Great minds think alike (or I could not agree with Mr. Williams more)

"If a person without health insurance finds himself in need of costly medical care, let's investigate just how might that care be provided. There are not too many of us who'd suggest that we get the money from the tooth fairy or Santa Claus. That being the case, if a medically indigent person receives medical treatment, it must be provided by people. There are several possible methods to deliver the services. One way is for people to make voluntary contributions or for medical practitioners to simply treat medically indigent patients at no charge. I find both methods praiseworthy, laudable and, above all, moral. Another way to provide those services is for Congress to use its power to forcibly use one person to serve the purposes of another. ... I'd personally find such a method of providing medical services offensive and immoral, simply because I find the forcible use of one person to serve the purposes of another, what amounts to slavery, in violation of all that is decent. ... I share James Madison's vision, articulated when Congress appropriated $15,000 to assist some French refugees in 1794. Madison stood on the floor of the House to object, saying, 'I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents,' adding later that 'charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government.' This vision of morality, I'm afraid, is repulsive to most Americans." --economist Walter E. Williams

Occupy Wall Street and greed

The Occupy Wall Street (OW) movement is indeed about greed, but it is not about the supposed greed of the wealthy or the Wall Street bankers as the supporters want us to believe. It is really about the greed of the occupy movement supporters. It’s about the jealousy and greed of people who have not, or could not realize the amazing opportunity of this great country.


OW would have us believe that the success of the wealthy somehow prevents the rest of us from getting ahead. But did Bill Gates having billions prevent Michael Dell from inventing the Dell computer? Did the domination of Sears stop Sam Walton from building the largest store chain in the world? The fact is as long as we maintain the level of individual freedom we have enjoy in the past and we are not strangled by government rules and regulations, there is nothing institutionally stopping anyone from any level of economic success.

Somehow this group thinks occupying public property and preventing other citizens from using it will solve income disparity.

Somehow this group thinks trying to prevent citizens from going to work because they don’t like the work they do will lift poor people out of poverty.

Somehow this group thinks breaking the law, injuring police officers, destroying other citizen’s personal property and defacing public property will level a playing field they think is tilted towards the wealthy.

I cannot help but think of all the good these thousands of people across the US could have accomplished in the same amount of time as they have been “occupying” public spaces.

If all the food and money that well meaning but miss guided people have donated had been sent to food pantry’s or programs to help the poor.

If all the time spent protesting had been put to use helping habitat for humanity or the United Way.

If all this effort was put toward promoting political candidates that would make a difference.

If all those people had just worked a job, paid taxes and then donated their earnings to the less fortunate.

The so called wealth disparity OW says they are protesting against is an example of miss-use of statistics. The census data that is quoted to prove the great income disparity breaks income in the US down to five quintiles, each quintile represents 20% of the income ladder. So as an example say the top wage earner made $100, each quintile would represent $20, the lowest people making 0-$20, the next $20-$40 and so on.

In the latest census numbers from 2010 we find that households in the top 20% of income bracket (wages over $116,000) receive 50% of the income paid out overall, a number absolutely unchanged for the last 10 years! And a number only changed about .1% since 1993. So the income disparity was about the same during the Clinton administration as it is today, I just don’t remember mobs of citizens complaining during the tech bubble of the 1990’s. Even more deceiving, the census numbers do not take into account the number of households in each income group. In looking at the numbers we find that not only is there a higher % of the population making over $100,000 a year than under $24,000 but the over $100,000 group (corrected 2010 dollars) has been getting bigger in the last 45 years!

So really to have a truly equal society as the liberals define it we need a lot of poor people and not very many rich people, is that what we really want? In order to have true income balance in these types of statistics you need a lot of poor people to make up the income of one rich person. So we have more rich people making more money than fewer poor people, is that really a surprise? Also not reflected is the census data is many kinds of government assistance that raises the standard of living for the bottom quintile. We are taxing the rich to transfer that wealth to the poor but we do not count that transfer wealth in the equation. Even the top 1% number often referred to by occupy Wall Street is misleading; the households in the top 1% wage bracket represent 3% of the total households!

The Occupy Wall Street movement offers no solutions, does nothing to help the low wage earners move up the income ladder. Just a group of jealous greedy citizens that think they deserve something that they have not paid for or earned. Just misguided people who think you can make the poor richer by making the rich poorer.

Do you ever wonder if we wil ever learn.

Ninety four years ago at 11am on the 11th day of the 11th month, the guns fell silent on the western front signaling the end of WWI - The War To End All Wars.

Since then, we have fought major wars in WWII, Korea, Vietnam, Kuwaiti, and now the long wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. American servicemen have also paid the ultimate sacrifice in: Somalia with Black Hawk down, the Iranian desert with the attempt to rescue the Iranian hostages, Cambodia rescuing the crew of the Marquez, Granada, Beirut, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Panama. Additionally hundreds of times we have asked our military to perform humanitarian missions all over the world.

Yet, the one constant, is the immediate draw down of the American Military at wars end. After WWI, the military was suppose to be reduced to 500,000 but because of budget concerns it quickly fell to 280,000 and then over the next few years to 110,000. A number that is only 10,000 more that the defeated German army was allowed by the Treaty of Versailles. It is as if we think that “this truly will be the last time” we will be required to send American servicemen into harm’s way. But history has proven the folly of that thought pattern and time and time again American servicemen have been forced to pay the price when we send them into combat under-equipped, under-trained and with two few numbers to accomplish the task asked of them without unnecessary loss of life.

At Corregidor, American military, poorly trained, under staffed with no plan for evacuation was no match for the superior Japanese Army. This situation led to the Bataan Death March. At the start of Korea, America sent troops into combat that had never fired their weapons and had never received any combat training. Many valiantly held to the last man in the defense of the Pusan perimeter, holding on to prevent the total defeat of the South Koreans while waiting for reinforcements that came too late.

And now, once again, we are talking about repeating the same mistake that history has shown us again and again doesn’t work. Budget talks in Washington have led us to the conclusion that slashing defense spending is the only way to reduce the federal deficit. Although in 1950’s we spent 60% of the federal budget on defense and today we barely spend 20%. The lowest levels since WWII and we are told by the Left that it is too much.

Today on Veterans Day, if we really want to honor our Veterans, we may want to ask our representatives in Washington to approve funding for the men and woman serving now at a level that they can perform the job we will inevitably ask them to in the future.

Ronald Reagan said – “Of the four wars in my lifetime, none came about because the U.S. was too strong”. The best way to deter tyrants is to make sure they understand that we have the resolve and the means to defeat them.

Our Servicemen have voluntarily agreed to lay their lives down in defense of our freedom, the least we can do is give them the proper tools to do the job and pick up the tab.

An open letter to all Republican candidates:

I have been getting a number of solicitations for contributions to the GOP in the last year. I had every intension of contributing during this election cycle because I view the defeat of Obama as paramount to our nation’s future.

As a very conservative Republican, I must say that I am disgusted with the tone and actions of Republican candidates during the recent debates. The childish bickering and finger pointing does nothing to further our cause, does nothing to inform the public, and does nothing to help Republicans build a coalition that can win this election. I do not need our national candidates to tell me what his or her opponent has done; I can do that research myself. I need the candidate to lay out a vision and ideas on how they plan to take this country forward. The political handlers that are using the “go negative” play book should realize they are destroying any chance of a Republican victory. Reagan would be as disgusted as I am with the behavior of these so called “Conservatives”.

