

Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi praise the occupiers.  Nancy Pelosi even said “God bless them,” which is ironic since she is a government employee, and any mention of God by a government employee is an infringement on the civil rights of 0.2% of the American population.  Al Qaeda loves the occupiers.  So does Mahmoud Ahmedenijad.  The Black Panthers, Communist Cubans, and other upstanding groups who believe in the American way of life also support these airheads. 

At the same time, Obama and Pelosi call the Tea Party movement members dangerous radicals who are racist and unpatriotic. 
Let’s sum up the Occupy movement’s score card, then compare that to the Tea Party’s score card. 

Deaths at Occupy protests:  3.  Tea party rallies:  0

Arrests at Occupy protests:  Over 3,000.  Tea Party rallies:  None that I know of.

Sexual assaults at Occupy protests:  Two dozen or so.  Tea Party rallies:  None.

Poop on cop cars at Occupy protests:  One giant poop.  Tea Party rallies:  None.

Poop on the American flag at Occupy protests:  At least one.  Tea Party rallies:  None. 

Cost of Occupy protests:  $350,000 in Atlanta alone.  Tea Party rallies:  No politician has complained about this.  Must be close to nothing, or they’d be complaining.

Yup.  I can see why Obama and Pelosi love these folks. 

The Occupy crowd has every right to march and beat drums and stink up whatever city block they happen to be hanging out on.  It’s American.  They do NOT have the right to endanger the citizens of that locale by blocking traffic and tying up the cops to the  point they can’t respond to a residence call.  They do not have the right to assault a motorcycle cop.  They do not have the right to destroy public or private property.  They’ve done all of the above. 

It is ironic, though, that these people seem to dislike Jews.  And it is even more ironic that they don’t want the homeless horning in on their action to get a little food.  They protest corporations, then whine that the laptop, built and sold by a corporation or two gets stolen at the wholesome Wall St. Protest.  Seems like they want to get you and I to share our stuff with them, but they aren’t interested in sharing their stuff with ANYBODY.  Ironic?  You bet.  Dishonest?  Yes, I believe so.

These people are clowns, but they are dangerous clowns.  Think of them like Chucky from Child’s Play.  It’s a little doll.  How could it be evil?  Ow!  My liver!

These people want to destroy America.  They want to recreate it in their own vision.  And every jerk with peace beads and a tom-tom has some beef with somebody, and they want that somebody punished.  Maybe it’s Wall Street fat cats who dared to be competent at their jobs and made money for their share holders.  Maybe it’s some corporation who used to employ thousands of Americans but now employ thousands of Indians (in India) because of the ridiculous regulations forced on them by an overreaching government.  Perhaps it’s a military that is fighting against a bloodthirsty enemy who will hide behind women and children, and must fight this enemy with one hand tied behind their backs. 

I wonder if these protesters would be interested to know that Nancy Pelosi used insider information to invest in Wall Street products, and that this action, which is illegal for you and me, is perfectly legal for people in congress. 

I’ve got an idea for these jokers.  Give up every product made by a corporation.  From your BVD’s to your IPhone.  From your toothpaste (like any of these people even know what that is) to your Crocs.  From your Prius to your Timex.  After that, you have some credibility.  Then, you can preach to me about corporate corruption.  Next, march on the real villain in the US.  1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.  Policies enacted by our illustrious leader have allowed a lot of this stuff to happen and have encouraged American companies to go overseas, hire overseas, and spend their money overseas. 

Finally, write down, in crayon or whatever you have handy, exactly what it is that you want.  This would eliminate the guess work of trying to figure out exaclty where you are coming from. 

Then, buy a ticket to North Korea.  You can find all that stuff there.  Maybe we should have a special sales tax to buy one way tickets for these people.   I’d pay an extra penny when I buy milk to open the eyes of these sixties radicals and their grandbabies.  Maybe after a year or two under Kim il Jong, they’d figure out that some rich people living in your country isn’t so bad. 

I can clearly see why the President likes these people.  They are doing what he’d like to be doing.  Taking down the country. 

Oh, wait.  He’s doing it, too.

