Problems Require Good Solutions, Not Feel Good Bandaids
Nov 9, 2006 Uncategorized
Here is a quote from Adam in one of his posts:
It’s time to start working to fix our failing K-12 education system, to bring minimum wages up to living standards, to move forward on better healthcare for every American, to make a college education more affordable, to honestly fix Social Security, and to move America toward renewable energy sciences.Lost Adam
I like Adam and he is a smart fellow even if he did vote for Nancy Pelosi and I agree with some of the things he says in principle. He says that things like gay marriage and Flag burning are fringe items that do not deserve the attention of real problems. This would be so true if activist judges did not keep seeing words in state and federal Constitutions that are not there. Adam indicates it will take time to achieve the above and that it involves more than poor legislation designed to influence elections (I know he means from both parties). He is right it will be hard but if he wants success, I offer these solutions. They will work as has been demonstrated in the private sector and in other countries.
However, spending more money will not fix the educational system. The per student spending in the poorest performing school districts is thousands of dollars more than in a private school yet the private schools perform better. It is also thousands more in better performing districts. Money is not the variable that is causing the problem. We have spent billions of dollars on education and yet Johnny can not read. Perhaps it is because Johnny’s teacher can not read. Or because Johnny’s teacher is too busy working on union activities and endorsing Democrats so she can get a pay raise for incompetence.
College education can be more affordable if we get rid of tenured professors who allow students to teach while they write their books. Maybe we can do a market analysis or if we are going to pay for people’s college, they have to go to local community colleges. If you want to go to an Ivy League school you should have your own Ivy League money. Also, anyone who gets money for college should have to prove they are a citizen of this country.
To honestly fix Social Security we need to allow people to invest some of it in private accounts. The money they pay in should be theirs as much after it is extorted from them as it is when they earn it. Privatized accounts ALWAYS perform better than anything the government does. Additionally, when people die they can pass THEIR money on to their families (without a death tax would be great). Another benefit would be that the government can not dip into private accounts in order to extract extra money and leave an IOU. Private accounts make the best sense and ALL of your elected officials have their investments in private accounts because they know that SS will not be worth anything. SS is designed to make old people live on fixed incomes and be forever in debt to the government. Private accounts will not lose money but if we accept that they will, then so will the money held by the government. You can not trust the government to manage it and the courts have ruled that the government is not obligated to pay out the benefits. Private accounts also keep ILLEGALS from drawing money to which they are not entitled.
Renewable energy is a good idea. Nuclear power plants would be best. There is never going to be a shortage of nuclear fuel and electricity will be so cheap we can cheaply produce hysrogen to run hydrogen automobiles. The fact is that until we get on the ball and see that nuclear energy is cheap and safe and until we build the plants, we will depend on oil so we need to consider drilling in ANWR. If not then people need to stop crying about the cost of gas and just pony up the money.
Adam is a sharp guy but these problems will not be solved by throwing money at them. We have proven this with the educational system and with the so called war on poverty (3 trillion dollars and the poverty rate is the same as when the war started 40 years ago). We need to get rid of the entitlement mentality and the idea that government is there to provide for us. Let us manage our money and we will do well.
Are all people earning minimum wage dead? If not then they are making a living wage.
Tags: Commentary
Did Your Vote Get You What You Wanted?
Nov 9, 2006 Uncategorized
I have not seen numbers showing voter turn-out so i am unaware if a number of Republicans stayed home rather than exercising their duties as Americans. I am also unaware if there are numbers to indicate how many might have voted for the opposition party in protest. I do know that there were some who fall into these categories. They decided to cast protest votes or protest by not voting because their Republicans representation did not get the things done that they wanted. The question is, how did voting in Democrats get them what they wanted?
Here are some of the ramifications of the Democratic win (in no particular order):
- One more Supreme Court Justice will be replaced and it will not be a Conservative because the Senate is in Democratic hands
- Taxes will increase and the economy will falter
- The terrorists will hail this as a victory and expect their brothers in the Democratic Party to fulfil promises made to them
- More than 11 million ILLEGALS will be given amnesty and will come out of their shadow societies
- Millions more ILLEGALS will flood into this country and be granted amnesty
- Troops will be pulled out of Iraq and terrorism against us will increase
- Republicans will not run around claiming fraud, at least not on the scale Democrats do when they lose
- Every vote will be considered to have counted because the Democrats won
- Every Democrat will say that this is important because it ends single party rule
- Democrats will run a candidate for President and ask you to keep them in the majority because one party rule when they are in charge is good
Some of these are observations about behavior such as claims that will be made or how people will act. These are political motivations because all politicians lie or change positions in order to win. However, there are some troubling items. The most immediately pressing is the immigration issue. Bush is soft on immigration and will sign about anything the Democrats send to him. You can expect to see a huge influx of ILLEGALS because they know that they will get amnesty. We will be flooded with more ILLEGALS and to add insult to injury there will be no enforcement of our Southern border. That wall will never get started and there will be no funding for it. Mexico will be happy once again because their amigo George Bush has the right mix to allow them to come here ILLEGALLY and get rewarded for it.
Either these folks will take more jobs away or they will drive labor costs up because as legals they can demand more in wages. When this happens people will complain that they can not get a job, blah, blah. Combine this with the increase in taxes and there will be a lot of unhappy people. Here is some advice; when someone complains about these items ask them if they voted and if so, for whom? If they did not vote or voted Democrat Tazer them. Do not accept their whining or crying and just Tazer them. They deserve it because they would not listen or they were too stupid to figure it out. In any case they deserve to be Tazered and more than once.