Until I see that type of grownup commitment, I am withholding my financial support for anyone. I vowed after the disaster of 2008, where we let a light weight, know nothing win the Presidency that I was done voting for a candidate just because he was not as bad as the other guy. Either we put a viable person forward that does something besides criticize their fellow Republicans, or I will support no one. A childish, glory seeking Republican is no better than a democrat in my book.

I assure you that main stream conservatives all have a similar belief. If we continue down this ridiculous path we will once again find ourselves defeated in November. I plan to forward this message to all the candidates but I hope you will pass along the feelings of the voting right.

Are they lying now or were they lying then?

During the recent Congressional debate on raising the debt ceiling, the President gave us a stern warning. Answering a CBS reporter who asks if Social Security checks would be delayed if the government shut down, the President said, “I cannot guarantee that those checks go out on August 3rd if we haven’t resolved this issue because there may simply not be the money in the coffers to do it.” This message was repeated later by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner on CBS Meet the Nation and again on a number of occasions by the President.

I find this statement curious because last February President Obama’s budget director Jack Lew, in a USA Today article, had this to say about Social Security. “Social Security benefits are entirely self-financing. They are paid for with payroll taxes collected from workers and their employers throughout their careers. These taxes are placed in a trust fund dedicated to paying benefits owed to current and future beneficiaries. … Even though Social Security began collecting less in taxes than it paid in benefits in 2010, the trust fund will continue to accrue interest and grow until 2025, and will have adequate resources to pay full benefits for the next 26 years.”

Syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer wrote an article responding to Mr. Lew’s comments and he called Lew’s statement “a breathtaking fraud” - a strong statement but completely accurate.

The problem, as Mr. Obama let slip is that while there IS a trust fund … it is completely empty.

By law, the Social Security Administration can only invest the trust fund in funds fully backed by the United States government, which means government bonds are the only option. Every single dollar that is not paid out to citizens in the form of benefits is loaned to the federal government. The funds are tracked in their own accounting system but the Social Security surplus exists only as IOU’s from the federal government. When the Social Security Administration needs money it calls one of the IOU’s from the Federal Government due. If the government shuts down there is no money to pay back the trust fund and no money to pay out benefit checks.

So President Obama in a rare moment of candor has pointed out the big lie of Social Security. We are told it is some type of retirement fund, that our retirement money is safe, sound and held in a totally different account as opposed to just another government program financed by the general fund. In reality if the general fund stops paying its bills…. the social security check cease to go out.

Liberals are telling us that Social Security is not really in bad shape and we just need a little tweaking to make it solvent. But politicians have been telling us that for decades.

Eighteen times since 1939 the maximum amount of income to be taxed has been increased.

Fourteen times the percentage of your income taken for Social Security has been increased, and now stands at 12.5% (12 % paid by you and ½ % paid by your employer).

In the 1960’s, 1970’s, 1980’s, 1990’s Congress passed changes to the program that was supposed to make the program solvent for decades. In 1973, President Carter said of the newly enacted legislation, "This legislation will guarantee that from 1980 to the year 2030, the Social Security funds will be sound." He was off a bit, by the middle of the 1980’s (45 years earlier than he predicted) it was necessary to increase taxes and decrease benefits to shore up the program. In 1950 there was 15 workers for every person collecting social security, today there three and yet the liberals in Washington continue to act as if nothing has changed

The government has actually used the Social Security surplus to offset the debt in the general fund on paper. In 1968 under President Johnson, the trust fund balance was included in the regular federal budget, still tracked separately but any surplus in the trust fund helped offset the deficit in the general fund on the books. So although the federal government had borrowed and spent all the money in the trust fund, the government IOU’s that made up the surplus were subtracted from the federal debt. If you tried that accounting in private industry they would put you in jail. This type of government shell game was thankfully repealed under Reagan in 1983. As an interesting side note, when the Graham Rudman Bill passed in 1985 debt targets were set that would trigger automatic spending cuts in the federal budget. The thought was this would force Congress to be more fiscally responsible. When setting the debt limits that would trigger cuts, Congress again included the trust fund surplus so the federal debt looked lower than it truly was and that delayed the automatic cuts, some shell games are too good to waste.

And all the while, Congress is using the trust fund as their personal piggy bank, not to pay down the existing deficit, but to finance more and more programs with borrowed money. It is easy to see why in 2002 the Democrats in Congress fought so hard to prevent people from being able to invest 3% of their social security obligation in their own private retirement plans. That would mean 3% less that congress could not borrow.

We can continue to increase taxes and decrease benefits all the while financing more and more deficit spending OR we can demand the government get out of the retirement business and allow Americans to make their own retirement decisions.

Are they lying now or were they lying then?

Both - they lied to us then, they are lying to us now and I see no reason to think they will not lie to us in the future.

Some things are to good not to reprint 3

Imagine a league where players who make it through three seasons could never be cut from the roster.

By FRAN TARKENTON

Imagine the National Football League in an alternate reality. Each player's salary is based on how long he's been in the league. It's about tenure, not talent. The same scale is used for every player, no matter whether he's an All-Pro quarterback or the last man on the roster. For every year a player's been in this NFL, he gets a bump in pay. The only difference between Tom Brady and the worst player in the league is a few years of step increases. And if a player makes it through his third season, he can never be cut from the roster until he chooses to retire, except in the most extreme cases of misconduct.

Let's face the truth about this alternate reality: The on-field product would steadily decline. Why bother playing harder or better and risk getting hurt?

No matter how much money was poured into the league, it wouldn't get better. In fact, in many ways the disincentive to play harder or to try to stand out would be even stronger with more money.

Of course, a few wild-eyed reformers might suggest the whole system was broken and needed revamping to reward better results, but the players union would refuse to budge and then demonize the reform advocates: "They hate football. They hate the players. They hate the fans." The only thing that might get done would be building bigger, more expensive stadiums and installing more state-of-the-art technology. But that just wouldn't help.

If you haven't figured it out yet, the NFL in this alternate reality is the real -life American public education system. Teachers' salaries have no relation to whether teachers are actually good at their job—excellence isn't rewarded, and neither is extra effort. Pay is almost solely determined by how many years they've been teaching. That's it. After a teacher earns tenure, which is often essentially automatic, firing him or her becomes almost impossible, no matter how bad the performance might be. And if you criticize the system, you're demonized for hating teachers and not believing in our nation's children.

Inflation-adjusted spending per student in the United States has nearly tripled since 1970. According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, we spend more per student than any nation except Switzerland, with only middling results to show for it.

Over the past 20 years, we've been told that a big part of the problem is crumbling schools—that with new buildings and computers in every classroom, everything would improve. But even though spending on facilities and equipment has more than doubled since 1989 (again adjusted for inflation), we're still not seeing results, and officials assume the answer is that we haven't spent enough.