Gloria Allred: Worst Kind of Ambulance Chaser

We’ve all heard about ambulance-chasing lawyers.  And we sneer at them.  They are opportunists of the worst kind.  They creep along listening for sirens and getting to the site of some life-altering accident for someone who needs to focus on getting treatment and healing their body and mind.  These people are vultures, making their living off of the misfortune of others, and, in the process, often leaving the victim of the accident with a laughable settlement, while they take most of the money they recover.  It’s not illegal.  It’s just wrong.  At least to me it is.  I don’t have a lot of love for lawyers anyway, but these people really make my blood boil. 

What’s worse than that?  How about a lawyer who has a reputation for going after someone for a violation that is difficult to prove, and often results in the accused simply paying the accuser off to go away and avoid negative publicity?  These cases rarely have any proof other than testimony of friends and family of the accuser.  Most of these cases turn into a “he said she said” situation, and the attorney makes a lot of noise to embarrass the accused into paying her to go away.  That’s Gloria Allred.  She descends on a victim who is vulnerable and embarrassed and gets her to say the key words and tricky phrases to get the public to take her side.  Who would lie about that?  Unfortunately, lots of people would.  Including Allred. 

When a person is sexually assaulted or sexually harrassed, the perpetraitor is a low life who is used to getting his or her way.  This is a person who doesn’t like to hear the word “no.”  Money and power can buy anything, right?  Including the right to abuse others who have a lower station in life than you.  Right?  WRONG!  Anybody who uses their position of authority or power to score sexual favors is a creep who needs to have something removed.  Violently.  I mean, if you can afford the expensive hookers, why would you feel up the cleaning lady?  The smell of Pine Sol really turns you on that much?  Come on, Man!

Here’s the problem.  All that has to happen for Gloria to score a big payday is to find someone willing to accuse someone of sexual harrassment.  If the accused is innocent, the damage done to their reputation cannot be undone.  If a disgruntled teenage girl, who are always a picture of stability, decides she deserved an A on a science project and wants to hurt the teacher, all she has to do is accuse the guy of saying something or doing something sexual in nature, and the teacher is automatically ruined.  Even if the charges are ultimately discovered to be false, he can’t teach.  Anywhere.  He’s done.  Because some spoiled child who turned in substandard school work decided she would get even with the teacher.  And she walks away with a stern talking to, if that.  No charges of making a false accusation, nothing.  No repercussions for an ILLEGAL act. 

You are currently seeing the same thing in the Herman Cain case.  Mr. Cain has met thousands of people in his life, and, if the odds are what I think they are, about half of them were women.  Here come four women, fifteen years after the fact, accusing him of sexual harrassment, and in one case, sexual assault.  All at a time when he is gaining traction in the polls as he runs for the Republican Presidential nomination.  Curious. 

I’m not going to mislead you here.  I’m a fan of Herman Cain.  I think he can solve a lot of the problems caused by the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and his predecessor.  I believe he will surround himself with the right people to help get the country back on the right track.  And I don’t know if Herman did this stuff or not.  I’ve listened him a lot on the radio, and I don’t believe he is the right personality to do this stuff.  People with his background typically don’t treat women the way he has been accused of.  He’s not a narcissist.  He’s a down to earth guy raised in a two parent (one man, one woman) home.  He’s been married for a long time without even a sniff of scandal in his marriage.  He doesn’t seem the type.  I know there are closet abusers everywhere, but I just don’t think he did this.  And, since one of the women has a pattern of accusing co-workers of inappropriate behavior and making off with a payday, the credibility of the charges against Herman is diminished in my mind. 

Why Herman?  Why now?  Because the other GOP candidates are terrified of him.  Barak Obama is terrified of him too.  That’s why his goon squad has been on TV and radio calling Herman everything but a human being.  (The goon squad is MSNBC, and the rest of the American left.)  The only way to deal with him is to get him out of the race.  He’s a threat to Romney, who is Obama light, in more ways than one, and to Obama.  Obama would love to run against Romney.  Healthcare is off the table as a campaign issue. 

