Trump's wrong message

This is a letter I sent to Bill O'reilly

Dear Bill,

I find it very disappointing to hear Donald Trump make the foolish remark he made about Iraqi oil when there’s so much of what he says that I agree with.  Can you imagine the propaganda tool we’d hand our adversaries if we did that?  And why does the richest nation in the world in natural resources need any nation’s oil when we have all we need right here?

This country is like a family on welfare that has a buried treasure in their own back yard.  They don’t want to use it because it will disturb the flower bed growing above it.  It never occurs to them that they could plant the flowers around the treasure they’re making use of. 

The number one driving force in wrecking our economy was OPEC’s assault in 2008 when they gradually drove the price of their oil up to $147.00 a barrel.  The Internet indicates that the unemployment rate at the beginning of 2008 was 4.6%.  This is something almost no one ever talks about.  We have to thank Donald Trump for making comment about that just recently.  But we don’t want to give anyone the impression that our motivation for bringing the fight to the terrorists on their own home turf was to take possession of the oil in any of the Middle East states.

JW

Bulls and Bears

This is a letter I wrote to Bulls and Bears in November 2008.  It is still relevant, and will likely be for some time, to our nation’s problems.  I thought I’d post it in my blog before deleting it from the e-mail sent folder:

I found it somewhat tragically amusing to watch the alleged experts on the economy on the Saturday morning (11/22) program Bulls and Bears as they all gave their opinion on how we can revive the economy.  It’s like watching a bunch of people walking through a forest asking, “Where are the trees?”    Before a solution can ever be found to a problem the first thing that has to be recognized is how the problem developed.

Before the oil producing countries started their extortionist program of raising the price of crude oil out of sight, the economy was cruising along very well.  It wasn’t going to be long before every household was going to find their budgets strained that would eventually translate into people’s inability to keep up with their bills and mortgage payments.  Trucking and airline industries were to see the cost of fuel more than double putting more of a strain on the consumer. 

No one should need a PHD in economics to know that a country is only as well off as what it can produce.  I’ll take the “street smart” guy over the PHD any time.  Playing checkers with the available cash, as is being advocated by the participants on the Bulls and Bears program, is nothing but a bunch of smoke and mirrors.  When my father was out of work after his business of research and development of electronics failed in 1929, he used his skill at glass blowing to make neon signs.   Using his bike, he pedaled from store to store getting orders where he could so he could put food on the table for his family. 

The economy is now in a train wreck.  It takes time to clear a train wreck before the trains can run on time again.  This won’t be easy considering the fact that the electorate has put the wrong people in charge of fixing this economy.  We’ve got to get into production the development of our natural resources.  We can be ninety percent independent if we bring up our own sources of crude oil.  Oil producing countries would be competing with one another to provide this country with the other ten percent.  This country has the knowledge of how to mine for coal in an environmentally friendly way.  If the environmentalists in this country want to do the world a favor they should have us mining for coal here instead of leaving it to third world countries who do not take the pains we take.  Along with tapping our own sources of crude oil and a more aggressive mining of coal we should get refineries and nuclear plants built and also do everything we can do to develop renewable sources of energy.  Every possible means of producing energy should be applied.  Unemployment would be reduced to a point where only those incapable of working and to those who won’t work.  Revenue would pour into the State and National treasuries and we would be able to pay down our national debt and we would not be hamstrung in our ability to manage our foreign affairs.     

Enamored by a glib talking, charismatic young Hollywood star-like personality and with the help of an irresponsible media the electorate has given us a president that does not believe in any of the things I just mentioned.   The argument that it would take X amount of years to be effective should be a non-starter if we’re concerned about what our legacy would be for future generations.   And a more immediate effect of this developing of our own natural resources would be to be putting people to work and a general restoring of everyone’s confidence that the economy is on its way to recovery.

Global Warming RIP?

This is a key paragraph from an article by Victor Davis Hanson in the National Review Online entitled Global Warming – RIP?:

While the Obama administration was subsidizing failed or inefficient green industries, radical breakthroughs in domestic fossil-fuel exploration and recovery — especially horizontal drilling and fracking — have vastly increased the known American reserves of gas and oil. Modern efficient engines have meant that both can be consumed with little, if any, pollution — at a time when a struggling U.S. economy is paying nearly half-a-trillion dollars for imported fossil fuels. The public apparently would prefer developing more of our own gas, oil, shale, tar sands, and coal as an alternative to going broke by either importing more fuels from abroad or subsidizing more inefficient windmills and solar panels at home.
Entire article:    http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/281392/global-warming-rip-victor-davis-hanson

The current price of gasoline in Saudi Arabie is 91 cents per gallon.  In Kuwait it's 78 cents.  Just recently it was 23 and 16 cents.  As Casey Stengel always used to say, "Ya can look it up" - on the Internet.

President Bush

To:      Laura Ingraham

From:  Jack West

               Fairfield, NJ

Dear Laura,

Is it any wonder that more people are blaming Bush than Obama for this sad economy when not even conservative talk show hosts can ever find anything creditable to say about President Bush?  Does everyone forget about the 54 months of economic growth and the Dow Jones Average steadily climbing toward the 14000 mark after the Bush tax cuts took effect?  For the biggest part of the time President Bush was in office the unemployment rate was five percent and lower.  And doesn’t anyone ever give any thought to the effect the assault by the OPEC countries had on our economy when they gradually brought the price of their oil to the peak of $147 a barrel in 2008?  This was the thing that had the most direct effect on bringing about the downturn and no one ever says anything about it.  The cost of energy for every household and industry and most directly transportation costs wrecked everyone’s budget.