These same misguided beliefs are front and center in President Obama's jobs plan, which includes billions for "public school modernization." The popular definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over, expecting different results. We've been spending billions of dollars on school modernization for decades, and I suspect we could keep on doing it until the end of the world, without much in the way of academic results. The only beneficiaries are the teachers unions.

Some reformers, including Bill Gates, are finally catching on that our federally centralized, union-created system provides no incentive for better performance. If anything, it penalizes those who work hard because they spend time, energy and their own money to help students, only to get the same check each month as the worst teacher in the district (or an even smaller one, if that teacher has been there longer). Is it any surprise, then, that so many good teachers burn out or become disenchanted?

Perhaps no other sector of American society so demonstrates the failure of government spending and interference. We've destroyed individual initiative, individual innovation and personal achievement, and marginalized anyone willing to point it out. As one of my coaches used to say, "You don't get vast results with half-vast efforts!"

The results we're looking for are students learning, so we need to reward great teachers who show they can make that happen—and get rid of bad teachers who don't get the job done. It's what we do in every other profession: If you're good, you get rewarded, and if you're not, then you look for other work. It's fine to look for ways to improve the measuring tools, but don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

Our rigid, top-down, union-dictated system isn't working. If results are the objective, then we need to loosen the reins, giving teachers the ability to fulfill their responsibilities to students to the best of their abilities, not to the letter of the union contract and federal standards.

Mr. Tarkenton, an NFL Hall of Fame quarterback with the Minnesota Vikings and the New York Giants from 1961 to 1978, is an entrepreneur who runs two websites devoted to small business education.

Reprinted from WSJ article

The choice is ours.

Ten years ago the United States was ruthlessly attacked by Muslim extremists operating from bases in a stone-age country on the other side of the world. Almost 3,000 innocent Americans lost their lives to a fanatical version of a religion that is bent on killing our citizens, destroying our country and ending our way of life.

Since then, American military and security personal have engaged this enemy all across the globe. This long war has tested our resolve to press on and not surrender to the easy but false security of isolationism.

Bad men in the past were armed with clubs then armies of men with clubs then more and more sophisticated ways to kill their enemies, but always in the past bad people killed primarily for profit, or plunder, or territory. We now face an enemy that kills for no other reason than we are different, we are a different religion, we support freedom for all people. Now our enemy could be armed with weapons that give them the ability to kill thousands, or tens of thousands at one time.

We must maintain the ability to fight this long asymmetric war while maintaining the ability to defeat a large conventional force. You can’t call close air support from a drone, you can’t have a Bosnia or Libyan type operation without conventional forces. You can’t mobilize a modern military like you did during WWII, we are not going to build an F-22 every hour like we did B- 17’s. What you start a conventional war with - is what you will fight the war with. Presently China has a military twice the size of ours. They have 6000 military aircraft, about equal to the US. China just finished their first aircraft carrier and is rapidly building more. Their front line fighters are as good as or better than ours. Yes, we have stealth fighters and they don’t, but they are working at perfecting it and we have less than 170 operational stealth fighters at this time. General Hackett in his excellent book “WWIII” demonstrated how we quickly run out of things like front line fighters and tanks because our ability and our enemies ability to destroy them is faster than our ability to replace them.

We can’t solve all the world’s problems, and every problem cannot be solved with military power but the tyrants of the world should always be afraid that we might act.

Many people have said to me “we can’t afford to be the world’s policeman”

I am not sure we can afford not to. We cannot retreat to our boarders and maintain our economy and security, the world it too connected. Let a person like Saddam run wild and he will take over the middle east, don’t keep Korea and China in check and they will control Asia. Let murderous dictators attack their neighbors or kill their citizens and that just encourages more dictators. It is in our own interest to promote economic freedom throughout the world. The world must know there is a line and if you cross it your dead body ends up dumped in the sea, people like Bin Laden, Saddam and Hitler only understand overwhelming force. If we are going to be the world’s police I would rather stop the crime in the neighborhood one block over, not wait until it is in my neighborhood.

President Reagan said it best “no one ever attacks you because you are too strong”

Someone has to do it and our allies have deserted us by eliminating any ability they had to fight an offensive war. Believe me, I wish it wasn’t so, I wish my boy was home, but I truly think we, the citizens of the United States of America and our military are the last best hope for civilization. The dark ages are only kept at bay by the US Military and our ability to support it.

Warren Buffett is wrong.

(Or how smart people say dumb things)

In response to the recent media reports about Warren Buffett saying that the government should tax the wealthy more, I have argued recently that Warren is just plain wrong. Usually this is met with a chronological outline of how smart Mr. Buffett is, how successful he is at making money in the investment industry, and what a philanthropist he is. Like any of this would make Warren incapable of being wrong.

Even more than that, I think Mr. Buffett’s own actions prove he does not even believe what he is saying and maybe his recent statement has more to do with aiding his friend President Obama’s political position than solving the country’s economic problems.

Warren committed in 2008 to donate the majority of his fortune to charities, primarily some $30 billion to the Bill Gates Foundation. But why did he do this? If he truly believes the federal government can spend his money better than he can, why not just sign it over to Washington? Why take all that money away from our benevolent government just to give it to some private charitable foundation?

Let just pretend that Mr. Buffett had his way and over the last 30 years the government had taxed Warren an extra 30 billion dollars. Do you think he would have given up his corporate jet? Or stopped buying his tailored suits or not purchased his mansion in California? Or would he just not have an extra $30 billion to give to the Bill Gates Foundation.

And do you think the world would be a better place with the Bill Gates Foundation spending the 30 billion dollar gift or with Washington spending 30 billion of seized tax money. We can see what Warren thinks he gave the money to Gates. Washington would have burned through the fruits of Mr. Buffett’s life’s work in about 12 minutes. Apparently Warren thinks the Gates Foundation would use the money a little more effectively.

The other really amazing thing is that as good at investing as Warren is, he apparently is not terribly good at math. His tax plan as outlined in his NY Times op-ed article primarily consists of raising taxes on those making over one million dollars a year. The total taxable income in 2009 for everyone making over one million dollars a year was about 727 billion. If the ultra rich were taxed an extra 50% surcharge this would only raise $363 billion, not close to the 1.6 trillion dollar projected 2011 deficit or the 14 trillion dollar federal debt. And this extra government income would only be if the ultra rich did not change their investment strategy. Make American tax system punish investments in this country and the money will go somewhere else. Warren said recently he does not think high taxes would change anyone’s investment strategy “I have never seen anyone walk away from a good investment just because of the tax implication” he stated. That may be true but how high do the taxes have to go before it is no longer a “good investment”.

Increases in government income to pay for the past spending orgy only leads to new government spending that will require even more government income. The solution Mr. Buffett is not more taxes, it is less spending. The solution is not to discourage investment but to encourage it.

I think for now, I will believe what Mr. Buffett does, not what he says. Actions do speak louder than words and sometimes, really smart people say really dumb things.

