You take a warm shower to help you wake up.
He goes days or weeks without running water.

You complain of a ‘headache’, and call in sick.
He gets shot at as others are hit, and keeps moving forward.

You put on your anti war/don’t support the troops shirt, and go meet up with your friends.
He still fights for your right to wear that shirt.

You make sure your cell phone is in your pocket.
He clutches the cross hanging on his chain next to his dog tags.

You talk trash about your ‘buddies’ that aren’t with you.
He knows he may not see some of his buddies again.

You walk down the beach, staring at all the pretty girls.
He patrols the streets, searching for insurgents and terrorists.

You complain about how hot it is.
He wears his heavy gear, not daring to take off his helmet to wipe his brow.

You go out to lunch, and complain because the restaurant got your order wrong.
He doesn’t get to eat today.

Your maid makes your bed and washes your clothes.
He wears the same things for weeks, but makes sure his weapons are clean.

You go to the mall and get your hair redone.
He doesn’t have time to brush his teeth today.

You’re angry because your class ran 5 minutes over.
He’s told he will be held over an extra 2 months.

You call your girlfriend and set a date for tonight.
He waits for the mail to see if there is a letter from home.

You hug and kiss your girlfriend, like you do everyday.
He holds his letter close and smells his love’s perfume.

You roll your eyes as a baby cries.
He gets a letter with pictures of his new child, and wonders if they’ll ever meet.

You criticize your government, and say that war never solves anything.
He sees the innocent tortured and killed by their own people and remembers why he is fighting.

You hear the jokes about the war, and make fun of men like him.
He hears the gunfire, bombs and screams of the wounded.

You see only what the media wants you to see.
He sees the broken bodies lying around him.

You are asked to go to the store by your parents. You don’t.
He does exactly what he is told even if it puts his life in danger.

You stay at home and watch TV.
He takes whatever time he is given to call, write home, sleep, and eat.

You crawl into your soft bed, with down pillows, and get comfortable.
He tries to sleep but gets woken by mortars and helicopters all night long.

If you support your troops, send this to 7 people. If you don’t support your troops well, then don’t send this out. You won’t die in 7 days, your love life won’t be affected, and you won’t have the worst day ever.You don’t have to email this. It’s not like you know the men and women that are dying to preserve your rights.

Now enter Obama who, despite this failure of social engineering, has plans to start a new, much more grandiose project in socialism. This new program isn’t just limited to banks, it now goes after the idea that 95% of all people are owed something for nothing. Why limit it to just the banks when government can go after all moderate to large businesses and mandate that they give to all.

Higher taxes are not the answer, bigger government is not the answer, tying up capital in government taxes that would otherwise be used for investment and job growth is not the answer. People do not invest money for profit, they invest it for a certain amount of after tax profit. If you lower that profit margin there is a certain amount of capital that will not be invested. This means less jobs, which means more government spending to support these people, which means higher taxes. This starts the loop over and over and sinks the economy lower and lower with each round.

Obama says that he will not tax small companies that make less than $250,000 a year. 85% of companies that make less than that number have zero or one employee in addition to the owner. Where is the incentive to expand? Where is the job creation? Where is the incentive to succeed when the extra hard work needed has such a small pay off. Just today Obama came out with new plans to help the economy. Part of those plans were to cut taxes for two years on parts of the economy. When pushed into a corner even Obama has to admit that lower taxes do work to stimulate the economy.

One of the worst times in recent history as far as U.S. finance goes was the 1970’s. This time period had close to 10% unemployment, 18% interest on mortgages, and almost no economic growth. It also had some of the highest taxes and government interference. The definition of futility is to keep trying the same experiment over and over and hope for a different result.

Our country was based on the principles of limited government, personal responsibility, the belief that hard work and individual achievement should be rewarded. Following these principles has allowed our 222 year old country to become the most powerful economy in the world. These are sound, proven principles that have a history of working. If these principles are abused you don’t blame the principles and try to scrape them, you stop the abuse. The people of our country need to be allowed to excel. They should be encouraged with the idea of a better life for themselves, not dissuaded with the idea of their hard work meaning a better life for others.

Social Engineering doesn’t work. Countries that practice it are the same countries that we passed up in becoming the most powerful country on this planet. Any step in the direction of socialism, no matter how small that step is, is a step backwards for our country. Any step towards the liberal agenda makes our country less than what it is. The power of our country is not its government but its people. If you diminish our power by larger government, if you diminish our freedom by more government intervention then you diminish that glorious idea that is America. Use your vote, use your freedom to make sure that doesn’t happen.

McCain / Palin ‘08

I fail to see how jobs will be created by taking money out of the hands of the people that sign your paycheck.

The social engineering program that forced banks to lend to people not qualified to have home loans failed miserably, but that isn’t good enough for Sen. Obama.  He now wants to expand this same type of program to all areas of the economy by forcing the wealthiest to now support lower income households.

I don’t see how Sen. Obama can say he has faith in the hard working people that make up the middle class when he would force them to go on a federally sponsored welfare program thinly veiled as a tax program.

Our government has become a reactionary government.  It waits until an issue has reached crisis mode before it acts and then it acts with crisis mode regulations.  The crisis eventually recedes but the regulations stay in place.  It shouldn’t be a matter of more or less regulations, it should be the right regulations that don’t respond to situations but stop these situations from happening in the first place.  Remember, it was regulations that forced banks to lend to people that couldn’t afford the loans in the first place, this is the base that caused the crisis in the banking industry.

Freedom isn’t just the right to make your own decisions; it is the right to make your own decisions and to allow those decisions to have meaning in your life.  Every time the government steps in and moderates those decisions for you it takes away from that freedom.

Our country is much younger that other economic powers of the world, yet in just 222 years we have become the only economic superpower in the world.  How did this happen?  By allowing the hardworking, innovative and creative citizens of this country the freedom to succeed and reap the benefits of that success.  These liberal, socialistic, government sponsored programs that Sen. Obama has proposed are the antithesis to everything that has made America great…they are a step backwards.

Sen. Obama has dressed up his policies in bright and shiny colors to dazzle your eyes.  The problem is that when you put them all together they just don’t fit quite right.

The government has no power except that which you the people give it, the government has no money except that which you the people pay it.  As such, any mistakes made by the government is born directly on the shoulders of the American people.  We know that freedom works, we know that capitalism works, we know that personal responsibility works.  What we don’t know is if Sen. Obama’s extreme left policies will work, and if they don’t work then once again the American people will pay the price.

I have heard congressmen complaining that they didn’t know what was going on.  This is just an excuse, the chose to turn a blind eye.  From 2004 to 2005 twenty-two states, who have a tendency to work in a more bipartisan fashion, enacted laws increasing restrictions on sub-prime lending.  This added to the six states that had these laws enacted prior to 2004.  If so many states were willing to do this all at once then obviously there was a problem, Congress just chose to ignore it. 

So what do we do?  Well, in my opinion, this new $700 billion Wall St. bailout is a simplistic approach to help all the wrong people with tax payer dollars.  These companies to the risk to buy these loans and should continue to take at least part of the loss.  Fannie and Freddie are on the road to reform, now being beholden to the people instead of the share holders.  Funds should be funneled through these companies to buy these bad loans, but buy them at a discount.  If these loans are bought at 80% of loan value then the companies selling them will still take a loss, just not as big a loss.  This will allow these companies not only to cut their losses but to also get a quick influx of cash to allow normal operations without having to go through the 3 to 6 month foreclosure process plus 9 to 18 month marketing time, which is good for them.  Part two of this plan should include the government to be able to force options to purchase fixed rate, full doc, low risk loans from these companies equal to 50% of the amount of bad debt loans bought.

Why all the extras?  Buy buying these loans at 80% it increases the government’s asset to liability ratio allowing a greater recuperation of monies down the road that will cut down the overall taxpayer cost in the long run.  This also gives the government more flexibility to work with the homeowners on restructuring their loans into something they can afford, and cutting the price tag on doing it.  With solid loans on the books from the get go it will bring in an immediate income flow to help further funding of loans by Fannie and Freddie and allow them to pay for their normal operating procedures.  Finally, it will stop Wall St. firms and other companies that are already lining up for their share by putting a cost to them for this bailout.