 Obama has been allowed to get away with making the false claim over and over again that he inherited a down economy.  He came into his “inheritance” two years before he took office as a result of the 2006 elections when the Democrats gained vetoproof control of the purse strings.  The economy was humming along well at that time in spite of the Middle East War.  The Internet indicates the unemployment rate to have been at 4.6% at that time and in 2008 it was 5.8%.

And who do we have to thank for not letting us be energy independent as we could be?  We have as much natural gas in this country as Saudi Arabia has oil.  We have enough oil not only in Alaska and offshore but in many parts of the “lower 48” – enough for our own needs as well as being competitors on the world market.  The revenue that would generate would give us all the capital we would need for research and development of renewable sources of energy.  We don’t have to live like paupers while we wait to be served by green energy.

 I’d like to see an end to this constant talk about Bush being as bad as Obama.  On the contrary, those who know how much the country is indebted to him know that that is a false claim.  It’s not going to help to unseat our Apologizer-in-Chief in 2012 by being fearful of saying anything complimentary about President Bush.  

Oil and the Department of Energy

This is one of several dozen statements in an e-letter entitled Walmart and the Morons that was forwarded to me: 

g.. The Department of Energy was created in 1977 to lessen our dependence on foreign oil. It has ballooned to 16,000 employees with a budget of $24 billion a year and we import more oil than ever before.

We use oil whether radical environmentalists like it or not and we don't have to rely on foreign hostile countries for our needs.  We not only have enough for ourselves right here but enough to make us competitive on the world market.   The current price for gasoline in Saudi Arabia, according to the Internet,  is 22 cents a gallon.  In Kuwait it's 16 cernts.  The prosperity we would enjoy by using our own energy supplies of oil and natural gas would provide all the capital needed for research and development of renewable sources of energy. 

                              

Who is Rick Perry?

Who Is Rick Perry? He is a fifth generation Texan, the son of hardscrabble west Texas tenant farmers – Democrats but conservatives through and through. He grew up in a farm town too small to be on the state map. Life was so hard that he was six years old before his house had indoor plumbing. His mother sewed his clothes, including the underwear he wore to college. He is an Eagle Scout. After Paint Creek High School , he attended Texas A&M, graduated, and was commissioned into the Air Force where he became a C-130 pilot. Now 61 years old, he has won nine elections to four different offices in Texas state government. In the first three elections he ran as a Democrat then switched to the Republican Party. He is currently the 47th governor of Texas – a position he has held for 11 years, the longest tenure of any governor in the nation. He has never lost an election. Rick Perry was the Lieutenant Governor to whom Governor George Bush handed over the office after winning the 2000 Presidential election. Since then, Perry won gubernatorial elections in 2002, 2004, and 2010, the last time by 55% against a field consisting of a Democrat, a Libertarian, a Green Party, and an Independent. Since he became its Governor, Texas – a right to work state that taxes neither personal income nor capital gains – has added more jobs than the other 49 states combined. In the last two years, low taxes and little regulation led his state to create 47% of all jobs created in the entire nation. Five of the top ten cities with the highest job growth in the nation are in Texas . People follow jobs, so in the last four years for which data are available, Texas led every state in net interstate migration growth. Perry signed ground-breaking “loser pays” tort reform and medical litigation rules that caused malpractice insurance rates to fall. Some 20,000 doctors have since moved to Texas . Texas boasts 58 of the Fortune 500 companies – more than any other state. Since May 2011 Texas resumed its pre-recession employment levels. Only two other states and the District of Columbia have done that. Texas ships 16% of the nation’s export value. California trails at 11%. Of the 70 companies that have fled California so far in 2011, 14 relocated in Texas . In this year’s Texas legislative season, Perry got most of what he wanted. With no new taxes, a fiscally lean state budget was passed leaving $6 billion in a rainy day fund even as other states around the country struggled to balance budgets and avoid more deficit borrowing. A voter ID bill passed that was designed to prevent ballot box fraud and illegal voting. A bill passed that makes plaintiffs pay court costs and attorney fees if their suits are deemed frivolous. Perry scored points even in his legislative failures. He failed to get sanctuary cities banned – Texas towns in which police cannot question detainees about their immigration status. The blame fell on the legislature. Perry also failed to get a so-called “anti-groping” bill passed that would put Transportation Security Administration agents in prison if they touch the genitals, anus, or breasts of passengers in a pat down. Federal officials threatened to halt all flights out of Texas airports and the bill died in special session. That endeared Texans even more to TSA employees living in Texas . Perry jogs daily in the morning. He has no bodyguard with him, but his daughter’s dog runs by his side and he carries a laser-guided automatic pistol in his belt. Last year while jogging in an undeveloped area, a coyote paralleled his jogging route, eyeing his dog. He drew his pistol and killed the animal with one shot, leaving it where it fell. “He became mulch," Perry said. Animal rights groups protested, but Perry shrugged it off. “Don’t come after my dog,” he warned them. Recently, Obama asked Perry to delay the July 7 execution of Humberto Leal in order to comply with the International Court of Justice in The Hague and the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. Perry refused. Therefore Obama asked the US Supreme Court to delay the execution because it would damage US foreign relations. The Court refused 5-4 and Perry ordered the execution to go forward as scheduled. Over the howls of diplomats, politicians, and the UN, Leal was administered a lethal injection at 6:20 p.m. Before he died, he admitted his guilt and asked for forgiveness. The case has special implications for Perry, who is considering a run for the presidency in 2012. Even his critics resent federal interference in a Texas execution, which is related to a state, not a federal, crime – an alcohol and drug-fueled rape and murder 17 years ago by an illegal whose family brought him into the country 35 years ago as a child. The interference hinges not on the man’s guilt, which Leal’s advocates acknowledged, but on a technicality – failure to inform Leal that he could have gotten legal representation from the Mexican consulate in lieu of the court-appointed attorneys who represented him. Independent Texans saw Obama’s interference as another intrusion of federal power into the affairs of a state, which could cost Obama support in other states. Needless to say, Perry is a hard-edged conservative and a ferocious defender of 10th Amendments rights (“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”) – an explicit restriction of the federal government to only those powers granted in the Constitution. Perry accuses the federal government, especially the Obama administration, of illegal overreach. Perry said “no thanks” to the feds whose stimulus offered taxpayer dollars for education and unemployment assistance. The strings on “free money” from Washington , he said, would restrict Texas in managing its own affairs. Perry even depleted all state funds to fight recent wildfires before asking Washington for disaster relief. His request has been ignored, which comes across as an unvarnished federal power play, further pitting Perry and Texans against the federal government.

