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For most of the last century, save-the-worlders were primarily Democrats and liberals. In contrast, many Republicans and religious conservatives denounced government aid programs, with Senator Jesse Helms calling them “money down a rat hole.”
Nicholas D. Kristof
Over the last decade, however, that divide has dissolved, in ways that many Americans haven’t noticed or appreciated. Evangelicals have become the new internationalists, pushing successfully for new American programs against AIDS and malaria, and doing superb work on issues from human trafficking in India to mass rape in Congo.
A pop quiz: What’s the largest U.S.-based international relief and development organization?
It’s not Save the Children, and it’s not CARE — both terrific secular organizations. Rather, it’s World Vision, a Seattle-based Christian organization (with strong evangelical roots) whose budget has roughly tripled over the last decade.
World Vision now has 40,000 staff members in nearly 100 countries. That’s more staff members than CARE, Save the Children and the worldwide operations of the United States Agency for International Development — combined.
A growing number of conservative Christians are explicitly and self-critically acknowledging that to be “pro-life” must mean more than opposing abortion. The head of World Vision in the United States, Richard Stearns, begins his fascinating book, “The Hole in Our Gospel,” with an account of a visit a decade ago to Uganda, where he met a 13-year-old AIDS orphan who was raising his younger brothers by himself.
“What sickened me most was this question: where was the Church?” he writes. “Where were the followers of Jesus Christ in the midst of perhaps the greatest humanitarian crisis of our time? Surely the Church should have been caring for these ‘orphans and widows in their distress.’ (James 1:27). Shouldn’t the pulpits across America have flamed with exhortations to rush to the front lines of compassion?
“How have we missed it so tragically, when even rock stars and Hollywood actors seem to understand?”
Mr. Stearns argues that evangelicals were often so focused on sexual morality and a personal relationship with God that they ignored the needy. He writes laceratingly about “a Church that had the wealth to build great sanctuaries but lacked the will to build schools, hospitals, and clinics.”
In one striking passage, Mr. Stearns quotes the prophet Ezekiel as saying that the great sin of the people of Sodom wasn’t so much that they were promiscuous or gay as that they were “arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy.” (Ezekiel 16:49.)
Hmm. Imagine if sodomy laws could be used to punish the stingy, unconcerned rich!
The American view of evangelicals is still shaped by preening television blowhards and hypocrites who seem obsessed with gays and fetuses. One study cited in the book found that even among churchgoers ages 16 to 29, the descriptions most associated with Christianity were “antihomosexual,” “judgmental,” “too involved in politics,” and “hypocritical.”
Some conservative Christians reinforced the worst view of themselves by inspiring Ugandan homophobes who backed a bill that would punish gays with life imprisonment or execution. Ditto for the Vatican, whose hostility to condoms contributes to the AIDS epidemic. But there’s more to the picture: I’ve also seen many Catholic nuns and priests heroically caring for AIDS patients — even quietly handing out condoms.
One of the most inspiring figures I’ve met while covering Congo’s brutal civil war is a determined Polish nun in the terrifying hinterland, feeding orphans, standing up to drunken soldiers and comforting survivors — all in a war zone. I came back and decided: I want to grow up and become a Polish nun.
Some Americans assume that religious groups offer aid to entice converts. That’s incorrect. Today, groups like World Vision ban the use of aid to lure anyone into a religious conversation.
Some liberals are pushing to end the longtime practice (it’s a myth that this started with President George W. Bush) of channeling American aid through faith-based organizations. That change would be a catastrophe. In Haiti, more than half of food distributions go through religious groups like World Vision that have indispensable networks on the ground. We mustn’t make Haitians the casualties in our cultural wars.
A root problem is a liberal snobbishness toward faith-based organizations. Those doing the sneering typically give away far less money than evangelicals. They’re also less likely to spend vacations volunteering at, say, a school or a clinic in Rwanda.
If secular liberals can give up some of their snootiness, and if evangelicals can retire some of their sanctimony, then we all might succeed together in making greater progress against common enemies of humanity, like illiteracy, human trafficking and maternal mortality.
Visit and Comment at: Nicholas Kristof’s On The Ground BLOG
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\\ tags: Sodom, World Vision
WASHINGTON—Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd (D., Conn.) is circulating a plan to create a Bureau of Financial Protection within the Treasury Department to supervise mortgages, credit cards and other financial products, as negotiations intensify over how best to rework banking regulations.
