STARVE THE FEDS

Is the $20 billion settlement between BP and President Obama the be-all end-all to the rule of law and the beginning of the rule of Men? When did the Executive Branch become less about enforcing laws and more about making up the rules as they go along? Is this the end of the Constitution? Will the election of freedom-loving conservatives reverse course, or will they seize and feast upon the new power the liberals have handed to them? If the Bush Administration took government power from one to ten, and the Obama Administration took the ten and made it a hundred, will the new administration make it a thousand? Is a hundred good enough? How about ten? What will it take to get there?

It took health care and BP to bring it from a hundred to a thousand. BP CEO Tony Hayward just handed the golden opportunity to our runaway federal government. If the feds are talking the $20 billion as a “down payment”, then we aren’t starving the feds. We’re giving them carte blanche at the all-you-can-eat buffet, and then drinking excessively on the house – the tab being ours – and then they get the women to boot.

I thought political hecklers aren’t supposed to get attention. I just saw an article on Yahoo showing a woman covered in oil screaming at the Congressional hearing. What a bunch of contrived theater. Then again, so is the idea of Congress grilling someone to give the citizens a show. It’s a media lions den.

BP got in bed with the federal government, and the government seduction was complete. What’s with the $75 million limited liability clause allowed to oil companies for oil spills; especially after the Exxon Valdez scandal wore off? Why did the feds disallow a shallower well when Louisiana allowed it? Why did Obama reject the Louisiana governor’s pleas to build dunes to block the oil spill for so long? Why doesn’t Obama plug the damn hole, so to speak?

Now people are mad, and rightfully so. I just wish we had the foresight to know we don’t think clearly when mad. The federal government knows, and refuses to let the crisis go to waste in a blatant power grab.

I’m sorry about supporting the Patriot Act at one time. I trusted Bush, despite the screaming from those who pleaded to watch the government power grab. I didn’t listen. One would think that after our trust was betrayed by one President, that we would watch the next one like a hawk. It turns out that the ones who warned us were right, but much fewer in number than I hoped. The liberal media picked up on it, and flew with it. Now Obama is making a ten into a hundred, and people have turned a blind eye.

The power levels have to be so intoxicating, that anyone, no matter their intentions, will lust after keeping the power after getting several tastes. It’s what made the 1994 Republican Congress blow it for everyone. Even if the 2010 Congress was as conservative as the voters allowed it, with all the new power government has, will they have the willpower to turn back what the Class of 1994 couldn’t with such a meeker opponent? What confidence do we have that any human being can take the Rule of Men and turn it back to the Rule of Law? Even if any human being/s could do that, what safeguards would be in place to ensure the line isn’t crossed again? If the safeguards take the form of words, as the law typically does, what’s to stop anyone’s disregard for those words as our current government does for the Constitution?

The $20 billion is yet another example about it being all about the money. Money that will go wherever the government wants it to go, so the company presidents can line up the campaign coffers in time for the next election. It’s why the “Porkulus Plan” was such a disaster. It’s why there’s no real job recovery – because the Census isn’t permanent, and Obama’s moratorium on offshore drilling killed even more jobs.

George Soros has upended small countries’ economies singlehandedly just by pulling out of stocks and funds here and there. His volume is the name of the game. Now is he pulling Obama’s strings, as Glenn Beck and Jim Quinn have alleged for several years now, but I was hoping I wouldn’t have to confront and believe? Why is Brazil allowed to expand their offshore drilling, then? Soros has his pockets in Brazil oil, and Obama is handing him the capital. So if Soros is that powerful, and wants to exert that power toward transforming America into a system that is the socialist ash to capitalism’s fire? When did our flame go out?

It hasn’t. The Tea Party knows it (not the Republican cover up parties, by the way), the Campaign For Liberty folks know it, and even if many of us don’t know it, we suspect it, or know something just isn’t right. We all joke about how politicians are corrupt almost automatically, but that doesn’t mean we just have to accept it and take it up the rear end in the name of not making waves or appearing crazy to folks.

Those in power are playing with fire. The world hangs at an edge of a cliff. We’re not off it yet, but the conditions are becoming more prevalent. The Titanic sinks while we arrange the furniture.

In America, there should be no such thing as helplessness.

I consider Arthur Laffer a reasonable man. The guy relies on the beauty of mathematical logic rather than rely on second-hand news/opinion accounts like those who are mathematically illiterate are forced to do. His economic/tax theory, illustrated by the parabolic Laffer Curve, has been proven time and time again. For those who hate numbers, all he illustrates is that if the government starts at collecting zero taxes and then increases tax rates, generally incoming tax revenue increases. By default, that also means that all our individual outgoing tax expenses increase.