Some things are to good not to reprint 2

"The Obama administration and congressional Democrats are betting their political futures on the hope that the American electorate is ignorant and forgetful, and hence the memo has gone out to functionaries hither and yon, from David Axelrod to John Kerry: This is to be called the 'tea-party downgrade.' That this is said with straight faces bespeaks either an unshakable contempt for the mind of the American voter or an as-yet unplumbed capacity for Democratic self-delusion. Let us revisit the facts. The original debt-ceiling deal put forward by the Democrats totaled $0.00 in debt reduction. This would have fallen approximately $4 trillion short of the $4 trillion in debt reduction the credit-rating agencies suggested would constitute a 'credible' step toward maintaining our AAA rating and avoiding a downgrade. ... The Democrats have suggested that Republicans' refusal to accede to tax hikes is the main reason Standard & Poor's felt it necessary to issue a downgrade, the first in American history, last Friday evening. In their assessment of Standard & Poor's reasoning, the Democrats are acutely at odds with Standard & Poor's. The credit-rating agency did not call for tax hikes in its assessment. ... But S&P, along with the other credit-rating agencies, has long taken a position on one aspect of our fiscal troubles: entitlement reform. ... As anybody who has looked at our long-term deficit projections knows, entitlement spending is the major driver of our future deficits. ... Tea-party leaders, far from being a barrier to entitlement reform, have demanded it. ... The deal that finally did pass would have contained significantly more in deficit-reduction, except for the fact that Democrats categorically refused to consider -- is this sounding familiar? -- entitlement reform, the most important issue. ... Democrats believe that they have discovered a cartoon villain in the Tea Party, and they are hoping that American voters are gullible enough to be distracted by the political theatrics. Come November 2012, Americans should keep in mind both the insult and the injury -- to the nation and its credit." --National Review

If not now, when?

Public opinion polls show a majority of Americans support a debt reduction plan that includes some tax increases and view Obama as more willing to deal on the federal debt.

Man we have fallen for the liberal media slant on this issue.

Look what has happened here, Obama has increased spending over 1 trillion dollars in just two years, he has imposed millions of dollars in new taxes, he has increased the % of total GDP the government takes to a point where spending as a % of GDP in the future could be 80-100%..... and now he wants to deal. Sure he wants to deal, he has taken a dollar and he is willing to give back 5 cents. It would be like Wal-Mart doubling all their prices and then giving everyone 10% off. That's no deal!

What has he really offered to deal? Has he offered any plan? The President preaches to congress that "they" have to do something, he holds meeting and the total real savings he has offered is 2 billion dollars, big deal, the government spent that in the time the meeting took.

The GOP has offered plans and ideas, the one thing they should not do is increase the income tax.

I want the federal spending stopped and you don't stop federal spending by raising taxes again. This is real simple, stop spending money. The federal government will collect 2.8 trillion dollars this year, if we give them another trillion next year they will want another trillion, it has to stop.

In 2008 the government spent 2.8 trillion dollars and if you listen to the liberals every single cent was absolutely necessary. In 2012 they will spend 3.5 trillion and guess what, every single cent is absolutely essential, well that is except for defense spending: which the liberals think we can slash.

I do not want the rate of increased spending slowed, I want the increases stopped, when the economy starts growing the government will get more money but there is no reason on earth the federal government need to continually have more and more of the money earned in this country as compared to GDP, it is absolutely unsustainable.

You might not like the Republicans digging in their heels, but Greece would be in a lot better shape now if someone in the Greek government would have dug their heels in 20 years ago. Compromise now and your kids will grow up in a country that makes Greek spending look like small change.

You don’t think it is all that bad? When Nancy Pelosi was sworn in as speaker of the house she vowed “there would be no new deficit spending” to quote madam speaker exactly

"After years of historic deficits, this 110th Congress will
commit itself to a higher standard: Pay as you go, no
new deficit spending”

The federal debt was 8.6 trillion at that time, today it is 14.5 trillion and we have raised the debt ceiling

74 times on the last 49 years……

It has to stop sometime and now is the time.

If we follow the same game plan why would we exspect a different result?

Wouldn’t be nice if you could try out political or economic theories before applying then to your country?

Amazingly enough we actually have a good test run of the Obama economic experiment right down to the one word campaign slogan of “change”. Where was the pre Obama socialist experiment conducted? Check out the Greek elections of 1981.

In 1981 Andreas Papandreou was swept into power as Prime Minister of Greece along with his socialist PASOK movement. At the time of his election the Greek debt to GDP ratio stood at 28%, a figure envied by most of the free world. By the end of Andreas second term it had ballooned to over 80%. It was a rate of government expansion so large and so fast reaching every corner of Greek society that in the end it actually changed a whole countries idea about the proper role of government.

Starting with government health care, huge increases in the number of federal public employees, takeovers of failing private industries, and numerous new government hand outs, Papandreou inserted government in every corner of Greek life. The similarities to our current US President are amazing and tragic.

In one generation Greece went from a country with a rich and proud tradition of self reliance to people rioting in the streets to maintain their government’s giveaways.

And even with the huge increase in government spending the government has proven once again the failure of large government to deliver, as Napoleon Linardatos wrote in the National Review “The Greek government employs lots of people, even by European standards; the increase in unemployment since the crisis started has come exclusively from the private sector. Finland may have the best educational system in Europe, but its ratio of students to teachers is double that of Greece, which has one of the worst educational systems. In area after area of governmental activity, Greece has the most people employed per population but also the worst results: a way-above-average number of tax collectors but very poor tax collection; an above-average number of policemen but dismal public order; a record number of local courts but perhaps the slowest justice system on the continent; a record number of hospitals but one of the worst systems of health care.”

Now Greece finds itself with a GPD to debt ratio over 140% and rising. With its only hope to remain afloat being bailouts from the European Union. The present Greek government finds itself attempting to drastically cut un-sustainable spending while facing mobs and riots by Greek citizens for their efforts. 25% of the population is employed by the government, and large minorities of the rest of the citizens are dependent on one government program or another or employed by failed government owned companies. The Greeks have become addicted to a living based on tax dollars and to many their solution to the crisis is an Obama like “tax the rich”.

The Obama play book looks to be ripped out of the failed policy manual of the Greek socialist. Maybe in 2012 we should try a different path.

Food for thought, maybe low fat food!

In the world of diet and weight control, the theory of a weight “set point” is widely accepted. The set point theory states that each person's body has an internal gauge based on certain factors that determines the amount of fat needed to function. The body's metabolism will do whatever is necessary to maintain this predetermined fat level.

I am beginning to think that the federal government also has a “set point”, a spending set point and that Liberals will do anything to maintain the federal government fat levels.

Recently a public debate between Secretary of Treasury Timothy Geithner and Representative Renee Ellmers (R-NC) pointed out that reducing the size of government is not really an option to the Liberals. When Ellmers finally told Geithner that “the point is, we need jobs,” he responded that the administration felt it had “no alternative” but to raise taxes on small businesses because otherwise “you have to shrink the overall size of government programs”—including federal education spending.

“We’re not doing it because we want to do it, we’re doing it because we see no alternative to a balanced approach to reduce our fiscal deficits,” said Geithner. (1)

Well there we have it - “no alternative” - the only way to reduce the federal deficit is to increase taxes. At least Mr. Geithner was honest enough to admit that if the level of federal fat is going to be maintained, we must raise taxes on small business. Geithner, who had trouble paying his own taxes before coming to work in the White House, now sees increase taxes as the “only alternative” to a balanced federal budget.