Democrat's false charges

This is a letter I'm sending to Fox News reporters and others:

To:       Laura Ingraham

 From:  Jack West

             Fairfield, NJ

Dear Laura,

Whenever you’re interviewing a Democrat guest you know that somewhere in the course of his/her comments you’ll hear the false charge that President Obama “inherited” a down economy.  Please don’t let them get away with that.  What the Democrats got in January 2009 they brought with them.  As the result of the 2006 elections the Democrats took over unencumbered, vetoproof control of the purse strings when they were seated in January 2007.  This was with the help of a RINO Senator from Vermont.  The unemployment rate at that time was 4.6% and the economy was humming. In December 2007, eleven months after the Democrat Congress was seated the recession began according to the Internet.  In January 2009 the unemployment rate hit 7.6%.  Please let your Democrat guests know that when they make their false charges.

In regard to the housing debacle, there are videos on You-Tube showing Barney Frank, Maxine Waters, Chuck Schumer and others telling us that “There is no housing crisis” when President Bush was exhorting Congress to rein in Fannie May and Freddie Mac.  His first warnings came during the first year he was in office.

But the real crusher to our economy came with the economic war the OPEC countries waged on us in 2008.  We have none but the Democrats to thank for that.  Because of the strong pressures they put on us not to develop our own vast resources and depend on OPEC for our oil needs, we were left wide open to OPEC’s assault.  We have enough oil in the “lower 48,” Alaska and offshore to not only make us self-sufficient but to make us competitors on the world market.  We would not have a national debt if we went after the treasures we have in the ground right here and we’d have a bountiful amount of money to put toward developing renewable sources of energy.                       

This is a letter I sent to Senator Dick Durbin:

Dear Senator Durbin,

You mentioned on Face the Nation on Sunday, 7/17/11, that the national debt rose somewhat substantially under President Reagan.  In order for that comment to gain traction it would be necessary for people who lived through the Reagan Administration years to forget about the very noble mission he was on.  And for the younger people it would have to depend on them not doing their homework to enlighten them what Reagan had done.  The SDI program was a costly one but it did result in bringing about a victorious end to the cold war (or did at least reduce the Soviets to a whimper).  According to Wikipedia the public debt truly did raise from $712B to $2T in the Reagan years and a year after he left office we saw the Berlin Wall come tumbling down.  It would be hard to believe that any loyal American wasn’t happy to see that happen.

Today’s spending mania makes Reagan’s pale by comparison.  There IS justification for being involved in two of the three wars we’re engaged in.  But there are things we hear about here and there that make us wonder - such as research being done with shrimp on walking machines and subsidies being given to companies such as GE who made 14B in profits in 2010 and paid no taxes.  There are other examples.

Under President Bush the gross public debt rose from 5.7T in January 2001 to 10.7T by 12/2008.  Under President Obama the debt increased from 10.7T to 14.2T by 2/2011 – an increase of 3.5 trillion in 25 months.  The war in Iraq HAS been a justifiable cause and to rid the terrorists from a safe haven in Afghanistan is important.  I can’t believe that any of us aren’t happy to see the end of the monster Saddam Hussein and his serial rapist sons.  Not even a beautiful young bride walking with her husband was safe from falling prey to them.  The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan also had the effect of having the cowardly lion in Libya scrapping his nuclear weapons program, fearful of being the next one the coalition would be going after. 

But the sad thing about this whole spending debate is that it should be taking place at all.  With the wealth of resources God has graced this great land with we should be the richest, debt free nation on the planet if we would get to work seriously developing these treasures instead of being beholden to foreign nations, some of whom are not even friendly to us.  Would we be in the mess we’re in now if we had not fallen prey to the economic attack the oil producing nations waged on us in 2008 that we put our reliance on?  Does it make sense that we should be giving two billion dollars to Brazil to drill a 10,000 foot deep well in the Gulf of Mexico while President Obama’s agents refuse to issue permits to our own oil companies who would be putting our own people to work?  Are we to believe that they can mine that oil in a more environmentally safe way than we can?  What about the revenue that would be coming into the treasury from the wage earners and the businesspeople who would be paying taxes on these earnings?      

Sincerely,

Jack West

  

       

Kudos to Tom Donahue

This is a copy of a letter I sent to Neil Cavuto:

Dear Neil,

Kudos to Tom Donohue, the President and CEO of the Chamber of Commerce, who was being interviewed on your time segment of Fox News at 4:30 PM Monday 7/12. I am in full agreement and have been touting for a long time what he was saying. We would have the richest, debt free nation on the planet if we would make use of the vast resources of this land of milk and honey that God has graced us with. And we have the people with the skills that can tap that wealth in an environmentally friendly way. Hopefully we’ll someday get the people we need to wrest this nation from the grip of the fools who are preventing us from using these resources.

