It’s time for Romney and Gingrich to step up their games with the fall in mind and stop slinging mud at each other. I’ll give Santorum and Paul a pass at this point as although they are trailing far behind, they are trying to stay on the high road and true to their beliefs.

Tips for Mitt

It’s time to give up the ghost on RomneyCare. Okay, you were a govenor and states are sovereign and it looked like a good idea at the time. But your efforts to defend RomneyCare while attacking ObamaCare is one of the reasons that many conservatives don’t trust you. ObamaCare is largely resonsible for the birth of the Tea Party, the only birth that conservatives want associated with ObamaCare and Obama probably wishes it was an abortion instead. I think many conservatives would accept you saying, it appeared workable, no one had tried it before, states should be a laboratory for differnt approaches to governing, but this idea really didn’t work, and regardless of whether it worked or not, healthcare is not the constitutional responsiblity of the federal government. Then forcefully reitereate that you will end ObamaCare.

Everyone knows that politics is not beanbag. It is a full contact sport, but just be careful with taking things out of context to twist their meaning. There should be enough differences between you and Gingrich, to present your plans and let the people decide. Keep it clean, no hitting below the belt.

Tips for Newt

It’s time to put on your big boy pants. If you think Romney is tough, wait until you get in the ring with Obama. He will have no compunction about lying about your record. If your excuse for not doing as well in the last two debates is that you never stood next to someone on the same stage who lied about your record, you have a rude awakening coming. If most of your supporters are salavating to see you debate Obama and this is all it takes to knock you off your debating game, throw in the towel now, please!

You need to come clean on what you did for Freddie Mac. Obama is still blaming the economy on the Bush years and the terrible mess he was handed, the center of which was the housing meltdown. If you don’t put on the table exactly what your role was and what you were paid to do, Obama will have a field day saying, “For the past four years we have been trying to recover from the housing crisis, and do you really want to put someone in the White House who caused it? De we really want to go back there?” Newt, you have to get this out now and put it behind you if he can.

It’s Obama and the Economy, Stupid

If we don’t get Obama out of the White House, ObamaCare will be permanant. If you thought Obama had socialist leanings before, imagine what they will be if he no longer has to face the electorate? If the past three years haven’t been painful enough, what will happen with a Republican Congress and an Obama presidency? Obama will try to run on a “do-nothing” Congress this fall but that’s a tough sell with the Democrats in Control of the Senate, but if the Republicans take both chambers and Obama stonwalls for two years, he can make that argument in 2014, “It’s a Republican Congess and we are stonewalled. I need a Democratic Congress to work with.” We may see a reverse landslide to 2010. Let us not snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. This should be an easy election to win, if we don’t screw it up ourselves.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

If you ask conservatives what their number one priority is in the 2012 election, most will agree it is to unseat Barack Obama. Yet unless Rick Santorum can expand his base beyond social conservatives, Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney may hand the election to Obama on a silver platter.

When Newt Gingrich is good, he is very, very good, but when he is bad he is awful. Romney has not won the hearts and minds of conservatives because of some of his past positions, his fumbling when he should strongly be defending himself, and his personal tar baby, RomneyCare. In the last debate Santorum almost pleaded for a focus on the national issues, but it only took a moment for Gingrich and Romney to roll back into the mud.

Romney has not been able to break out of the 25% neighborhood, but he hasn’t much fallen below it either. Santorum, Romney, and Gingrich each have a win under their belts, but Romney has either been first or second in each contest, which the others can’t claim.

Gingrich can rightfully claim to have led the Republicans out of the wilderness that they languished in for forty years. He can rightly claim that he worked to reform welfare, balance the budget, cutting the capital gains tax, and has worked hard to strengthen conservative causes. He also has some good ideas on taxes. That is what he should run on.

On the flip side, he resigned from Congress when it was clear to him that his own party was not going to reelect him Speaker of the House. In 1997 there was an attempted “coup” where several Republican leaders told Gingrich to step down or be voted out. Newt stood firm and prevailed, but after the 1999 election it was clear that he would not retain the Speaker’s gavel and he resigned. At the time Gingrich said, “I’m willing to lead but I’m not willing to preside over people who are cannibals.” On the one hand, Newt Gingrich through deft political skill got Bill Clinton to go along with welfare reform, balancing the budget and tax cuts which turned Clinton into a demigod among Democrats. On the other hand, his brinksmanship against Clinton, with the government shutdown and his handling of the impeachment, drove Republican approval ratings into the ground. Clinton was a masterful politician, so is Obama.

The Dark Side

In the nomination battle Gingrich has gone after Romney on some pretty bizarre points for a conservative. He has attacked him on being a free market capitalist. The super PAC that backs Gingrich put out a hit piece that was so full of errors, even Gingrich said it should be corrected or pulled. But is attacking free market capitalism conservative?

He attacked Romney for his investments and for having foreign bank accounts when he knew, or should have known that Romney’s investments were in a blind trust. For those who don’t know what a blind trust is, here’s a definition.

A financial arrangement in which a person, such as a high-ranking elected official, avoids possible conflict of interest by relegating his or her financial affairs to a fiduciary who has sole discretion as to their management. The person choosing the trust also gives up the right to information regarding the status of the assets.

The key point is that Romney “gives up the right to information regarding the status of the assets.” How can Newt attack him on his investments if Romney has no control or knowledge over them? So Newt either knew this and hoped no one would notice, or he didn’t bother to find out. Romney seems be more on top of his game, because in the debate when Newt attacked him on investments in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, Romney shot right back that Newt had similar investments. Oops! Who would you rather have in the Oval Office, the guy who does his homework, or the guy who shoots from the hip?