Even with this approach it will be an expensive project for the government, but it will be less expensive, at least in the long run.  It will also do more to help the people that government should be helping, the taxpayer.

Of course, none of this matters if government does nothing to correct the problems that caused this in the first place.  For my opinion on that please read here.

We constantly hear of congress having hearing with a multitude of people.  All of them have ties to people of knowledge, power, or influence that are not in government.  If congress, repubs and dems alike, wanted to know what was going on in the financial sector they could have found out.  The truth of the matter is they didn’t want to know, at least not until it was too late.  No one wanted to mess with a problem that at the time was an economic boon, even if the boon was floating on a title wave of irresponsibility and bad debt.  Sorry dems, you all failed.

Both candidates have serious issues in their past that will be used against them in this campaign.  Obama is guilty for less that savory ties to Freddie and Fannie, its former CEO’s and their checkbooks.  Make no mistake about it, this current crisis has its base in these two institutions and the dems are the ones that forced them to open up to higher risk loan.  McCain has his own problems for supporting deregulation.  This didn’t start the problem but it did perpetuate it.

McCain is calling for more regulations now.  He needs to stop this, with his past history it is a point he can’t effectively win.  What he needs to point out is that the government has hundreds of bills on banking regulations, none of which seem to work.  The answer isn’t a hodgepodge collection of more and more regulations.  The answer is better regulations, a cohesive set of new regulations that make sense for the 21^st century.  It is time for the government to start being proactive instead of reactive.

For Obama I have no advice.  He seems convinced that only he and his economic advisors, the ones that helped get us into this mess, have the answers and they don’t need any outside help.  Well good luck with that.

Well here are some interesting tidbits to keep in mind as Obama goes to war with the greedy Wall Street CEO’s and fixes this problem that he is convinced that only he can fix.  Sen. Dodd (D) is the main beneficiary from lobbying effort by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, Sen. Obama is number two on that list.  Biden’s main campaign contributor is MBNA and, as we all know by now, his son has received quite a bit of money from MBNA for lobbying activities.  Biden’s voting record really does prove that lobbying works.

The democrat’s hero, Bill Clinton, is the one that signed legislation forcing banks to ease up lending restrictions which lead to the irresponsible loans that were made by the banks.  Freddie and Fannie funneled huge amounts of lobbying money into the pockets of the democrats to ensure continued support of these programs by the government.  Unfortunately, this is one that the republicans blew too.  It is all of the government’s job to remain diligent to issues that may have a negative impact on the American people and all of government failed us.

So what’s the plan?  Well Obama’s plan is to allow politicians, the same ones who do such a bag up job keeping the books straight in D.C., influenced by the same people who got us into this mess, to come up with new government regulations on the finance industry.  This is the equivalent of randomly placing duct tape around a collapsing building and hoping it doesn’t fall again in the future.  McCain’s plan, while much better, still isn’t perfect.  McCain wants to form a commission to find out where the weak spots are and put in proper regulations that will actually make a difference.  This is equivalent to strategically placing plaster on the weakest parts of the building, but it is still the same old crumbling building.

Let’s look at this building.  It is created from a hodgepodge pile of regulations dating back more that 100 years.  Few of these regulations were ever made proactively, most were made as a reaction to problems that already existed and none were made as part of a cohesive plan.  This building made of government regulations is the shack surrounded by the huge skyscrapers that is today’s economy.  It is time to tear it down and rebuild.  It is time to set in place a system of regulations that is relevant to the economy of today, one that is cohesive, effective, adaptable, and doesn’t smother the free markets ability to grow.  Having more regulations is not the answer, having the right regulations is.

The last thing that is needed is to have a government watchdog group to pay attention and be diligent to the economy.  Congress has a tendency to pass laws, shake each others hands, pat them selves on the back for a job well done, and then forget about what they just accomplished.  Nothing stays the same in this world.  The government needs a constant watch and to use consistent diligence on the issues that they are responsible for.  This is a part of their job that they are failing at and until this is done the world will continue to change around them and the purpose of government will continue to be playing catch up.  It is now the 21^st century and the country needs a 21^st century government.

John McCain was right when he stated the fundamentals of the economy are healthy.  Unfortunately, the one part of the economy that is not healthy is the banking industry, especially those banks that had assets heavily backed by mortgages.  This is the one part of the economy has the ability to heavily influence all the other parts of the economy and so is a threat that could ruin those fundamentals that are sound. 

I think that McCain was right that a 9/11 style investigation is needed, not to ferret out the wrongdoers, but to find ways to prevent the underlying causes that create these kind of problems. Only then can the government put into effect effective regulations that don’t overburden the business’s trying to create a strong economy but also don’t allow them to overreach themselves causing these types of collapses.  The U.S. economy is the backbone of America’s power and can no longer afford to be governed by a patchwork series of regulations that are created by over zealous politicians.  Reform is needed and John McCain is the person to bring about this change.

This paragraph would normally be used for me to tell you why Obama’s plan wouldn’t work.  Unfortunately, up to this point all Obama has done is attacked McCain’s plan without giving one of his own.  Well given Obama’s past theatrics I guess he plans on governing by Divine Intervention and we all know that Obama believes he is the only one that can bring about that kind of change.

Let’s start with her interview.  Well in my opinion it she did ok, not great and nothing on the level of her powerful speech at the convention, but ok.  People are talking about how unfair she was treated or how poor her answers were or a whole slew of other things.  The one thing I haven’t seen people talking about was the design or reason for the interview itself.  Has anyone asked themselves why the RNC took their prized VP pick that had two weeks to familiarize herself with the campaign, not to mention a convention and some heavy campaigning during those two weeks, and placed her in front of Charles Gibson, a report known to be unfriendly to the republicans?  On top of this, they gave Gibson open reign to talk about anything he wanted and two days to do it in.  To date the republican strategists have been running a pretty solid campaign, why take a risk like this?  As you ponder this also keep in mind that they scheduled the interview so that it would run on 9/11, a day that almost everyone would be watching Obama and McCain at the ceremonies in New York.  Anyone seeing a formula yet?

Well let’s see what the McCain camp learned from all this.  They learned how she would be interviewed in the worst type of situation and in doing so how to best situate her for future interviews.  They also learned where her weak points were both in policies and interviews.  You can believe that her advisors were taking notes on everything from questions and answers, to her presentation of the answers, even down to her body language during the interview and the real beauty is that they took a highly anticipated interview bound to draw in an audience and drastically minimized it.  Conclusion:  The interview with Charles Gibson will most likely be the worst interview you will ever see her in and, given the short memory during election time, come the end of October no one will really remember it.

The next big issue with Palin is, of course, is she ready to be president.  My answer is: probably not right now but then, by the same token, I don’t think Obama is either.  Neither one of them has had the time to gain the experience I think is needed for POTUS, but then, Gov. Palin isn’t running for POTUS, Obama is, which gives Palin the advantage here.

Everyone is talking as if John McCain is going to keel over dead on November 5th.  Let’s be a little more real, McCain has been running hard during this campaign and has done it without the week vacation his much younger opponent seemed to need, he came out of five and a half years of hell in Vietnam, and battled cancer and won.  We are talking about one tough man here, I’m pretty sure he has some years left in him.  This is very important because these are years that Palin can use to gain experience in a job that is arguably the very best training ground for being President.  You add to that a person that is smart, motivated and has an ideology that the conservative obviously love and you really have your self a person that has serious potential to be a good, solid, effective President.

Now let’s look at what she has done in just two years as Governor.  She has passed ethics reform that actually means something and works.  She has cut earmarks by 64% and still maintained a health budget despite the loss of that $352 million.  She has fought oil companies and, to the benefit of her constituents, won.  She also has an excellent understanding of energy policy (which sadly seemed to be a very short part of her Gibson interview) which I believe is a pretty important issue these days.  Sarah Palin has done more in two years than most governors do in there first four year term, and while the dems and the MSM are trying to find out everything she has done wrong, 80% of the people whose lives she directly affects think she has done right and, to me, that is the best endorsement she could have.