Donohue also made good sense of the way to raise revenue. He left one important thing out. We often forget the most obvious thing. I was waiting for him to mention that when we get people working they pay taxes on their income and the businessman/woman they work for prospers, pays taxes commensurate with this income and enables the business to grow and take on other tax paying employees.

Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi and their confederates think it’s a clever mantra to use the phrase “tax breaks for the rich.” If they had their way they’d take all the working capital away from the job providers. I’m a retired construction electrician who made a good living in New York and I never begrudged Donald Trump getting richer with all the construction work he did in New York, providing me and so many other tradesmen with good livings. We didn’t have the capital. We provided the labor. Trump and other people like him provided the capital and thank God they did. They could have simply retired to a life of leisure on some vacation island somewhere. Thanks too that they kept that energy up and still do.

Tax cuts bring economic growth

I don't know what kind of history Senator Dick Durbin is studying.  The Bush tax cuts during the early days of his time in office brought about 54 months of economic growth and five percent unemployment.  It was when the Democrats took over vetoproof control of the economy in January 2007 following the 2006 elections that the economy started to go south.  Would Senator Durbin take all of the investment capital out of the hands of the people who create the jobs?  Four different presidents in the past fifty years stimulated the growth of the economy when taxes encroached to levels that the economy was being choked - Kennedy, Reagan, Clinton (When he adopted Newt's Contract With America Program) and G. W. Bush.   Employment figures began to go up and revenues flowed into the treasury.  As Casey Stengel always used to say, "Ya can look it up."

Democrats touting their candidates

For as long as I can remember the Democrats have touted that the candidates they run for public office are the most brilliant people in the land.  They did it with Adlai Stevenson in 1956 when he ran against President Eisenhower.  Stevenson was supposed to be wiser than Solomon.   I was a dyed-in-the-wool Democrat in those days and I voted for him in spite of wondering about the wisdom of unilaterally stopping the testing of defensive nuclear weapons that he advocated.  But, of course, he was wiser than me - or anyone else - so I had to vote for him.  I didn’t know the Democrat Party was going to ‘morph’ into an organization that was going to attempt to impose Socialism on the country and make us a bunch of puppets led by a dictatorial puppeteer.  My real awakening came with having Obama elected to the presidency.  I suddenly became aware that the country was infested with a large number of people that were willing to embrace Socialism.  What Socialist country can they point to that would ever convince them that this is a pleasurable system to be a party of?       

Other candidates the Democrats have pumped up about their brilliance were:  Bill Bradley when he ran for the Senate in New Jersey; President Kennedy (Here, I was in full agreement.  I did have a lot of respect for the intelligence and wisdom of Kennedy.)  He was no Socialist.  He was an advocate and supporter of the free market system and his economic policies were much like Reagan’s.  He revived a stagnant economy by lowering the tax tables for highest income earners from 91 to 70 percent and the lowest from 20 to 14 percent.  Reagan’s figures were even more dramatic and in both cases economies revived that were being choked as taxes encroached to levels that were stifling the free flow of trade and causing unemployment.  The employment numbers grew and revenue flowed into the treasury in both cases.  

And now we have Obama.  Where are his school records that can show just how book smart he is?  He won’t let us see them.  He has already shown that he has no common sense.   He was supposed to have won degrees from Harvard and Columbia.  George Stephanopoulos was being interviewed on TV last year and he said, that based on what he had been hearing from Obama supporters, Obama should have been in the same class as him, studying the same subjects, and he never saw him.  Obama makes as many gaffs as there are weeks in the year.  Last week he made two (May 2011).  When a dignitary goes to a foreign land it’s customary that they acquaint themselves with the rules of protocol.  When the song God save the Queen is being played the rule is silence till it’s finished.  Obama went on with the toast until he raised his glass to the Queen and didn’t stop talking till he noticed that she wasn’t responding to him.  I’ll give him this: he’s supposed to have a committee whose job it is to apprise him of these rules of etiquette. 

But the biggest gaff of all is what he proposed for Israel a day before Benjamin Netanyahu, the Prime Minister of Israel, got here for a State Visit.  And this is something an educated person should have knowledge of.  In a meeting that was aired by Fox News by the two heads of state it was obvious that the Prime Minister had a lot more knowledge of the history of the United States than President Obama had of the Prime Minister’s.

 

President Obama delivered a speech the day before the Prime Minister arrived in which he proposed that Israel give up the land they acquired after the six day war in 1967.  With this unilateral display of appeasement he expected to see the Palestinians give up their quest to drive the Israelites out of the Holy Land and accept sovereign states of Palestine and Israel.  This had to be the most extraordinary display of naivete and bankruptcy of knowledge for conducting foreign affairs.  From the time Moses led the Jews to the Promised Land the people of that region have been trying to drive them out.  When Israel’s independence was reestablished May 14, 1948 they were invaded by five Arab states the next day.  The day the Palestinians accept having a land of their own at the expense of seeing Israel with one sovereign to them is the day they’ll be serving iced tea in hell.  And I don’t need a degree from Harvard to know that.   

It’s indisputable that Obama has a very charismatic likable personality with a great gift of gab.  This would make him eminently qualified to be a great master of ceremonies at an entertainment event.  But it’s not enough to qualify him to be our executive representative in conducting foreign affairs or making him qualified to guide the nation’s economy.    