However, if government keeps increasing tax rates, that does NOT mean they will necessarily collect more taxes as a result. The Laffer Curve shows that the people who pay the taxes hit a breaking point as tax rates increase. Meaning, the more your goods cost more as a result of higher rates, the less goods you’ll buy, which means the less taxes are being collected. It makes sense that if we get penalized more and more for purchasing products, then we’ll just slow down or stop buying the products.

It’s the same reason some people in certain situations are reluctant to get raises at work – they know that the raise will trigger a higher tax bracket, and so they will take home less money as a result. Thanks a lot, progressive income tax system, and those who support it by keeping quiet and accepting business as usual.

So when the Bush tax cuts expire starting 2011, that means income taxes will go up, dividend taxes will go up, the capital gains tax will go up, and the estate tax (which is a fancy term for DEATH TAX) will be awakened from the dead. We die, and taxes will live.

Businesses with any financial foresight know this. Therefore, they are looking to produce as much as they can in 2010 to take advantage of the lower tax rate, so they can hoard when the higher tax rate goes into effect, which will minimize their penalties for producing. Which leads me to this thought – why are there penalties for producing anyway?

This phenomenon, called an “income shift”, will make 2010 look better than it should, but also makes 2011 and later much worse than it should. Just as the Cash For Flunkers program seemed successful at the time, only to find out the real result was that sales were stolen from the future. Someone who would have bought a car in September ended up buying them in July when the program was in effect. One more car sold in July means one less car sold in September. Instead of an even flow that is forecastable, the sales were distorted in favor of the timeline that the program was in effect.

Of course, Obama and the Congress could stick some provision in on a bill that would cancel the deadline, and let the current tax rates stand as they are, but they seem too busy convincing us that this isn’t a tax increase, it’s just an expiration of temporary tax discounts. Ummm…sounds like an increase to me. However, it is possible that if this becomes more of a political hotspot issue that we may see something passed sometime in late December, just in time for all tax preparers to relearn tax law after their software has already been installed for 2010. Nothing new here, Nothing to see here, please move along.

The Great Recession is here to stay for awhile. Jobs are opening up somewhat, but I wonder if that well will dry after the New Year rolls around. It’s times like these where I wish Mr. Laffer were wrong for once. Only time will tell.

It’s becoming a more hostile environment to those who want to remain neutral when it comes to betting our lives and livings in this world. The political class seems intent on having any given citizen believe that politics is a luxury and not a necessity; one can choose whether to follow the political winds of change or just to stand aside. The political class also seems intent on encouraging the thought that it’s ok if we don’t pay attention because we work long hours, study hard, and try to keep roofs over our heads. I don’t have to ask anyone for their words to prove this theory; it has been proven by the lack of participation of local Ohioans as far as political party central committees go. It wasn’t hard for me to go through – I found my precinct/ward’s representative slot had been vacant, I got 9 signatures in my ward (only 5 needed to be certified as valid), and I went unopposed in the primary. One vote in, and I win.

I’ve been tempted to fall into the trap that I don’t need to access information as much as I do. I don’t stare at TV news scrolls 24 hours a day, I don’t refresh news stories constantly, and my car radio reception has taken a nosedive since my car was repaired due to hitting a deer during campaign season. I’ve almost been tempted to end internet access and just focus on taking care of my property and my family, and outside politics be damned. My logic was that no matter what happened outside my property lines, if any of it came to my front door, I could deal with it then.

However, the tax bill always makes its way to the dining room table to be reviewed. Intrusive laws remind me of how a contract between a land buyer and land seller is really a contract among three parties – the two I listed previously, plus government. Add to that the fact that we have allowed our various levels of government the rights to seize our gross wages before we even receive our paychecks. You don’t need a front door for that.

Lines are being drawn, and I want to be at the front lines for it. Maybe most of you don’t want to participate, but I do. So here are some world changing events that have happened recently, with paragraph bites to demonstrate the lines, and which side is the right one.

Israel

Israel is the only beacon of true freedom in the Middle East, is it not? I don’t know Israel well. All I know is that the country has faced resistance from extremist Muslims, the UN, and Jew-haters everywhere since Israel was reformed in 1948. All three of those subsets are so ingrained as to not deserve any public trust from any freedom loving individual; therefore, if they make so much noise about how bad Israel is, then maybe Israel is doing something right. Add to that the fact that Israel has continued to voluntarily give up land such as the Gaza Strip against the wishes of their countrymen, and the war continues. The burden of proof is on the extremist Muslims, the UN, and the Jew haters, not on Israel. Let freedom ring.

