It’s time for a change…
An article by guest contributor, Richard P
While we are not but a year into what I am finding to be the most humorous presidency of my life (alas I have only seen three to this point), the staggered decline in presidential approval ratings for President Obama does not offset the curious and ever-present phenomenon of the Obama maniacs.
It would be so easy to adopt the most appealing conclusion that a substantial amount of the 53 percent of this country that elected this man are ignorant and enjoy following charisma in blind faith, that hypothesis would take this note (and its almost guaranteed subsequent feedback) in a direction that would include a detailed discussion on the most common historical effects that ignorance and blind faith has had on such civilizations. So, I shall rule out any shred of possibility that people have no clue what is going on in this country and are not able to tell one candidate from the other when it comes to issues and say for the sake of argument that all 70ish million people, dead and alive, that voted for our current president did so with a full and complete understanding of the issues and the way our government works.
With that in mind, I am interested to see how those same people, looking at the platform, promises, last eight years, would either qualify my conclusion, justify their own conclusions, or (hopefully) reconcile the following information with what was guaranteed by those who are in government now.
Let’s start with something easy. Everyone loves to attack Bush and I still hear people say that things are better now, particularly economically and in foreign policy, than when Bush was in office.
About the time when Bush left office, the national debt was approximately $9.8 trillion with a 2008 deficit of around $450 billion. Bush was spending at a rate that was 58 percent faster than inflation and this country endured a steady 2.7 percent increase in unemployment (4 to 6.7 since 2000). Finally, and what I found most astounding, was that consumer confidence went from 115.7 in 2001 all the way down to 38.0 in 2008. I won’t go into Bush’s foreign policy facts and figures because MSNBC reminds us all every day because they can’t seem to let it go. However, inevitably Bush’s policies will be somewhat compared to this president as later I will highlight some fun facts and hypotheses about Obama’s foreign policy strategy.
Now compare the numbers above to what we are seeing now. Unemployment as of the beginning of May was at 8.9 percent. The debt is over $11 trillion. The stock market, while it has bounced back somewhat, reached its lowest point in over 100 years back in March (including the 29 crash for those of you like me who have trouble adding). The deficit for 2009 is $1.85 trillion and is expected to reach almost 10 in the next decade. According to experts, this country would still experience $150 billion deficits in 2030. My personal favorite for those of you who say, “Well he just started,” or “Give him a chance,” the DJIA and S&P are outstanding indicators of consumer confidence and market confidence. The Dow lost almost 1000 points in the two days following the election and the S&P dropped ten percent in market value, without Obama saying anything except “thank you for electing me.” That is some confidence.
So now we get to who is paying the bill. Again, lets forget for a moment about scary possibility that we could become China’s submissive sex toy in the coming decades for all the debt we have with it, and focus on just Americans. Obama wants to hike taxes on just the folks who make over $250,000 a year. In his words, “they can afford to pay a little more to help this country out.” While people below $60,000 pay approximately A PERCENT of this country’s taxes, under Obama’s tax policy, those of us who actually work our asses off and make some money will see 15.6 percent payroll tax, 33 percent increase in capital gains taxes, and 39.6 percent in income tax, meaning that if you lived in Florida, you would owe the government 56 cents to every dollar earned (so now you make a little less than $125,000 a year) or up to 2/3 of your income if you live in California. That means that under Obama’s plan, the guy at McDonalds and the corporate lawyer or hospital department head can afford the same quality of life (roughly). Additionally, remember how we all thought Bush was spending too fast for our growth? Well Obama is spending 116 percent faster than the inflation rate. And while he fiercely opposed the idea of taxing any kind of health benefits, Obama now expresses an openness to taxing health benefits, which would be a neat thing to watch especially if he were able to socialize medicine. Finally, Obama has also been very sensitive to small businesses and wanting to preserve the “backbone” of America. Funny story, 75 percent of the top 5 percent of the income bracket in America are small business owners. I’m going to guess that if they are in the top 5 percent, they probably make more than $250,000. How fast can the economy fall? Oh yeah, and all of this has happened in less than 200 days. Best part, Obama has increased the debt by 2 trillion in that time period which is about half of what Bush did in 8 years. ONWARD!!