We will probably never know who told Politico to run this story.  All I know is the reputation of a good man is being smashed.  I will be shocked if any of these allegations prove to be true.  And I will be disappointed because I may have to move to New Zealand. 

I don’t think America can weather four more years of Obama’s “hope and change.”

What Is a College Education Worth?

I’ve had about enough. 

I’ve had enough listening to the arguments for paying college athletes to play sports while they are in school.  Listening to the jocks on ESPN whine that these guys are being taken advantage of by the universities they play for.  Yeah.  Poor kid.  Being given an education worth a hundred grand or more in exchange for their efforts on the athletic field.  Cry me a river.  

But what is a college education really worth to these kids?  It’s always stated that a lot of them come from poor backgrounds where they “have nothing,” where playing ball is the only way to escape from the cycle of poverty their families are trapped in.  Why, then, do a lot of these kids end up right back where they started, with no degree, busted up knees, and no skills they can sell in the private marketplace?  It’s because a college education that promises the ability to work in the world and make six figures isn’t worth as much as the possibility of making nine figures in the NFL or NBA. 

Look, these are young people.  Teenagers.  Teenagers are notorious for not thinking ahead, for living in the right now and not getting ready for the down the road.  And if a kid is raised by a parent who doesn’t teach them how to think about the future in terms of life after football or basketball, they won’t think that way.  Young people need guidance from someone other than some whistle blowing jerk coach who only cares about how many carries he can get out of a kid on Saturday.  And that doesn’t happen these days. 

The math doesn’t lie.  There are over one hundred Division I colleges in the US.  If each team has 70 players, that is about 7,000 players in college.  If we say one fourth of those are seniors, that’s 1,750 kids coming into the NFL draft in a given year, not counting underclassmen who declare early for the draft.  Each team gets six picks, 32 teams, that’s 192 players.  1,750 kids trying to get 192 spots.  They can’t all get drafted.  Sure, a few get signed as undrafted free agents, but not many of these kids make the team.  Most of these kids won’t be pro football players.  It’s even worse for basketball, because the squads are smaller in the NBA (twelve players), and there are more D-I basketball programs. 

So, why would a kid not take advantage of the education he or she is given to play college sports?  They don’t see it as necessary.  They can go back to the old neighborhood and make a living on the street, if they want to.  Maybe a better living than getting a job as a result of having a degree.  The life expectancy is shorter, but, hey, you live big while you live.  Once you’re dead, you don’t care anymore.

Maybe it’s time, not to pay these kids with a scholarship, but simply pay them fifty thousand a year and not even force them to go to class.  If they want to spend their money on school, fine, but it’s up to them.  We get NFL and NBA teams to sponsor several schools and treat the university like a farm system.  It happens in baseball.  A kid can get drafted out of high school, then play ball or go to college.  They get a scholarship, but they CHOOSE school over pro ball.  We should make these kids choose.  They get four years of eligibility, get $50K a year, regardless of injury, and once their four years is up, they go back to the ‘hood and do whatever. 

At least then the school would be honest and the player would be honest about what they hope to get from the relationship. 

Of course, this plan has some problems.  Some teams would have college teams loaded with hired guns who don’t have the problem of studying or going to class.  Fine.  Who cares?  They are in the farm system, not student/athletes. 

By the way, the university gets to keep all the revenue they earn from putting on these games.  Minus the salaries for the kids.  And every kid gets the same money, so no corruption, no favors, nothing.  Anybody who violates this rule is off the team and ineligible for play in the farm system, and must sit out until the end of his eligibility plus one year from the pro team.  They lose their salary, too. 

How well are D-I schools doing at graduating players?  According to http://chronicle.com/article/Chart-College-Athletes/49200/, not too well.  Only one D-I school that has been ranked in football or basketball is in the high performing schools regarding graduation rates.  Notre Dame. 

In fairness, the worst performing schools aren’t big name schools, either.  And all of the schools on the list do a better job at graduating athletes than the university does at graduating regular old students. 

These kids see dollar signs when they get to go play at a big school.  They don’t see a degree.  So, how much is the degree worth? 

Not much. 

(I understand that many students do graduate.  The media is chocked full of players who did not.  I just think it’s time to be honest about your goals.)