The bureau differs from a proposal the White House has pushed for months, which would create a standalone Consumer Financial Protection Agency.
The Treasury bureau, according to a summary reviewed by the Wall Street Journal, would still have the power to write and enforce policies against banks and finance companies of all sizes, with certain restrictions.
The idea is the latest to emanate from Mr. Dodd’s office and could still change as negotiations on a final bill continue. Republicans, who opposed the CFPA idea, are also expected to have several concerns with the new proposal.
One sticking point, several people briefed on talks said, is a concern among Republicans that the bureau will have too much power to write rules and policies affecting banks that are already subject to another federal regulator.
Another significant issue for Republicans is that the agency is a part of the Treasury and could therefore appear too political.
Many Republicans have called for the consumer division to be housed within the primary federal regulator for banks to better coordinate the consumer protection and safety and soundness policies for financial institutions.
Under Mr. Dodd’s proposal, the Treasury bureau’s director would be appointed by the White House.
The bureau would have a “dedicated budget” and the ability to write rules and policies for all companies offering financial products like mortgages.
The entity would be able to examine and enforce its policies for all large banks, and serve as a back-up examiner to banks and credit unions with less than $10 billion of assets, according to a summary of the proposal reviewed by the Wall Street Journal.
It would be able to penalize these smaller companies only if the federal bank regulator’s inspector general agreed that the federal bank regulator wasn’t “acting properly.”
The proposal would limit the power of state regulators to prosecute national banks for alleged violations of state laws, although they would be able to in certain circumstances.
The bureau appears to be Mr. Dodd’s effort to bridge a gap between Democrats and Republicans, in what has become a divisive debate over consumer protection, a flashpoint as Congress seeks to rewrite the rules governing financial markets.
Democrats have argued for months that new consumer protections are needed because banks and finance companies sold to consumers bad mortgages and credit-card deals in the lead up to the financial crisis.
Republicans have said a freestanding consumer protection agency will crack down on banks so hard it will shut off access to credit and further damage the economy.
The broader financial regulatory overhaul would encompass a broad range of new policies, potentially giving the government the power to break up failing financial firms, creating new standards for exotic financial products like derivatives, and putting tougher standards in place for large banks.
The consumer piece has become the biggest sticking point, as banks and business groups have fought aggressively to defeat it.
White House officials have recently said they would back down from their insistence that a new consumer agency be a separate entity as long as it had enough powers to protect consumers.
A key to whether Democrats and Republicans eventually support the Bureau of Financial Protection will be how much power it has and what checks there will be on its powers.
The bureau would be required to consult with federal bank regulators before writing new rules to make sure its policies don’t interfere with the safety and soundness of banks.
It would also have to publish a note in the Federal Register if the regulator for national banks objected to any of its policies.
A proposed council of regulators could potentially veto consumer-protection policies if they are seen as threatening the safety and soundness of banks or the stability of the financial system.
The agency would also be able to examine and penalize finance companies that offer mortgages, even if they aren’t banks.
Aides to Mr. Dodd and Republicans on Capitol Hill are expected to work throughout the weekend to potentially come up with a compromise, and a bill could be proposed next week.
Several people cautioned that it remains unclear if a bipartisan bill is attainable
This proposal comes from the same guy that led the financial political pigs to the banking trough and was part of the reason the mortgage banking system collapsed. Suddenly he has turned into a white knight on a horse.
Dear Senator Dodd,
The only thing that we, the American taxpayers and consumers, need to be protected from are politicians like you.
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\\ tags: Dodd
Is it time to upgrade, improve and repair the downtown alleys? If you think so, then call the City and tell them so, and also call the Grant County PUD Commissioners and tell them so. It seems that the process of getting things upgraded and repaired is stuck between the City and Grant County PUD and unless you call and tell them what you want, things may remain stuck.
written by webmaster
\\ tags: Moses Lake Alleys
In the U.S., doctors are known for working extraordinarily long hours, seeing patients in the office and then at the hospital. But in the last decade American doctors have been either retiring or putting in shorter work weeks while fewer Americans are entering medical school.
There’s a shortage of students in American medical schools and that is one of the issues. In recent years, U.S. medical colleges have graduated an insufficient number of students.
Experts say the United States needs at least 50,000 more doctors, and if nothing is done about it there could be a shortage of 200,000 by the year 2025.
The drop in the number of physicians is acute in rural areas. In addition, there are two growing segments of the population in greater need of medical care: the elderly and the uninsured, largely made up of immigrants and the poor.
