Helping Out, Bailing Out or Buying Off the Seniors?

Cloudy

Since the cost of living hasn’t gone up, there will be no increase in Social Security amounts for the nation’s senior citizens and disabled. The Obama administration is considering sending each of them a “stimulus” check for $250, at a cost to the nation of $13 billion.

I’m wondering if that $13 billion price tag to the nation is worth the benefits that $250 will glean. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not objecting to helping out people who have seen the benefits of a long life of work and contribution to the Social Security system disappear to past thieves in Congress. I’m just wondering if that little bit of money will really make a difference in the quality of their lives!

A quick search for goods and services showed me that $250 will buy or do ONE of the following:

2 suits at JC Penney

1 skirt, 1 pants, 1 shirt, and a boss belt at JCrew

1 month of groceries, IF you live alone without pets and don’t need laundry supplies

1 swivel bar stool

1 pound puppy and crate, but no vet care or Puppy Chow

1 well check up at the doctor. (Get this while we still have a good supply of them!)

1 one-way drive from Atlanta to Salt Lake City (w/o food or hotel)

50 trips across town if you live in Birmingham or a city of that size

Dinner for two at Per Se in NYC (cab fare and tip not included)

½ of a mortgage or rent payment

2 cartons of cigarettes

5 weeks of nightly toddies at home for 2

4 trips to the hairdresser

2 new tires for the car

1 airline ticket across country IF you don’t bring luggage or a coat

5 decent Christmas/birthday gifts (2 if you are buying for a teenager)

$13 interest if you put the money in a savings account

Clear

What it REALLY buys, or at least what the Democrats are hoping for, is votes in the upcoming election. They are hoping our seniors will remember the check and not be aware, yet, of the drastic cuts that will be coming in their Medicare.

Not One Red Cent, Mr. President

Cloudy

What do we do when we are out of money? We stop spending. We get a second job. We do without. So, why doesn't our government show such fiscal responsibility?

Clear

Join me in asking the President to do the following:

1) Give us a balanced budget.

2) "Squeeze" that waste from Medicare TODAY! Don't wait on a new bill.

3) Do your "line by line" search for pork and special interests, and eliminate it all.

4) Get rid of all posts in your administration that are not elected, vetted and/or confirmed OR do not allow a penny to spent on them. You may still ask for input, just not with my pennies!

5) Reduce the First Lady's staff by at least half. There are too many people being paid too much for doing too little.

6) Ditch the Cap and Trade bill, as it will break our backs and there is NO CONCLUSIVE SCIENCE to justify it.

7) Establish a moratorium on all new offices, agencies, and position in the federal government until the deficit is reduced.

8) Leave health care where it is (except for correcting the part of it that the federal government has screwed up - Medicare) until we can afford it.

9) Stop rescuing large corporations and stimulate small businesses to generate jobs.

10) Turn the water in the San Joaquin valley. We need the food. They need the jobs.

NOT ONE RED CENT, MR. PRESIDENT! No spending until you keep your promises to us and get this horrendous burden off of our children and grandchildren.

(I'll cut you some slack. If the CBO says that some health care plan will only cost a dime, you may have 10 red cents and sign it. It was your promise, after all!)

An Open Letter to Washington

Clear
I am not the least bit CLOUDY on any of the concerns in the following letter.

To ALL elected officials in Washington:

WE THE PEOPLE are very upset. We are voicing very strong opinions every day, and need to be heard instead of being called "un-American" or "mobs" or "astroturfers!" So, please, listen!

REDUCE THE DEFICIT! REDUCE THE DEFICIT! REDUCE THE DEFICIT! REDUCE THE DEFICIT! This should be the number one job of the federal government! It should be the ONLY job until we are debt free. DO NOT ACCEPT A SALARY UNTIL IT IS DONE!

NO BENEFITS FOR ILLEGAL ALIENS! NONE!! They can apply to work here, pay taxes, learn English, take the test and the oath, and become CITIZENS! This applies to ALL nationalities of people who are here illegally and benefiting from my tax dollar.

NO MORE STIMULUS SPENDING! Do not spend ONE MORE PENNY until something is done about the deficit or a balanced budget is passed. Do not spend money you don't have. All TARP money not spent up to this point should be put towards lowering this immoral deficit.

NO CZARS! The President is, unfortunately, free to associate with any and all of his radical, socialist and communist friends who DO believe in euthenasia, sex with animals, governmental ownership of businesses and redistribution of the wealth "for the common good." BUT NOT ON MY DIME! NO federal money should be spent on their salaries, their office space, their staffs, their power bills, their office supplies, or their existance. Outlaw the use of public funds for any position that is not ELECTED or APPROVED by the Senate.

REDUCE THE FIRST LADY'S STAFF! What arrogance and waste! How many people does it take for her to do so little? IMPOSE LIMITS on who can slop at the public trough!

NO CAP AND TRADE. Every plant, every animal, every microbe affects the climate, but NO ONE is absolutely sure that disaster is impending. Most extinctions and severe climate changes happened long before man every arrived!