BP Oil Spill

BP screwed up. Mistakes happen, but this mistake has cost mankind 11 lives, and has caused the animal and plant kingdoms countless losses that we’ll never be able to tally years from now. BP has made the oil industry look terrible, and has given our opportunistic federal government another reason to level a campaign against capitalism. I’m tired of stupid mistakes giving the opposition more ammunition to make the fight that much more harder for us. I think if accounting scandals have led to our ability to jail CEOs and CFOs held responsible, maybe these standards should apply to true environmental scandals such as these. I’m not talking the decline of the dodo bird population, I’m talking the oil covered wildlife along the Gulf Coast along with the tourism industry that has all but vanished. No slippery slopes, please. We have enough of those.

Republicans and Democrats

I’m trying my hand at being a registered Republican for the first time in my life. Not because I want to follow party politics, but because if this country is to be saved from deterioration, we must utilize options already in place before embarking on unchartered territory. I don’t know what to expect, or what people expect from me, but I will strive to be a conservative voice that has been severely lacking in the past.

A purely democratic system is wrong, regardless of who is in the majority. Socialism is also dead wrong. Freedom must be maintained or it will be left to deteriorate. Freedom and liberty must be guarded by highly vigilant people who can be trusted to do so by those who aren’t able to be so devoted for whatever reason. It seems socialism is wanting to use the vehicle of democracy and the Democratic Party to let freedom decay into a lower level of mankind – where we voluntarily surrender our liberty to our elected officials without a shot being fired. The media has somehow become a cheerleading vehicle for this, and people seem to allow themselves to be told what to feel about certain situations. I’m not saying news and opinion shows should stop their schtick; they shouldn’t. It all boils down to the people. You can go down the candy aisle, but you don’t have to buy the candy. You can watch Glenn Beck give his opinion, but you don’t have to allow it to substitute it for yours.

Democracy and socialism are beautiful systems and methodologies until you throw numbers into the mix. Numbers are the breaking point. Numbers are the ultimate in accountability. If everyone were highly capable of obtaining the correct information and had high skill levels in statistical operations, then the numbers would speak for themselves and the political tricks would be seen through, as well they should. I was told by one person that the reason he would vote for me for Richland County Commissioner was because with me, “two plus two would always equal four”. Damn straight. Two plus two can never equal five, no matter what spin the press or political hacks try to put on it. You can’t tell me black is white. You can’t put gray where it isn’t. Anyone that cannot define an “unfunded liability” without looking it up on Google should just stay home on voting day. Free lunches and broken promises lead to riots in Greece. We’re heading there. If it came to a violent revolution against a government that is very intent on retaining its overbloated power, whose side are you on? I don’t want another Tiananmen Square, I don’t want another failed uprising that Iran just had, I don’t want my life to exist at the behest of Kim Jong-Il. Even if we wanted to give a government full of good people more power to set things right, there’s nothing to stop bad people from utilizing the same power to fight against us. Worse yet, good people go bad when power is dangled in front of them. Money, power, prestige, and ego strokes hurt everyone, even at the local level. That is why government power should be minimized. Power to the people of 300,000,000+ and counting seems to me a better option than surrendering that power to hundreds of elected and unelected officals at the federal level.

To remain “neutral” is to allow the deterioration to happen, and falsely allow the neutralite to claim that they aren’t responsibile for the results. Not anymore. To not pick a side is to have the side picked for you.

Resistance is not just revolution. Resistance also comes in smaller, incremental forms, such as telling the census worker that you refuse to answer their questions. Resistance is putting up with shallow fair-weather friends that abandon you at the first sign of political disagreement. Resistance is pitting your home-schooling ethic against the teachers’ unions and our socialistic way of collecting school district taxes. Resistance is insisting on birthing your newborn child at home with the assistance of midwives, and not an automatic conforming to the habit of going to the hospital, as if hospitals have had to exist as a prerequisite long before we let mankind reproduce. Resistance is telling doctors that you refuse to let them vaccinate or let them take blood samples if you don’t want them to. Resistance is taking the long hard road full of people annoyed with you, irritated with you, and wishing you took the same simple road as they did. Resistance is taking the time to understand ourselves, and surrounding ourselves with those who think outside of others’ boxes. Resistance is knowing what’s right and using absolute determination to stick to it no matter if it goes out of style with other people. Resistance is no longer giving in to people that yell at you if you know they’re wrong but would give in just to avoid hassle. Resistance is hassle. Resistance is determination. Resistance is knowing who you are, and how you won’t let others chip away at it without just cause. Resistance is not letting ANYONE take anything from you that you don’t want them to have. It’s easier to give in and go “neutral”. I know who I am. Whose side are you on?