So, if there’s a huge demand for medical services, why aren’t doctors putting in longer hours?
Professor Douglas Staiger of Dartmouth College in New Hampshire was the lead author of a study in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
“We think that probably the changing financial and competitive pressures on physicians are just discouraging long work hours,” Staiger said. “They are making that last hour of work less pleasant, less rewarding.”
Residents, who are hospital doctors in training, have historically worked long hours. But in 2003, their hours were cut as a result of mandated limits imposed nationwide.
Dr. Betsy O’Donnell is at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. She says a shorter work week of 80 hours helps her function better. “I’m the mother of two, so I think that it enables me to balance those responsibilities much better than a 100 hour work week would probably allow me to do,” she said.
At first, researchers thought the limits on residents’ hours were the main reason why physicians’ hours were dropping.
But the decline in hours has been throughout the profession, including doctors who do not work in hospitals.
Using data from the US Census bureau, the researchers found that doctor’s hours declined while at the same time their incomes dropped 25 percent between 1995 and 2006.
The loss in income was most likely the result of cuts in private and government insurance reimbursements, the authors said.
One doctor put it this way: the less you are paid, the less incentive there is to work harder.
In addition, American students have found it difficult for decades to get into medical school in their own country. That’s a prime reason for the shortage of new doctors.
The medical profession now says something must be done.
The Association of American Medical Colleges says a 30 percent increase in enrollment is necessary to replenish the supply of doctors.
For the first time in half a century, several new medical schools are planned or already opening.
But some experts worry those students won’t graduate soon enough to resolve the crisis.
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\\ tags: Doctors, Medicine
Fannie to U.S.: We need another $15.3 billion
By Tami Luhby, senior writerFebruary 26, 2010: 6:35 PM ET
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Battered by the housing crisis, mortgage finance company Fannie Mae said Friday that it needs another $15.3 billion in bailout money from the federal government.
Fannie Mae (FNM, Fortune 500), which is controlled by the government, reported a fourth-quarter loss of $16.3 billion, including $1.2 billion in dividend payments to the Treasury Department. This is down from $25.2 billion a year earlier and $19.8 billion in the third quarter.
Webmaster’s Note: The U.S. Banking System is more accurately represented with this house of cards inverted to look like this, with everything ultimately being controlled and defined by The Federal Reserve. Our national finances are all controlled by and defined by the Federal Reserve, which in turn dictates to our Federal Government what it can and cannot do financially. The Federal Reserve pulls the strings and the President and our nation has to jump. It wasn’t that way until the middle of the 1910s when Woodrow Wilson made a deal with the New York bankers and financiers to surrender control of the United States monetary system to them and they have been raping and pillaging the country ever since.
For 2009, however, Fannie’s losses ballooned to $74.4 billion, compared with $59.8 billion in 2008.
Fannie and its smaller sibling, Freddie Mac, are the primary source of mortgage funding in the nation. They bundle home loans that conform to certain standards into securities, attach a guarantee that they will be paid, and sell them to investors. The process gets money back to the banks and other lenders that originate the loans.
In the past year, the two have played a central role in President Obama’s efforts to stem foreclosures and keep people in their homes.
Continuing problems with Fannie Mae’s mortgage portfolio are still straining its finances. Some 5.38% of its single-family loans were more than 90 days delinquent, up from 2.42% a year earlier.
Total nonperforming loans were $216.5 billion at year-end, compared with $198.3 billion in the prior quarter and $119.2 billion in the prior year-end.
On the bright side, Fannie reported that the number of loans turning seriously delinquent has stabilized. It predicts that credit-related expenses in 2010 will be lower than in 2009, absent further economic deterioration.
Fannie Mae said it is working to reduce its credit losses by helping homeowners avoid foreclosure. During 2009, it completed 200,339 loan workouts and initiated 333,300 trial modifications under Obama’s loan modification program.
Since it was taken over by the federal government in September 2008, Fannie Mae has received $60.9 billion from the Treasury Department.
Freddie Mac (FRE, Fortune 500) reported on Wednesday a fourth-quarter loss of $7.8 billion, compared to $23.9 billion a year earlier. The company lost $21.6 billion for the year, an improvement from 2008 losses of $50.1 billion.
Freddie Mac, which has received $50.7 billion in taxpayer funds, did not request any additional money.