As President Obama’s Chief of Staff said, “Never let a good crisis go to waste”. Apparently if you don’t have a crisis, you just create one. It would appear that the budget was not sufficiently in debt when we spent 2 trillion dollars a year, so the Democrat’s drives spending up to over 3 trillion and presto debt crisis, now we have “no alternative” but to raise taxes, really it wasn’t our fault cry the Liberals.

Let’s just look at some statistics. As of December 28th, the U.S. national debt was $13,877,230,355,933. (That’s trillions of dollars in case you lost count of the zeros), the U.S. national debt is increasing by roughly 4 billion dollars every single day. The U.S. government is borrowing approximately 2.63 million more dollars every single minute. September 30th, 1980 the U.S. national debt was 907 billion dollars. Just thirty years later, the U.S. national debt is over 14 times larger. (2)

 A federal government that only spent 2.4 trillion dollars in 2008 now must raise taxes so it can spend 3.5 trillion in 2012. The liberals are not even satisfied with maintaining the existing level of government fat; they want to gorge themselves on tax dollars to increase the fat levels by 30%!

The First Lady’s “Lets Move” program is focused on reducing obesity in children, maybe her husband could think about the same program for the federal budget.

(1) http://lonelyconservative.com/2011/06/geithner-we-must-raise-taxes-so-government-doesnt-shrink/

(2) http://www.treasurydirect.gov/govt/reports/pd/histdebt/histdebt.htm

The Real Story of America’s Founding (or some things are just to good not to re print)

Frank J. Fleming

San Francisco is considering a ban on the sale of goldfish. Basically, the government is afraid that people are getting fish as impulse buys and not treating them properly, so they don’t want to allow anyone to buy them at all. They’re also considering a ban on parents having their babies circumcised.

They’ve already banned Happy Meals, as they think they’re too enticing to children and parents can’t be expected to control what their own kids eat. Also increasingly regulating the daily behavior of its citizens is New York City under Mayor Bloomberg, who has banned trans-fats city-wide and smoking in most of the city and has considered a ban on salt.

The leaders of these cities have taken it upon themselves to place their own opinions of what people should or should not be doing above basic liberty. They’ve made it the government’s role to be a nanny and have ruled individual choice as unimportant. And I have one thing to say to them: Finally, someone is remembering the principles this country was founded on.

Back before the Unites States was an independent nation, people lived in horrific conditions under British rule. The British weren’t providing very good free health care (wait time for a poor person to get an MRI was over 200 years), they were refusing to increase taxes on the rich, and they had very few laws dictating what colonists were allowed to eat, causing many to become obese on the high-fructose maize syrup the Indians taught them to make.

So the colonists kept demanding that the British give them big government to regulate their lives and provide for their basic needs while confiscating all their wealth. “We’re stupid,” they’d cry out to the British. “Please rule us and make us do what you think is best!” But the British kept refusing, saying, “No, you guys are doing okay by yourselves. We want you to have the freedom to run your own lives.”

It was this laissez-faire attitude that led to the Boston Massacre, in which five people died of heart attacks in Boston from eating fatty foods a proper government would never have let them eat in the first place. Finally the colonists had enough of not being bossed around and decided if the British weren’t going to provide them the all-encompassing government they wanted, they had to make it themselves.

They started by throwing tea into the Boston Harbor since they determined it had too much caffeine and people shouldn’t have been allowed to drink it. Then they formed militias to collect more taxes from the colonists to spend on welfare and government works projects. The British tried to strike back by ending regulations and giving tax rebates, but the colonists were now ready to fight to make sure some large entity would tell them what to do. And many were rallied to the cause by Patrick Henry’s cry of “Give me a large government telling me what I can and can’t do while spending most of my money, or give me death!”

Soon, Thomas Jefferson penned the Declaration of Independence, which includes the famous line, “We hold these truths to be revealed after careful study by Ivy League-educated people, that all men are in need of constant care and supervision, that they are endowed by the highly-educated intellectual class with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are free Health Care, strict and expansive Regulations on all activities, and the pursuit of Big Government.”

For these causes the Revolutionary War was fought and won, allowing the colonists to form their own country: the United States of America. And they made a constitution giving the government the right to control its citizens’ activities and wealth and made sure the Constitution had lots of things like the Commerce Clause, which could be broadly interpreted to allow people in the government to do whatever they felt was best, such as force people to buy things. And they added a Bill of Rights, which outlined all the free stuff the federal government was supposed to give everyone in case they were too lazy or stupid to get it themselves.

So America prospered until there formed a group of agitators who wanted to put as much salt as they wanted on their food. This could not be allowed, of course, so America fought the extremely bloody Civil War, which led to two horrible outcomes: The first ever Republican president (who was killed while in office by going to the theater and eating popcorn made with refined coconut oil) and the Thirteenth Amendment, which ended one of the greatest progressive programs ever, one that had guaranteed jobs and shelter to millions of underprivileged people.

America continued on, though, with Reconstruction: The attempt to build government as big as it had been before the war. And the government got bigger and stronger for many years until one day America faced its greatest nemesis yet: the Nazis. The Nazis (a.k.a. the National Capitalist German Investors’ Party) started spreading all over Europe, radically reducing government and ending all regulations on business and individual behavior (you can watch old footage of them savagely cutting taxes if your stomach can handle it). As a result, millions died from obesity and smoking. Luckily the world united against them and defeated that evil, and everyone vowed that people would never again live without a government dictating their every action.

So it seemed things would be peaceful for a time, but then arose the Red Menace — also known as Red Staters — who demanded this dangerous thing called liberty where people got to make their own choices even if really smart people — people with PhDs from prestigious schools — thought it was a bad idea. As obviously stupid as this liberty idea was, it caught on and has infected the American psyche ever since. And now people have forgotten the very American ideals of regulation and government control this nation was founded on.

But San Francisco and New York City are bravely taking a stand for the true American idea of a government that controls our every action. They know that “freedom” should instead be called “costly dumb” because it is stupidity that costs us all and leads to obesity, lung cancer, over-salting, and circumcised children getting toys in their meals. People think liberty is a great thing to have, but is it worth having people impulsively buy goldfish and then later realize that maybe they didn’t want the goldfish but now they’re stuck with the goldfish? Of course not; nothing is worth that. And it’s un-American to insinuate otherwise.

the above was reprinted from http://www.pajamasmidia.com/, I highly recomend you check them out, as you can see educational and informative.

We can never forget.

On this day in 1944, more than 150,000 Allied troops walked, ran, crawled, and swam onto the heavily fortified beaches of Normandy, France. The D-Day invasion marked a turning point in WW2 and ultimately the end of the Nazi regime in Europe.

2499 American service men were killed that first day.

As Ronald Reagan said in 1984 commemorating the 40 anniversary of D Day

"Here, in this place where the West held together, let us make a vow to our dead. Let us show them by our actions that we understand what they died for. Let our actions say to them the words for which [General] Matthew Ridgway listened: 'I will not fail thee nor forsake thee.' Strengthened by their courage and heartened by their valor and borne by their memory, let us continue to stand for the ideals for which they lived and died."

For all those who served then, and serve now “let us continue to stand for the ideals for which they lived and died."