Summitt Diagnosed With Dementia

University of Tennessee women’s basketball coach was diagnosed with dementia today.  It’s a sad day for her and her family, and for Volunteer basketball fans as well.

In case you don’t know, Summitt has won more basketball games than any coach in Division I college basketball.  That includes Adolph Rupp, Dean Smith, and anybody else you can think of.  The Volunteers, under Summit’s leadership, have won six national titles.  She’s a winner, and has never had any inclinations on the part of the NCAA that she cheated. 

It’s a sad day that Americans are still suffering from dementia.  Pat’s case points to this idea.  There has been promising research done on stem cells to help Alzheimer’s patients.  Why are we not pursuing this research? 

In any case, this post isn’t about political or religous ideology.  It’s about what Pat Summit has accomplished, and what she plans to do next. 

She’s not giving up coaching yet.  She plans to keep going until she can’t any more, relying on her staff and medical people to help her stay in the game as long as she can.  This is a courageous approach to a terrifying ordeal.  She deserves our admiration for showing this courage. 

In a time when college sports has almost daily reports on players having trouble with the cops and universities getting caught up in cheating, Pat is a refreshing change.  She demands the best from her players and from herself.  She doesn’t let college kids get away with making excuses for not performing.  And I’m pretty sure that if a player of hers had a run in with the cops, that player would have to deal with it like an adult. 

Now, I don’t know if any women players have had these issues like their male counterparts.  I’ve never heard of any, but that doesn’t mean that it has never happened.  Women’s athletics doesn’t exactly get the same coverage as men’s athletics do.  And these ladies understand that most of them will need to go pro in something other than sports, so they don’t have the hangers on that men athletes do. 

At any rate, I wish Pat the best, and I hope and pray that she will be able to continue for a long time to come.  Good luck, Pat.  We’re cheering for you, and this time, the game is much more important than any other you’ve been part of.

One Group Missing from Obama’s Shared Sacrifice

It’s been pretty popular to smack the president around about rubbing elbows with the old money on Martha’s Vineyard.  The state run media is all too quick to point out that President Bush took more vacation days at this point in his presidency that President Obama has.  Of course the big difference is 9/11, and President Bush went to Crawford to cut down trees on his ranch.  Obama is kissing up to the old guard in Kennedy country.   But forget all that.  I’m fine with the president taking a vacation.  He’s never not the president, after all, and it is a stress-filled job.  He has a lot of stuff kind of piling up on him.  The economy isn’t completely destroyed, Americans still can’t find work, and he hasn’t kissed the ring of EVERY third-world dicator just yet.  Got a lot left to do.  He needs to rest up. 

It irks a lot of Americans, that’s true, that he is in hoity toity land playing the smartest guy in the room.  But why?  Maybe because a lot of American families have had to cancel or postpone a vacation this year due to economic problems.  The president has, after all, acknowledged on several occasions that many families are “sitting at the dinner table figuring out how they will pay their bills.”  He is obviously in touch with what Americans are suffering through, right?  He has called for “shared sacrifice” in this troubled time. 

But he has left one group out of the sharing.  Government. 

Every time the government spends more money, it gets bigger.  It gets more bloated.  It gets less efficient.  And this president has spent a lot of money.  What has this spending gained us as a nation?  Well, if our spending continues on this current track, it will reach about twenty percent of GLOBAL GDP in less than ten years.  That means that to continue to spend, we will have to sell treasury bonds, ie borrow more money.  And the rest of the world will have to pay for us to do this.  Sounds like a good deal for us.  Not so much for the rest of the nations around the world. 

Has the spending resulted in more jobs?  Only if you want to work in government or the “green” industry.  President Obama is all the time talking about the two million jobs he has “created or saved.”  Of course, the part he leaves out is the net jobs loss of over 5 million jobs. Every month we hear of between 200,000 and 500,000 new people on the unemployment rolls.  Two to five months is a million.   If you create have job creation of two million, but losses of seven million, well, you don’t have to be Einstein to figure out that that math just doesn’t work.  We still have unemployment over nine percent, and in some areas over ten percent, like my home state of Georgia.  But hey, at least unemployment in the DC area is low.  And home values aren’t in the tank there.  Maybe we should all move to DC. 