In late December, the Treasury Department lifted a $200 billion limit on the amount it was ready to pump into each of the two mortgage firms.
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\\ tags: Fannie Mae
The Greek Lesson
No, I don’t mean the classical Greeks, but their present-day counterparts.
Economists have given us all the usual diagnoses of what went wrong in a now bankrupt Greece — high taxes, tax cheating, too generous retirements, unsustainable entitlements, government corruption, and anemic demography.
Add to such socialism the natural foreign policy and collective expressions that always follow statism in the modern Western world — increased pacifism, utopian pretension, moral equivalence, cheap anti-Americanism — and we have the foreign policy expression of Greece (and much of the E.U.) of the last 30 years. (A citizen who believes by birthright that he is to be taken care of by the state always hates the state that can never do enough, in the fashion that the country who is taken care of militarily always hates its protector.)
In other words, Greece is the canary in the mine of the impending crack-up of the modern welfare state. It is a great gift to us all, this example. A year ago, the socialists, even as they were juggling and falsifying their books, were bragging that the Wall Street meltdown was a referendum — and capitalism was doomed. Now, the entire socialist dream is exposed and even the most ardent statist knows that there is no longer enough “others” to pay the tab.
The poor E.U learned that the Greek siesta, the 10PM Athenian dinners, the state power company vans at the beaches in the workday afternoons, the kafenions full of 50-year-old men at 11:00 a.m., the angry students perpetually in the streets at each hinted reform, and the moonlighting telephone employees all came at the expense of far harder-working Scandinavian and German socialists, who apparently now realize a nice two weeks each year on Santorini or Crete aren’t worth billions of their own Euros in rescue bailouts.
We Are All Greeks Now?
Here in California we see the symptoms of the same Greek malady as we go from one budget shortfall to the next — dream-like borrowing, raising taxes, and furloughing, in lieu of the tough medicine of cutting government payrolls, changing pension payouts, and freezing the pay of state-workers until their compensation mirror images those in the private sector.
Postmodern Western society will soon witness a real showdown, analogous to the teenager who rebels and either accepts that he is still dependent on his parents and therefore subject to the rules of the house, or runs away and implodes in a sea of drugs and street-life.
In short, how will an entitled society react when the money runs out and it learns that it must change or wither away — and all the whining rhetoric about “social justice” and “a green future” and “spread the wealth” and “redistributive change” won’t bring another barrel of oil or bushel of wheat or Douglas fir 2” x 4”?
Imagine…
Imagine a politician announcing: we are going to raise the Social Security age to 66. We are going to freeze and cut spending until we balance the budget within three years, and then with surpluses pay down the debt within 6 years. We are going to build 100 new nuclear power plants and open up the country and its shores to oil and gas production. We are going to cut back all federal entitlements and subsidies by 20% immediately. We are going to ensure enough water for agriculture. We are …
Would collective relief or revolution follow?
Two Forks in the Road Ahead — California as Greece
On the one hand, the money is vanishing. Income, state and federal, as well as payroll, taxes here in California may soon top 60% on top incomes (10% state, 15% plus payroll on most of one’s self-employed income, 39% federal). Add in property and sales taxes and we’ve reached the point where the lemon can no longer be squeezed without either more than the current 3,500 a week leaving the state, or going the Greek route of endemic cheating.
(Indeed, as I wrote not long ago: I go to Greece every other summer, and lived in the country for over two years. I come away with one overriding observation: almost every Greek I met in some way either cheated on his tax obligation or conned a way to get some state subsidy — or both, while furiously damning “them.” [“Them” if one were poorer, meant the rich; and if richer, the state; and for both, also meant the United States.])
Bottom line: I don’t see how the state or federal government can up taxes much more and still find wealth-producing, law-abiding, motivated job creators.
On the other hand, as the money runs out, will state workers, pensioners, and entitlement recipients accept that there are too few wealth-creators to fund their pay-outs, or, as in Greece, hit the streets in protest, teenager style, each time some adjustments are necessary?
So if we can’t raise taxes and we can’t cut expenditures what is left? There is no Germany to bail us out? Cut defense? Keep borrowing from the Chinese and Japanese?
Modern Drones
Where did all the wealth go? Modern Western society is in some sense becoming drone-like, its entitled sensitive citizens assuming ceremonial roles and attitudes about the very landscape they inherited from their industrious predecessors.