 To do anything less would be a disgrace.

I wonder if anyone ever wonders how the federal budget got to this point?

The federal government did not have the power to levy income taxes until 1913. For a very good reason, the founding fathers understood any ability to tax, to seize the property of citizens, most certainly could and would be abused. This was not pure conjecture on the part of our founders but was the result of studying the behavior of governments throughout history.

Until the passing of the Sixteenth  amendment, the federal government managed to conduct its business using the constitutional forms of revenue collection defined in the Constitution. Even in times of emergency when income type taxes were instituted, such as the civil war, they were quickly rescinded when the emergency passed. After the passage of a constitutional amendment allowing a federal income tax, payroll deductions of those taxes were quickly rejected. Citizens paid their tax bills yearly as a direct payment from the tax payer to the government. What you paid in taxes was obvious.

The huge expense of WWII offered the government the opportunity to institute a payroll deducted income tax. In a classic example of the slippery slope, government officials reasoned since we already had a payroll deducted social security tax, that to make sure the government got all the tax it needed or wanted, why not use payroll deducting for income taxes also? The 1940’s saw a huge change in the income tax where originally a minority of wealthy citizens paid income tax to a tax on the masses where virtually every citizen who earned income paid some tax. Tax filings went from less than 8 million in 1939 to 35 million in 1943. Wrapped in the patriotic obligation to “support the war” and sold as a “convenience to the tax payer”, taxes for the first time would be deducted (confiscated) before the tax payer ever saw the money. What was the government reasoning? “We are only doing this to make it easier on the taxpayer”.


But even as the government was promoting payroll deducted taxes as a service to the citizens, Congress understood the advantages of people not really seeing the money as it flowed to the government. As Representative Donald H. McLean said (U.S. House Hearings 1943: 85)payroll deductions would serve in , ``protecting the Government revenues not only now, but for all times to come.'' He felt that ``the need for the change in the collection method, due to the increase of the number and type of taxpayers that we have brought into the system.'' that it would be ``good business'' for the government: government ``will have more revenue; ... its people will pay better and be happier about it.'' Representative Frank Carlson (R., Kans.), warned witnesses to use such language, reminding them that the House Ways and Means Committee ``passed a 10-percent increase in our income and corporate taxes a year ago by calling it a defense tax.'' He added that ``the suggestion that we call this tax a war tax is a good one.'' Representative A. Willis Robertson (D., Va.) noted “the word forced is not a euphonious name'', it ``would be much better if we should call it `Victory savings,' or something of that kind'' (U.S. House Hearings 1942, vol. 1: 108). Treasury official Randolph Paul at the same hearing agreed.

And even though support for the war was massive, popular support for payroll deduction for income tax was barely 50%. That was until the government came up with a better sales pitch. There was a real problem in the year the country would switch collection systems. If a “pay as you go” system was adopted in 1943 the tax payer would be responsible for their 1943 taxes being payroll deducted, and their 1942 taxes that they had accrued, basically double taxes in that year. The government’s solution was as sellable as it was deceitful. The Congress eventually passed and the President signed a bill that allowed for the “cancellation of 75% of the 1942 tax liability. When people where presented with the idea that they would escape their 1942 taxes, support soared, even though most government officials realized it was as Former Treasury Department official Elisha Friedman openly called it a ``paper forgiveness”. As Mr. Friedman noted in congressional hearings in 1942, “The `forgiveness' of the small brackets is merely temporary. ... They will pay more later. ... You will forgive the 1942 tax for the little people but in 1944 and 1945 they will be paying at a higher rate. ... Ours is a paper forgiveness for the low brackets.” In other words the revenue lost by not collecting the 1942 tax would easily be made up because the payroll deduction would make tax increases seem painless to the tax payer.

In what has become common practice, we see Congress doing what is good for the government, in deference to what is good for the citizen, and cloaked in the illusion that it is good for the country as a whole. But it is hard to see how anything that injures the citizen can in the long run be a good thing.

And as they say, “the rest is history”. With a payroll deducted income tax in place, separating the tax payers, from their property became easy, people don’t miss what they never had and not many take the time to actually look at their pay checks and realize the volume of money being handed off to the government. As Senator John A. Danaher observed (U.S. Cong. Rec.-Senate 12 May 1943: 4268, 4272, 4282) ``the fact of the matter is the Treasury collections will go up annually rather than down.'' And as Senator Byrd in 1943 predicted ``before the ink is dry on the signatures, we will call upon the Congress to increase the existing tax rates in proportion to the cancelation [sic] and forgiveness we extend to the taxpayers.'' He believed that ``so-called benefits to the taxpayer'' would then ``quickly sink into complete oblivion'' so that ``most taxpayers would be injured rather than benefited''

Fast forward to 2011 and the federal government officially hit the 14 trillion dollar debt limit this week. In 2010 social security recites were 49 billion dollars short of payments, and the country is racking up one trillion dollars of debt per year. The total 2011 federal spending is at 3.7 trillion dollars, or almost 7 billion dollars a minute! The federal government uses payroll deducted taxes to siphon off ever increasing amounts of money to fund every function Congress can dream up with almost no regard to constitutional limits of that spending. Now conservatives like Paul Ryan are pushing back against out of control spending and focusing on how much money the government actually goes through.

The response given to the Los Angeles Times last Thursday from Mr. Reid, democratic leader of the Senate is ““It would be foolish for us to do a budget at this stage.”

Foolish Mr. Reid?

Foolish would be a government that borrows 40% of the money it spends.

Foolish would be a government that buries its head in the sand as Medicare and Social Security careened toward certain bankruptcy that will certainly destroy the economy.

Foolish would be trying to convince the American people if we just increase taxes on just 5% of the population that it will fix everything.

Foolish would even be an American population allowing our elected leaders to get away with such foolishness.

But most foolish of all would be not doing your job and create a budget that deals with the financial disaster that you and your elected colleges have created - unless of course we are only taking about politics and not actually about governing.

The federal government pulled the wool over our eyes in 1943 as Americans tried to save the free world from Fascism. It’s now time we take off the blind fold, really look at what is happening in Washington and fix the problem.

I wonder if anyone ever thinks, enough is enough?

The federal government will take in 2.2 trillion dollars in 2011, enough to fund every single department and function of the federal government with no deficit spending..…..at 2008 levels.

Unfortunately the government plans to spend 3.3 trillion, which means it is going to borrow 40 cents out of every dollar it spends. Try that with your household budget and see how far you get.

The liberals tell us if we do not shovel more and more money into the furnace of the federal government the fire will go out and we will be left in the cold and dark like lost little children in the woods. It’s funny, but I don’t remember 2008 being a time of painful fiscal discipline. The current administration and its supporting clowns in congress now say we not only needed to increase federal spending by over 1.1 trillion dollars since 2008 but to even cut 30 billion last month was paramount to moving us back into the dark ages, and without federal support for cowboy poetry festivals, children will starve and the elderly will be helpless.

There are only two ways to produces wealth. Farming, where a plot of land produces a crop where nothing before existed, or to manufacture, where a group of raw materials are combined to produce a product worth more than the combined raw materials, the federal government does neither. In fact every time the federal government takes a larger cut of the capital of this country through taxes, it reduces the capital available to accomplish anything.