Government has to spend some money to keep necessary services going.  It’s how we define “necessary” that needs some tweaking.  Is it necessary to give grants to universities to study shrimp on treadmills?  How does this create a single job, except for the shrimp?  They already have work to do.  In a cocktail.  Can our economy do without a cowboy poetry festival?  According to Harry Reid, we can’t. 

This idea that somebody has to sacrifice something, but not me, has got to be smashed against the rocks of common sense.  Taxing the rich and leaving the rest of us alone will not, by itself, solve our problems.  Cutting spending alone may not, although who knows, since Democrats will cut military spending and border security, but the cowboys will still have a place to recite their original poems.  Without doing something about the ponzi schemes in Washington, Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, we can never get out of this mess.  What should we do?  I don’t know, maybe we should allow these behemoth government entities to be managed by someone in the private sector, you know, someone who actually has a clue about solvency in a business.  Raising the eligibility ages is always tossed around, but if you raise the age high enough, you won’t need the entitlements any more.  Maybe the people of the country should be allowed to “opt out” of these schemes, telling the government to keep what you already have taken from me, I’ve got it from here, thank you very much. 

But government cannot relinquish this power.  It makes sense to allow us, the American people, the option to stay in or get out.  But if that happens, government cannot continue to grow and become more hungry for our money. 

My family and I could not afford a vacation this year, to Martha’s Vineyard or Martha’s Country Cooking.  We didn’t go anyway.  We can’t afford to go out on Fridays to a nice dinner, mainly because I’m working at my part time job on Fridays.  We don’t go anyway.  Other families have made this same sacrifice.  Many other families. 

When will it be government’s turn?

Vacation? Who Cares?

I have had enough of the breathless reports on Fox News about President Obama’s “vacation” to Martha’s Vineyard.  Just because the economy is in the tank, people are out of work, and we owe more than three generations of Americans will ever be able to pay back, why should the Campaigner in Cheif stick around?  After all, everything he’s done up until now hasn’t helped any of the above situations, so why would staying around now help?

I’m of the opposite opinion.  He should go on vacation, and stay on vacation.  Yes, that would leave the country to be run by the walking gaffe Joe Biden, but, honestly, could it be any worse?  Would Biden call American citizens names for standing on principle in the debt deal?  Wait.  He did.  So, yes, he would.  Would he request another stimulus like what is being bantered around DC right now?  Probably.  Would he leave the debt ceiling issue on the table and attend birthday parties and fundraising events for his reelection?  Probably also. 

On second thought, it might be better if Obama and Biden went on vacation together and got lost in the woods.  Obama would insist on leading from behind, which would put Biden in front, and, honestly, do you think that guy could navigate the woods?  The only thing they’d agree on would be to constantly turn left. 

Now, don’t mistake this post as some kind of threat or my wishing ill for the president or vice president.  I do not wish them harm.  I just wish they’d go away for awhile and let some adults run things.

Which is not to say that the people in Washington in their absence could be considered adults.  John Kerry, John Lewis, and the rest of the Democrats portraying the US credit downgrade as the “Tea Party Downgrade” simply shows how low these loons will stoop.  They know that most people don’t follow what they are doing, and that most people wouldn’t know a lie if it slapped them in the face. 

Here’s my question:  If the downgrade is a result of the Tea Party putting pressure on Republicans to not negotiate, how come they didn’t get really any cuts of any consequence?  Why are we spending more next year than we are spending this year?  Why are tax increases still on the table (don’t kid yourself.  With this crowd, they are DEFINITELY still on the table)?  And why, if this is the Tea Party downgrade, did S&P say that if the Tea Party’s proposal had been accepted, there would have been no downgrade? Lastly, why did Obama get to put off another debate until after his election?  This downgrade is all about our leaders’ unwillingness to truly address the problem of debt. 