Here in California we idle farmland, though we have the water, expertise, and soil to produce far more food than we do. We put vast swaths of both land and sea off limits to gas and oil production, though we could produce far more petroleum and natural gas than we do. We snub nuclear power, though our population steadily increases and its desire for electronic appurtenance grows, not shrinks. We like “wilderness areas” (who doesn’t?) where we build no roads, harvest no timber, and build no dams. We strangle Silicon Valley with all sorts of labor and business regulations until it fabricates and outsources abroad. In other words, we are creating no real new sources of concrete wealth as we nuance the shrinking capital we inherited.
We Are Still Humans For a Bit Longer
Hollywood is great. Tourism keeps San Francisco alive. Napa Valley produces great wines. We have strong finance, insurance and plenty of regulators. But ultimately our generation lost sight of the fact that we must eat and therefore grow food; we must clothe ourselves and therefore need fibers; we must move from place to place and therefore need fuel; and we must have shelter and therefore have wood, cement and glass.
Yes, we can import all this from the Chinese or the Canadians or the South Americans, but at some point one needs the real capital created by real wealth to pay for it all — not nuancing and adjusting and tinkering with money. Money is simply a representation of stored capital that comes from real production of some sort. Talking about “millions of green jobs” and “a wind and solar future” and “high-tech sector” is well and good. But ultimately Western man has not yet (as we learn from his consumptive habits) evolved to some sort of ethereal existence. Even Harvard Review grandees need real fuel to power Air Force One to get to Copenhagen.
So for a while longer, we need the miner, the oil pumper, the farmer, the fabricator, the carpenter, the road-builder, the railroad guy, the cement layer, the chemist, the computer engineer — and the system that allows them all to create wealth unimpeded by government and in an environment in which the citizen who benefits from their labor appreciates their industry.
The 11th Hour
Yes, before we have the actor, the writer, the professor, the insurer, the investor, the regulator, and the politicians, we need the elemental among us to find or create material wealth. We, the sloganeering class, forgot that, and so subsidize our high living either on borrowed money or the prior productive investment of those now in the grave yards.
And the tab is coming due faster than we ever dreamed. All the soaring, teleprompted rhetoric, the Ivy-League credentials, and the social justice boilerplate will no more create wealth than ceremonial fifth-century A.D. consuls and robed bishops could fabricate the glory of Rome.
P.S.: Why am I not too optimistic right now? Our President, who submitted the largest deficits in recent memory, and who is on track to nearly double the national debt in record time, continues to blame Bush — not just for Bush’s lamentable deficits, but for Obama’s own new unsustainable ones. I think his weird logic is: “Bush’s bad deficits made me trump them by a factor of four.” When the Commander-in-Chief expects the populace to believe that, or drops real unemployment figures and talks instead of theoretical jobs saved, or flip-flops on everything from evil Wall Street bankers now suddenly good, or bad nuclear power now vital, then we have about as much hope as we would have under Jimmy Carter.
Remember January 2009? In the era of Democratic supermajorities in Congress, a new JFK in the White House, and a media proclaiming Obama “a god,” we were all grassroots saints, who threw out the Bush bums and had at last a great workable Congress and White House — and were a daring electorate eager for hope and change from a non-traditional president. Yes, life was good and we, in the pre-tea-party age, were the salt of the earth that earned an Obama.
Now? Suddenly in our media and politics the people are stupid, full of ingratitude, often racist, the system broken, the Congress bankrupt, all of us undeserving of our one chance in a lifetime state agenda. Yes, the petulant liberal attitude in 12 months went from “We, the People” to “You stupid idiots” — and all because some Democratic congressmen discovered that the more they went out on the limb on Obama stimulus, healthcare, cap and trade, higher taxes, bigger government, bailouts and endless deficits, the more they were going to get sawed off in November by the ungrateful people. So naturally instead blame the filibuster, the people, the clingers — anything other than the self-preservation instincts of the political class of your own party.
©2010 Victor Davis Hanson
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\\ tags: Wealth
545 vs 300,000,000
EVERY CITIZEN NEEDS TO READ THIS AND THINK ABOUT WHAT THIS JOURNALIST HAS SCRIPTED IN THIS MESSAGE. READ IT AND THEN REALLY THINK ABOUT OUR CURRENT POLITICAL DEBACLE.
Charley Reese has been a journalist for 49 years.
545 PEOPLE
By Charlie Reese
Politicians are the only people in the world who create problems and then campaign against them.
Have you ever wondered, if both the Democrats and the Republicans are against deficits, WHY do we have deficits?