Obama proposes tax credits for lower income households, that’s additional money they will receive above and beyond their tax bill.  Obama speaks openly about this.  My question is this; how can you go to someone that wants to work for a better future and tell them work a little harder by giving to the community and we will be glad to help you achieve your goals then turn to the next person and say well if you don’t want to work for a better future and are doing nothing to improve your situation then we will just give you free money?  This is contradictive.  This is proof, by Obama’s own hand, that his tax program is a disincentive for the American people to be as great as they have the ability to be.

If you look at all of Obama’s policies they are like these brightly colored jigsaw puzzle pieces.  They look pretty just laying there but when you try to fit them together they just don’t seem to fit quite right.

The problem with the economy today is not Bush’s policies failing America; it is Bush failing his policies.  The basic ideas of these policies are sound.  Keep taxes low for American families, put capital in the hands of those who know how to efficiently (a word never used to describe the federal government) invest it while providing incentives used to help direct the flow of that investment, and keep government spending low.  President Bush started strong but failed to follow through.  He didn’t fight the open checkbook attitude of congress, yes both parties, and he didn’t pay attention to underlying currents in the economy that if detected soon enough could have been prevented, such as the mortgage crisis. 

Now to be perfectly fair, the failure of the mortgage industry can not be laid at the feet of Bush alone.  For decades now the government has failed the American people on this issue.  Now I’m not one for heavy government regulations but some issues require, if not regulation, at least solid, diligent, and consistent monitoring.  Real Estate, being the base of wealth for the vast majority of Americans, definitely qualifies as one of these issues.  Also, allowing the government sponsored Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, both of which have the ability to borrow directly from the government treasury, to become more beholden to their share holders than to the people that they were created to help was another failure of our government.

When you take unchecked government spending add it to the failing real estate market and the total mismanagement of the war then policy, no matter how good, is bound to fail.  So do you take good policies and implement them properly or do you discard them completely?  According to Obama you discard them completely.

Obama is calling for increased government spending and, by his own words, will do nothing to reduce the deficit for at least the next four years.  The revenues to be received from his increased tax on those making greater that $250,000 a year will pay for only a fraction of his proposed spending.  There are only two possible outcomes of this scenario. The first would be an expanded deficit and the second would be raising the taxes on those making less than $250,000 a year.

Obama’s tax program has its own inherit dangers.  I say program and not cuts because, in many cases, he isn’t proposing cuts.  After all, how can you cut taxes on the bottom 40% of the income level when this income level already pay no taxes?  The answer, of course, is tax credits.  Credits allow people to actually get more money out of the system than they put into it.  This is not a tax program, it is a welfare program.

CBS did an article on three families in Ohio.  Under Obama’s plan family three, the wealthiest of the three, would have a tax bill that would increase by $5,000 a year. Family one, with the lowest income of the three, while already paying no taxes, would get a check for $2,200.  In essence, this means that family three would be giving $2,200 of their money directly to family one.  This is blatant wealth distribution.  This isn’t a Robin Hood attempt to take from the corrupt rich government and give to the poor; it is stealing from people that have worked hard to become successful.  It is socialistic in nature, creates dependency on the government, provides a disincentive to succeed, and is just plain wrong. 

“The surge has succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated,” Obama, the Democratic presidential nominee, said in a recorded interview broadcast tonight on Fox Newss “The O’Reilly Factor” program.

Actually Obama, what has happened after the surge is exactly what McCain said would happen.  It seems that somebody did anticipate this.  Your first shot at foreign policy and your 0 for 1. Well if you don’t believe me then how about this from Obama.

Obama today defended his opposition to the surge when pressed by O’Reilly to say he was “wrong.”

When pressed as to whether, if elected, he would prepare for possible use of military force against Iran, Obama, who has repeatedly called for greater diplomatic efforts with Iran, said it wouldn’t be “appropriate” for someone who might become president to start “tipping their hand in terms of what their plans might be with respect” to the country.

Correct me if I am wrong but didn’t McCain say that Obama should not be laying out his plans about hostile countries months ago?  It seems to me that if Obama really thought he needed a VP that has foreign policy experience he should have asked McCain to be his running mate since he is the one creating Obama’s policy.

Once again Obama has shown that his only talent is behind a teleprompter.  Left to his own devices he seems to fail every time in any situation that is even moderately tough.  This was proven at Saddleback and now with O’Reilly.  Well we have to give him credit, based on this interview I think he is really starting to understand who really has what it takes to be President.

Senator McCain now has a powerful, smart, and energetic running mate.  He has shown he has the experience to lead.  He has shown well laid out policies.  He has proven that he has everything it takes to be a solid and effective President of the United States.  McCain is the perfect guidance system and Palin is a hell of an engine.  It’s now a straight shot to the White House.

Obama and what’s his name in ’08?  I hardly think so.

Well let’s see how the experience level adds up.

Topic	McCain	Palin	Obama	Biden
Foreign Policy	1			1
Energy Policy	1	1		1
Economic Policy	1	1		1
Bipartisan History	1	1
Executive Experience		1
Military Experience	1	.5
Ethics Reform	1	1	1
Totals:	6	5.5	1	3

An entree onto this scorecard was limited to action not words.  Candidates got a mark if they have actually been involved in any of the topics.  Palin received .5 for Military because she is in fact commander-in-chief of the Alaskan National Guard, probably not the most pressing part of her job though. 

As far as I can see there is very little that the democrats can run on other that the sad attempt to tie McCain to Bush when the reality shows that no other republican senator has voted against Bush as much as McCain.  That is a loosing battle in the end.  Obama minions can attack Palin all they want on her experience level but the truth is the only experience that Obama has that is greater than Palin’s is living closer to D.C. (ok I will give him public speaking too even though that may change soon.)

So to summarize:  we have the republican ticket that has more experience than the democratic ticket, has a better history of working in a bipartisan fashion, and a better record on reform and ethics.  Obama is Change ’08?  Obama is Chance ’08 at best.

When you have a senator that votes party lines 96% of the time it isn’t change, its follow the leader.  In fact, it shows a complete lack of leadership.  The only time Obama has ever gone out on his own was on the Iraqi war, which he has slammed at every opportunity even though in his own words Saddam Hussein had “repeatedly defied UN resolutions, thwarted UN inspection teams, developed chemical and biological weapons, and coveted nuclear capacity,” and that he “butchers his own people.”  Obviously Obama stands for an America that allows this type of evil to exist in our world.  America has always stood for freedom and democracy, if Obama had a little more experience he would know this.  Nine days later the resolution to invade Iraq was overwhelmingly passed.  So on his own Obama is 0 for 1, some leader.

In his short lived Senate career Obama has introduced three items of legislation.  The first is an ethics bill that was ridiculed as weak even among his own party.  The Dignity for Wounded Warriors act which never made it out of the Democrat controlled Senate Armed Services Committee.  This bill went down without a fight, even from Obama.  Finally there is the Lugar-Obama bill that is essentially a follow up to broaden the effects of the Nunn-Lugar bill of 1991.  While essentially a good bill it was destined to succeed, not really a strong mark of a leader to be attached to a bill that had overwhelming support from the get go.  Interestingly enough Lugar tends to get most of the credit for this legislation.

So what has Obama history shown us?  That he is not a proponent of change, only of continuing the policies of the well established DNC and there is nothing new there.  That he will not fight for ideas he believes in.  That he is more than happy to float on the coat tails of more well established politicians.  Last but not least, that he doesn’t have the experience to come up with or implement his own ideas but would rather extend party partisanship.  In effect Obama has shown that he is not ready to be President and if elected will be seen as one of the most ineffective Presidents ever.  Let’s hope it doesn’t get that far.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told convention-goers Tuesday morning that polls are underestimating the strength of Barack Obama, contending he will win with the support of new or intermittent voters, who are not generally polled.“I’m very comfortable with those polls,” Pelosi said at a rooftop breakfast panel near the Democratic National Convention. “I think he is trouncing him. I want more of a spread, of course — I want it all.”

