Our Bucket is Being Drained

Everything Out and Nothing In Demonstrates Bad Management

This column presents a conservative viewpoint about items of interest in our community and our lives. Focus is on items impacting your pocket book, your personal freedoms, and your rights. I hope you will read the column regularly and it occasionally influences your opinions and actions. Now, on to the subject of the week:

“The USA has become a poor credit risk.”

The ordinary citizen has to constantly be aware of his/her credit rating on the various systems the bankers and credit card companies have designed to measure the risk involved when monies are loaned. If any citizen had the credit score which our U.S. Government has at this time, they wouldn’t be able to borrow a dime. In fact, they would be forced into immediate bankruptcy.

It appears to me that the combined impact of making very bad international trade decisions over the past twenty years, a stupid energy policy, and the wild spending of a corrupt, inept, self serving congress has finally emptied the bucket of available funding for our stumbling nation.

Stupid Trade Policies- When China and the other Far East countries convinced the campus cloistered economic advisors and our inept politicians that it was a good idea for the United States to embrace the philosophy of the “global marketplace” and “free trade”, they must have had a hard time holding back their laughter at our nation’s stupidity. Remember the era during Clinton’s reign when Washington diverted our attention by making a big deal out of the NAFTA trade deal with Mexico, while at the same time they were sneaking the passage of giving China “Most Favored Nation Trade Status”.

Well it was the old bait and switch scam, the deal with Mexico was trivial, while the deal with China actually traded away a huge, huge chunk of our nation’s industrial resources. As a result thousands of factories across a broad band of industries were closed, and millions of jobs left the USA and were transferred to new factories being built in China.

That evolution began to make an already bad balance of trade for the US into a horrible, negative cash draining hole in our bucket of wealth.

Stupid Energy Policies – Every politician who has held a national office over the past thirty years was aware of our nation’s growing dependence and vulnerability which was being created by our declining oil reserves at home. Even today our politicians are willing to court the “green” environmental voting block by prohibiting new Alaska and off shore drilling, by prohibiting construction of nuclear plants, by prohibiting construction of new refineries, by prohibiting mining of oil shale in the Rockies, and now by working to eliminate the use of coal as a source of energy when we have some of the largest coal reserves in the world. All of these things work to enable the Oil Barons of the Mideast to rape our economy.

These policies have created another huge money hole in our bucket. Billions and billions of US dollars have flowed from the pockets of our struggling American citizens into the open pocketbooks of the Sheiks. This morning I heard Donald Trump make the statement that the actual cost of a barrel of oil on the international market should be only $20.00. Our weak bargaining position is forcing Americans to pay for gasoline based on a cost of three or more times that amount. And it will undoubtedly get worse.

Our politicians have allowed the “Green” movement to assist in the destruction of our nation.

Stupid Spending Policies - We hear over and over – “You can’t spend yourself our of debt!” – AND YOU CAN’T! But our corrupt, inept, uncaring, self serving political leaders (of both denominations) seem to believe that by printing, borrowing, and stealing more money and spending the money on unnecessary short term projects will somehow return our economy to its former glory.
The sad part is the ten year lag effect for most actions taken by politicians. They can enact some inane, terrible policy or program today, and it is usually ten years before the real results of that action can be measured. By then they are off in a corner somewhere counting their money and avoiding responsibility…i.e. Bill Clinton.

Stupid Immigration Policies - Both political parties allowed our immigration laws to be made into the laughing stock of the world as millions of illegal immigrants poured over our borders. In their corrupt, distorted vision of how things should function, many of our politicians see these illegal’s as a potential new constituency which can be wooed to vote for them if they help them gain the full benefits of citizenship.

The social burden created by this new underclass of citizens is tremendous. The medical costs, welfare costs, and the cost of the crimes and subsequent imprisonment of the illegal criminal element of this group combines into billions in added social cost burden for our nation to support. Again, political gain at the cost of our nations well being.

Rudiments – Odds and Ends Worth Mentioning:
♦ It is reported that officials within the EPA received a ninety eight page report two weeks before the vote on Cap and Trade. This internal EPA report demonstrated errors in the data supporting global warming claims, especially those correlating the warming to carbon dioxide emissions. The officials tried to hide the report, and kept it from becoming public prior to the upcoming vote on the issue.
♦ Woe be to us all! That comic idiot Al Franken was declared the winner in the Senate race in Minnesota. That gives the dems full control of the U.S. Senate. After the election, ballots were found in the trunk of an Elections Supervisor’s car which were counted, and of course ACORN was very busy in that state. Glory to the USA!
♦ By the time this issue hits the streets the Florida Highway Patrol and most local police agencies will be busy sneaking around through traffic to be sure you didn’t forget to fasten your seat belt. Now, when they smack you with that hundred dollar fine for being forgetful, remember it is all for your own good. Big brother is worried about your safety and the matter has nothing to do with their desperate need for more money……HA!
♦ The story on the front page about the city trying to get $165,000 in order to “Go Green” (ugh) and buy new lighting for the city shows the difference in the way industry works and the government works. In industry in order to justify a purchase of new equipment, the savings had to generate a three to five year return on investment. These new lights will save $9,000 per year, thus giving a 18.3 year return on investment. Oh Well, it’s only tax money!
♦ In the article issued by the County Health Department concerning the county’s new mosquito eradication program, they provide a list of things that we should do to help prevent the hatching of mosquitoes. They tell us to keep our roof gutters clean, not allow cans, jars and tires to collect water, and to drain our boat bilge areas. How can they overlook the real cause of most of our downtown residential mosquitoes…..those damned FDEP required water retention mosquito hatcheries. In my opinion they are the real cause in the increasing incidence of West Nile Virus.
♦ Our school board is going to vote this afternoon on a proposal to increase our property taxes for next year by another .25 mil. That will be another $25 per $100,000 on your property assessment. The system just keeps on squeezing the middle and lower classes. There isn’t much left in our veins at this point….I am sure they will pass the increase since there is absolutely no waste in their budgets and programs where they could pick up any shortfalls in funding.
♦ I think all conservative readers of this column should be aware that our local representative, Congressman Boyd, followed the instructions of his party leaders and voted for the “Cap and Trade” legislation last week. This bill will result in further increases in your electric bills, because of the unverified, unproven supposition that CO2 emissions are the cause of global warming. Boyd might have made Nancy Pelosi happy….but he made a lot of Jackson County people very mad. The bill still has to pass the Senate, let us hope that group has a little more intelligence. If it passes, turn out the lights and hide your wallet…because they didn’t “Get It right!”

Quote:
You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
You cannot lift the wage earner up by pulling the wage payer down.
You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
You cannot build character and courage by taking away people’s initiative and independence.
You cannot help people permanently by doing for them, what they could and should do for themselves.
~Abraham Lincoln

Note: The opinions stated in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of Hatcher Publications.