Herman Cain who is vying for the nomination to be the Republican candidate for president says that President Obama could not run one of his pizza parlors.  He wasn’t saying that to be insulting.  It’s what he truly believes. President Obama has never run so much as a newspaper stand. He has nothing in his resume that would encourage Cain or any other company president to employ him to start at an executive level in any business. There is only one place where money can constantly be printed to keep a failing enterprise afloat – it’s the Federal Government. Anywhere else it’s necessary to know what to do to turn a failing business around. This is what Herman Cain did when he became Chief Executive Officer of Godfather’s Pizza. For those who didn’t know in 2008 that Obama was so totally unqualified to run the biggest business in the land as President of the United States, unless they have their heads buried in the sand, they should know it now.						e

Obama's latest words of wisdom

Don’t you love the latest words of wisdom that were expressed by our illustrious “brilliant” leader?  He said you have to experience a few bumps in the road on the road to recovery with the economy.  He then used the analogy that you might be hit with a truck.  Oh yeah!  Don’t you hate when that happens?  You go flying through the air and wonder if when you come down whether you’ll be in this land or the next.  I’ll take the bump in the road but not the truck.  

This is information that was forwarded to me through E-mail:

In  1952  President Truman  established one day a year as a "National Day of Prayer."  ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- In  1988 President Reagan  designated the First Thursday in May of each year as  the National Day of Prayer.    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- In June  2007 (then)  Presidential  Candidate Barack Obama  declared that the USA  "Was no longer a  Christian nation."  ---------------------------------------------------------------    In 2009 President Obama  canceled the  21st annual National Day  of Prayer ceremony  at the White House under the ruse  Of "not wanting to offend anyone"    ------------------------------------------------------------------------    BUT... on September 25, 2009  from 4 AM until 7 PM,  a National Day of Prayer  FOR THE MUSLIM RELIGION  was Held on Capitol Hill,  Beside the White House.  There were over 50,000 Muslims in  D.C. that day.         HE PRAYS WITH THE MUSLIMS!  I guess it Doesn't matter  if "Christians"  Are offended by this event -  We obviously Don't count as  "anyone" Anymore.  The direction this country is headed  should strike fear in the heart of every Christian, especially knowing that the  Muslim religion believes that if Christians cannot be converted, they should be annihilated.  This is not a Rumor -  Go  to  the  website  To  confirm  this  info:  http://www.islamoncapitolhill.com    .

Herman Cain's view of Obama

This is an excerpt from an article that I’m preparing for my blog site and Facebook:

Herman Cain who is vying for the nomination to be the Republican candidate for president says that President Obama could not run one of his pizza parlors.  He wasn’t saying that to be insulting.  It’s what he truly believes.  President Obama has never run so much as a newspaper stand.  He has nothing in his resume that would encourage Cain or any other company president to employ him to start at an executive level in any business.  There is only one place where money can constantly be printed to keep a failing enterprise afloat – it’s the Federal Government.  Anywhere else it’s necessary to know what to do to turn a failing business around.  This is what Herman Cain did when he became Chief Executive Officer of Godfather’s Pizza.  For those who didn’t know in 2008 that Obama was so totally unqualified to run the biggest business in the land as President of the United States, unless they have their heads buried in the sand, they should know it now.     

                   
    

Lifespan of Republics

This is something I posted awhile back.  Considering the track this country is on it could be worthwhile to be keeping in mind:

Lifespan of a Republic

This article was e-mailed to me and is on the Internet:

About the time our original 13 states adopted their new constitution, in 1787, Alexander Tytler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh, had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic some 2,000 years prior:

"A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship."

"The average age of the world's greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these nations always progressed through the following sequence:

From bondage to spiritual faith;

From spiritual faith to great courage;

From courage to liberty;

From liberty to abundance;

From abundance to complacency;

From complacency to apathy;

From apathy to dependence;

From dependence back into bondage."

Professor Joseph Olson of Hamline University School of Law, St. Paul, Minnesota, points out some interesting facts concerning the 2000 Presidential election:

Population of counties won by: Gore: 127 million; Bush: 143 million;

Square miles of land won by: Gore: 580,000; Bush: 2,427,000

States won by: Gore: 19 Bush: 29

Murder rate per 100,000 residents in counties won by: Gore: 13.2 Bush: 2.1

Professor Olson adds: "In aggregate, the map of the territory Bush won was mostly the land owned by the tax-paying citizens of this great country. Gore's territory mostly encompassed those citizens living in government-owned tenements and living off government welfare..."

Olson believes the United States is now somewhere between the "complacency and apathy" phase of Professor Tyler's definition of democracy, with some 40 percent of the nation's population already having reached the "governmental dependency" phase.
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Don't Blame Bush

From the time I first heard Obama crying about what he inherited regarding the economy my response was to think and say to myself, "This was no inheritance. It's what you brought with you." The Democrats had dictatorial, unencumbered, veto-proof charge of the purse strings during the last two years of the Bush administration. This article written by Thomas Sowell in September 2010 expresses exactly what I've been saying to anyone who would listen:

http://washingtonexaminer.com/node/460586

I also appreciate Sowell pointing out that President Clinton had the benefit of a Republican Congress for the last six years he was in office. Let's give credit where credit is due for the surplus he likes to brag about.

A video on You-Tube is also something that should be dusted off from time to time to see and hear in the Democrats own words who was responsible for the crash in the housing market - click on the Barney Frank pictures:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MGT_cSi7Rs

I would also like to remind Bush-bashers that the Bush tax cuts brought about 54 months of economic growth that was only slowed when the OPEC countries declared economic war on us in 2008 when they gradually brought the price of their oil to the peak of $147 a barrel. We chose to be reliant on them for our oil needs instead of being self-reliant as we could have been.