Have you ever wondered, if all the politicians are against inflation and high taxes, WHY do we have inflation and high taxes?
You and I don’t propose a federal budget. The president does.
You and I don’t have the Constitutional authority to vote on appropriations. The House of Representatives does.
You and I don’t write the tax code, Congress does.
You and I don’t set fiscal policy, Congress does.
You and I don’t control monetary policy, the Federal Reserve Bank does.
One hundred senators, 435 congressmen, one president, and nine Supreme Court justices equates to 545 human beings out of the 300 million are directly, legally, morally, and individually responsible for the domestic problems that plague this country.
I excluded the members of the Federal Reserve Board because that problem was created by the Congress. In 1913, Congress delegated its Constitutional duty to provide a sound currency to a federally chartered, but private, central bank.
I excluded all the special interests and lobbyists for a sound reason.. They have no legal authority. They have no ability to coerce a senator, a congressman, or a president to do one cotton-picking thing. I don’t care if they offer a politician $1 million dollars in cash. The politician has the power to accept or reject it. No matter what the lobbyist promises, it is the legislator’s responsibility to determine how he votes.
Those 545 human beings spend much of their energy convincing you that what they did is not their fault. They cooperate in this common con regardless of party.
What separates a politician from a normal human being is an excessive amount of gall.. No normal human being would have the gall of a Speaker, who stood up and criticized the President for creating deficits.. The president can only propose a budget. He cannot force the Congress to accept it.
The Constitution, which is the supreme law of the land, gives sole responsibility to the House of Representatives for originating and approving appropriations and taxes. Who is the speaker of the House? Nancy Pelosi… She is the leader of the majority party. She and fellow House members, not the president, can approve any budget they want. If the president vetoes it, they can pass it over his veto if they agree to.
It seems inconceivable to me that a nation of 300 million can not replace 545 people who stand convicted — by present facts — of incompetence and irresponsibility. I can’t think of a single domestic problem that is not traceable directly to those 545 people. When you fully grasp the plain truth that 545 people exercise the power of the federal government, then it must follow that what exists is what they want to exist.
If the tax code is unfair, it’s because they want it unfair.
If the budget is in the red, it’s because they want it in the red ..
If the Army and Marines are in IRAQ, it’s because they want them in IRAQ
If they do not receive social security but are on an elite retirement plan not available to the people, it’s because they want it that way.
There are no insoluble government problems..
Do not let these 545 people shift the blame to bureaucrats, whom they hire and whose jobs they can abolish; to lobbyists, whose gifts and advice they can reject; to regulators, to whom they give the power to regulate and from whom they can take this power. Above all, do not let them con you into the belief that there exists disembodied mystical forces like “the economy,” “inflation,” or “politics” that prevent them from doing what they take an oath to do.
Those 545 people, and they alone, are responsible.
They, and they alone, have the power.
They, and they alone, should be held accountable by the people who are their bosses.
Provided the voters have the gumption to manage their own employees.
We should vote all of them out of office and clean up their mess!
Charlie Reese is a former columnist of the Orlando Sentinel Newspaper.
What you do with this article now that you have read it………. Is up to you.
This might be funny if it weren’t so darned true…
Be sure to read all the way to the end:
Tax his land,
Tax his bed,
Tax the table
At which he’s fed.
Tax his tractor,
Tax his mule,
Teach him taxes
Are the rule.
Tax his work,
Tax his pay,
He works for peanuts
Anyway!
Tax his cow,
Tax his goat,
Tax his pants,
Tax his coat.
Tax his ties,
Tax his shirt,
Tax his work,
Tax his dirt.
Tax his tobacco,
Tax his drink,
Tax him if he
Tries to think.
Tax his cigars,
Tax his beers,
If he cries
Tax his tears.
Tax his car,
Tax his gas,
Find other ways
To tax his ass.
Tax all he has
Then let him know
That you won’t be done
Till he has no dough.
When he screams and hollers;
Then tax him some more,
Tax him till
He’s good and sore.
Then tax his coffin,
Tax his grave,
Tax the sod in
Which he’s laid.
Put these words
Upon his tomb,
Taxes drove me
to my doom…’
When he’s gone,
Do not relax,
Its time to apply
The inheritance tax.