There’s plenty of blame to go around.  But, as usual, the talking heads only hear one side of the story.  Calling this downgrade the Tea Party Downgrade is like Mohamar Qadaffi blaming the rebels for his policies that caused the rebellion in the first place.  If Kerry and his cohorts hadn’t spent us to oblivion since 2006 (with President Bush going along with it), maybe it wouldn’t have come to this.  Maybe if the Clinton and Carter administrations didn’t try to make banks give home loans to McDonald’s part-time employees, the economy wouldn’t have crashed in the first place, and maybe my house would be worth more than a used Buick.  Maybe if President Obama hadn’t spent almost a trillion dollars to “stimulate” the economy by giving money to labor unions, the debt ceiling wouldn’t have needed raising. 

I think it’s a good thing that the President is taking some well deserved R & R.  I only wish he could get far enough away to not cause more damage.

Protecting Our Children from Failure, or Ensuring Failure?

We live in a different time than we did when I grew up.  Nobody had cell phones, satellite TV, or five hundred dollar bicycles.  We didn’t use germicidal handwash, wear bike helmets, and we knew how to start a lawn mower at age ten.  If a kid had trouble paying attention in the inadequate government school he attended, he got pounded by his parents until he either paid attention or moved out.  I hadn’t heard the term “self esteem” until I was out of school as it applied to damaging a child’s psyche.  I played outside when it was warm enough, did homework, and got dirty.  I went fishing with my dad, got all smelly at the lake, and even smellier when I got home because I helped clean the fish. 

I have been around a little.  I was in the Navy, worked as a mechanic in a steel mill, and at a contact lens factory.  I’ve sold insurance and worked as an engineer in a power distribution manufacturer.   I now work part time in a bowling center as a mechanic, after I quit my most recent job because I didn’t like the way it was going there for the company.  Now, this may sound like failure to you, but I don’t think so.  I’ve managed to raise three bright boys who are doing what they love doing.  They didn’t get cell phones until they needed them.  When they made mistakes, they paid for them in sweat or with a spanking (didn’t have to spank them much.  Go figure).  They understand that their lives are in their hands, and that the choices they make from now until forever affect how they live their lives. 

And they never had bumpers at the bowling alley.

As I mentioned, I work at a bowling center.  I see a lot of parents and kids in the center bowling, eating pizza and having fun.  I like this.  It’s important for people to spend time with family and enjoy each other’s company. 

Then there are the bumpers. 

If you haven’t been bowling in the last twenty-something years, bowling centers have installed bumpers to prevent the ball from going into the gutter.  Little kids can now bowl with little regard for where the ball goes once it leaves their hand.  Drunks can, too.  But I digress.  Now, you may think that this bumper thing is a good idea.  And it is.  For kids between the ages of two and five.  Beyond that, a kid is coordinated enough to walk in a line and roll a bowling ball.  Hell, the thing only weighs six pounds.  Drunks like those, too.  Again, I digress. 

I see parents with their seven year old and the bumpers up, using one of the ramps that are supposed to be used by people who cannot walk when they bowl.  You’d think with all these safeguards to prevent an uncoordinated kid from throwing a gutter ball, they would score big and never throw a gutter ball.  You’d be wrong.  The bumpers only go as far as sixty feet, with the pin deck beyond that distance, so the ball can fall into the gutter very near the pins.  And it does. 

Why go through all this explanation?  Because it is a microcosm for how we are screwing up our kids.  If you go bowling once a year, fine.  Use the damn bumpers.  If not, let the kid learn how to bowl.  I guarantee you a five year old can do it.  My kids did when they were five.  And they learned how to bowl.  Now, they are all pretty solid bowlers.  But they might never have learned how to properly hold and roll the ball if they had the safety net of the bumpers all the time when they were little.  Now, parents are so intent on “protecting” their kids from failure that they are hurting their kids.