Related Items:
NRO
The Washington Times
Tags: Commentary
Maryland Blacks, Quit Crying You Had Your Chance
Nov 8, 2006 Uncategorized
For years the blacks in Maryland have been subservient to the Democratic party. When the Democrats said jump the blacks said how high on the way up. For those very years blacks were promised that they would get something better in exchange for their support. Yet, year after year the blacks were largely ignored by the Democrats, except of course for the obligatory handouts of other people’s money. Under the rule of Democrats, Baltimore City became a killing field and drugs run rampant and more blacks died.
Through all of this Republicans were steadfast in their support of people by giving them opportunities while trying to earn their trust. Unfortunately, the blacks have been conditioned to hate Republicans as racists who don’t care of them ignoring, of course, that Republicans freed the blacks from slavery. Robert Ehrlich selected a true black man (as opposed to the faux black O’Malley selected) and Michael Steele performed admirably. He set an example that young blacks could emulate. But blacks were too stupid to see this.
Michael Steele had an opportunity to become the first black Senator from the state of Maryland and he is a Republican of all things. The Democrats did not have a black candidate after all the years of promises. They put a bunch of wealthy white guys on the ticket and pissed all over the blacks while ignoring those in their party who are black and more than qualified. Some may say that Anthony Brown, O’Malley’s running mate is black, but he is not. I think he is a mix of Puerto Rican and something else but it is not black. They used his darker skin as a ploy.
The blacks in this state had the chance to elect a fully competent black man to represent the state but they ignored this in order to elect a white bread career politician. I do not think that voting for someone because of color is the reason to vote but since he was perfectly qualified that should have been a bonus for a group of people who have been ignored by their party. Part of the problem is that black politicians, even those who were crapped on by the Democrats (Mfume, are you reading this) elected to support the Democrat instead of a highly qualified black despite how they were treated by their masters in the Democratic Party.
I want to make this clear right now so there will be no mistake. Every black in the state who voted against Michael Steele has lost any right to complain about how blacks are treated or that they do not get opportunities. You had your chance and you showed that you were either too stupid, too subservient, or too attached to the Democratic Plantation to realize that the Republican Party offered the best chance for independence. Enjoy it while you can, or as long as the bosses in the Democratic Party let you because day after tomorrow they are going to forget what they promised you.
Shame on you.
Tags: Commentary
What Are The Problems With Voting Machines?
Nov 7, 2006 Political
Ever since we went to the touch screen voting machines there have been complaints of problems real or perceived. I have my reservations about machines that have no paper trail though I realize that if a person can hack the machine he can hack it so that it affects the printer. If we are going to use electronic machines I would prefer that the voter fill out a ballot (with the bubbles and number 2 pencil) and then the voter would activate the machine with the plastic card and insert the ballot to be tallied. This would provide a paper receipt that was generated by the voter and not the machine.
Having said that, I wonder why so many people have problems. I keep hearing reports of “I voted for one guy and when I voted for the next guy my first vote got changed.” Before people jump on the bandwagon and say there is fraud it might be helpful to see if voter error is involved. Did the person touch the wrong area of the screen? Did the voter select the wrong person in the first place? Perhaps the screen needs to be re-calibrated (a function that needs to be performed throughout the day). I know that the machines can be hacked but if someone were hacking a machine then it would be hacked in a transparent manner, not one that can be seen on the screen.
I also believe that many people say that there were problems even when there were not. We only need to look back two years and see that the Democratic play book indicated that people should allege problems even if there were none. This sounds like a perfect way to cast doubt on the process and allow lawyers to get involved in supposed problems. I am not saying that the Democrats have people who were told to do this but I would not put it past them. I also think there are people who are resistant to change and they will allege difficulties because they do not like the system.
Tags: Commentary, Political
Are Clintons Losing Their Appeal
Oct 29, 2006 Political
Bill Clinton celebrated his 60th birthday in August and he was all over for gala events. He recently hosted an event to benefit his Global Initiative and raised quite a bit of money. No one can fault the man for the efforts he has made in this endeavor because he has raised money to help people. If there is one thing the Clintons have been good at it is raising money. One only needs to take a look at Hillary’s financial disclosure form to see that Bill is still a top draw earning anywhere from 125 to 500 thousand dollars each time he appears at an event.
Last night there was an event to celebrate his birthday and to raise money for his Global Initiative. The Rolling Stones were to appear and Hillary and Chelsea sent out 10,000 invitations to the elite in America asking them to pay half a million dollars for photo ops, golf, and a premier seat at the concert. The minimum price was 60 thousand and that did not include the frills the half million price brought. Unfortunately for the Clintons, they did not sell very many tickets at the half million dollar price. As the event approached there was a question as to whether the Stones would perform because Mick Jagger was ill. In addition, they had to discount the tickets or face the reality of having a lot of empty seats.
The ticket prices were reduced to 12,500 dollars for one reception and the concert and $5000 for the concert only. There has been no report yet regarding turn out or if there was any backlash from those who paid $500,000 for seats only to find people who paid significantly less sitting with them. This begs the question, have the Clintons lost their appeal?
Perhaps with the election season in full bloom many of the heavy hitters are unwilling to pony up a significant amount of money to see the Stones or have their photos taken with Bill. Maybe, people are experiencing Clinton overload. In the last few months, Hillary has made the circuit in order to raise money for her run at the White House and Bill was out raising billions for his charity. Now that faithful have paid those dues as well as their dues to the party’s candidates, perhaps they are unwilling to throw more money into the pot.
What ever the reason, it will be interesting to see what the real attendance numbers for the event were and how much he raised for charity. If the numbers are low, it will also be interesting to see how the Clinton PR machine spins the results.
Source:
Daily Mail UK
Tags: Commentary, Political