Check out this video on You-tube by Professor Steve Horwitz on oil:

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcWkN4ngR2Y

U. S. Oil Resources

Attorney General, Eric Holder, said we're a nation of cowards. No, but to some degree we are a nation of idiots and in economic straits we don’t have to be in. That is, enough of the populace to put a roadblock in the way of letting us make use of our own vast resources of oil and natural gas. They'd prefer to keep us beholden to hostile foreign nations for our oil needs. Our economy would skyrocket. The cost of energy to run our vehicles, heat our homes would be down and family budgets would be more manageable. Costs of all commodities and travel expenses would be lower. The fear of falling behind paying bills and mortgage payments could all but vanish and the entire economy would flourish. A good example of this is North Dakota where the unemployment rate is 3.5% and their economy is flourishing because of the income and revenue that's coming in through the use of their oil.

Whether the enviro ideologues like it or not, this country uses oil. And the means by which this country mines the oil is likely a lot more friendly to the environment than the way it's done in third world countries.

The United States is second only to Russia in its vast resources of oil and natural gas. The Internet has a world of information about this. Unfortunately, because of federal mandates due to the influence of wealthy environmentalists most of those stores are locked away. Check out the information this link leads to:

http://www.wealthwire.com/aqx_p/25727?gclid=CO3PiOjGhagCFdMD5Qodsk9fJw

Watch this program on You-Tube or go to my post on Facebook "Are we running out of resources?" by Professor Horwitz:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcWkN4ngR2Y

The income and the wealth we would create by energetically producing our oil and natural gas would enable us to ambitiously research and develop renewable sources of energy and provide the hope for a time when fossil fuels would be found to be almost entirely obsolete as a source of energy. We don’t have to keep the country in a state of chaos by keeping oil resources off limits to incentivize us to develop renewable sources of energy.

Not being independent of foreign oil also creates complications with our foreign affairs, especially with hostile Middle East Nations. And the wealth it would create would enable us to clear up our debt to other nations. We currently owe China close to a trillion dollars and Japan 8.6 billion. Iran and Libya, of all places, are also on the list of our creditors.

Obama and oil

Obama says he wants to reduce our dependence on foreign oil by 1/3rd in ten years. He wants to do this by developing renewable sources of energy.


We don't have to wait ten years to get the economy moving. All we have to do is to start to earnestly develop our own vast resources of oil and natural gas. The United States is the second richest nation in the world in oil stores, surpassed only by Russia according to geologists' reports. Check out the information on the Internet this link leads to:  http://oilshalegas.com/bakkenshale.html

It's about the oil deposits in the Williston Basin in Montana, North and South Dakota and Saskatchewan. Geologists findings indicate that there is more oil there than there is in Saudi Arabia. The revenue generated by being energy independent through the use of our own oil would go a long way to provide the funds we need for research and development of renewable sources of energy. We've got the horse behind the cart if we're going to put our efforts into developing renewable sources of energy while we struggle with a stagnant economy because we don't want to tap our oil resources. It's like a family living on welfare while they have a treasure buried in their back yard.

We currently send a trillion dollars every year a half out of this country to foreign nations - some of whom are not very friendly - for our oil needs that we could be producing right here that would put our own people to work.

The very knowledge that we're going all out to tap our own oil deposits would cause the oil producing nations we've been choosing to put our dependence on to immediately start cutting back their prices - if for no other reason but to hopefully disincentivize us from drilling.

We could be competitors on the world market and be reducing our debt to foreign nations by giving them oil to credit toward that debt.

We owe China close to a trillion dollars and Japan 8.6 billion. And, unbelievably, we owe a sizable portion of our national debt to Libya and Iran. What does that do in matters of conducting our foreign affairs?

Health Care

This is an article I prepared for my blogsite prior the healthcare bill being enacted into law:



On the issue of Health Care Insurance - and I'd like to see this proposed by an authority who might be listened to quicker than they'll listen to me.

85% of the people are satisfied with their Health Care Insurance. Of the 15% that are not insured there are those who cannot afford insurance; there are those who are well enough off that they're willing to pay for their health care needs as they go; there are those who lost their health insurance when they became unemployed; some can't get insurance because they have pre-existing conditions etc.

I don't see why a health insurance plan can't be modeled after automobile insurance plans. Years ago, and maybe it is still in play, automobile insurers all got together and paid into what was called the Assigned Risk Pool. The pool provided insurance for new car drivers and others who were considered poor risks. By means of this pool, everyone was insured.

If all the health care insurers in the country paid into a pool, such as what is - or was done - in the Automobile Insurance Industry, it could provide insurance to everyone that needs it. It could allay the fears of the insurers that the Government would take over the Health Insurance Industry with a Nationalized Health Care plan.

There are quirks that would have to be ironed out, of course. With auto insurance the law requires everyone to have insurance and no one argues the State's mandate and requirement for people to have insurance because they want to collect if they've been harmed through someone else's fault.

Health insurance is different. It would have to be studied to see if people could be compelled to have it. But all but the well-to-do would surely not want to be without it. A study could be made for those who are in that lower income category to pay according to their means. The poorest would have to pay some small fee or perform community service so they don't clog the system running for treatment for every little sniffle. There would have to be a charity care program set up to care for anyone who is completely incapacitated.

And so it goes for that portion of the people that get their health insurance from this pool that would mimic the Assigned Risk Pool of the Auto Industry. A study would have to be made to see what income level a plan like this should be available to.

As with auto insurance the only Government involvement would be for each state to have a commissioner to settle whatever grievances that might come up.

A privately run plan such as this could end the fears of imposing a trillion dollar burden on the taxpayer over the next decade.



Of course, if we're in the grip of an administration that's bent on transforming our Republic/Democracy into a Socialist/Communist State this plan would not appeal to it.

OIL

Eric Holder said that we're a nation of cowards. If, instead, he had said we're a nation of fools, he would have said something with some degree of truth. That is, those of us who don't want to develop our own vast resources of oil and natural gas and want to keep us beholden to foreign hostile nations for our oil needs. And vast resources it is. Check this out:
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/editorial/7380721.html

Disgraceful Behavior

This is a letter to the editor that appeared in the 2/28/11 issue of the Washington Times:

Disgraceful behavior

By the attitudes and ac­tions of the Wisconsin protesters and other of like mind, we are certain they never would have survived the Great De­pression or World War II like their parents and grandparents, who should be extremely ashamed of their thuggish, childish behavior. Most of us, who pay their inflated salaries, don't get a union, govern­ment, or double dip re­tirement package. We saved ours all by our­selves, by choosing smaller homes, driving our cars 10-15 years, and forgoing lavish sporting/entertainment events.

This regime has elimi­nated 25 percent of our hard-earned retirement, caused a 30-40 percent increase in our medical insurance costs, added 30 percent in food, gas (where's the rage over $3.00 a gallon now?), taxes, and utilities, with no end in sight.  How much more money will you waste before our for­eign lenders take over?  Where will these protest­ers be then?

For years we have poured billions of dollars into education, even our road funds, leaving us with miserable highways. Yet, what do we have to show for this money?  How about more fraud and graft and lazy, illiter­ate students who show no respect for their teachers or their schools.  We have triple the administrators we need, making triple the salary they earn.  We have social programs that impede kids from being productive citizens. We have programs that waste years coddling non-citi­zens through our schools, giving them advantages over our kids who have to pay their own way. We have unqualified teachers who should have never been hired, and who can't get fired, dragging down the dedicated ones who really care.  Don't tell me we can't cut fat out of this Pig.

We are sick, sick, sick of the "entitlement" union thugs demanding more from those who pay their inflated salaries, re­tirement, and medial beanies, and who refuse to participate in rebuild­ing a strong fiscal nation. Where are the repercus­sions from breaking their union/school contract?  Where did they get their professional signs and who paid for them... union dues or your taxes??  Why isn't the Jus­tice Department issuing injunctions to go back to work or not be paid?  Their greed is appalling, and their holding our kids hostage is degrading to their profession and a blight on their character.

B. C. Lochridge

McKinnev. Texas


I have a blog post further down (entitled Lifespan of a Republic) about information that was passed on by Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor, about how republics literally cannibalize themselves and meet their demise because of entitlements.  Tyler states that the average lifespan of a republic is 200 years.


Quote of the Day !!!

"The budget should be balanced, the Treasury should be refilled, public debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered and controlled, and the assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed lest Rome becomes bankrupt.  People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance."
 -- Cicero, 55 BC !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That was close to the time that Rome ended as a republic and
Julius Caesar took over as the first Roman emperor.

Victory ignored by media

---------- Forwarded Message ----------
Hi, This is a must read - Hank

Hank Bried

Financial Services Rep.

19700 N. 76th St #1022

Scottsdale Az. 85255

480-368-9893 h; 602-721-0606 c


From: ADRIENNE DODD

Subject: Fw: Shocking Good News !!!!!!!!

----- Original Message -----

--- On Wed, 12/31/08, Andy Anderson wrote:

Your kind of news!

Ready for a shock? Below is an article from the London Times about our military. Interesting, it is! Our media coverage is shameful!

Winning Isn't News - By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY

Iraq: What would happen if the U.S. won a war but the media didn't tell the American public? Apparently, we have to rely on a British newspaper for the news that we've defeated the last remnants of al-Qaida in Iraq .

London's Sunday Times called it 'the culmination of one of the most spectacular victories of the war on terror.' A terrorist force that once numbered more than 12,000, with strongholds in the west and central regions of Iraq, has over two years been reduced to a mere 1,200 fighters, backed against the wall in the northern city of Mosul.

The destruction of al-Qaida in Iraq (AQI) is one of the most unlikely and unforeseen events in the long history of American warfare. We can thank President Bush's surge strategy, in which he bucked both Republican and Democratic leaders in Washington by increasing our forces there instead of surrendering.

We can also thank the leadership of the new general he placed in charge there, David Petraeus, who may be the foremost expert in the world on counter-insurgency warfare. And we can thank those serving in our military in Iraq who engaged local Iraqi tribal leaders and convinced them America was their friend and AQI their enemy.

Al-Qaida's loss of the hearts and minds of ordinary Iraqis began in Anbar Province, which had been written off as a basket case, and spread out from there. Now, in Operation Lion's Roar the Iraqi army and the U.S. 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment is destroying the fraction of terrorists who are left. More than 1,000 AQI operatives have already been apprehended.

Sunday Times (London) reporter Marie Colvin, traveling with Iraqi forces in Mosul, found little AQI presence even in bullet-ridden residential areas that were once insurgency strongholds, and reported that the terrorists have lost control of its Mosul urban base, with what is left of the organization having fled south into the countryside.

Meanwhile, the State Department reports that Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government has achieved 'satisfactory' progress on 15 of the 18 political benchmarks 'a big change for the better from a year ago.' Things are going so well that Maliki has even for the first time floated the idea of a timetable for withdrawal of American forces. He did so while visiting the United Arab Emirates ,which over the weekend announced that it was forgiving almost $7 billion of debt owed by Baghdad, an impressive vote of confidence from a fellow Arab state in the future of a free Iraq.

But where are the headlines and the front-page stories about all this good news? As the Media Research Center pointed out last week, 'the CBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News and CNN's Anderson Cooper 360 were silent Tuesday night about the benchmarks 'that signaled political progress.'

The war in Iraq has been turned around 180 degrees both militarily and politically because the president stuck to his guns. Yet apart from IBD, Fox News Channel and parts of the foreign press, the media don't seem to consider this historic event a big story.

Copyright 2008 Investor's Business Daily. All Rights Reserved.

Addendum: The reason you haven't seen this on American television or read about it in the American press is simple--journalism is 'dead' in this country. They are controlled by Liberal Democrats who would rather see our troops defeated than recognize a successful Republican initiated response to 9/11.

Media probably are holding 'til after coronation of BHO in order to give him credit.

Citizenship

Forwarded electronic letter:

Subject: Countries that offer birthright citizenship

In God we trust!

Obviously we're the only racially paranoid dopes to the very point of destroying our National Identity. And for "What? and for Who?"

HERE ARE ALL THE DEVELOPED NATIONS OF THE WORLD THAT OFFER BIRTHRIGHT

C ITIZENSHIP TO THE BABIES OF TOURISTS AND ILLEGAL ALIENS:

1. United States

That's right, every other modern developed nation in the world has gotten rid of birthright citizenship policies. Yet, during the last few months, most of U.S. news media and many politicians have ridiculed comments by some other politicians that it is time for the U.S. to put an end to birthright citizenship for tourists and illegal aliens.

Folks, the U.S. stands alone.

There used to be all kinds of Developed countries that gave away their citizenship as freely as we do in the U.S. But one by one they all have recognized the folly of that policy.

SOME MODERN COUNTRIES THAT RECENTLY ENDED THEIR BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP POLICY:

Canada was the last non-U.S ... holdout. Illegal aliens stopped getting citizenship for their babies in 2009

Australia's birthright citizenship requirements are much more stringent than those of H.R. 1868 and took effect in 2007

New Zealand repealed in 2006

Ireland repealed in 2005

France repealed in 1993

India repealed in 1987

United Kingdom repealed in 1983

Portugal repealed in 1981


The United States is now the laughing stock of the modern world.

Only the U.S. values its citizenship so lowly as to distribute it promiscuously to the off-spring of foreign citizens visiting Disney World on tourist visas and to foreign citizens who have violated their promises on their visitor, work and student visas to stay illegally in the country, as well as to those who just plain sneak across our borders.

It's not just Mexico and South America who are sending illegals across our borders. Currently, the CBP reports that of those apprehended illegally crossing the border, China is number one.

Wake up America.

Illegal aliens from China , India , Russia , the Middle East and a host of other nations are flooding the country. Ironically, some of these illegals and/or their offspring are given positions at the front of the line for Government jobs, contracts and assistance.

Look around you! We are giving away our culture, and economic and fiscal strength because our borders are not secure and we bestow citizenship irresponsibly.

US awash with oil

This is a note  I sent to Glenn Beck when the issue of oil was being discussed once again:


Thanks for once again (2/22) calling attention to the harm that's being done to our economy by not going after our own vast resources of oil and natural gas. Instead we leave it to foreign hostile nations to provide for our needs and face the consequence of paying the cost of their oil according to their whims or the unstable circumstances these countries find themselves in.

The extortionist pricing imposed on us in 2008 was the #1 cause of bringing down our economy. Everything else was the effect. When the price of a barrel of foreign oil was gradually raised to the peak of $147 a barrel, gasoline prices rose to over $4.00 a gallon, putting a strain on every family budget and every industry - most directly and noticeably the airline and shipping companies. Is it any wonder that some people would fall behind paying their bills and making their mortgage payments, especially the ones laid off because of the pressures imposed on businesspeople.?

This country is awash with oil and natural gas.  Just Google Bakken oil deposit and scroll to "Massive oil deposit could increase US reserves 10x."  In the 1870s John D. Rockefeller was refining 90% of the oil used in the US - his competitors the other ten percent and we were energy independent. (Google John D. Rockefeller in Wikipedia and look for the sub-title "Standard Oil").  The oil fields being harvested by JDR in almost every state in the union in the 19th century did not exactly dry up.

Our economy could soar replacing our dependence on foreign oil through the use of our own, and the capital and revenue it would generate could provide robust investment in research and development of alternative means of energy.  By offering China our oil at a price attractive to them, they wouldn't have to pay with hard cash but could be crediting our almost one trillion dollar account and gradually eliminating our debt to them.

Social Security

A note I sent to Sean Hannity when the subject matter being discussed was Social Security:


There is a solution to bringing about a healthily administered Social Security program. This is something that should be handled like an insurance program the same way we pay for auto insurance, homeowner’s, etc. Most of us pay into insurance programs that we hope we’ll never need.  I’ve driven accident free for 59 years.  I paid insurance all those years and don’t regret not having to avail myself of payment from the companies I dealt with.  Social Security could be handled the same way.  People should be made to understand that they’re paying into a program that they’ll only be able to collect on if they have the misfortune of being in a certain low enough income level to need it when they retire. That level could be determined periodically as the economy changes.  At the present time it surely doesn’t make sense that Social Security should be paid to people making a half-million dollars or more.  Bully for them for having the good fortune that through their industry and good fortune they find themselves in that income category.