The latest attack from Gingrich out today concerns Medicare fraud at a company called Damon Corporation. Damon was involved in Medicare fraud to the tune of about $25 million between 1988 and 1993. Bain Capital acquired Damon in 1989, while Romney was running Bain and he sat on the board of Damon. So according to the timeline Damon was already fraudulently filing Medicare claims before Bain bought them.

When tipped off by whistleblowers an investigation was started and Damon ultimately paid a fine of $116 million. Romney was never charged with any wrongdoing. So what is the point of Gingrich’s ad? Why are Democrats and unions running similar ads to Gingrich’s? This is not a new discovery. It was brought up when Romney ran for Governor in 2002 and a Google search finds a similar reference on a Huckabee blog in 2008. Romney said he learned of the issue and took steps to deal with it, prosecutors disagreed. More facts will certainly come out in the next few days, but it seems that Gingrich is writing Obama’s campaign playbook. It’s one thing for the Democrats to raise these petty issues, but it gives them a whiff of credibility if they can show clips of prominent Republicans mouthing the same charges.

The focus for both of them should be the guy in the White House. For Romney it’s about making the case that he is a reformed moderate and he has moved away from those positions and how he has to convince conservatives of that and of Republicans that he can beat Obama.

For Gingrich, he has to prove that he is not a flip-flopper between pro-free market or anti-free market; between government solutions or government being the problem; about creating an environment for success or demonizing success; about being pro-cap and trade or against the global warming hoax; about endorsing liberal Republican candidates because they can win or backing the most conservative, electable candidate.

I took up commenting on the political scene just before the last presidential election. I don’t want to try to survive another four years of Barack Obama. It will be no consolation to say,”Yeah, but do you remember how Gingrich ripped up John King of CNN?” Retiring Obama is job one.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

Photo by roberthufstutter

One of the knocks on Herman Cain is that he has never held political office and therefore he doesn’t have the necessary experience. I, for one, would like to see a lot more people who have met a payroll go into government, than be governed by those who have never done anything other than live off of a government paycheck. They have no concept of the real world, but love to write the rules the real world must live by.

We have been watching a number of debates among the Republican candidates and one thought that must be in the back of the minds of some, is how will this particular candidate perform in a debate against the charming Barack Obama? Will Barack Obama be able to talk himself back into the White House using his “gift“?

In the purely political realm there have been few who were as talented as Bill Clinton. Bill Clinton survived in 1996 because his primary goal in his life, in my humble opinion, was to be president. Ideology came second. So if remaining president meant pivoting, he pivoted. If remaining president meant working with Newt Gingrich to reform welfare, pass NAFTA, balance the budget, that was what he would do and then apply his political skills to make sure he got all the credit.

In 1994, when Bill and Hillary were trying to push their version of health care, there was a Town Hall meeting where one of the questioners was a fellow by the name of Herman Cain. Watch this exchange and then tell me how worried you would be if Herman Cain faced off in a debate one-on-one for the full two hours, with Barack Obama.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WP5dYfBBzU

I think Herman Cain is very electable. He is the only candidate with a plan to fix Social Security. He has a concrete plan on taxes. You may not agree with him, but he has done his homework, and as you can see in  the video clip, when Herman does his homework, he knows what he is talking about and he doesn’t need a teleprompter to tell him what he is talking about.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

Photo by Luke M. Schierholz

In a recent interview on Piers Morgan Tonight, Academy Award winning actor Morgan Freeman, once again, laid down the charge that has no proof, that the Tea Party is racist. I like Morgan Freeman. I think he is a great actor. But with this display, I also think that he needs to get out of the Hollywood bubble that includes such deep thinkers as Michael Moore and Janeane Garofolo, and actually visit a Tea Party gathering, (they are very safe places to go to). Here is his thinking. The Tea Party is opposed to Barack Obama, therefore the Tea Party is racist. Game. Set. Match. Gee, that was easy. Does Morgan Freeman know who Herman Cain is? How does he explain that one?

Here is Morgan Freeman in his own words:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSbjRElWv5I

It is simply because he is a black man. It has nothing to do with 9+% unemployment; it has nothing to do with an additional $5 trillion in debt; it has nothing about having a health care program that the majority of Americans have consistently opposed crammed down our throats; it has nothing to do with our abandonment of Israel; it has nothing to do with Obama now being less popular in the Arab world than President Bush was in 2008, despite President Obama grovelling to every dictator in that part of the world after taking office. No, it can only be racism. Talk about being stuck on stupid.

Meet Frederick Douglass

Maybe Freeman is desperately trying to salvage the historic moment of having the first real black president (apologies to Bill Clinton, the self-proclaimed first black president) being elected by 53% of the American people and in three short years, destined to go down as one of the worst presidents in American history, alongside James Buchanan and Jimmy Carter. Perhaps Mr. Freeman should study Frederick Douglass, a former slave, who led the abolitionist movement and helped bring an end to slavery.

In a book by K. Carl Smith, Mr. Smith lays it out and shows how far we have come from our founding principles, principles that were embraced by Douglass. He calls them Douglass’ four principles;

1. Value #1 — Respect for the Constitution
2. Value #2 — Respect for Life
3. Value #3 — Limited Government
4. Value #4 — Personal Responsiblity

Based on that list of values Frederick Douglass would fit comfortably within the Tea Party. According to Morgan Freeman, Frederick Douglass is a racist, because he too would disagree with Barack Obama.