I consider myself almost brutally conservative when it comes to fiscal issues but some of this next part I just don’t care about. What irks me, however, is that Obama promised bipartisanship, consensus building, and portrayed himself as a person “we can all” believe in. Unfortunately, the body politik does not align itself so easily. Being the astute individual that Obama is, his first order of business (in the spirit of bi-partisanship) was to announce the closing of Camp X-ray. As if the act alone did not stir up controversy amongst the conservative population of America, the scary possibilities about what to do with these detainees makes me shiver. Option 1: put em in military prisons. I have no problem with that really but I think when the testosterone-filled military community gets its hands on those fellas, human rights violations will occur and that may go against the whole “gotta treat everyone fairly” mantra. Option 2: US prisons. I don’t know how many of you have, well, EVER watched TV before but for those of you who haven’t, prisons usually house dangerous, unstable, and quite often rebellious individuals. I wonder if perhaps the promise of tons of money if they would just go kill some people in the name of extremism might inspire some parolees to carry on the jihad, regardless of religious affiliation. Baller. Liberals 1, Conservatives 0.
Next, Obama repealed the Bush stem-cell laws. Personally, I don’t care if you want to do some gene splicing or whatever to find a cure. I don’t think there is any money in the cure and we probably won’t find it, but do what you gotta do. However I am fairly certain that a pretty large chunk of the roughly 65 percent of this country that practices religion do not see it quite the same way. While the average dope-smoking Berkeley protester can just laugh them off, government officials are accountable to those that they do not agree with on sensitive issues and to alienate the base of this country can produce damaging political consequences. This, in addition to the fact that it doesn’t support the notion that Obama is bipartisan. Liberals 2, Conservatives 0.
Second Amendment. Obama’s words, voting record, and legal career have indicated a trend that he is more in favor of gun laws and heavy gun restrictions (though somewhat tailored to specific areas such as urban communities). Without getting into the Constitutional issues, I will simply say that, again, a big chunk of this country has a fundamental belief in the right to bear arms and while Obama may feel that it is one of the two things they cling to, he would be alienating many people if he started to tighten the grip on firearms. Ironically, the policy behind such restrictions is to reduce crime however the areas of this country with the strictest gun laws actually have the largest gun-related crime rates in the nation. Liberals 2.5, Conservatives 0.5 (just because of the irony 
of it all).
First Amendment. The Fairness Doctrine, that silly beast that Clinton tried to enact, has been advocated expressly by Obama however he has since backpedaled on it. If you are not familiar with this legislation, it basically would “encourage” (meaning force) broadcasters in the media to present both sides of a controversial issue in an “equitable and balanced way.” By the way, Congress will be the group defining controversial and equitable/balanced. Despite widespread criticism and assassination by the legal system, folks are still pressing for it in the Senate and the House. The Supreme Court declared that the Fairness Doctrine would, “dampen…the variety of public debate” when it held that it was all but unconstitutional, 418 U.S. 241. Just for a moment, what if it did pass? I wonder if the Three Musketeers of Olbermann, Matthews, and Maddow would give Hannity or Rush a segment. I bet it would boost the ratings of that embarassing network. We shall depart from this issue with the words of the 1st Amendment: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” Liberals 3, Conservatives 1 (cuz I like round numbers).
While we are on the subject of speech and courts, let’s next look at the recent Supreme Court nominee, Judge Sotomayor. Initially it was all praise and heroic stares (by Obama) and yay for diversity on the court! However, conservative observers noted the nominee’s flare for the dramatic when speaking of sensitive racial issues and she has since been described as leftist and a racist decision-maker. Well, again, regardless of the truth, picking a person for the highest court with even a remote possibility of racial preference in her legal opinions and simply being a flaming liberal does not promote the spirit of bipartisanship, especially when looking at the totality of the circumstances. For me, I doubt if many judges allow their political opinions enter too much into their legal opinions. Even if she is pretty far left, the Court is still balanced and she would have some fun times with Justice Scalia. Her experience would enrich the Court and enhance jurisprudence. So while I think it is ridiculous that the media has basically confirmed her already (see newest TIME cover), I think she is a fine selection and much better than the 50 other San Francisco-based possibilities. Regardless of how it looks now, we all win on this one (no need for points)
Quickly, healthcare. I do not know too much about the system beyond that it is corrupt, brutally capitalist, and needs fixing. While fatass Michael Moore probably credits his movie Sicko to this new awareness, wouldn’t you know it, he oversimplified his information again and there is a multitude of information available that contradicts and expands the Cuban healthcare system (http://lanic.utexas.edu/project/asce/pdfs/volume12/sixto.pdf ). Nevertheless, it is about time that someone stepped up and undertook that monumental task so hat’s off to Obama on that one. However, it is neither the time or the appropriate strategy that the administration has adopted. It wants to introduce a system that is much like those in the UK, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand. It seems to be almost modeled after Canada. So let’s look at Canada.
