1.18.10
I’m scared.
Recently, while watching the speed at which I have been losing personal freedoms due to the actions and proposed actions of Congress I have gotten sick to my stomach – and it made me decide that, even if I could not find a solid Constitution-supporting candidate, I would support slowing Congress down in any way possible – that’s right: good ole GRIDLOCK. I love gridlock; I love it because oftentimes, the more government does, the worse they make things, often responding too late, to the wrong target with the wrong answer. Therefore, I prefer they do nothing! With that said, let’s review some of the developments over the past year:
The biggie – Health Insurance
Seriously, do you think the cost of this is not going to bury us? Do you really think that? Not only that, you will be FORCED into certain choices by government orders. Adding 31 million insurees is wonderful for HMO companies – more customers – and who will pay for all this? You can answer that. Do you realize that we can no longer use the political catch phrase “your grandchildren will pay for this” anymore? You know why? Because it’s been bumped up to YOU – you will pay for this either through higher taxes, lower social security increases, higher Medicare premiums, taxes on social security or our old favorite, the one that every economic layman gets destroyed with without knowing it – inflation! (printing the money to solve – we will have to create a new phrase: Borrow and Print!).
I want to control my health care – I don’t want some career politician deciding that for me (I have my own small business; i doubt if many of these reps ever even had a paper route). And I can make my own best economic decisions, how about you? And the worst part is, this health insurance bill is an amalgamation of proposals that have been around for years. How much thought was really put into this, and furthermore, isn’t it true that most of Congress NEVER EVEN READ the bill? never read something that will control 15% of our economy? Hello? As an aside, perhaps we should create a 51st state and fill it with paternal politicians and “adult” Americans who want more daddies to make decisions for them – then they won’t bother me. The best solution for me – and maybe you too if you agree? Gridlock – vote for the party out of power.
Increasing Undeclared Wars
Our Nobel Peace Prize winning President just increased the troop presence in Afghanistan. Let me ask you something, do you think that putting more of our men in the Middle East, often on Muslim holy ground, incites more young unemployed Muslim men to take extreme actions, or do you think they’re all happy we’re over there? And do you think we’ll see more or fewer military deaths due to our actions? If we carpet bomb a village in Pakistan and kill 500 civilians while trying to kill one suspected Al Queda leader, does that help or hurt our cause? I sympathized with people who voted with Obama because they felt he would end our drive to build an American “Empire” (which is bankrupting us as China secures economic relations with many African and South American countries – and we’re not developing our massive natural gas reserves for export – duh might be a better use of the billion$ we blow overseas), but as you can see, they’re still trying to expand our empire and persuade with guns.
[As a sadly humorous aside, I saw Rambo III a few weeks ago – I had never seen it but since it was based in Afghanistan, I had to watch – super weird: what characters were saying about the Soviets sounded like it applied to us today.]
I want less spending on empire and more internal investment – someone needs to slow Congress down – yes! Gridlock.
Wall Street Bailouts and Fed Moneyprinting
Yes GW’s man Hank Paulson asked for the original big bailout, but developments since then have shown me nothing has changed. Recent news has revealed that Mr. Geither, our Treasury Secretary, might have had a hand in funneling taxpayer bailout money to his buddies at Goldman Sachs. He is an Obama appointee. Ben Bernanke, perhaps the biggest reason why you earn nothing in your bank account, and why endowments and charitable funds are making nothing is up for reconfirmation by the Senate. He and his predecessor, Alan Greenspan, because they set interest rates so low, and required financial institutions to keep so little in reserves, allowed and encouraged rampant speculation on Wall Street.
I have always said, the average person should not be investing – they should be able to buy bonds and earn 5-7% more safely. However, since the system is distorted by government spending, and especially by Federal Reserve interest rate policy, the average person is forced into the stock market to find decent returns. And furthermore, the average person’s costs rise every year, even though the government says they do not (see the Shadowstats link to the left for more info on real inflation figures). You can thank Ben Bernanke for that – money printing and low rates, coupled with huge government borrowing (borrow and print!) will cause, if let go, our dollar to depreciate at a much accelerated level. And in the future, when the dollar buys even less, and gas cost $6/gallon, some Congressional gasbag will get up on TV and blame “big oil,” and you will fall for it – even though you should be blaming Congress and “Big Ben.” And who renominated Mr Bernanke for another term at the Fed full of money printing? You guessed it – Daddy O!
SUPER IMPORTANT – Oh and lesson time here – you do understand don’t you, that not only were big financials bailed out with TARP from Treasury, but also keeping rates low so that banks can borrow from the Fed at 0.25% and lend out/buy investments that yield 5-10% is another BAILOUT that costs you? You are subsidizing “Government” Sachs, Bank of America, AIG, Wells Fargo, etc with your no-interest-earning savings accounts – thanks to Uncle Ben Bernanke. You do understand that don’t you? You are PAYING TWICE for the bailouts (3 times if you include 5+% inflation).
I need government spending to stop – and I need some gridlock to make this happen – so I am voting for gridlock tomorrow and voting for the party out of power.
Just a note: I would prefer Bernanke not get renominated. A better candidate for Federal Reserve Chairman might be former Chairman Paul Volcker – a democrat chosen by Obama to be on his economic team. But I think they keep Volcker on the team yet in the background so they can appear to be listening to sound advice when really they probably don’t follow much of his advice (his first move would likely be to jack rates to 4% – good for savers, bad for debtors and Wall Street; Obama prefers Bernanke and likely his vain attempts to re-inflate the housing bubble).
Interesting Analysis for Poli-Sci Junkies:
I can’t believe it but I think the democrats might upstage the republicans of 2008 in sheer stupidity. You remember in 2008, voters were telling candidates that they wanted out of Iraq – they wanted less “Empire.” McCain said as president, he would expand our presence in Iraq. Obama said he’d bring the soldiers home. I have to think that for 4-7% of the country, the war-making was their biggest issue and they voted for Obama to end it – unfortunately, he won’t deliver as the Military Industrial Complex drags Obama in (20k more troops). Take away that swing, and maybe McCain wins. The republicans didn’t listen to the people and lost badly in 2008. They listened to George Bush, who though winning an election by 70,000 was a “mandate.”
Now the democrats are repeating this script – thinking Obama won on a “mandate.” They are not listening to the people with health care, civil liberties, war-making. Many are waking up to see that they don’t want a paternalistic government (nor do many want control from Europe as those Copenhagen documents would have ceded US sovereignty to foreign powers). Most of the time, it is better that government do nothing. For example, if we didn’t bail out AIG, Government Sachs, GM etc, and let them fail (yes fail – it’s ok to fail in the US) we wouldn’t have to complain about bonuses right? And you wouldn’t be more in debt.
We need more gridlock and government inaction. The US Constitution, the document that amazed me as a schoolboy, and was part of the reason I studied history at Tufts University, is a wonderful foundation to stand on – greater than any personality that ever crossed our political stage. We’ll be all right without all these laws, restrictions, controls…
Help SLOW CONGRESS DOWN. So no to government “paternalism”, no to “Empire,” no to “borrow and print,” and if you don’t have a solid, constitution-supporting candidate to vote for, vote for gridlock both tomorrow in Massachusetts and wherever you are in the Fall elections.