Increasing the wealth of the country is the only hope for the poor (or anyone for that matter) to increase their lot in life. The federal government, using tax money to make one person richer: only to make another person poorer is hardly the way to expand the economy.

Maintaining a functioning federal government is a necessary evil of a free society, but an ever expanding wealth redistribution program run by the federal government, enforced with the rule of law is just an evil, neither constitutional, nor in the long run helpful to anyone.

The liberals say we must maintain a social safety net for the most disadvantaged. Fine, for the sake of compromise, I agree. But I think we had that many times over in 2008.

One if by land......

236 years ago William Dawes and Paul Revere started their epic ride to warn patriots that the British were marching on Concord. The British hoped to capture Sam Adams and John Hancock and the American arsenal. If successful the British may have been able to put a quick end to the emerging revolution.

Dawes and Revere took separate routes in case one was captured. Although detained at a road block, the two along with Samuel Prescott managed to notify hundreds of Minutemen of the arriving British troops. On the morning of April 19, 1775, 77 Colonial Militia blocked the path as the British arrived at Lexington, Massachusetts. During the tense standoff someone fired the “shot heard around the world”. Both sides returned fire and the American Revolution had begun.

Like Dawes and Revere’s ride, this blog is an attempt to rouse American Patriots to impending threats to America. Not threats of invading foreign armies, but threats to an ever expanding federal government that are sapping the resources and reducing the Liberty of all Americans.

The unique freedoms Americans have enjoyed are the very thing that has made the United States economy the engine of the world. The US economy is what allows America to maintain the world’s only super power level military, a military that not only protects America but is the only deterrent to tyrants and dictators all over the world. Just in the last months we have seen NATO struggle to contain a third world military in Libya, both France and England have called for the US to resume strike missions because the combined militaries of NATO do not have the resources to deal with Libya’s meager army.

A US economy that is unrestricted by a meddling and intrusive federal government is the best hope for prosperity for America and its citizens……and America is the last best hope for the free world.

So as long as needed, my ride continues.

"We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt." --Thomas Jefferson

The Democrat’s unwillingness to address the insane budget disaster in the Federal Government borders on criminal. If any large corporation ran its financing as irresponsible as the government, the government would be attempting to bring the officers up on charges, remember Enron?

Let look at some of the facts, in February the Federal Government posted the largest monthly deficit ever at $223 billion, yet the Democrats refuse to cut even $61 billion a YEAR!

We are now six months into the 2011 budget year but Congress has yet to pass a budget. Even when the Democrats were in control of both houses of congress and the White House, they refused to get the work done to pass a budget. This is the first time this has happened since the new budget rules went into effect in 1974. In the last 36 years, every Congress has managed to pass a budget before the end of the calendar year - - except the band of fools led by Reid and Pelosi.

With a projected budget of 3.8 trillion dollars, and a projected deficit of 1.4 trillion, that means the federal government has income to cover only 2/3rds of the spending, the rest is borrowed. But the Democrats refuse to cut less than 2% saying these cuts are, “draconian”! Think about this for a minute, the government spends 1.4 trillion dollars more than it takes in, everyone says that we must decrease spending, but the Democrats say cutting 61 billion dollars is far too much.

How in the heck do you close a 1.4 trillion dollar short fall if you can’t even cut $61 billion?

On Tuesday the President chided Republican Speaker of the House Boehner for holding up a budget deal for what the President refers to as “quibbling around the edges” of the budget. Well, if what the Republicans are asking for is such a small issue why are the Democrats willing to shut the Federal Government down over them? Come Friday our troops in combat will stop getting paid so the Democrats can be sure the National Endowment of the Arts can continue being funded. That is one of the critical services the Democrats say cannot be cut to help balance the budget.

While the clock ticks toward a Federal Government shut down, the Federal Government spends 5 million dollars a minute. The only way this will ever end is if we hold our elected officials responsible to balance the budget.

Mr. Jefferson could not be more correct.

In response to my Liberal friends continual reference to greedy conservatives.

 You totally miss the conservative point of view, as we already know, conservatives, and Christian conservatives in particular are the most chartable politic group in the country by far. The question is not if a person should be charitable.

The question is does the government have the right to order us to be charitable and does the government have the right to define who we are charitable to.

You say the government does have the right to seize my money and use it for whatever charitable cause it sees fit. I say it does not.

You are happy with the government taking a private citizens property and awarding it to another private citizen. I say the constitution prohibits this.

You have no fear that that charitable contribution by the government is really just a bribe to citizens to buy votes. I say in many cases this is all they are.

You think the government forced charities are more efficient than private charities. I know this is not correct.

You do not see any negative effects to the economy when the government seizes a larger and larger portion of the earnings of this country. I say all evidence suggest otherwise.

In short, you believe our lives and livelihoods are better controlled by the people in Washington than by us. You believe in the rights of the collective over the rights of the individual.

Supporting the government does not mean paying my neighbors rent. Helping my neighbor is a noble and moral thing to do. The government pointing a gun to my head to force me to do this is not.

INVOLUNTARY SERVITUDE

 “A condition of compulsory service or labor performed by one person, against his will, for the benefit of another person due to force, threats, intimidation or other similar means of coercion and compulsion directed against him.” (1)

It really is hard to find a better definition to describe what is happening with much of the federal tax system today.

Of course, we all have a constitutional obligation to financially support the federal government, and we most definitely have a moral obligation to support our fellow man. But the federal government demanding how much of our labor must be used to support our fellow man and what fellows must be supported, can be defined as nothing but involuntary servitude. If my neighbor refuses to get a job, even if he is able bodied and able to work, there are a myriad of federal programs that will transfer federal tax money to him and his family. The government feels it is my obligation to surrender a portion of my earnings to him through these programs. If I protest that he is undeserving of my property, the federal government will use escalating threats, intimidation and ultimately force to seize my property and transfer it to who the government has decided is more deserving of it. If you think I over state the case, try not paying your federal taxes.

We now have a situation where the majority of federal taxes collected do not go to maintain the government or provide for the common defense but is money confiscated from one citizen and transferred to another citizen. Just a huge, trillion dollar, wealth redistribution program that skirts, if not openly defies, the Constitution.

The founding fathers were very aware of the potential dangers of well meaning but destructive urges by elected officials to attempt to use public money collected as a tax, to correct every social ill that might befall a citizen. They were very careful to write a constitution that did not give the federal government the authority to confiscate a citizen’s property and redistribute it as the government saw fit. James Madison wrote “I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on the objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents." They understood not only how this practice was contrary to the founding principal of individual freedoms, but also the political reality that the ruling party might be tempted to seize money from political opponents and bestow it on political supporters in the name of benevolence.

In the mid 1850’s a Frenchman named Alexis de Tocqueville, who traveled extensively in the U.S. and later wrote a book about the American democratic experiment, wrote “The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public's money.”

It is hard to determine with the trillions of dollars changing hands, where the benevolence stops and the bribery begins,

(1) 'Lectric Law Library

Happy birthday President Reagan, and thank you.