Respect for the Constitution

“About four years ago I became convinced that it was not necessary to dissolve the union between the states, and that the Constitution of the United States not only does not favor slavery, but is is, in letter and in spirit, an anti-slavery document which demands the abolition of slavery. This radical change in my opinions logically resulted in my actions as well.” — Frederick Douglass, “My Bondage and My Freedom (1855)

Where does Obama stand on the Constitution? Since coming to office Obama installed czars for almost everything. By calling them presidential advisers he could avoid Senate confirmation.Here is what Democrat Senator Robert Byrd had to say about Obama’s use of czars.

Before passing away last summer [2010] Byrd, a nine-term senator who twice chaired the powerful Appropriations Committee, blasted the president’s czar appointments as unconstitutional and a clear attempt to evade congressional oversight. He referred to Obama’s “czar strategy” as an unprecedented power grab centralizing authority in the White House.

Obama is also of the school of thought that the Constitution is a “living, breathing” document that fluidly changes with the times. In other words, it means nothing to him other than what he wants it to mean to support his objectives. He believes that it is perfectly constitutional to force every American to buy health care insurance as a condition of being an American, whether or not you want it.

Respect for Life

Frederick Douglass held life as being precious. He wrote:

“When I was treated exceedingly ill; when my back was being scourged daily; when I was whipped within an inch of my life — life was all I cared for. ‘Spare my life.’ was my continual prayer.’” – Frederick Douglas, “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave & Other Writings, p. 125

While an Illinois Senator, Barack Obama helped kill a law that would have required medical treatment to any child born alive, even if the procedure being performed was an abortion. Life was important to Douglass, life is a choice to Obama and not the choice of the individual who will live or die.

Limited Government

Frederick Douglass was also a strong believer in limited government. After all, wasn’t it government that enforced his enslavement. He had this to say about the relationship between government and the freed slave:

“Let him alone and mind your own business. If you see him plowing in the open field. leveling the forest, at work with a spade, a rake, a hoe, a pick-axe, or a bill — let him alone; he has a right to work. If you seem him on his way to school, with spelling book, geography and arithmetic in his hands — let him alone. Don’t shut the door in his face, nor bolt your gates against him; he has a right to learn — let him alone. Don’t pass laws to degrade him.” {emphasis added} — Frederick Douglass: Selections from his Writings

But where does our government stand with regard to a Right to Work? Obama appoints far left progressives to the National Labor Relations Board and they try to block Boeing from opening a factory in South Carolina. Laws such as Davis-Bacon were passed as a result of a contractor bringing black laborers to Long Island to build a VA hospital in the 1930s. Although changes have been made to reduce the impact on minorities, the law has continued to make federal constructions projects more expensive than they otherwise would be. With regard to education, again, the government gets in the way. While Obama sends his daughters to a prestigious private school in Washington, D.C. he fought against a voucher program that could rescue other black children from failing schools in the District. The Tea Party fully supports such vouchers. Tell us again about who is racist, Mr. Freeman.

Douglass also wrote about government power.

“I was now getting, as I have said, one dollar and fifty cents per day. I contracted for it; I earned it; it was paid to me; it was rightfully my own; yet, upon returning each Saturday night, I was compelled to deliver every cent of that money to Master Hugh. And why? Not because he earned it, –not because he had any hand in earning it, — not because I owed it to him, — not because he possessed the slightest shadow of a right to it; but solely because he had the power to compel me to give it up.” – Frederick Douglas, “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave & Other Writings, p. 85

How much does this sound like the government and President Obama’s insistence that he is entitled to take more. In Obama’s view and in his language he treats all earnings as belonging to the government except what the government allows you to keep. That’s why he says tax cuts “have to be paid for.” Never mind that the government is spending our money for $16 muffins; $500 million for failed solar companies; $60-$100 billion a year stolen from Medicare and Medicaid; $1 trillion for failed stimulus programs, but his solution to the budget crisis is not to spend less, but to take more.

Personal Responsibility

“….And if the Negro cannot stand on his own legs, let him fall also. All I ask is to give him a chance to stand on his own legs! Let him alone!…your interference is doing him positive injury” –Frederick Douglass, What the Black Man Wants (1865)

Douglass did not call for the Great Society programs that have destroyed the black nuclear family. He did not call for spreading the wealth around, because it is good for everyone. Barack Obama wants to grow government bigger and bigger, to do more and more, whether we want it or not. And if we don’t want it, we are racists; if we object to it, we are greedy; if we look at the economic wreckage that surround us and we say enough, leave us alone and we’ll right this ship, we are called Nazis. Here is what Frederick Douglass accomplished without a government program:

• Taught himself to read and write — self-taught homeschooling program
• Taught himself to play the violin
• Escaped from slavery at age twenty
• Delayed his escape from slavery for one year in order to learn how to read and write as well as read
• He wrote his first book at age twenty-seven
• Became the face of the Abolitionist Movement and served as the catalyst within the movement that gave birth to the Republican Party
• In 1847, started a newspaper, The North Star
• Assisted Harriet Tubman in the Underground Railroad Movement through the use of his home in Rochester, NY
• Became an ordained minister in the AME Zion Church
• Served as an adviser to five U.S. Presidents (Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, Rutherford B. Hayes, James A. Garfield, and Benjamin Harrison)
• in 1863, served as a recruiter for the Massachusetts 54th Infantry Regiment
• in 1870, became the owner and editor of The New National Era,  a weekly newspaper in Washington, D.C.
• Without his knowledge, in 1872 Douglass became the first black American to be nominated as a Vice-Presidential candidate — Victoria Woodhull’s running mate on the Equal Rights Party ticket
• Douglass earned $50-$105 per speech during his public speaking career.

All accomplished without a government program.

“I am a Republican, a black dyed in the wool Republican, and I never intend to belong to any other party than the party of freedom and progress. — Frederick Douglass (1818-1895)

So, Mr. Freeman, are you prepared to call Frederick Douglass a racist, because his views are far closer to those of the Tea Party, than to Barack Obama? We’ll wait for your next interview to find out.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

Note: a shout out to K. Carl Smith and his book Frederick Douglass Republicans: The Movement to Re-Ignite Americas’s Passion for Liberty (Author House: Birmingham, AL) 2011

President Obama laid out his jobs plan and its more of the same. Tax more. Spend more. Calling more taxes, savings and more spending, investment. Is this president incapable of learning from his mistakes or is he going “all in” for a class warfare strategy to get reelected?

But it is not just the president. Democrats in Congress are circling the wagons and backing the president to the hilt, but they are starting to get nervous. They are worried if President Obama’s ratings keep falling, they may be dragged down with him.

In the First Congressional District of New York there will be a rematch between professional politician and Democrat Tim Bishop vs. entrepreneur Randy Altschuler. Bishop was in academia before getting elected to Congress in 2002, and that represents the sum total of his career. He eventually rose through the ranks at Southampton College, but just a few years after he left, in 2005, the college closed its doors, eventually being bought by the State University of New York.

After many years of fiscal mismanagement, the University announced a multi-million dollar capital campaign, launched a new interdisciplinary CORE curriculum and the construction of a new library (almost completed) to re-vamp the campus. After one year of a 10-year plan however, Long Island University officials ceased all plans and Long Island University decided to effectively close the campus. This forced most students to either move to University’s Nassau County location, C.W. Post Campus or transfer elsewhere.

That’s not an impressive record from a Democrat who likes to blame everything on President Bush. I wonder if he apologized to his successor at Southampton College for the terrible mess he left them. Since entering Congress he has voted with Nancy Pelosi 97% of the time. More than $5 trillion has been added to the national debt since Tim Bishop has been in Congress under both a Republican and a Democrat in the White House. However, with the recognition that spending has to be reined in, Bishop has given it lip service, but he cannot seem to bring himself to cut any real spending. The only thing he has seemed to offer up is closing a tax loophole on five oil companies which would close 0.2% of the current year budget deficit. With the U.S. Postal Service announcing an $8.5 billion budget deficit, Tim Bishop was out fighting to keep a superfluous post office in Setauket, NY. In addition, he voted against stopping the National Labor Relations Board from killing 2,500 jobs in South Carolina being created by Boeing. This has to stop. Tim Bishop cannot control his urge to spend, so he has to be replaced.

President Obama says we cannot cut our way out of the situation we are in. But we managed to spend our way into this mess. In Tim Bishop’s district, over $100 million of stimulus money went to school districts, who reported creating fifteen jobs. The green initiative that Obama and Bishop support has already spent $19 billion and has created only 3500 jobs; that’s $5.4 million per job! This administration guaranteed loans to a company called Solyndra, that is now bankrupt only one year after getting the loan guarantee. One of the biggest investors in Solyndra was also a campaign bundler for Obama, raising $84,000 for his presidential campaign.

Bishop’s challenger, Randy Altschuler, has created two companies and created hundreds of jobs. He decided to go into politics as he contemplated the future facing his young son. We need people in Congress who have felt the burden of trying to create jobs under the anti-business environment that exits today in America. We cannot continue to live in a fantasy world of spend, spend, spend and things will be better.

Think of a very successful company like Home Depot, which has created thousands of jobs. One of the founders of that company Bernie Marcus was recently interviewed by Neil Cavuto. Many of the suggestions he had to fix the mess we are in, have been advocated here, but they are also the very opposite of what those who are strangers to private industry are advocating, people like Barack Obama, Tim Bishop, and Chuck Schumer. We need more of the thinking and experience of those who have lived under the rules of Congress in private industry and less of those whose careers have been around telling others how to live their lives.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHUREbTn0Qo

It’s time to send Tim Bishop home and put some fresh thinking and problem solving in Washington. That’s why I support Randy Altschuler.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

Progressives are a funny group when it comes to investing, and I mean real investing, not the phony code word for spending. If they’re the ones controlling the money and especially if the money is not theirs, then investing is fine. If it will compete with one of their sacred social programs and you will directly benefit from it, then bar the door it’s an out of control casino.

The Big Ponzi Scheme

Yes, I said it. Social Security is a Ponzi scheme. I wrote about it that way in my book Liberty’s Lifeline, and I was happy to welcome some straight talking from Rick Perry on the same subject. If not run by the government, anyone who ran something like Social Security privately would be in jail, just like Bernie Madoff. The difference between Charles Ponzi or Bernie Madoff and Social Security, is that Ponzi and Madoff had to get people to volunteer their money to the scheme. With Social Security, the government just takes it.