NO UNIVERSAL HEALTHCARE. Just fix what is wrong, don't hijack it! Pass torte reform to keep doctors in the profession. Lift mandates for unnecessary tests and procedures. Allow insurance companies to engage in interstate commerce. FIX MEDICARE and MEDICAIDE first, then come back and ask us to trust that you can run more of it!

NO VALUE ADDED TAX! How about no more tax increases, period! If government handouts and entitlements can't be funded, so be it. Most of them are pork and have generated a population of people dependent on others, capable of working for themselves, but with no incentive to do so.

REDUCE THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT! How many new agencies, with office space and staff are going to be created by the new healthcare bill alone? It's been estimated that EIGHT new buildings would have to be erected! The STATE should be regulating more and more of what the federal government is arrogantly assuming.

STOP ACORN! I do not want ACORN and its affiliates in charge of our 2010 census. I want them investigated, and stopped. I also do not want mandatory escrow fees contributed to them every time on every real estate deal that closes. Stop the funding to ACORN and its affiliates pending impartial audits and investigations. And, while you're at it, look into illegal activities of SEIU and other unions that get their way by force and intimidation.

CHANGE THE CENSUS FORM! You are allowed to know HOW MANY PEOPLE LIVE IN MY HOUSE. It is not the business of the federal government to know the number of hours that I work, when I leave my house, or my phone number. We've already seen too much illegal, unethical and immoral information gathering by this White House! I proudly flagged myself because of my "fishy" blog. It is my right to think as I do and to speak as I will.

BALANCE THE BUDGET! It is simple. Millions of Americans do it. Spend no more than you take in. Print no more worthless money! DO NOT ACCEPT A SALARY UNTIL IT IS DONE!

LIVE LIKE US! Elected officials should have to live by the same standards, under the same programs, that they impose on us. If a public option for socialized medicine does pass for this country, every elected official should be forced to have it and no other supplements!

NO REDISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH! I work for my money. Others can work for theirs. I've worked three jobs simultaneously most of my life because I wanted to provide well for my children.

LEAVE US TO BE CHARITABLE. Churches, civic groups, and individuals have always taken care of those who cannot take care of themselves. If we aren't taxed to death, we'll continue to do so without help or interference from the federal government.

NO CORPORATE BAILOUTS! You have no business being so overtly communistic!! If a business can't make it, another will step up! Let it happen because of free enterprise, supply and demand...not COMMAND.

DEMAND ACCOUNTABILITY! The President has harped and harped about "transparency," yet he will NOT disclose documents about his past; birth certificate, passport, school records, early employment records, etc. Mr. Obama, put up and we will shut up! We still don't know how all this TARP money has been spent, because there is NO accountability, NO transparency, NO truth from our president and democratic leaders.

SLOW DOWN! Do not EVER AGAIN try to ram legislation through Congress. If people need time to read bills and debate, so be it. Post bills on the Internet and give the public time to weigh in with their elected officials. The last time I looked, WE THE PEOPLE were the true governing voice!

UPHOLD THE CONSTITUTION! What we fear the most is what is happening. When candidate Obama said he would fundamentally transform this nation, he meant it! Congress is helping him lead us away from democracy. Don't participate! Fight it! Question the constitutionalily of all that you do, or we will be questioning your ability to be our representatives in government. Save the Republic from this Socialistic takeover by radical community organizers.

I'm proud to be an American. I want future generations to be able to say that, too. Never in my 60 years have I been so ashamed of my government. Never have I seen so much spin doctoring of rhetoric to justify such unethical behavior. Never have I heard so many lies and contridictions. This is the worse administration I've ever witnessed, and the public by far agrees with me.

Thank you.

No..No...No....No.....No.....NO!!!

NO!! NO!! NO!! NO!!

NO more stimulus spending!

NO Cap and Trade!

NO National Health Care!

NO Value Added Tax!

NO benefits for illegal aliens!

NO more Federal agencies!

NO more Federal departments or Czars!

NO more Federal spending!

NO ACORN in federal programs!

NO more Taxes!

NO salary for you unless you balance our budget!

Leave me and my children some kind of a future!
Thanks to many of you who still believe in and govern by the constitution of the United States!

Cap and Trade

Clear

I’m extremely clear on many things. I love my children. I know Mary Martin was the best “Peter Pan.” I return my carts at the grocery store. Turn signals are not optional. And, I am extremely clear that I do NOT want our elected officials dictating:

• how often I can bathe, or how many towels I can use after my bath;
• how I set my thermostats, or how many thermostats I can have in my home;
• how many miles I can drive in a month;
• how much money I can give to my grown children each year for birthdays and Christmas;
• how many appliances I can run at any one time;
• how many hours I can run my pool pump or how many treatments a month I can do for pristine, healthy, safe water;
• how often I can burn a fire in my fireplace;
• how much beef or corn I can eat in a year;
• how many long-distance calls I can make or how many phones I can have;
• how many lights I can have on at night or what kind of bulb can burn in them;
• how much I can spend on clothing, groceries and/or entertainment in a year; and
• how often I can have my nails or my hair done.

