THEY SHOULD LOVE HIM - BUT THEY DON'T

In the interest of full disclosure, I voted for a republican for the first time when I was 19 years old, and continued to vote that way in all but two elections for the next 35 years.  I finally gave up on the Republican Party and became an Independent, two years ago when folks started showing up outside venues where the president was speaking carrying guns.  Please don’t get the wrong impression, I am all for gun ownership, I actually own a few myself.  I just could not see myself continuing in a political party in which people think it’s acceptable to express their displeasure with the president in way that by all appearances was designed to intimidate not just him, but anyone who supported him.    
As an Independent, I think that Republicans should love Obama after all, like every president before him he continues to do their bidding.  Before you decide that I’ve lost my mind, let me outline a few of the things that he’s done that conservatives should love.

1.        Wars – When Obama was elected, there were two wars in process, and although he campaigned against both, he has ultimately decided to continue to prosecute both.  Not only did Obama continue the war in Afghanistan, he sent an additional 40,000 troops into that war, and more than ten years into the war, we’re still there with seemingly no way out.  In addition, we’re still in Iraq with seemingly no way out of there either.  Never mind that we really had no good reason to go to Iraq in the first place.   Not only did Obama continue the two wars that he inherited, he actually decided it would be a good idea to follow the French into Libya.  But don’t worry now that the rebels are in charge, we have someone else to sell arms to, so that they can be used against us in some future war. 

2.       Taxes – Despite all of his talk about the poor and disenfranchised, Obama has not only done nothing to help those folks, he has continued to give tax breaks to the wealthiest among us.  Don’t get me wrong, I’ll take the tax break, but for a president who was elected on a platform to help the poor and middle class, Obama has failed miserably.  The extension of the Bush tax cuts is a direct subsidy to the richest Americans, at the expense of the poorest among us, yet the very people receiving those tax breaks hate him.  Can you say hypocrite?

3.       The Banks& Wall Street – Prior to leaving office, Bush 43 signed off on bailing out the banks and Wall Street, and yes once again, Obama went along with the program.  Not only did he bail out the Banks and Wall Street, he used tax payer funds to bail out the automotive industry as well.  Yep, this man who campaigned on helping those most in need of help, continued to help those who don’t really need it, while ordinary Americans continued to lose their homes, and stand in unemployment lines.  The very people in big business and the Wall Street crew are Obama’s chief critics, while taking advantage of his policies to line their pockets.   Obama’s policies all seem to be designed to help the wealthiest among us, to the exclusion of those who continue to support him despite the fact that he continues to fail them. 

4.       Entitlements – Let’s be clear, Social Security is not an Entitlement, most of us paid into it for 30 to 50 or in some cases 60 years.  It’s our money, the government was supposed to invest it in a way that earned interest for our retirement years.  Entitlements are subsidies to big oil companies, bailing out banks and other financial firms, entitlements are in my view things like farm subsidies, grants to the family members of congress people, disability to people who could work, but won’t.

5.       Stimulus – Every Republican running for president accuses Obama of running up the deficit, and criticizes his stimulus plan, yet every one of them live in a state that took stimulus money.  Rick Perry’s rails against the stimulus, yet Texas got over 24 million in stimulus funds, that’s second only to California.  Listen, I don’t care of states took Federal money, but if you did, just shut up, you have no right to complain when you’re stuffing your state coffers with the very money that you’re complaining about.

Those who hate Obama, blame him for the deficit and claim that he has increased the debt more than any other president, which is not only an outright lie, those who make those statements know it’s a lie, but they continue to say it because their audience is ignorant!   Did you know that when George W took office, he inherited a surplus from Clinton?  Yep, that’s right, a surplus.  When Obama took office, he inherited a deficit of 10.26 Trillion dollars. The deficit t is currently projected to be around 14 Trillion next year.  Now for those of you who can’t count, when Clinton left office, the surplus was approximately $236 Billion dollars, which means that not only did Bush blow the small surplus, he ran up over 10 Billion dollars in debt.   Fact is that 4 Trillion of that debt was for the two wars that Bush kept off budget during his administration, and Obama put on budget when he was elected. 