That being said, let’s all agree that we can’t just abandon it. Those who are receiving benefits today and those who are within ten years of receiving benefits, must be protected. We allowed this scam to continue this long and our seniors planned their retirements around it. We cannot allow the rug to be pulled out from under them. But what about the next generation and those after them?

The best plan for going forward is private retirement accounts. The money put into the accounts by the next generations would be their money. They could leave it to their heirs if they don’t live long enough to collect it. If they invest wisely, they could probably live off the income alone and pass the principle to their children which would make saving for their retirement easier. This would have a compounding effect and work toward solving the retirement income problem completely, and privately.

“Invest, did you say,” the progressive asks, “in what? Not the stock market, of course!” Despite the growth through investing in stocks over the long-term is proven as one of the best investments, the progressives will scream, “What about 1929!!! What about 1987!!! Did you forget the dot.com bubble!!! Are you insane!!! It’s a casino, a crap shoot, legalized gambling.” What they are really saying is how will we control the senior vote if they are not fully dependent upon us? If private accounts take hold, the account holders will look for government policies that allow private companies to thrive, which is exactly what progressive policies don’t do.

So progressives don’t believe in investing in stocks, right? Not so fast.

Investing you Can Believe In

If progressives can take your tax dollars, and invest in companies funded by big campaign donors, that push forward their progressive agenda, they think investing is swell. If the investment turns out to be terribly bad, don’t expect to hear many “I told you so’s” from the left. You won’t hear about gambling, casinos, stock market crashes. No, it is about leadership.

That’s what they are saying about squandering $500 million taxpayer dollars on a bad investment called Solyndra, a maker of solar panels that filed for bankruptcy just one year after getting that pile of taxpayer cash. Evidence is leaking out that the green jobs agenda came before stewardship of our tax dollars. There appears to have been White House pressure to push this through before a politically staged photo opportunity for this administration. Oh, they are furiously backpedaling now, working on a timeline to blame it on Bush, naturally, but the stubborn fact that keeps getting in the way is that the Bush administration put a hold on it saying there wasn’t enough information to approve it. Then Obama happened, and it was all systems go.

I noticed that GM stock is trading at around $22.60 per share today. It has to climb to around $53 per share for us to break even on that investment that we positively, absolutely had to make. How’s that Chevy Volt doing? You know, the one that we subsidize to the tune of $7,500 per copy, because you can buy two Toyota hybrids for the cost of one Chevy Volt. Meanwhile, Ford, which turned down a bailout is doing well.

Our government takes our money for the Social Security trust fund and immediately spends it, but progressives tell us how foolhardy it would be to save for our own retirement. If you pay into Social Security all your life but die before you can collect any money, oh, so sorry.  But take more of your money and invest it to protect their union supporters, and campaign bundlers  and that’s okay.

Solyndra’s chief investor, George Kaiser, was also a bundler for Obama’s 2008 campaign, gathering over $50,000 in campaign contributions. Kaiser, together with Solyndra executives and board members, donated $87,050 to Obama’s campaign.

Is your blood boiling yet? There comes a point where you have to ask when does the mere incompetence end and criminal activity begin? While President Obama is jetting around the country trying to sell us on another jobs plan that is all about public sector employees, perhaps we should be looking to do something else.

How about we say goodbye to TurboTax Tim Geithner? He has failed miserably at his job. He should be fired. Next we should start a criminal investigation into the Energy Department people who pushed through this loan to Solyndra and then start a similar investigation over at the Justice Department regarding running guns to Mexico under the Fast and Furious program.

So if you want to invest your own money in some blue chip stocks to reduce your dependency on government programs and build a nest egg that you control and own, that is dangerously reckless. If you want to invest millions in a start-up company making heavily subsidized products, that is on the brink of bankruptcy, to pay back your fundraisers, that’s A-OK. It is time to start getting serious with what is going on in Washington and really clean house.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours; Please comment below.

Photo by Violentz

Most presidents view an address to a joint session of Congress for serious non-partisan purposes. Outside the annual State of the Union address they are rare. President Bush only did it once, in the aftermath of 9/11, and while jobs are very important to the country at this time, it is no place for a lecture (saying pass this bill seventeen times) from the most inexperienced president in our history.

This is not to minimize the importance of getting the economy moving. Who does not know that this is a problem? But it rings hollow that it was not important enough for the president to call Congress back into session in August, nor to delay his own two-week vacation to Martha’s Vineyard. Even scheduling the speech was bungled. President Obama does not seem to understand that Congress is co-equal to the Presidency and to the Judiciary. They do not report to him. He does not commandeer their chamber for his use whenever he so desires. He can make a request and then Congress can pass a resolution to invite him.

But let’s look at it a different way. Can anyone imagine John Boehner requesting an audience in the White House where he would bring in television cameras and then lecture the president about how things are done around here? Preposterous. But this president used his State of the Union address to lecture the Supreme Court, also guests at that speech, on a ruling that they made. Just who does he think he is? He is not king; he is not a dictator. He is a candidate for reelection who is rapidly sinking in the polls and is looking for the Hail Mary that will save his sorry presidency.

Having added four trillion dollars to the national debt, he is back looking for more. After a bruising battle to raise the debt limit, all he can think about is spending. But this time it will be different. This time it is paid for. Let’s think about that. Paid for by whom?

The federal government has no money other than what it takes from the private sector. So how is it possible that President Obama and his merry men and women are smarter than 340 million of their fellow Americans? How do they think that they can take money from the private sector, and only they know how to best put it back into the private sector to make the economy grow? I know there are readers out there objecting that it is not just the private sector who pays for government, but actually it is.