Pelosi paused to chuckle along with the crowd, then added: “We will get much more in the House and the Senate, and we have to have a Democratic president — nothing less is at stake than our economy, our Constitution, our budget, our reputation in the world, ending this war — the list goes on.”

Once again Mother Pelosi is showing exactly what she really thinks of the American People, that they don’t know what is in their best efforts and only she and the democrats can lead us to salvation.  In her opinion, the only way to save us is to give all power to the democrats of which she handles the reigns in congress.  In her own words, “I want it all”.  Another little quote she gave at this meeting, while meant to be cute, really shows some insight to her thought process.  “Think of me as a lioness — you threaten my cubs, you have a problem,” she said.  According to her she is in charge and the people of the U.S. are her little cubs she needs to protect and guide and nourish. 

Understand that Pelosi’s idea of a fair and even congress that is supposed to support the ideas of democracy is to use streamlining to get bills to pass and to allow no vote for opposing ideas.  I have news for her, that is border line dictatorship and does not promote the values of our great country.  Pelosi does not know what is best for America, what she does know is what is best for her and her narrow vision of the socialist path that she wants to lead this country down, and she wants to do this without opposition and debate.

I think that I still like the idea of living in a country that stands for freedom and personal responsibility, if I wanted to live under the rule of an all guiding government hell bent on being involved in all parts of my life I would move to a country with a dictator.  Luckily, thanks in large part to the efforts of the Republicans, those are much harder to find these days.

Remember, a vote for Obama is a vote to take away the threat of veto from Pelosi.

Once again Obama’s dubious past comes back to haunt him:

Mayor Richard Daley declined to answer directly Wednesday when asked whether a University of Illinois-Chicago organization named after his father should release documents related to Sen. Barack Obama’s service for a nonprofit education project started by 1960s radical William Ayers.

The university’s Richard J. Daley Center has refused to release records of the project, which put Obama, the soon-to-be Democratic presidential nominee, in contact with activist Ayers, who now is an education professor in Chicago.

Asked if the school should release the records, Daley replied: “Bill Ayers, I’ve said this, his father was a great friend of my father. I’ll be very frank. Vietnam divided families, divided people. It was a terrible time of our country. It really separated people. People didn’t know one another. Since then, I’ll be very frank, (Ayers) has been in the forefront on a lot of education issues and helping us in public schools and things like that.

“People keep trying to align himself with Barack Obama. It’s really unfortunate. They’re friends. So what? People do make mistakes in the past. You move on. This is a new century, a new time. He reflects back and he’s been making a strong contribution to our community.”

Daley has been a strong supporter of Obama’s presidential bid.

Of course they should be released, this is an important issue on Obama’s character.  Daley says that people make mistakes and then you move on, this may be true but Ayres still doesn’t admit that his terrorist actions of setting bombs off in the U.S. was a mistake in fact he says he should have done more.  Besides, some things you just don’t forgive.  I’m pretty sure that if Charles Manson would have said he was really really sorry that he still should have gone to jail.

I don’t see why people so easily forget that Obama’s early relationships with the likes of Rezko, Ayres and Rev. Wright are people that helped influence and shape the person that Obama is today.  I think that who that person is should be known by the people since Obama wants to hold a position that can have a direct and serious impact on their life.  Do we really want a president that can have skeletons in his closet put there by a white bashing, country hating reverend and a terrorist known to have attacked the U.S. and is not repentant?  I don’t.  Obama denouncing these people after he decided to run for president simple because they are no longer politically acceptable doesn’t erase the years he did spend and was influenced by them.

The people deserve to know who Obama really is.  Should the documents be released? Oh, absolutely. 

In a world with so much friction this can play a role:  

Less than two years after Democrats finally bridged the decades-long gap between the parties on national security issues, Republicans have opened it right back up — a shift likely tied to the party’s new standard-bearer John McCain and the perception of improvements in Iraq.

The reemergence of the national security gap comes amid the first headline-grabbing world conflict of the 2008 campaign — the Russian invasion of Georgia that highlights the potential for a dramatic military event to upend the political landscape, and likely aid McCain.  July’s NBC News/Wall Street Journal Poll found that three in four Americans believe McCain can “handle” the role of commander in chief, while only 19 percent said he “cannot,” compared to a 50 percent to 42 percent split for Obama.

When asked which party is more capable of “dealing with the war on terrorism,” 40 percent of respondents to the latest NBC/WSJ poll said Republican while 29 percent said Democrat. The parties had been effectively tied as recently as January of this year, and the 11-percentage-point gap is the largest since 2004, the last year these numbers shifted so dramatically and, not coincidentally, the last presidential election year.

I think that Obama’s response to Russia may have played a role here.  Obama’s response was late in coming and weak in stature.  There are still to many of the older generation that remember what the cold war was like to have a reemerging Russia out there flaunting its power to have a president seen as weak or indecisive.  If you couple this with his completely missing the mark on the Iraqi surge it can lead to doubt in the minds of the voters. 

The Saddleback forum was excellent for McCain.  He had strong, decisive answers that were given with conviction.  When you are looking for a commander in chief you want someone that leads with authority and doesn’t ho-ha around trying to think up something to say.  I’m not suggesting that major brainstorming wouldn’t go on by either party in the event of an escalation with Russia or any country, but you don’t do it while standing in front of the country. 

For any of you that are thinking that there wouldn’t be so much friction if it wasn’t for Bush think again.  The planning for 9/11 came into effect during the Clinton years.  It was Clinton that pulled funding for Afghanistan after we used that country to help bankrupt the Soviet Union and thus creating the Taliban’s hatred of America.  It was Clinton who was in office when Saudi Arabia called and said we have Bin Laden come and get him, and Clinton said no…twice.  You can’t ignore a problem and hope it goes away.

While you may not like Bush for whatever reason you desire, he has been consistent in his policy to protect America and promote democracy around the world.  I’ll grant you that his implementation was less than perfect in a lot of areas but that doesn’t mean that his ideas were bad and that we should give up on them or lessen our desire to see these dreams fulfilled, it means that we need someone in office that will continue those ideas but just do them better.  McCain is the man for that job.  I’m afraid Obama would just be lost.

The reality is you have to discern the best message you can from each of the candidates and make a decision based on that.  I am, personally, a McCain supporter because his ideas more closely match the direction I want to see the country going to.  I want a less socialistic tax code.  I want people to be able to work hard for a better future and actually have that future and not have those rewards given to the people who don’t feel hard work is the answer.  I want more independence on vital U.S. needs such as oil.  I want a stronger military especially now with Russia deciding that it wants to revert back to old school bullying of its neighbors.

These are my views and I feel McCain supports them better.  If you disagree….great, what a boring world it would be if we all agreed.  Just look hard at the message that each of the candidates is putting out, research the true cost of their policies to America and decide if it is worth it then ask yourself if you believe that they are capable of implementing those policies.  If you then decide to vote for Obama then good for your, if you decide that McCain is your man…even better.

Aug. 14 (Bloomberg) — Democrat Barack Obama would wait at least a decade to impose the Social Security payroll taxes on Americans who earn more than $250,000 a year, a main component of his proposal to keep the retirement insurance system solvent.

The delay is designed to create an influx of cash to the government’s Social Security fund at a time when it is projected to be paying out more in benefits than it takes in from taxes, Obama’s top economic adviser, Jason Furman, said.

“Historically, many tax changes in Social Security have been phased in gradually and usually not effective immediately,” Furman, Obama’s chief economic adviser, said in an e-mailed response to questions. “You have virtually the same impact on solvency as an immediate change.”

Deferring a new levy on higher income taxpayers also would allow Obama, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, to largely dodge immediate political and economic repercussions of the proposal. During the campaign, Obama has advocated making incomes above $250,000 annually subject to the payroll tax, though he hasn’t provided specifics of how that plan would be implemented.

Oh how I would love to lay this back tracking at the feet of Obama, but in this one instance I can’t.  The truth of the matter is that every politician runs from this topic, Obama’s mistake was sticking his head into this issue before following in the footsteps of everyone else.  Why is this?  Because the truth of the matter is the cure is going to hurt and no politician wants to be responsible for that.