Accounts Receivable Tax
Building Permit Tax
CDL license Tax
Cigarette Tax
Corporate Income Tax
Dog License Tax
Excise Taxes
Federal Income Tax
Federal Unemployment Tax (FUTA)
Fishing License Tax
Food License Tax
Fuel Permit Tax
Gasoline Tax (currently 44.75 cents per gallon)
Gross Receipts Tax
Hunting License Tax
Inheritance Tax
Inventory Tax
IRS Interest Charges IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax)
Liquor Tax
Luxury Taxes
Marriage License Tax
Medicare Tax
Personal Property Tax
Property Tax
Real Estate Tax
Service Charge T ax
Social Security Tax
Road Usage Tax
Sales Tax
Recreational Vehicle Tax
School Tax
State Income Tax
State Unemployment Tax (SUTA)
Telephone Federal Excise Tax
Telephone Federal Universal Service Fee Tax
Telephone Federal, State and Local Surcharge Taxes
Telephone Minimum Usage Surcharge=2 0Tax
Telephone Recurring and Non-recurring Charges Tax
Telephone State and Local Tax
Telephone Usage Charge Tax
Utility Taxes
Vehicle License Registration Tax
Vehicle Sales Tax
Watercraft Registration Tax
Well Permit Tax
Workers Compensation Tax
STILL THINK THIS IS FUNNY? Not one of these taxes existed 100 years ago, and our nation was the most prosperous in the world. We had absolutely no national debt (COMMENT: This is not true, our nation has had debt since it’s existence) , had the largest middle class in the world, and Mom stayed home to raise the kids.
What in the hell happened? Can you spell ‘politicians?’
And I still have to ‘press 1′ for English!?
I hope this goes around THE USA at least 100 times!!! YOU can help it get there!!!
GO AHEAD – - – BE AN AMERICAN!!!
Sent in by a GCPowerNet Subscriber
written by webmaster
\\ tags: Charlie Reese
President Barack Obama announced a bipartisan commission on Thursday to tackle mounting U.S. federal budget deficits that economists say imperil the nation’s economic future. The president acted to correct America’s long term fiscal imbalances while short term economic signals point to a bumpy recovery after a deep recession.
President Obama says he inherited massive budget deficits and a staggering national debt when he entered office, and that he has had to incur even more debt (See, it’s not his fault) to combat a financial crisis and prevent a prolonged economic recession from becoming a depression.
But he is quick to add that deficit spending is unsustainable.
“Without action, the accumulated weight of that structural deficit, of ever increasing debt, will hobble our economy,” Mr. Obama said. “It will cloud our future and it will saddle every child in America with an intolerable burden.”
Mr. Obama spoke at the White House, where he signed an executive order creating a bipartisan commission that will craft solutions to bring federal spending in line with tax receipts.
Standing behind the president were the two men who will lead the panel – Democrat Erskine Bowles, who served as White House chief of staff during the Clinton administration, and former Republican Senator Alan Simpson of Wyoming.
“I am asking them [Erskine and Simpson] to produce clear recommendations on how to cover the costs of all federal programs by 2015 and to meaningfully improve our long term fiscal picture,” Mr. Obama said.
More than half of federal spending goes to so-called entitlement programs such as Social Security for retirees, and medical subsidies for the poor and the elderly. Cutting such programs is politically unpopular.
National defense consumes another large portion of the budget, and is difficult to rein in during a time of war.
President Obama has proposed a freeze on the remainder the federal budget, beginning next year. But a limited freeze along will not eliminate a deficit that exceeded $1 trillion last year and is projected to do so again this year.
Congress rejected creating a budget commission of its own that would have been empowered to draft fiscal solutions and to compel the legislature to consider its recommendations.
Meanwhile, fresh signs of weakness emerged in the U.S. labor market that analysts say point to a slow economic recovery. The number of newly-laid off workers filing for unemployment benefits stood at 473,000 last week – 31,000 more than the previous week.
Global Insight chief economist, Nariman Behravesh:
“After substantial progress in fixing or at least improving the jobs situation, we seem to have backtracked a little bit,” Behravesh said. “This is not so unusual. When you reach a turning point [in the economy after a recession], the progress is not uniform – two steps forward, one step back. And I think that is what we are seeing – the one step back.”
At the same time, a broad measure of future economic vitality, the Conference Board’s Index of Leading Economic Indicators, rose for the 10th consecutive month, but at a slower pace than in previous months. And spiking energy costs caused U.S. wholesale prices to rise 1.4 percent in January – double what many economists had anticipated.