Think of it this way. If a Congressman takes his $174,000 salary and, assuming he knows how to actually use TurboTax, he figures out that he owes $50,000 in income tax and pays it. Is he really paying for any part of government other than a portion of his own salary? To put it another way, would it be any different to cut the salary to $124,000 and make it tax-free? Not really. The Congressman will never pay enough in taxes to cover his own salary. The same can be said of any government worker. They will never pay enough taxes to cover their own pay and put additional money to pay for the rest of government. So the government is ultimately supported by the private sector. The more government spends, the less there is available to the private sector that really creates jobs, because at a minimum, some of the money collected has to go to paying the rest of the salaries and everything else that is government. If you leave a dollar in the private sector it is still a dollar, If you pass it through the government first, you will never get the whole dollar back into the private sector.

So if you want the economy to grow; if you want to create jobs, the way to do it is to make the government as small as possible to still meet its basic mission, as spelled out in the Constitution (Article I, Section 8), and leaving the rest to us. Shrink the government back to what the Founding Fathers laid out, and reduce the taxes accordingly. This is not the time for political posturing.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

Photo by Sillgwailo

Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz wrote an open letter to his fellows CEOs about the current economic situation. (Howard Schultz CEO Letter) In it he calls for action. The letter and Mr. Schultz are interesting both for what they say and what they don’t.

Over the last few weeks and months, our national elected officials from both parties have failed to lead. They have chosen to put partisan and ideological purity over the well-being of the people. They have undermined the full faith and credit of the United States. They have stirred up fears about our economic prospects without doing anything to truly address those fears. They have spent a resource even more precious than the dollar: our collective confidence in each other, in the future, and in our ability to solve problems together.

So begins Mr. Schultz’s letter. A failure to lead and partisan and ideological purity are the root cause. There seem to be good doses of that going on in Washington. Mr. Schultz has a two step solution. He continues:

First, we aim to push our elected leaders to face the nation’s long-term fiscal challenges with civility, honesty, and a willingness to sacrifice their own re-election. This means not kicking the can anymore. It means reaching a deal on debt, revenue, and spending long before the deadline arrives this fall. It means considering all options, from entitlement programs to taxes.

That is a pretty bold start to actually push our leaders to put country ahead of re-election. For the first time that I can recall there are actually politicians who are saying the same thing, the Republican Tea Party freshman. They have said they were sent to Washington to fix the problems and that is what they intend to do whether it means getting reelected or not. The same sentiment among the Tea Party goes for not kicking the can down the road. It practically sounds like Howard Schultz is a Tea Party supporter, or should be. Is he? More on that later.

This is what so many common-sense Americans want. That is why we today pledge to withhold any further campaign contributions to the President and all members of Congress until a fair, bipartisan deal is reached that sets our nation on stronger [sic] long-term fiscal footing. And we invite leaders of businesses — indeed, all concerned Americans — to join us in this pledge. {emphasis mine}

Common-sense Americans? Concerned Americans? Fair and bipartisan? Isn’t it years of bipartisan spending that got us into this mess? Where was the outrage when the Democrats controlled both the White House and Congress and were spending like there was no tomorrow? The closet group to what Schultz is saying is the Tea Party, but rather than try to rally support behind them, he pulls back to a bowl of bipartisan mush. Why? I guess than can best be answered by asking who is Howard Schultz?

Howard Schultz

Howard Schultz is the CEO of Starbucks, a very successful company. But a search of political contributions in the Federal Election Commission data base will turn up that Mr. Schultz, over the last fourteen years has given $116,700 to political candidates or organizations, of which $115,700 went to Democrats and $1,000 went to Republicans, namely John McCain in 1999, which may have been more an anti-Bush contribution than pro-McCain. Who were some of those he gave to?

• Max Baucus
• Maria Cantwell
• Bill Bradley
• Hillary Clinton
• Tom Daschle
• John Edwards
• Ted Kennedy
• Patty Murray
• Barack Obama
• Chuck Schumer

Just about a who’s who of the biggest, and most liberal spenders in recent Congressional history. So when he preaches fairness and fiscal responsibility, is it sincere or just a crony capitalist trying to save the presidency of Barack Obama and raise enough taxes to turn the spending spigots back on. Howard Schultz is apparently an unapologetic liberal Democrat. In his letter there is not one specific program he mentions that should be cut, just the “everything should be on the table” platitudes. As far as his pitch to withhold contributions, based on his history I would applaud him to keep on withholding them regardless of what Congress and the President do.

His Second Suggestion

He then kicks off his second pledge.

The only way to break this cycle of fear is to break it. The only way to get the country’s economic circulatory system flowing again is to start pumping lifeblood through it. That is why we today issue a second pledge. Our companies are going to hire. We are going to accelerate growth, employment, and investment in jobs.
We do this because we want to set in motion an upward spiral of confidence. We are not waiting for government to create an incentive program or a stimulus. We are not waiting for economic indicators to tell us it’s safe to act. We are hiring more people now. We invite leaders of businesses across the country to join us in this pledge as well – and to bring their stakeholders into the effort. Confidence is contagious. The best thing we can do now is to spread it.

Instead of letting business people follow their assessment of the marketplace, the hell with it, just start hiring. This had a familiar ring to it. And it was Herbert Hoover who was doing the ringing.