Social Security is broken, plain and simple.  Fixing it is going to cost probably an entire generation.  By this I mean that people within a 20 year range are either going to have to pay into a system they will get nothing back from or at the very best get less return than they should be eligible for.  Unfortunately fixing something broken has a cost, and the only money the government has to pay that cost is from the tax payers.

My question is, should we fix it at all?  Granted people 45+ have based retirement planning on SSI and should receive it, but people under that age should have options.  Let’s really look at what we get from Social Security. 

The government can’t borrow from it, yet it can.  SSI is allowed to be invested only in government bonds.  Bonds are sold by the government with the funds going into their coffers (BTW outstanding bond issues have another name…national debt), but at least you are now earning money on your retirement, except your not.  Interest on government bonds is paid by the government which gets its money from your paycheck.  In essence you are paying your own interest on money you’re investing for your retirement.  It just doesn’t sound like a winning situation.

I know everyone has heard and scoffed at this but I bring it up again, what is wrong with private investment accounts?  Given any 20 year period in Wall Street history the stock market has averaged 8% or better.  With bond prices floating around 4% why would you rather invest in government debt that pays less than investing in the businesses of America and doubling your money?  One issue I know people had was the amount of money that the investment firms wanted to manage the portfolios, so what.  The government spends .8% managing SSI now to give you the 4%, the investment firms wanted, I believe it was, 1.25% to give you 8%.  Yes the firms may charge more than the government but they are also offering you much more in perspective.

Of course the SSI problem is complex and I doubt one person sitting in front of his laptop will be able to give the final answer to it all but the truth of the matter is plans need to be laid and started now.  We need people in Washington to stop admitting there is a problem and start addressing it.

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Never mind the last days of the presidential campaign. The busiest days for Barack Obama‘s campaign in this perennial swing state are likely to be a month before Election Day.

Ohio has created a window in the election calendar that would allow residents instant gratification — register one minute, vote the next. It’s also given the campaigns of Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain a chance to bank thousands of first-time voters during that Sept. 30 to Oct. 6 window.

The move will benefit Obama, who enjoys a 2-to-1 lead over McCain among 18- to 34-year-olds, according to a Washington Post-ABC News poll released last month. If Obama’s campaign were able to tap into college campuses with one-stop voting, it would add thousands of votes to his tally in a state where, in 2004, John Kerry lost to President Bush by only about 118,000 votes, putting Bush over the top in the electoral count.

Ohio elections officials say they are working out potential kinks, such as questions about whether a vote counts when it is cast or when it’s counted. They also are trying to address potential fears of massive voting fraud, and what effect this influx is going to mean on vote security.

“The prospect of someone coming in with no ID and registering and voting is contrary to every sort of protection that legislators and lawmakers have built into this system for decades,” said Kevin DeWine, a Republican lawmaker who is poised to take over the state party after the election. “The processes and the law and the systems in our 88 counties are not equipped to handle same-day registration.”

People in Ohio can register without identification, but they have to show some sort of ID to vote.

State lawmakers accidentally made the window before the 2006 elections. Obama’s campaign is eager to take advantage of it this year.

“This is one of many ways we’ll be encouraging our supporters to skip the lines on Election Day and make sure their vote is cast early,” said Isaac Baker, an Obama spokesman.

The move is likely to bring Obama to Ohio for nonstop campaigning that week. Also, television ads are expected to be in heavy play as both campaigns try to take advantage of the electoral oddity. And the early push could help neutralize any last-minute attacks by one campaign on the other.

Obama should love this loophole since his best chance of winning is to ensure that his personality is bigger than his policies.  Obama has consistently come up with weak policies for important issues that are shot full of holes time and time again.  This is the main reason that his poll numbers are stagnant in a year that should have been a democratic landslide, people are unsure or unbelieving in his answers.  Why does Obama still maintain this level?  Well there are the obvious “going to vote democrat no matter what vote” and then there are the people mezmorized by his personality and massive media coverage. By allowing people to vote the second they are registered the potential for voting with your emotions instead of your head is much greater, which is deffinatly an Obama boon.

This loophole will also potentially allow unqualified voters to cast a vote.  Since the majority of these people will be illeagle minorities this is also a boon for Obama since he holds a lead with minorities.  The red tape nightmare of figuring out who is qualified to vote and then matching those up with ballots and disregarding the ballots for people who don’t qualify holds the potential for some serious question marks on the final Ohio results.  

WASHINGTON – If you’re a senior citizen and make less than $50,000 a year, Barack Obama has a deal for you: the rest of your life free of federal income tax.

Sounds appealing, right? Maybe to many seniors. But tax policy experts in Washington are giving it bad reviews. They see it as another subsidy for senior citizens, who already get federal help through Social Security and Medicare and often have economic advantages over other demographic groups.

“The odds are the retired folks — they’re getting pensions, they’re getting Social Security, they have investment assets, they own a house — so … they’re better off than somebody who is 30 or 40 years younger who’s trying to buy a house (and) trying to start saving,” said Clint Stretch, managing principal of tax policy for Deloitte Tax.

Even the powerful seniors’ lobby AARP doesn’t seem excited about Obama’s idea. An AARP bulletin on the presidential candidates’ tax plans barely mentions it, saying that Obama’s proposal could partly offset additional taxes that Obama would impose on seniors through higher tax rates on dividends and capital gains.

Tax experts across the political spectrum also fault the Obama plan’s abrupt $50,000-a-year threshold. As described by the campaign, seniors making, say, $48,000 would pay no income tax, while someone with income slightly more than $50,000 could pay several thousand dollars in income taxes. Seniors nearing the $50,000 threshold would have incentive to quit working.

So what is Obama up to while on vacation?  Making more bad plans so it seems.  Does Obama truly thing that this plan has merit?  Well republicans, AARP, and even many democrats think not.  So the question is, why this idea?  I can only come up with two reasons:

First, this is Obama’s strategy to buy votes for president in a demographic he is trailing in.  This really leads me to believe that Obama is not above putting his own interests before the interests of the country.  It also leads me to believe that Obama is certainly not comfortable with being elected on his platform hence the need to resort to buying votes, regardless of cost.

Second, this is really just Obama’s inexperience shinning through once again.  Let’s face it, he has shown time and again that he doesn’t really know what he is doing.  This is proven by some far fetched policies and continual flip-flopping (or maybe it should be called extreme re-positioning).  The people of America deserve better leadership than guesses, personal interest, and inexperience.

McCain on Thursday was to discuss DHL’s plans with local officials and others affected by the potential job losses. The economy and job losses are important issues in Ohio, a critical swing state that gave President Bush the electoral votes needed for re-election in 2004.

McCain campaign spokesman Brian Rogers said Wednesday that Davis had not worked with DHL since 2005, long before DHL announced plans to move its work out of Wilmington. The companies merged in 2003.

“At the time of the merger, no one anticipated an impact on jobs in Wilmington,” Rogers said.

McCain, as chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, had a role in the deal too. He urged then-Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Ted Stevens to abandon proposed legislation that would have prohibited foreign-owned carriers from flying U.S. military equipment or troops, which Airborne Express said was aimed at torpedoing its merger with DHL.

Rogers said McCain opposed the bill because it could have hurt the military’s airlift capabilities in a time of war.

I feel for the people of Willmington, I really do, but to lay the blame at the feet of McCain is ludicrous.  To think that this happened only because McCain “allowed” it to happen is short sighted in the extreme.  American based companies constantly shift and/or close sites within the U.S. also.  The corporation I work for just closed two sites 3 months ago laying off thousands in the process.

This was just a business decision, all be it crappy one with horrible side effects.  Let us not forget through all of this that Airborne Express was experiencing financial difficulties when DHL bought them out, they couldn’t compete with UPS and FedEx.  There are no guarantees that if the sale didn’t go through that Airborne would still be around or wouldn’t have made a similar deal with UPS to cut costs either of which would have resulted in the Willmington plant closing years earlier.