Failure is good for a kid.  It teaches perseverence.  It teaches attention to details of a specific task.  And it teaches kids that if they want to win the trophy or get the blue ribbon, they have to try harder next time.  This builds character and self esteem.  Self esteem is, by definition, how a person feels about themselves and cannot be given to them by anyone else.  Self esteem is earned by doing a difficult task well.  No other way.  Kids now have a false sense of self esteem.  If they fail at something, no big deal.  They still get a trophy for participating.  “You showed up Johnny.  You weren’t very good at basketball, but you showed up.  Good job.”  Kids begin to expect this treatment.  When they get into the real world and have to perform a job to the satisfaction of their boss and cannot, there isn’t a prize for them.  Effort does not matter nearly as much as results.  And there are a lot of competitors in the real world.  If you can’t out perform them, you won’t get a raise or promotion.  That’s just how it is. 

Parents are largely responsible for this trend.  I like that there is basketball, football, baseball, tennis, water polo, chess, karate, soccer, and competitive BB stacking for kids. But these activities are supposed to teach kids how to perform physical tasks, condition their bodies, and teach sportsmanship.  They are also supposed to teach them how to take direction and how to be patient and persevere.  Playing time should be earned.  But many leagues now have rules about minutes or quarters a kid is allowed to play, making sure everyone gets into the game.  Fine.  If the coaches agree to play their B teams against each other, that’s all good and fine.  But there isn’t anything sadder than a B team football team getting stomped by an A team football team because the coaches have manipulated the rules.  It doesn’t teach either team anything.  But that doesn’t seem to be the point.

My youngest son is small.  He’s always been small.  He won’t always be small.  We are late bloomers.  Just genetics.  He played football for a youth team starting at age eight.  He was slower than the other kids, but he gave everything he had on the field.  He was smart and was where he was supposed to be on the field when he got in the game, he just didn’t have the tools to get a kid to the ground who outweighed him by fifty pounds.  Not every time, anyway.  He got them down sometimes.  The point is that he knew he wouldn’t ever be a star, but he played anyway.  I asked him why he played once.  “Because I love it, Dad,” was his response.  And he kept playing until after the eighth grade.  He gave it up when he realized he would be on the field with kids that weighed three hundred pounds.  He didn’t want to die, since he is a buck ten soaking wet.  But those days did teach him something.

If a parent kisses the coach’s butt, you can get playing time.  If a coach is a parent, his kid can be quarterback, even if he can’t run or throw, or isn’t smart enough to execute the offense.  He still suited up and practiced hard, got better, but, alas, never got much of a chance to play.  And I’m okay with that.  He earned everything he got on his own.  He tried hard, and didn’t give up.  I refused to suck up to get him playing time.  I figured it wouldn’t help him.  I was right.

Look, if your kid is capable of being a first round draft pick in the NFL, it will show on the field.  You aren’t helping a kid who can’t do it by putting him in a position to fail.  You are ensuring that his own opinion of himself will never measure up.  You are ensuring failure. 

Let your kid experience lifes joys and sadness, successes and failures.  He’ll be better able to deal with disappointment. 

Oh, and ADHD is an invented sickness to give kids an excuse to do whatever they want whenever they want.  If a kid’s wiring is that messed up, is phychiatrist time.  Kids will focus if they are interested, and they will be interested if they think that a belt is waiting for them at home if they don’t. 

Just sayin’.

Obama’s “Balanced Approach” Unbalanced

Our president must be nuts. 

During his latest spin fest tonight, he explained to the American people that we’ve got to get this debt ceiling raised, and we must do it now, and we must do it his way, or he will take his blocks and go home. 

Okay, I added that last part in. 

But in reality, he has said that the so called “Cut Cap and Balance” bill that passed the House is dead on arrival.  He will not sign a bill that does not include tax increases for the richest Americans and corporations.  And he will not sign a bill that does not extend past the 2012 election. 

Maybe calling the Campainger in Chief has been a mistake.  Maybe I should take to calling him the Ultimatum President.  Or maybe just the Unbalanced President.

Obama has said over and over that he favors a “balanced approach” to solve the debt problem.  Maybe you are unsure exactly what that means. 