But didn’t he also just say a few days ago…
U.S. President Barack Obama says the massive economic stimulus bill he signed one year ago has prevented another Great Depression and kept millions of Americans working. The president is celebrating the anniversary of the bill’s signing.
President Obama says the $787 billion Recovery Act is working. “It is one of the main reasons the economy has gone from shrinking by six percent to growing by about six percent. And this morning we learned that manufacturing production posted a strong gain. So far, the Recovery Act is responsible for the jobs of about two million Americans who would otherwise be unemployed,” he said.
My Comment:
Which is it? We are in trouble, or we are not? We are sinking, or we are recovering? It’s Bush and the prior rapacious administration’s fault, or is it Congress’s fault (I remind you that 90% of the same people who ran Congress during the Clinton and Bush years are still there running Congress today), or is it the fault of the Obama Administration?
When does it stop being Bush’s fault and becomes the responsibility of the “current” administration. One can only keep pushing off blame for so long.
Who is currently responsible for the continual running of the Federal money printing presses, rolling out the billions of dollars with nothing to back them? Bush, or Obama? Who is President right now? Bush or Obama?
When will this President finally step up to the plate and say, these problems are my problems, they come from many of the choices and decisions that I have made?
I actually do not think that he will ever take ownership of anything. He has been raised to not own the problems of life, he just organizes dissatisfied people, talks big talk and then makes his living feeding off of the situation. He is the worst kind of professional politician. Lots of hat but no cattle.
I think that in the future, history will not be kind to President Obama. He will go down and being big spending but little doing president. The nation may sincerely regret the day it put him into office, not that President Bush and Republicans did any better in terms of responsible fiscal policy management for future U.S. generations.
I think that what has happened to America over the past decade at the hands of the politicians, parties, and lobbyists is criminal. I have to work at keeping my temper about it.
Opinion,
Clint Bridges
written by webmaster
\\ tags: Economy, Jobs, Obama
U.S. search engine giant Google has announced its plans to provide Internet users in America with faster Internet service and the capability to do more online. The company says its experimental broadband system will be capable of streaming Web-based content more than 100 times faster than what is commonly available to Americans today.
In a video blog posted on Google’s Web site Wednesday, James Kelly, a product manager at the company, outlined what Google hopes to accomplish with its plan.
“We’re doing this to because we want to experiment with new ways to make the Web better and faster for everyone, allowing applications that will be impossible today,” said James Kelly. “We also want to try out new ways to build and operate fiber networks and share what we learn with the world.”
Kelly says that Google will offer the service initially to areas with populations of 50,000 and later expand it to areas that include of up to half a million people.
Google says consumers in those communities will be able to sign up for the service, which would offer connection speeds of 1 gigabit per second. Right now some of the fastest home Internet connections in the United States range from 20 to 50 megabits per second. There are over 1,000 megabits in one gigabit.
The move comes as Google aggressively seeks to grow its Internet realm in a wide range of ways and has grabbed headlines by standing up to China over Internet freedom concerns.
Last month, the company released its first smart phone, challenging the way wireless industry sells handsets. This week, it unveiled Google Buzz, a function that is part of its Internet email service Gmail that seeks to bring together a variety of social networks into one grand collective.
David Sohn, senior policy counsel with the Center for Democracy and Technology in Washington says that in general Google’s push for greater speed and capacity will of course ultimately mean more business for the company.
“I think in general they want to kind of push the envelope on Internet speeds because ultimately if the Internet evolves in that direction it increases the pie, in terms of the online environment, and they currently have a pretty large share of that pie,” said David Sohn.
Sohn says that it will also put Google in a good strategic position to influence both the public and private sector in terms of broadband networks. The United States Federal Communications Commission is currently working on a national broadband plan that is due to be released next month.
“I think there is definitely an element of this, that’s just meant as a prod, they realize that the FCC is currently crafting a national broadband plan and is going to be working on implementing that, and they would like to try to probably influence the kind of goals that get set in that kind of plan,” he said. “And so this is both a prod to other carriers and to the FCC to try to raise the bar a little bit.”
Google has been experimenting with broadband service for years and currently runs a free wireless or Wi-Fi network in its headquarters city of Mountain View in the western state of California.
With the announcement of its plans to launch the service this week, Google says it is accepting proposals online from individuals in communities, and from local town and city governments alike to participate in its experiment.
The company says it will announce the locations of its test markets later this year.
written by webmaster
\\ tags: Internet Access
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