McCain, at least, has stated that he is going to use his influence to try and help the people of Willmington.  I haven’t heard such offers from the democrats.

I have said often that Obama is continually seen only in controlled atmospheres such as set stage speeches or interviews with reporters known to be sympathetic.  He doesn’t field unknown questions and he won’t do town hall meetings or debates.  It seems that even Obama understands that his only option to win is to do his best to keep the glitter on his golden shield, because on policy he knows he comes up short.

See what happens when Jon Ralston actually dares to question is policy.  Obama stutters (oh the indignity) and becomes defensive and argumentative.  The interesting thing about this interview is the only time Obama does look comfortable when he is able to steer the conversation back to well practiced monologues.  Oh wouldn’t it be nice if the office of POTUS offered the opportunity to be well prepared for all of the decisions that that position requires.  I’m sure terrorist, national disasters, or any kind of emergency requiring quick resolution will be more that happy to wait until Obama can prepare himself properly.

Let’s be real, Obama needs to be, can only be, in situations that are safe because he just doesn’t know the right answers himself.  His experience is lacking.  He can’t field unknown questions because with just 143 days of real, full time job experience all of these issues he is claiming to be an expert on he has never actually been involved in.   The truth is he is a polished celebrity front, the democratic poster boy, nothing more.

Barack Obama, unveiling a broad energy plan, said he supports tapping the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve to drive down gasoline prices in the short term. Republicans responded by criticizing the Democratic presidential contender’s apparent shift in position — and poking fun at another of his proposals to save gas: having drivers fully inflate their car tires.

During the Democratic primary, Sen. Obama argued against releasing oil from the strategic reserves, in contrast with then-rival Sen. Hillary Clinton’s support for such a move. He has reiterated that position during the general election campaign against Republican Sen. John McCain.

Sen. Obama, speaking in Lansing on Monday, urged the government to sell 70 million barrels of oil from its stockpiles, suggesting that gas prices could fall within two weeks. He pledged funding to support long-term work on hybrid cars and pushed for the development of renewable energy sources.

Another Obama flip-flop and this time in the wrong direction.  For a country that uses 20.7 million barrels a day and 70 million barrel release from the strategic reserves would amount to, well almost nothing.  Let’s face it; the oil companies are not looking for the general relief of the public, what they are looking for is the highest sustainable price that they can charge without damaging the long term economy of the country.  Even on that note the only reason they care about the long term is in the form of long term profits.  Any short term plan such as releasing oil from the national strategic reserve (which, by the way, is there for a reason) or the creation of a “tax holiday” will only cause the oil companies to come up with something new to push prices to the level they see as optimum.

The only way to break this cycle of dependency is new technology.  Granted there is going to be an interim that needs to be filled with oil until new technology is created and shorter term prospects need to be examined such as off shore drilling, oil shoals, and exploration into existing oil fields, but 1 and 2 month fixes wont solve anything except lowering government revenue and depleting the national reserve while something new will come around to push prices back up. 

My issues with Obama’s plan are that he isn’t expanding on proven, current, reliable technology such as nuclear energy and that his proposal of investing money into new technology promotes the possibility that that technology won’t be created until the investment money runs out.  McCain’s policy is to fill the interim with domestic oil production, increase the use of current technology, and reward companies for coming up with new ideas expeditiously.  McCain’s plan does, however, have one flaw.  His reward money is focused on batteries, what it should be focused on is overall alternative energy technology.  This would allow companies competing for the prize to focus in multiple areas instead of just batteries.

An old political adage says, “He who sets the debate wins the election.”

If the presidential election was held tomorrow, it would be hello President Barack Obama because, so far, John McCain is handing him a victory.

McCain is better than the campaign he has run so far. Most people admit that McCain is an inspirational figure – even Obama has admitted that – so why isn’t McCain telling voters where he wants to lead them?

Instead, his campaign is all about his opponent.

“He himself is reinforcing that this campaign is all about Obama,” says Democratic strategist Mark Siegel. “His ads and his message are all negatives. The problem with that is, it is driving his own negatives up as well.”

I have to admit that the negativity of the McCain camp was, and still is, bothering me.  The problem is that the more I thought about it the more I saw that there really is no choice for the Republican Party to take.  My belief is that McCain is the stronger candidate with a much stronger resume and better policies and I would love for McCain to be elected based on this but the truth remains that on any but the very conservative web sites Obama’s name is plastered all over the place.  In fact, the only time you see McCain’s name anywhere is when it is associated with an attack on Obama, think how little you would see his name if he didn’t.

Obama knows this to, hence his refusal to meet with McCain in debate except for the 3 traditional (and well structured) debates that allow for a rehearsed response.  An open question forum would be the best way to see both candidates on the issues, their experience, and what they could do for the country.  This would be Obama’s biggest nightmare.  Being the media created celebrity is the only path that Obama has to the White House because running policies based on making sure there is air in your tires won’t cut it on its own.

Things that could be done.   The republicans in congress could take some pressure off of McCain by pointing out the failures of the democrat congress and linking Obama to them, which they have finally started to do.  McCain also needs to allow subordinates to run the majority of the attack ads, McCain need only endorse them not expound upon them.   If McCain doesn’t start to get back to the ideas that got him here, by election time he may very well be known as the empty suit since no one will remember what he stands for by then.

Enormous cosmic speaking, itty bitty substance.  While making a speech in front of 200,000 people Obama once again shows that he is a bright shinny exterior covering unrealistic and naive interior.  It is worth your time to read this entire article from, of all the unlikely places, the L.A. Times.

SEN. BARACK OBAMA said in an interview the day after his Berlin speech that it “allowed me to send a message to the American people that the judgments I have made and the judgments I will make are ones that are going to result in them being safer.”

If that is what the senator thought he was doing, he still has a lot to learn about both foreign policy and the views of the American people. Although well received in the Tiergarten, the Obama speech actually reveals an even more naive view of the world than we had previously been treated to in the United States. In addition, although most of the speech was substantively as content-free as his other campaign pronouncements, when substance did slip in, it was truly radical, from an American perspective.

These troubling comments were not widely reported in the generally adulatory media coverage given the speech, but they nonetheless deserve intense scrutiny. It remains to be seen whether these glimpses into Obama’s thinking will have any impact on the presidential campaign, but clearly they were not casual remarks. This speech, intended to generate the enormous publicity it in fact received, reflects his campaign’s carefully calibrated political thinking. Accordingly, there should be no evading the implications of his statements.

Obama really shows that he has no understanding of the world, its history, and what really makes it work.  I’m glad to see that in a region of the world where polls show that 58% of the population wish for a weaker America that Obama’s ignorance is well received.  It’s amazing that a couple hour meeting involving warm smiles, firm hand shakes and well rehearsed comments about how he is willing to work with foreign leaders can be, in any way, construed as a firm understanding of foreign policy. 

McCain has long opposed Obama’s call for a 16-month timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from Iraq. On Friday, though, McCain said, “I think it’s a pretty good timetable, as we should — or horizons for withdrawal,” echoing a phrase Bush used in recent days. “But they have to be based on conditions on the ground.”

At his news conference, Obama jumped on that to say there was now some convergence “around a proposal that we have been making for a year and a half.”

Wow, this is one of the most ridiculous things that Obama has ever said.  Obama supported pulling the troops out of Iraq BEFORE victory was achieved.  His 16 month timetable isn’t a year and a half old, this is just his newest version.  Lets face it, no one ever expected our troops to be there forever (except, possibly, as what would amount to a small permanent base in Iraq).  Now that the greater majority of the goals have been met, the Iraqi security forces taking much greater roles, and more solid commitments have been made to the Iraqi central government we are in a position that could allow for a troop withdrawal.

Bush and McCain have always stated that the withdrawal should start when the goals have been met and the generals on the ground say that withdrawal is possible, this is no flip-flop but long standing beliefs by both men.  Let’s face it Obama, if you constantly call for troop withdrawal over and over and over eventually you will state it at a time that it really could happen.  The job that Bush and McCain did will allow us to leave Iraq in a better place than it was.  You, Obama, did not do this, you fought this on every front and you did everything in your power to stop us short of victory for the U.S. and the Iraqi people. 