It means simply that the people who earn the most in this country should be more than happy to fork over more of their earnings to a government that spends on stupid crap.  If they aren’t more than happy to do so, they are evil, greedy, and unamerican.  He said something tonight that made me scratch my head a little.  Only until it bled and a small portion of my ample brain was exposed to the atmosphere.  He said we don’t want to cut spending on programs that help working families.  Now, my family is a working family, and we don’t get government assistance for anything.  My son is borrowing money to go to school, but I don’t have anything to do with that.  Who, exactly is he talking about?  What “programs” do “working families” take advantage of?  If you are a working family and you are on government assistance of some kind, say, food stamps, exaclty what kind of “work” are you doing?  You are certainly not working in a law firm or teaching calculus to high school kids (Right.  Like goverment schools teach calculus).  You aren’t a professional manager or technician or electrician or engineer.  You may still be a professional.  A professional couch potato.  A moocher.  A leech.  Those are the “working families”  the Campaigner in Chief is talking about.  He’s not talking about a father working two jobs to feed his family.  He’s talking about a single mother in an urban area raising seven illegitimate children on burger flipping money.  Now, what’s the difference between the two?  Maybe these two examples have similar education.  Maybe they live in the same neighborhood.  But one is not interested in accepting government money to do something he can do for himself, if he works hard enough.  The other, simply, is interested in getting that free “Obama money.”  Without a care in the world about where it came from. 

Obama’s balanced approach means that those among us who prepared themselves for life, learned a skill or got a degree and now work in the private sector providing services to the public MUST be content to live on less, while those among us who have made one bad choice after another continue to show up with their hand out.  His approach also means stripping the military down to two jeeps and dinghy, while allowing the pentagon to be used for section 8 housing.  His approach means slowing an already sluggish economy down further by increasing taxes on corporations.  It means increasing “investment” (code word for more spending) in education (padding the teacher’s union’s coffers), and infrastructure (public works projects that will come in over budget and late.) It means “reforming” medicare (rationing care) and “getting healthcare costs under control” (price fixing). 

Now, if there are places to cut wasteful spending, and everybody seems to not only agree that their are but they seem to know where these places are, why not go after that first?  Why not cut spending on stupid crap like sending college students to Africa to photograph ants?  Or cut National Endowment for the Arts funds that allow “artists” to throw poop on a canvas and call it art?  Hey, if we are going to cut depreciation to big oil companies and corporate jet owners, why not cut it for computer manufacturers and Apple?  These big companies make a much larger profit margin than oil companies do.  Why not go after them? 

Does wasteful government spending need to be cut?  Absolutely.  It needs to be cut on the military, on White House staffers, on Congressional staffers, and anywhere else we can do what we need to do while spending less. 

Maybe if we KNEW where all the money was going, we’d be a little more comfortable allowing our tyrannical government confiscate more of our hard-earned cash.  But that will never happen, because if we KNEW where the money was going, we wouldn’t pay any taxes at all.  Why pay to support stupid crap?

I think the Republicans cannot make a deal with the Democrats over the debt ceiling.  President Reagan made a deal with a Democrat Senate and House.  The deal was that he would sign a tax increase if spending were cut three dollars for every dollar taxes went up.  Still waiting for that deal to come to fruition.  You cannot make deals with Democrats.  These guys will hold the entire country hostage to keep their pet programs in place at current spending levels or with the ability to increase spending whenever politicians feel like it’s necessary.  And Republicans aren’t really any better.  Saxby Chambliss of Georgia, member of the “gang of six,”  proposed increasing tax rates on capital gains, taking away tax incentives from private companies to keep deployed reservists on the payroll, and elimination of a portion of the mortgage interest rate deduction.  Sound plan, there, Saxby.  If you think any of these ideas will help reduce the debt long term, you are just as insane as President Obama. 

If these clowns want to raise taxes on ANYONE, they should have to show us why they need the money.  They shouldn’t be allowed to call an increase in spending a cut, which they currently do. 

Maybe it is time for a balanced approach.  Go ahead and raise taxes on the job creators, but balance that with an elimination of the earned income tax credit.  Attack big oil companies and remove their depreciation incentives to buy equipment, and remove their incentive to search for energy sources, but balance that with a decrease in spending on cars and plane rides for congressmen, as well as the first lady.  It’s probably cheaper to charter a private jet than it is to take Air Force One on a shopping spree in Europe. 

That’s balance.