“Hoover’s wage ideas sounded good to some. And they were indeed the opposite of federal policies in the last downturn. But they did not really make sense: to force business to go on spending when it did not want to was to hurt business. And in some areas — wages, especially — the president’s policy was dramatically counterproductive. As the crash continued, profits began to drop. Yet businesses could not adjust: if they wanted to be good citizens, they had to keep their pledge to Hoover and sustain employment and wages. The president was, essentially, requiring that companies take the hit in profits instead of employment.” — The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression by Amity Shlaes, p. 93

It seems to me that it could not be possible for a group of people to try harder to recreate the Great Depression than President Obama and his supporter have done. Between the runaway spending and now this idea from Mr. Schultz, if we make it to 2012 it could well be amazing if we don’t have another Great Depression. It’s time these people took a hard look at what they have put in place and how damaging it has been. It has been tried before and failed miserably with the employment practices under Hoover and the spending under Roosevelt. If we are to get out of this hole we have to stop digging deeper and start filling the hole back in. We can start by repealing ObamaCare and placing a two year moratorium on new regulations. Once certainty returns to the marketplace businesses will start hiring again. We do not need Mr. Schultz’s stimulus plan of unnecessary jobs any more than we needed President Obama’s. It didn’t work, neither will this.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

Photo by BlueRobot

A contentious battle has concluded today with the passage of the debt limit deal. It was a hard fought battle where no one is entirely happy with the outcome. Before we leave this field of battle, we should take stock of the accomplishments and the players involved.

President Obama

President Obama is damaged goods. His poll numbers have been falling due to the economy and he was disengaged in the debt limit debate until the very end. He has angered the left, the right, and the center. According to Scott Rasmussen, the only reason his approval rating is not lower is that he still has strong, albeit reluctant, support from Democrats. The economy is not likely to improve with him at the helm and the silver lining of the flaws in the debt deal, is it won’t help him on the economy although he managed to push another round of this past the election.

Vice President Joe Biden

Gaffe machine Joe Biden went beyond the gaffe by saying the Tea Party was a band of terrorists. Terrorists? Biden and the main stream media get all clutched up when it comes to calling real terrorists, terrorists, but easily call patriots and a large percentage of Americans, terrorists. It is a badge of dishonor he will carry for a long time.

Senator Harry Reid

Senator Harry Reid has proved, that while an adept parliamentarian in using procedures to try to play Goliath against “David” John Boehner, he just can’t get it done. He couldn’t or chose not to pass a budget for over 800 days. President Obama’s own budget went down to ignominious defeat 97-0 in his chamber. He didn’t bring Cut, Cap, and Balance up for a vote in the Senate because to do so would be lose-lose. If he brought it up he would have to defeat it. If he defeated it, many of the  twenty-three Democrat senators up for election in 2012, would  be on record for more spending and against sound fiscal policy and against two-thirds of Americans who support it. When he and President Obama hit that ball back over the net by saying Boehner walked out of the talks, that Obama has been left at the alter, etc., Boehner couldn’t just ignore it, from a political perspective, he had to respond. And so he prepared another round to put the ball back in the Democrats court. Reid tried to gut that proposal to stuff it with his own and send it back to the House but Boehner outflanked him by copying Reid’s bill and put it up for a vote, the result being it went down in flames. Reid could not even get his own version passed in the Senate. In the end the negotiations proceeded with Obama, McConnell, and Boehner; Reid was sidelined.

Nancy Pelosi

Nancy Pelosi was Obama’s right hand legislator slamming through ObamaCare, stimulus, TARP, etc. She has been essentially muzzled. When the final deal was negotiated she agreed with one of her members that this was a “Satan sandwich with a side of Satan fries.” Satan? Write that one down folks, it will come in handy along with , “We have to pass the bill to find out what is in it.” She voted for the deal, but told her members to “vote your conscience.” Sounds like “every man for himself.”

John Boehner

Sell out. Traitor. He got rolled. He is done. Not strong praise for playing the role of David, controlling one-third of the legislative power against two-thirds. But he must be doing something right when the New York Times editorial board screams

There is little to like about the tentative agreement between Congressional leaders and the White House except that it happened at all. The deal would avert a catastrophic government default, immediately and probably through the end of 2012. The rest of it is a nearly complete capitulation to the hostage-taking demands of Republican extremists.

Terrorists, hostage taking, brinkmanship. One need only look back to where this started: just raise the debt limit without condition just like every other debt limit increase. The taxes that Obama and the left wanted, were declared a non-starter; cuts equal to or greater than the amount of the debt limit increase were held firm; a vote on a balanced budget amendment in both houses and although it is not likely to pass, every member of Congress will have to go on record where they stand on it. Would this have even seen the light of day in Reid’s Senate without this deal?

There is a lot not to like in the deal, but it is a lot better than where it started. Most important is that it has brought the debt and the consequences of dealing with it into laser focus. It is up to the Tea Party to keep it there over the next fourteen months with a simple question, “If you want the spending to continue, elect Democrats; if you want to get our fiscal house in order, elect Republicans.”

 Mitch McConnell

McConnell also gets scorched for selling out, making deals to undermine real reform, etc. McConnell is the equal if not the superior parliamentarian to Reid. Many of us do not understand how the “sausage” is made in Congress and do not like it when we see it, but McConnell does. Remember when there were only forty Republican senators in the Senate it was McConnell who held them all together, even the RINOs, until Scott Brown was elected to be able to block legislation. It was McConnell who checked Harry Reid’s maneuver to sneak through his version of a deal with a simple majority. It prompted the news conference with Reid, Dick Durbin, and Chuck Schumer to chant, filibuster, filibuster! But McConnell and his deft maneuvering has been holding down the fort until reinforcements arrive.