UNEMPLOYMENT - Did you know that when Clinton left office, the unemployment rate was 4.1%?  The day that Bush 43 left office, the unemployment rate was 7.5%, and our current unemployment rate is 9.1% which means that Obama s responsible for 1.6% of the current rate.  Yeah, I know, if Obama wasn’t president, somehow all of those businesses that he continues to give tax breaks to would move those jobs back from China, India and Pakistan, and our unemployment rate would instantly drop to 2%.  No one wants to face it, but the new full employment in this country will never be 5% again, unless the corporations can find a way to get us to work for the same wages as folks in Pakistan, India and China, and there is absolutely nothing that Obama or any other president can do about it.

You may not agree with my assessment, but facts are facts.  In my lifetime, only Carter was a worse president than Obama has been thus far, but given what he inherited, and the fact that he doesn’t seem to have much of a back bone, he’s doing the best that he can. 

“I’m Just Sayin”

WHO IS MICHAEL WEBERT?

Twice a week, I receive a flyer or post card in my mail box from candidate for the House of Delegates Michael Webert, unfortunately I have no idea who Mr. Webert is, or what his true views are.   I had actually hoped to learn more about Mr. Webert at the debate held at the John Barton Payne building last night, but he failed to show up.  Mr. Webert’s opponent Kevin Kelly was there ready to debate, and there was a packed house filled with what will be Mr. Webert’s constituents  should he be elected, yet it appears we aren’t important enough to warrant ninety minutes of his time.

Mr. Webert’s mailers say that he is a farmer and small business person, yet according to the Fauquier Democrat, he spent the last three years in college and now runs his grandmother’s farm.  To be clear, I’m not against someone getting a job in the family business, but does that really qualify as experience running a business?  Hell, my dad was a mechanic, so by Mr. Webert’s logic, the fact that I occasionally handed him a wrench, makes me qualified to be a mechanic! 

Mr. Webert’s opponent Kevin Kelley not only attended the debate, he was gracious enough to stand and answer two rounds of questions from each of the panel members.  Mr. Kelley told us about his background as a Small Business person, his upbringing and his family. He talked about his time serving with the Chamber of Commerce, and his work in the community.  I don’t know about others in attendance, but frankly I found it refreshing to hear someone running for office refuse to duck and dodge when asked a direct question.  Mr. Kelley answered every question directly and without providing the kind of spin that so many politicians attempt to do.  You may not have liked his answers, but they were direct and to the point!

As voters, we all have to ask ourselves; if the candidate is not accessible and accountable to his constituents prior to being elected, how accessible will he be once in office?  Kevin Kelley will be accessible to the people who live in our communities and helped put him in office.  His opponent is invisible to us now, and we should he be elected, we can only expect more of the same.

I’m Just Sayin!!!!!

SUCKING THE GOVERNMENT TIT?

Ok, so I’m sure that like me you’ve been following the negotiations over raising the debt ceiling with bated breath, and like me, I’m sure that many of you have wondered why some in our congress refuse to raise taxes, while others don’t want to cut programs for the poor and disenfranchised.  Well this article will hopefully give you some insights into why unless you and I wake up and vote every single person currently in office out, we’ll never be able to balance the budget.

Twenty years ago I was a Federal employee working under a retirement system called the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS).  Now you have to understand that CSRS was without question the greatest retirement system ever created aside from that provided to the House and Senate of the United States.  You see unlike people in traditional private sector employment who paid into Social Security, with CSRS, I didn’t have to contribute a single penny to my retirement.  In addition, had I stayed in government service, I would have been able to retire at age 55 with 25 years of service and collect full retirement and have full health insurance benefits at the expense of the American Taxpayer for the rest of my life.  I don’t tell you this story to pick on Federal Employees, I’m telling you this as an example of why our government can’t balance the budget or get spending under control.  I personally know of a number of Conservative Americans collecting retirement under CSRS who believe in their hearts that we have to cut spending, however if you mention limiting Cost of Living Increases for them, they squeal like pigs.  You see, when these folks think about cutting spending, their thinking about an entire different class of people, they can’t fathom a world where they would have to sacrifice so that others might benefit.