CLOUDY

What I don’t understand is why so many Americans are letting all of this happen by staying silent!

No. There is no bill before Congress that states how many baths you can have in a week, but, if you have energy bills that quadruple, or triple or even double, you are going to have to cut corners somewhere!

No. There is no bill that limits how often you can go to a spa or a salon, but if you have no job these luxuries will go by the wayside!

No. There is no bill that will dictate the temperature of my home, but if I can’t afford to run the heater, I’ll have to bundle up in the dark and the cold of winter.

Except for a desperate surge on the last day of the House debate and vote, not many called or emailed or faxed or signed online petitions or exercised their right to BE the government of the United States of America (or their pleas were ignored in favor of favors.) The phone lines and fax lines jammed on the final day, and the democrats kept putting off the vote on the Cap and Trade bill until they could add enough pork for those opposing it that they could “buy” the votes that they did not have at the time of the initial vote. (Why do our elected officials get to put off a vote, or call for a re-vote? If I don’t get to the polls on time, my vote/opinions/wishes/voice are not heard!)

So, I’m cloudy on why citizens are not involved with what their elected officials are doing and why the White House and Congress lie and cheat and make up their own rules to make things happen. I guess these two things go hand in hand. Children are always on their best behavior when they know someone is watching! (And, Michael Jackson died the day of the vote, so the networks, hell-bent on backing Obama, had the perfect excuse not to cover it.)

Basically the Cap and Trade bill is a 1,200+ page, complex and convoluted bill unread by most of Congress that is based on unproven, shaky science. (I taught Environmental Biology and Ecology for 25 years, and I never saw a period where the experts agreed on the results of the Greenhouse Effect or carbon dioxide or methane production. Now we have evidence that the EPA tried to hide information from us! Who meets their payroll?) The government intends to determine how much carbon pollution will be allowed, who can produce it and who can exceed it with the government’s blessing if they trade for their excess by buying rain forest acreage or some such local or… watch out…global action. Then, the government will hire people with our dollars to monitor the emissions, and will create an enforcement bureau that will be paid for with our dollars to do something that we have been steadily improving on for the last 30 years voluntarily without the tax cost or the government size growing by leaps and bounds!

Thirty years ago, my daughter would get excited as we would travel to Birmingham to see her grandmother and she could see the smog. “Oh, yea!!! We’re almost to grandma’s house!! I can see her dirty sky!” As the result of information, grass roots movements, some governmental regulations, free enterprise and capitalism enjoyed by large and small businesses alike, we got more energy efficient cars and appliances, clean water, clean air, and a greener environment.

We need to be good stewards of the Earth’s resources, but we do not have to sacrifice for other species. WE are a competing species on this planet! Species have come and gone long before man ever arrived, and they will continue to come and go. We just need GOOD science to let us make intelligent decisions about how to keep Homo sapiens here for as long as possible! When science tells us the truth, we will make good decisions. We will mulch grass and carpool and recycle cans and reduce packaging before we jump into our clean, cool swimming pools! I already installed storm windows, solar screens, and siding voluntarily to reduce my energy bills. It was my CHOICE.

This bill opens the door for the government to make your choice. It allows them to pick and choose who they want to favor and who they want to crush. And the Congressional leadership that we have now wants the power to do both. They have changed the terminology that they use to cover what they are doing, all while calling for “transparency.” (Does that mean some of us can see straight through what they are doing?) And they are trying to do it at a speed that would shame Superman! They want to shove it all through before citizens have the chance to catch on to what they are doing! Their models for environmental controls and socialized medicine have already been tried elsewhere and have already failed. It is an attempt to redistribute the wealth from average, hard-working citizens to Congress and their pocket-lining pets. It IS a tax. They just don’t call it a tax. They have dropped that word in the same trash can where they dumped “terrorism” and “war.” They spend our money to pay for air time to show infomercials that they have produced to brain wash us into going along for the ride with their charismatic figure head. (Can someone say “propaganda?”)

It hasn’t passed the Senate, yet, so get on the phone, the computer and the fax machine to let your voices be heard! You can find contact lists all over the Internet. They make it hard on us, as you must fill out an online form to email most of them, but give it an hour a day. Take an hour a day to be part of the government that is “of the people.” (An excellent site for ALL congressional contact information is: http://www.conservativeusa.org/mega-cong.htm) Do this long before the vote is due. Do it every day if you have the time. You can email 40 people while watching “America’s Got Talent.”)

If this Cap and Trade bill passes, hang on to your hats! Between it and the proposed national health care, we will freeze in the dark for the rest of our lives! Not because of lack of fuel, but the inability to pay for it. It will be the legacy we leave to generations to come.

If you want to 'green' America, read tomorrow's blog. It's a lesson I've been teaching since the '70s!