Yet despite the sycophantic media frenzy, average Americans aren’t yet convinced Obama’s “change” is what they need. When it comes to identifying with the candidates’ values, far more likely voters in the NBC/Wall Street Journal poll, 58 percent, say they could identify with John McCain’s background and values than with Obama’s, 47 percent. And when it comes to their assessment of his knowledge and experience or his ability to be commander in chief, Obama’s deficits in voters’ minds are so great it’s hard to imagine he can ever reassure them. Only 19 percent said he was the more knowledgeable and experienced candidate, and only one in four said he would make a better commander in chief.

Americans have seen far more of Obama than McCain in the last year, but they still aren’t sure they know or fully trust him. The nonpartisan Project for Excellence in Journalism found that Obama has led campaign coverage in 78 percent of stories since he clinched the nomination. The McCain campaign has even taken to mocking the obsequious attention the media have bestowed in an amusing web video featuring Frankie Valli’s “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” and clips of MSNBC‘s Chris Matthews telling viewers he fills “this thrill going up my leg” when Obama speaks.

Everybody loves a novelty and that is exactly what Obama is.  Let’s face facts; Obama has 143 days of real experience (from the day he took office to the time he turned his attention to campaigning).  It would be hard for a McDonald’s employee to make manager in that amount of time and we want to elect Obama to the most important job in the world?  He has no track record of effectiveness and no ideas that hold a resemblance to reality. 

Every domestic policy he wants to put in place is supposed to be funded by taxes on the rich which is asinine.  The reality of it is that while rich people may hold a lot of assets those aren’t taxed, in fact having a tax increase on what their real annual taxable income is wouldn’t fund the least of Obama’s grand government spending plans.  His plans have no mention of verifiable progress but instead call for throwing money at a problem in a most irresponsible manner. 

The windfall profit tax on oil companies has already failed in the past why bring it back?  To fund research into new forms of energy technology?  Well if you were a for profit research company and someone told you that they were going to give you $150 billion dollars for that research at exactly what point would you miraculously discover the new technology?  My guess would be somewhere between the $149 billion and $150 billion mark.  His plan is really a single approach idea that has no tools for the measurement of progress in it.

Let’s face it people, McCain has over two decades of experience on Obama.  He has a proven track record of effectiveness, more experience in foreign policy, and realistic plans for the future of our country.  It’s your vote and your right to cast it any way you like…just put some thought behind it before you do.

I found this posted by a blogger on WashingtonPost.com and had to bring this over.  This really says a lot.

Each year I get to celebrate Independence Day twice. On June 30 I celebrate my independence day– and on July 4 I celebrate America‘s. This year is Special, because it marks the 40th anniversary of my independence.

On June 30, 1968, I escaped communist Cuba and a few months later I was in The United States to stay. That I happened to arrive in Richmond on Thanksgiving Day is just part of the story, but I digress. I’ve thought a lot about the anniversary this year because the election-year rhetoric has made me think a lot about Cuba and what transpired there.

In the late 1950s, most Cubans thought
Cuba needed a change, and they were right. When a young leader came along, every Cuban was at least receptive and when the young leader spoke eloquently and passionately and denounced the old system, the press fell in love with him. They did not question who his friends were or what he believed in because when he said he would help the farmers and the poor and bring free medical care and education to all, everyone agreed. When he said he would bring justice and equality to all, everyone said ‘Praise the Lord.’ And when the young leader said, ‘I will bring you change,’ everyone yelled, ‘Viva Fidel!’

Unfortunately nobody asked about the change, so by the time the executioner’s guns went silent the people’s guns had been taken away. By the time everyone was equal, they were equally poor, hungry, and oppressed. By the time everyone received their free education it was worth nothing. By the time the press noticed, it was too late, because they were now working for him. By the time the change was fully implemented Cuba had been knocked down a couple of notches to Third-World status. By the time the change was over — more than a million people had taken to boats, rafts, and inner tubes.

You can call those who made it ashore anywhere else in the world the most fortunate Cubans. And now I’m back to the beginning of my story.

This is an election year and I wonder .. can Americans fall for a young charismatic leader who promises change – without demanding full disclosure of what changes he will make .. how they will be carried out and what it will cost America?

Can THAT happen in America? Will it?

Manuel Alvarez Jr.
Sandy Hook, VA

This sounds very much like Obama.  He spouts things that polls show the majority want to hear, but never really states the cost or the ultimate effect.  It’s time to look at reality, what can the candidates do that will actually really help our country and what will the cost to the people of the U.S. be.  Change for change’s sake is not good.  Positive, efficient and effective policies are what we should be looking too.

Penalizing the oil companies won’t make them act differently, especially when history shows that companies usually end up passing most or all of those costs onto consumers.  Throwing billions of dollars at energy research without requiring results will only produce well paid executives and better-than-expected earnings reports.  Nationalizing health care may help a certain income level of people but by raising the taxes on the majority of the people that already have it and, if other countries that already have national health care are any indicator ( and they should be ), provide a lower overall ability to provide quality health care in a timely manner.

You may not be enthusiastic about Senator McCain’s ideas but his ideas are solid, responsible, positive ideas that are based in reality.  I, personally, like many of his ideas, that’s me, that’s my right.  It’s your right to disagree with me but is your argument for disagreeing voting for someone who is too inexperienced (or just out of touch with reality), or to work with a President who has a track record of solid ideas and is willing to work on compromises that allow both sides of the isle to come to an acceptable outcome.

Granted the story above has very little chance of becoming that extreme in the U.S. but why would you even want to take a step down that road?

As a German correspondent in Washington, I am accustomed to the fact that American politicians spare little of their limited time for reporters from abroad. This is understandable: Our readers, viewers and listeners cannot vote in U.S. elections. Even so, Obama’s opponents have managed to make at least a small amount of time for international journalists. John McCain has given many interviews. Hillary Clinton gave a few. President Bush regularly holds round-table interviews with media from the countries to which he travels. Only Obama dismisses us so consistently.

You have to ask yourself why Obama won’t have interviews with the foreign media. My guess is Obama is babied by the U.S. media, he is their golden child and they protect him.  How could someone who has so little substance take a chance on the rest of the world knowing what he really is through unbiased media? 

John McCain has interviews with foreign and domestic reporters, open forum town hall meetings, and will field just about any question anyone wants to throw at him.  How is it that McCain can do this while Obama runs and hides?  That’s simple, McCain knows who he is and what he believes through decades of experience.  Obama has no experience and is rapidly finding out how little he truly knows.  His biggest fear now is that someone else may find out.  Well surprise Mr. Obama we already know, know it is just a game, wondering if and when that wonderful thing will happen that lets even those with the rose colored glasses see you for who you really are….a frightened fake.

Senator Obama this morning said that he wants a foreign policy that is “tough, smart, and principled.” This afternoon, I ask: was it tough when Senator Obama voted to order U.S. forces to retreat from Iraq on a fixed timeline—regardless of the recommendations of our military commanders, regardless of conditions on the ground? Was it smart when Senator Obama opposed the surge and predicted that it would fail to improve security? Was it principled when Senator Obama said that he would order U.S. troops to retreat from Iraq, regardless of the humanitarian consequences for millions of innocent Iraqis—even genocide? Was it tough and principled when Senator Obama said he would be open to changing his plan for Iraq after going there and talking to General Petraeus—only to change that position a few hours later after being heatedly criticized by organizations like Moveon.org? I say respectfully, the answer to all of those questions is no.

Senator Obama also said this morning that he wants a foreign policy that recognizes that we have interests “not just in Baghdad, but in Kandahar and Karachi and Tokyo and London.” But what Senator Obama does not seem to recognize is that—in an interdependent world—what happens in Baghdad affects our interests in Kandahar and Karachi and Tokyo and London. What Senator Obama does not seem to understand is that—had we taken the course he had counseled and retreated from Iraq—the United States would have suffered a catastrophic defeat that would have left America and our allies less safe not just in Baghdad, but in Kandahar and Karachi and Tokyo and London.