The Tea Party

The Tea Party was not in complete agreement on this deal but everyone should take something positive out of this. This debate would not have happened at all without them. This would have passed quietly with no strings attached without the efforts of the Tea Party. Some members took a hard line that there should be no increase in the debt limit at all. Others argued caution that the political reality of only controlling one-third of the legislative process meant fighting for the best deal possible, without seeking a “bridge too far,” and triggering Treasury not sending out some checks. If that happened, which checks those would be is anyone’s guess. If the most political damage could be done and tagged to the Tea Party through that process, the left could turn a big defeat into a big victory. With seventy percent of the public disgusted with the process in Congress, if the blame could be hung on those “stubborn, inflexible, terrorist” Tea Party members, instead of having momentum to pick up more seats in November 2012, it could be turned around to “get those crazies out of there,” which would mean electing more RINOs and more Democrats and the disaster that would follow. The spirited debate in  the Tea Party was a good thing, one side kept pulling for a better deal, the other provided enough resistance to keep it from going over the edge. The goal is to get as close to the edge as possible without going over.

Where We Go From Here

Some are saying the deal will allow tax increases when the joint committee convenes. Is it possible? Yes. Is it likely? No. Boehner and McConnell, if they are smart, will appoint hardliners to the committee. My suggestions: Paul Ryan, Allen West, Connie Mack from the House and Rand Paul, Mike Lee, and Jim DeMint from the Senate. I believe there is zero chance that they would vote for a tax increase, regardless of what the Democrats want. Even if such a calamity would come to pass, it would still have to get through the House and I don’t see that happening.

Where do we go from here? We need to get more like minded people elected to Congress and the White House. This deal was by no means a great deal, but it was far better than no deal. We often lament that many people in America are just not focused on what is going on in Washington and what it means to us. This debt debate was front and center on the national news for weeks. This is something we need to leverage and expand on. We have come a long was since the fall of 2008 in getting people involved, getting them interested, and getting them educated. This event is an opportunity to get more people enraged and engaged. We must seize the opportunity, formulate the message, and drive it home as we close in on November 2012.

Consider if we had a great budget deal, everything we wanted. The stock market would rebound, the economy would start to recover with some uncertainty lifted, and if the employment picture improved, who do you think would take credit for it? It would be Obama crowing all day, every day, how it was a tough struggle, but he alone saved the day. Everything bad was Bush’s fault, but everything good was his doing. Therefore American must obviously give him four more years. A imperfect deal is a gift. Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth; ride it to the finish line.

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.

Two-faced can be such an overused term, but on the other hand two doesn’t seem to be enough to capture Harry Reid.

“Their unwillingness to compromise is pushing us to the brink of a default on the full faith and credit of the United States,” Mr. Reid said of Mr. Boehner and Senator Mitch McConnell, the Senate Republican leader who also attended the session. “We have run out of time for politics. Now is the time for cooperation.

That’s how Harry Reid characterizes the Republican position in an article in today’s New York Times. They are stubborn, they won’t compromise, they have left poor President Obama standing at the alter, etc., etc. But just a little further on in the same article we have these gems.

Democrats, who have dug in against anything they see as a short-term extension that would require multiple votes on the debt increase before the end of next year, said they accepted the two-stage plan but wanted the full increase in the debt limit now.

“I will not support any short-term agreement, and neither will President Obama nor Leader Pelosi,” Mr. Reid said in a written statement earlier on Saturday. “We seek an extension of the debt ceiling through at least the end of 2012. We will not send a message of uncertainty to the world.”

“Dug in,” “not support,” sounds somewhat stubborn to me. So Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama “will not send a message of uncertainty to the world.” Really? How certain is not passing a budget for the past two years? How certain is not having any plan of your own other than to shoot down every proposal the Republicans put forth? How certain is not letting Cut, Cap, and Balance, which passed the House and according to a CNN poll is supported by two-thirds of Americans, even come up for a floor vote?

So how is the Republican demand that this is a spending problem best solved by cutting back on the $5 trillion that Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid added to the debt since they took control of Congress in 2006, being stubborn, but Harry, Nancy and Obama’s insistent on taxing Americans more and more so that this trio can spend and spend, not unreasonable? The other demand that the debt be raised high enough not to be discussed again before 2013 is pure politics. Reid, Pelosi, and Obama want to bury this until after the next elections.

The Republicans are drawing a line in the sand, because they told the voters that they would get our fiscal house in order. The voters agreed and put Nancy Pelosi out of the Speaker’s chair and cut back on Reid’s power. They are standing up and honoring their campaign promise and in many cases saying they don’t care about the election of 2012. They came to Washington not to get reelected as their number one priority but to fix the problem. How refreshing is that?

But the Republicans have a tough fight as they are outgunned 3:1. The Republicans only hold the House of Representatives, while the recklessly spending Democrats hold the Senate, the White House, and the Main Stream Media who pump out whatever propaganda is fed to them by the White House. Hint: that’s why after months of no press conferences, Obama is holding daily press briefings.

The Republicans showed the courage to tackle the tough issues, put forth a budget, pass Cut, Cap and Balance in the House and are fighting to stop the runaway spending. All the Democrats have to say is No. We want to spend more. What do you say?

That’s my opinion; I’d like to know yours. Please comment below.