While they get it all for free (or mostly free), Canadians on average wait anywhere from 14-30 weeks for medical treatment and once treated, the diagnostic procedure takes up to 24 weeks. Some believe that the government-run system may be even more expensive down the road for the consumer than the American system. I can’t for the life of me figure out how something that is free can cost more than something that is not. Obama’s system would cost roughly $1.5 trillion (his own estimates) to cover 50 million people. I am insured but if I could get it free, I am all over that nonsense! If the entire country, which is nearing 300 million people, did this (it is human nature to find something cheaper…hence Walmart), then we are looking at another $9 trillion in addition to the first 9. Doctors and citizens alike flock to the US from Canada because of the wait time and people have died waiting in countries that “benefit” from socialized medicine (http://www.angelfire.com/pa/sergeman/issues/healthcare/socialized.html ).
The sad part about all of this is that Obama has duped the American people into placing all of their hopes and dreams into a government that he believes is, “the only way” to fix these troubled times (economy, jobs, etc). Wake up people! Government is the root cause of all evil in this world, past and present. The bigger it gets, the more dangerous it becomes. Take some responsibility for yourself and stop waiting for a handout or a rehearsed speech about change.
This president promised fiscal responsibility and yet we are reaching debt and deficit levels unprecedented in history. I heard somewhere that if Christopher Columbus put 1 dollar into a banking account from the moment he landed in America, every minute, he would still not have enough money to pay off Obama’s plan.
He promised drastic changes in foreign policy and I’ll give him that. He increased the troop withdrawal from Iraq by 2 weeks but the real changes have been his utter neglect for the threats against America. He is taking gifts from dictators, sending love letters to rivals, and completely ignoring the irrational military regime of North Korea while it threatens to blow up Asia, not to mention it is testing a missile in the coming weeks that can reach the US mainland. Meanwhile, sheer incompetence has resulted in our own nuclear silos becoming public knowledge. Perhaps the single largest national security issue that required no more than shutting the hell up was just given away. Handing out secrets seems to be in step with the federal government’s mission statement after all.
He promised fresh faces and bi-paristanship though his acts convey that he is merely the manchurian puppet of the Reid-Pelosi Congress. He has succeeded in alienating the base of this country because he is too immature to go against those who become aroused whenever he speaks. He has been called the World President and indeed the world may be his principal interest because he is more concerned with appeasing Europe and the Middle East than sticking up for the soldiers who have all but been abandoned in Iraq.
We are being sucked into a culture of dependence and reliance, persuaded by fear that we cannot fend for ourselves unless the righteous hand of Obama does not intervene and show us the way. I get sick thinking of the people I know who claimed that my position on the Iraq War was based on instilling fear to inspire support while these same people worship a man who has done the same with his economic policies. Outrageous.
No doubt I’ll get some opposition and name-calling for this note. In the past, I’ve been told I’m a bigot, ignorant, a hater, idiot, un-American (my personal favorite) and that I need to shut up. Read the First Amendment. Read the facts listed above. Draw your own conclusions.
If anything can be learned from the first days of this president, it is not that everything will be OK because a new suit wanders around the Oval Office, it is that the American people can change the course of this country at the drop of a dime. Change is fine. Trying new things is what this country is all about. It thrives off innovation and entrepreneurship. Tell me this though, how is THIS change helping? How are you going to start up that business with your dad building choppers if you can’t cover your costs because your business declares more than $250,000 a year? What is your incentive to give 100 percent (or more) when the government says it should get 66 percent? What’s the point of trying to be the best and become an expert and a specialist in the business market when the government is going to punish you for it? What are you going to tell your grandchildren when they are paying taxes because you didn’t have collateral for your loan or spent more than you had? Why did you elect a government to do the same exact thing?