Unfortunately, Obama tends to set policy on a naïve view of reality with updates only in hindsight.  He was against the military build up in Iraq and the build up worked.  Now he is for a more length withdraw only after the majority of the goals have been reached and a drawdown is inevitable.  Hindsight.  He wants to set an Iraqi policy without input from General Petraeus.  Naïve.  He wants renewable energy but see no need to mix this with current (and transitional) oil needs that draw down on our dependency for foreign oil.  Naïve.  He rejects public finance after he realizes that the Democrats will be able to outspend Republicans during the campaign.  Hindsight.   He supports “single-pay” or national health care even though the countries that have it show that either the expense is unsupportable or that the quality of the healthcare suffers greatly.  Naïve. 

The truth of the matter is that Obama simply doesn’t have the experience to set forward looking, mature, realistic policies for our country.  America can’t afford unattainable dreams or rear looking policy making.  Let’s stand as a united country and move into the future, not into dreams with no substance.
]]> http://nevadapundit.wordpress.com/2008/07/16/mr-forward-looking-hey-your-facing-the-wrong-way/feed/ 1 Nevada Pundit http://nevadapundit.wordpress.com/2008/07/10/now-serving-obamaparty-of-one/ http://nevadapundit.wordpress.com/2008/07/10/now-serving-obamaparty-of-one/#comments Thu, 10 Jul 2008 15:24:53 +0000 Nevada Pundit http://nevadapundit.wordpress.com/?p=43 ]]>  

In the much-hyped video that captured his remark, Jackson is seated next to Dr. Reed Tuckson just before they were to appear live on “Fox & Friends” on Sunday. In barely more than a whisper, Jackson criticizes how Barrak Obama has been speaking to the black community and how he discusses positions on faith-based issues.
At that point, Jackson said he wanted to cut Obama’s “nuts out.”

It was all part of a careful arrangement: Democrat Barack Obama would get fundraising help from his erstwhile rival, Hillary Rodham Clinton, in exchange for his help retiring about $10 million of her campaign debt.

But Obama momentarily forgot his part of the deal at a major New York fundraiser Wednesday night, forcing him to retake the stage after he had concluded the event and said goodnight to the audience.

It should come as no surprise to Senator Barack Obama that his vote today in favor of expanding the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act is drawing cries of outrage from many corners of the liberal blogosphere.

Obama’s sound support base is starting to come through clenched teeth.  Almost every position that this man took to get the party nomination has been flip flopped yet Jackson offers an apology for his beliefs (not a great trait for a man of the cloth) and Clinton is with Obama at a fund raiser today.  Oh how that must sting.

The only thing that I can surmise from Obama’s current strategy is to eat into the independent voters that are leaning towards McCain.  The worst part is that this strategy might work, after all the Democrats have a track record of voting for the person with the D next to their name regardless of previous transgressions.  The one mistake that Obama may be making is that he is one of the few who have gone directly against what his base wants.  Swindle some money?  That’s ok. Provide funding for a bridge to nowhere? Doesn’t directly affect me.  Go against the basic beliefs of the Democratic Party? …..I guess we find out in November.

Obama has however put Democrats in a hard spot.  Left leaning Democrats won’t vote for McCain, he doesn’t stand for what they stand for and that’s ok, it’s the reason for more than one party.  Now, based on that same logic, how can they vote for Obama?  I hope they use more brains that to put a person in the White House just because he puts a D by his name on the ballot.

Very little that I have heard from McCain is a continuation of Bush’s policies, what they are are a continuation of Republican ideas in a way that McCain and many feel will be much more effective than President Bush’s approach.  The idea of “McSame” is only being used, in fact can only be used as a scare tactic to the moderate voters of both sides to help throw off support for basic Republican values.  Now granted McCain is not the poster boy for the ultra conservative out there but his base values of America and the freedom of it’s people first does and will strike a cord with many Americans.

Ah Freedom, the idea that made our relatively new country the most powerful and influential country on the planet.  Based on the idea that if you work hard and apply yourself you can reap the benefits of your actions, that the amount of effort put out is returned and allows you to give yourself and your family a better life.  It is a shame that the thing that made us great so quickly the Democrats are slowly trying to leak away.  Obama has made no secret of the fact that he wants to, on many levels, take from the rich to give to the poor, redistribute wealth, everyone work to the best of their ability and have from the government what they need.  Why does that last part sound scary, the words are pretty enough…oh yeah, the 85 year case study done in the former USSR proved it doesn’t work…personal responsibility and freedom of choice are what make a country great. Well at least the great thing about Obama is that next week all of his idea’s will be different so maybe there is nothing to worry about.

Ms. Pelosi also recently killed “fast-track” procedures intended to ease congressional votes on trade agreements, meaning new pacts with South Korea and Panama are also likely to remain in limbo. And just last month, Democrats in the House and Senate proposed a bill (containing many of Senator Obama’s campaign promises) that would require the president to submit plans to renegotiate all current trade agreements – including the North American Free Trade Agreement with Canada and Mexico – before Congress would consider any new agreements.

The message Democrats are sending to the world is clear: You cannot trust America to honor its trade agreements, even with developing nations struggling to enter the global middle class. This is a far cry from Obama’s Lincolnesque promise in his Democratic nomination victory speech June 3rd to restore “our image as the last, best hope on earth.”

Protectionism at its best. It amazes me that the Democratic run congress believes that the answer to improving domestic economy and foreign relations is to restrict trade with other countries. Nancy Pelosi seems to be doing everything in her power to make the “defenders of freedom” the outcasts of the world and for the life of me I can’t understand her reasoning. Is she truly so shortsighted as to think this will bring the jobs back to America? Well according to the yearly unemployment rates there seems to be no loss of jobs, in fact if you look at the average since the inception of NAFTA in 1994 the average unemployment rate for the last 14 years is lower than the 14 years previous. How can this be? Because the jobs didn’t leave, they just simply moved to the areas of the economy that needed them. Don’t think that bringing back the auto workers job isn’t going to have an effect somewhere else. Will you then feel sorry for the farmers that will have a harder time selling there goods, or will you just support farm subsidies, i.e. our taxes, being given to them.

On Iraq, Obama said Thursday that his upcoming trip there might lead him to refine his promise to quickly remove U.S. troops from the war.

He now supports broader authority for the government’s eavesdropping program and legal immunity for telecommunications companies that participated in it, after opposing a similar bill last year.

After the Supreme Court overturned the District of Columbia’s gun ban, the handgun-control proponent said he favors both an individual’s right to own a gun as well as government’s right to regulate ownership.

Obama became the first major-party candidate to reject public financing for the general election after earlier promises to accept it.

He not only embraced but promised to expand Bush’s program to give more anti-poverty grants to religious groups, a split with Democratic orthodoxy.

He objected to the Supreme Court’s decision outlawing the death penalty for child rapists, even though he has been anti-capital punishment.

Obama also said “mental distress” should not count as a health exception that would permit a late-term abortion, saying “it has to be a serious physical issue,” addressing a matter considered crucial to abortion rights activists.

It is amazing to me that so many people take this man serious. Here is a man running for POTUS with absolutely no definable position, it’s like a grab bag of policies. Obama has been stating that his changes have been a refinement of his ideas, these are not refinements they are complete shifts. You may or may not like what McCain stands for but at least you know what his positions are. Can you really in good conscience say that a coin flip is better? This is our country people and I am very proud of it, please don’t leave it to chance.

I personally like the majority of the policies coming from the McCain camp, that’s my opinion. I also understand and relish the idea that everyone has their own and that we have such available forums to debate these opinions in. Please feel free to enjoy my site. Express your opinions and debate your points but be respectful of how you say it.

It’s nice to know that the Committee feels strongly about sticking up for a practice known for entailing a total lack of transparency, funds being allocated to projects often without a vote even being held, and, frankly, a great deal of waste.  Voters don’t tend to like that kind of thing, so in my book, it’s absolutely fantastic that Howard Dean & Co, and (by extension) Barack Obama, are publicly indicating that they do.