The Tea Party – Many in the Tea Party ran on a platform of cutting spending, and during the Debt Ceiling Negations, they made a point of ensuring that none of their rich friends, neighbors or contributors paid one penny in additional taxes.  Now please don’t get me wrong, I like the rest of you don’t want to pay any more in taxes than I have to, but before you elevate the Tea Party Congress men and women to hero status, consider the following.

Michele Bachman, the queen of the Tea Party and presidential candidate also happens to be the queen of sucking on the Government Tit.  Yep, that’s right, good ole Michele’s family farm has collected more than $251,000 in farm subsidies between 1995 and 2006, yet she describes programs to help poor people as Socialism, and oh by the way, her husband’s counseling service also receives subsidies from the Federal Government.  I guess that to Michele if you’re trying to help folks who can’t help themselves, you’re a Socialist, but if you’re helping yourself to the tax payer’s money you’re a (___________________________) you fill in the blank!

In addition to Bachman, Chuck Grassley of Iowa who describes Obama as a Socialist has taken over a million dollars in Farm subsidies, although most of that amount ($699,248) went to his son and the remaining $239,000 going directly into Grassley’s pocket.  I could go on for a couple of days like this, but let me just give you some additional examples and we’ll move on:

Sam Brownback (R) Kansas $500K over 11 years, Rep Stephen Fincher (R) Tennessee who’s bio says he’s a farmer and gospel singer has pocked over 3 million dollars between 1995 and 2009, Rep Vicky Hartzler (R) MO got $775K and the list goes on and on.  These people are your Tea Party Patriots, they are the people you’re relying on to cut spending, yet they and their consistutiant's continue to suck on the tit of government subsidies to the tune of billions of dollars a year.  Make no mistake, while my focus has been on Tea Party members, there are also a number (about half as many) Democrats sucking on that tit as well, however they for the most aren’t the ones banging the monkey about controlling spending on one hand while pocketing millions in taxpayer subsidies with the other, but make no mistake, their all guilty. 

Last year the US Congress spent over 4.8 Billion dollars to prop up corporate farmers, all the while trying to make you and I believe that we need to cut Social Security, Medicaid, Food Stamps and Head Start in an effort to keep us out of default with our foreign creditors.  

Most of my friends are Conservatives, and whenever I talk to them about welfare, or other government assistance, I almost always walk away with the feeling that unfortunately they don’t see the face of people getting government assistance looking anything like theirs.  You see, in America, we tolerate Corporate Welfare, tax breaks and loop holes for those who don’t really need them because those folks create jobs!  Really, how many jobs have been created in the last 4 years?  When George Bush entered office, the unemployment rate was around 4%, when he left office it was close to 7.5%, and after 2 years of Obama, it’s slightly above 9.2%.  Bush cut taxes and continued to give corporations subsidies, and Obama continued the Bush Tax cuts, yet there are no additional jobs and every day I read that major corporations are laying off additional workers. 

As long as the politicians can keep the middle class and poor at each other’s throats, this country will continue to decline.  Most people have no idea what those they vote for stand for, or many of those in office would be out making honest livings like the rest of us.  Did any of you knowingly vote for folks telling you that you or your parent’s social security benefits need to be cut while they were taking subsidies from that same government?  If your answer is yes, at best you’re an idiot, worse case, you’re misinformed. 

Stop watching ABC, NBC, CBS and FOX and find other ways to inform yourself, or you’ll continue to make the same mistakes when you vote.  If you’re rich, you can afford to put people into office who don’t have the best interest of the country at heart.  If you’re not rich, you had better wake up and realize that the next poor face that you see might be staring back at you in the mirror someday soon!

I’m Just Sayin!!