"The Founding Fathers knew a government can't control the economy without controlling people. And they knew when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose. So we have come to a time for choosing. ... You and I are told we must choose between a left or right, but I suggest there is no such thing as a left or right, there is only an up or down. Up to man's age-old dream -- the maximum of individual freedom consistent with order -- or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. ... It's time we asked ourselves if we still know the freedoms intended for us by the Founding Fathers. James Madison said, 'We base all our experiments on the capacity of mankind for self government.' This idea -- that government was beholden to the people, that it had no other source of power -- is still the newest, most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man. This is the issue of this election: Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American Revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves."

Ronald Reagan.



Ronald Reagan was a great communicator, but as he said much of his success was because he communicated great ideas. I don’t think anyone has ever more eloquently expressed the true ideal of individual liberty than President Reagan in the above quote. A great man who truly saved the nation by reminding us all of what has made this country great.

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

I am quite certain that the founding fathers never realized how much some of those words recorded in the preamble to the constitution and in the introduction to section 8 would alter the way Washington does business, nor would they approve.

Up until about 1937 congress limited its business to the 17 enumerated powers outlined in Article 1 Section 8 of the Constitution. But starting with FDR in 1937 and continuing on to this day Liberals have sought to use the “general welfare” clause, to justify all manner of interference in our lives and Liberty, at least in their minds “for our own good”.

Below, in a 1791 letter to George Washington is a quote from Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson, who should know something about the original framers thoughts  lays out for Washington his ideas of the purpose of the “general welfare clause”. The italics are Mr. Jefferson’s, highlights are mine.

“To lay taxes to provide for the general welfare of the United States, that is to say, “to lay taxes for the purpose of providing for the general welfare.” For the laying of taxes is the power, and the general welfare the purpose for which the power is to be exercised. They are not to lay taxes ad libitum for any purpose they please; but only to pay the debts or provide for the welfare of the Union. In like manner, they are not to do anything they please to provide for the general welfare, but only to lay taxes for that purpose.

To consider the latter phrase, not as describing the purpose of the first, but as giving a distinct and independent power to do any act they please, which might be for the good of the Union, would render all the preceding and subsequent enumerations of power completely useless. It would reduce the whole instrument to a single phrase, that of instituting a Congress with power to do whatever would be for the good of the United States; and, as they would be the sole judges of the good or evil, it would be also a power to do whatever evil they please.”

So in other words, the line of thinking that the Congress can use the general welfare clause to justify anything Congress thinks is “for the general welfare” of the people is absolutely ridiculous and unconstitutional. Congress may lay taxes to provide for the general welfare but only within the defined and limited powers outline in the rest of the constitution.

Today Congress thinks it is best for “the general welfare” to force us all to buy health insurance. Maybe tomorrow it will be to limit each family to one child, or take away personal property rights. And if the general welfare clause was meant to give Congress such unlimited power, how are we to know when the general welfare clause trumps the defined powers outlined in the Constitution. The 10th Amendment states quite clearly “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people”, no where does it add “unless it is a power the Congress thinks is for the “general welfare”.

Why bother outlining the Right of Free Speech if the “general welfare” clause gives Congress the power to cancel free speech - if deemed necessary to “provide for the general welfare”?

Why bother to define the Freedom of the Press if Congress can decide that restricting a free press is “for the general welfare”? Throughout history, dictators have used power to control populations all the while saying it was for the public good or general welfare.

If the general welfare clause was meant to give Congress the power to do whatever Congress thinks is best for the “general welfare” ,the Founding Fathers wasted a great deal of precious time in the summer of 1787 listing out definite limits to the federal government’s power.

They could have just written the general welfare clause and gone home.

Who need elected officials when we have appointed bureaucrats?

WASHINGTON — When a proposal to encourage end-of-life planning touched off a political storm over “death panels,” Democrats dropped it from legislation to overhaul the health care system. But the Obama administration will achieve the same goal by regulation, starting Jan. 1. Under the new policy, outlined in a Medicare regulation, the government will pay doctors who advise patients on options for end-of-life care, which may include advance directives to forgo aggressive life-sustaining treatment. (1)

Put another way after resistance from a large portion of the citizens that elected them, Congress removed payments for “end of life planning” and then passed the health care reform bill. Then a non-elected bureaucrat reinstates the very same thing as a new Medicaid rule.

Here are the details: the “Americans Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009” was passed by the House in November 2009. But not included in the final legislation was Section 1233, — that section allowed Medicare to pay for doctor/patient consultations about “advance care planning. Section 1233 was removed under withering criticism by Conservatives who feared the Government, who was paying for the health care, might have a vested interest in withholding that health care from senior citizens as a way to save money (the Sarah Palin “death panels”). This view was not without merit after reading comments from Dr. Berwick, the author of the new regulations.

” Dr. Berwick has said “Several techniques, including advance directives and involvement of patients and families in decision-making, have been shown to reduce inappropriate care at the end of life, leading to both lower cost and more humane care.” (Italics are mine). The key words here “inappropriate care” and “lower cost”! Personally I am not comfortable someone in Washington deciding care is inappropriate!

 Dr. Berwick a fan of the British National Health Service and has argued strongly for rationing health care to the elderly. The President Obama recently said “The chronically ill and those towards the end of their lives are accounting for potentially 80 percent of the total health care bill out here . . . there is going to have to be a very difficult democratic conversation that takes place”.(2) 

 Does the phrase and  "toward the end of their lives” make anyone else a little uneasy? Who will determine when you are “toward the end of your life”? The government? Dr. Berwick?

Dr. Berwick himself has said  “The Decision Is Not Whether Or Not We Will Ration Care—The Decision Is Whether We Will Ration With Our Eyes Open.” (3)

Do you want someone sitting in Washington to decide what inappropriate care is when you are toward the end of your life? We might have an idea what the future of the government health care might look like in this country by looking at Dr. Berwick’s beloved UK health care system where they have an elaborate formula to determine your “quality” and length of life and how and what care you receive.

 One other interesting fact of this whole story is Berwick was appointed with a recess appointment because the President feared he could not get enough votes in congress to get such a radical figure confirmed as required for a cabinet position. (A recess appointment is an option that the President has to appoint a cabinet member when such appointment is necessary and Congress is not in session, most often used to appoint someone who would not have the votes in congress be approved for the appointment. This appointment does not have to be voted on by Congress until the end of the next congressional session)

So we have Congress passing a hugely unpopular 2600 page heath insurance law that congressional members admit no one read. Congress did omit one of the most unpopular sections of that bill. Only then to have a White House appoints a man to oversee large portions of this law. This appointment is so unpopular the President does an end run around Congress with a recess appointment. Then this appointee immediately reinstating that same section congress rejected using his bureaucratic power granted to him by his new position.

The continuing and increasingly popular end runs around the Constitution not only by the courts but now by the White House are slowly chipping away at the constitutional power of the citizens of this country. It is that constitutional power that we use to control the workings of the federal government through our elected officials.

It’s hard to decide which is the biggest threat to our Liberty: the unconstitutional and overbearing laws and rules, or the method with which they are enacted.

(1)New York times Dec 25 2010


(2)NYT Magazine interview April 28 2009


(3) June 2009 interview for the magazine, Biotechnology Healthcare: