The problem with discussing politics

I have to confess I do not know where I fall on the Wisconsin political landscape. One time I used to call myself a Democrat although I'm registered as an independent I also tend to lean towards her right occasionally. I will admit that I got caught up in Gov. Scott Walker's plan to limit bargaining by state and county workers. I do understand that the reason for doing this is to cut down expenses. Also many times militant union members would keep on asking for more and more wages and more and more benefits not realizing that companies have a finite amount of resources before profits drop off. Upon further examination and meditation, limiting wage increases tied to inflation is a good thing thereby limiting the excesses that unions want. We must also remember that is not necessarily the unions fault but the militant unionists were the source of all our troubles.

On the subject of businesses many times businesses do not listen to their customers and make bad decisions. Sometimes the only way we can get them to listen is to hurt them where it hurts, in the pocketbook. They have to get the message loud and clear, they need us we don't need them. We can take our business elsewhere, and if enough people leave them in droves perhaps they will start to listen and realize they made a mistake and hopefully change their minds before it's too late. The intention is not to put them out of business but to get their undivided attention. If they don't listen and go out of business, so what? There are a lot of other businesses ready and willing to give us their business and listen to us. Don't get me wrong I still don't like Scott Walker. He is a sneak and a liar and that is an unforgivable thing from a preacher's son.

Unfortunately the reason our economy is in such bad shape is pure and simply greed. I put the blame on two things NAFTA and CAFTA. Both of these things allow big business to export jobs overseas where the pay scale is miniscule compared to here in the USA. We make parts here and export them to Mexico where they are essentially put together by unskilled labor. Also is a fact that pollution standards in Mexico are next to nonexistent therefore allowing US companies to bypass those standards at the expense of the Mexican people. This is not right. My solution would be to institute an export tax when things leave our country, and when it comes back Institute and import tax, then perhaps if we raise it high enough big business will decide to keep jobs here in the USA where they belong.

The Wall Street and cyber terrorism

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/08/business/08trading.html?th&emc=th

Headlines abound the New York Times and the Washington Post have been reporting the recent plunge and near collapse in Wall Street trading. Now this probably sounds like a conspiracy theory but there is a good possibility that somebody may have found a way to infiltrate Wall Street and its trading miasma of electronic connections too numerous to count. Investigators are having problems trying to find the source of the problem whether it was a mistake or whether it was on purpose we have yet to find out. My question is could this be a new form of cyber terrorism geared to bring down our financial institutions and flow of money nationally and internationally? Is something I think that we should seriously think about. Terrorism does not have to be comprised of acts of violence, but if terrorists can infiltrate our financial systems they can wreak havoc worldwide. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that there are many places where terrorists could infiltrate a company and insert code or purposely punch in the wrong figures thereby causing the Wall Street crash and burn. Let us hope that it was a simple mistake and the person or persons responsible be held accountable. I also think it's about time that we took a very close look at how our trading systems work and what we can do to make it safer.

Clergy Sexual Abuse, Is it Universal?

Universal phenomenon?
I tend to think that with the advance of the national and worldwide mass communication information is more broadly disseminated throughout our nation and the world therefore making us more aware of what is going on around us. In times past the only means of mass communication were through print media or radio which only reached a small segment of our society. With the advent of television and satellite communication and news agencies like CNN or MSNBC have opened the door to instantaneous video communication of world events as they are happening. Coupling that with the World Wide Web and information gathering and disseminating sites such as Google we now have the opportunity of searching and obtaining information on any subject we can imagine. The propensity for news media to sensationalize the news has made us super aware of current events whether good or bad. For example the real-time broadcasting of the events that happened on 9/11 coupled with America is response to these attacks to the real-time broadcasting of the bombing of Baghdad of the so-called shock and awe. Not only did these events make us acutely aware of what was going on worldwide but also had the effect of needlessly instilling fear in the hearts of many people.

I think I would debate whether clergy sexual abuse of children would be considered a universal phenomenon given the effects of the news media’s sensationalistic approach to this tragic turn of events. Not only has it made us acutely aware of the problem that the Catholic Church has to deal with and their propensity to whitewash the situation but has also instilled the anger of the populace. Bringing to light such actions may be good and also bad. Good in that we now know what is happening and bad because it may cause us to be vindictive seeking retribution rather than being constructive and demanding that those responsible be removed and dealt with as the laws allow. I believe that the pressures exerted upon us in today’s society are the root of many of our problems. Many people cannot handle the stresses of today's society and tend to crack under the pressure seeking sometimes destructors alternative outlets such as child abuse. And I think we need to take a closer look at dysfunctional families and relationships as a means of screening out undesirables. I also believe that our educational system has put up too many barriers concerning sexual education and moral up bringing. We can do that while still keeping the separation of church and state out of our educational system and still instill proper values in our children. But that's another debate I think will keep for another time.

Beneficial and HFC finance, watch out

In the beginning of December prior to my due date on my mortgage payment I had called that official inquiring whether I could skip a payment and if there would be any consequences to doing so. They said they would have to get back to me which they did and they indicated that yes indeed I could skip a payment. They offered no information whatsoever as to the consequences of doing so. Whether I would have to make a double payment or if they would attach a late fee onto my mortgage payment. Lo and behold once a December payment, which they said I could do had been skipped received a letter from beneficial indicating that I was behind him my payments. I immediately called beneficial and and asked why I was getting this kind of a letter. At this point the manager said he had no recollection of my calling him but later backtracked and said that I speak spoken to a person named John (no last name). He said they would get back to me and see what they could do about the problem. Apparently this is a common tactic for this type of company hoping that the customer will not pursue anything further. The manager at this point became very belligerent and indicated that I would have to make a larger payment and would have to also catch up with the loan which is not what they had agreed to. I guess he thought it was going to be a pushover, wrong, wrong, wrong. I am anything but.

I must warn anyone who wants to deal with this company that is beneficial or HFC to do so at your own risk. I had to file a complaint with two government agencies asking that they would look into their banking practices requesting a full audit and that no late charges be assessed and nothing to on my credit report. These government agencies was the Wisconsin Department of regulation and licensing, stay Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, trade and consumer protection, and the state of Wisconsin Department of financial institutions, within a matter of days indicated that they were going to look into the situation. I also indicated that I wanted beneficial to put this all in writing so I would have something in black and white indicating that they had taken care of the situation. I vigorously indicated that I would accept nothing less. As for me, as soon as I am able I will try in the not-too-distant future to refinance my house with a different more reliable company.

The ultimate Iraqi insult

Atta Boy Bush Baby, Way to go
I don't know if anybody knows about Islam or Iraqi culture but the ultimate insult is to throw a shoe at someone. It is the same as if someone threw a bottle of waste from a pail on a person from an upstairs window as they are walking by their house. In their culture is extremely rude to show your feet and throwing your shoes at a person is the ultimate insult. Apparently Mr. Bush is not liked by anyone anymore. You may just want to watch the video several times because of first time the journalist missed Mr. Bush and the second time (although they say he may not have been hit) it looks as though the shoe brushed by him skinning him within millimeters. I guess it just shows you how far Mr. Bush has sunk in his world wide ratings. This is from "I just thought you'd like to know"as part of my blog.

Wisconsin GOP shame on you

Is this the best you can do?

The Wisconsin GOP must be getting desperate because I just received a glossy piece in the mail trying to link William Ayres and 1960s one time weather underground terrorist with Barak Obama. They try to make it sound like this is a true story that Mr. Obama has close ties to domestic terrorist is a heading on the inside page. Inside of this glossy brochure are a pile of lies are pictures of the 1960s protests having to do with the Vietnam war. There's only one problem with this glossy advertisement that they purposely failed to tell us that Barak Obama at the time was only eight years old when all this happened. Now I don't know about you though when I was eight years old I wasn't very much interested in anything except Cowboys and Indians riding my bike and maybe playing basketball. I probably knew about the war, but I really didn't care about it. After all when is the last time you ever saw an eight-year-old kid drafted into the Army? What they also fail to tell you is that the only way that Mr. Obama got to know Mr. Ayres is through a local youth group similar to the Boys and Girls Club that both of them alonged to.

I've got news for the Republican Party of Wisconsin, we aren't as dumb as you think we are! We've grown weary of the scare tactics and all the lies spread by the GOP and the Bush administration and the never ending efforts to control the minds and thoughts of the American public. Guess what? We learned a lot in the last eight years and were not going to fall for that stuff anymore. It seems to me like you guys are getting desperate that you are losing ground rapidly because we can see through all your twisted rhetoric and lies and were not falling for it anymore.

So boys and girls take that for what it's worth I just wanted you to know what the real truth is and the kind of lies the GOP is trying to feed you. I predict that the presidential election is going to be a landslide. And believe me it's not McCain who is going to be in the winning circle. With that I urge each and every one of you to get out and vote because this is a very important election. I know I will be out there, even though I am recuperating from spinal surgery I hope to be recovered enough to go cross the street and vote on election day. Believe me if I can do it so can you.

Report: McCain Exploded With Rage During Gambling Outing

Report: McCain Exploded With Rage During Gambling Outing

How about this one? It seems to have been glossed over by almost everybody including the press. Do we really need John McCain as president with somebody who is known to have an explosive temper? Read the article and then watch the video. And make a decision for yourself whether you would want to have somebody who explodes the way Mr. McCain did with very little provocation. I certainly don't think I want somebody as president who acts like that. I don't get me wrong I don't see anything wrong with gambling although I don't do it myself. I think it's a waste of my hard earned dollars. The only times I've ever been to a gambling hall has been to attend a show but never to gamble. But that's beside the point.

Mr. McCain comes across as very controlled, calm cool and collected during his many debates and this is what is being shown on TV to the American public. This is the persona he wants to project as a public image, but what we don't see behind the scenes is a very explosive Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde persona that he so carefully hides. This is what he does not want you to see. Like Gov. Palin this is a personality trait I don't want anyone to ever have was going to be in such a high public office such as the president of the United States. Here again I ask the same question, what would happen if he blew up when confronted with a very volatile situation? Politically and internationally we cannot afford this type of outburst because the consequences would be disastrous. And my question once again, is do you want somebody like this as president? Your comments are always welcome.

In Dozens of Calls, Palins Pressed for Trooper’s Removal - NYTimes.com

In Dozens of Calls, Palins Pressed for Trooper’s Removal - NYTimes.com

There's nothing like a woman scorned. I just found this article in the New York Times and think it's rather interesting about Gov. Palin. I don't know about you but I don't know if I'd want to have somebody like that in office who holds a grudge the way she does and the way her family does. I've had bosses like that. They tend to be vindicative when they can't get their own way and it seems like a trait that Ms. Palin has shown to the public in a way that says to me at least, that she is not the type of person I would want as a vice president or even as the president should that ever happen.

One of the things that I've noticed in heterosexual marriages or should I say divorces is that one or the other party or both parties usually wind up hating each other and become very vindictive during the course of their divorce and especially if there are children involved. Although most people tend to overlook this it is a very common trait amongst many many people. To me it shows a much darker side to Ms. Palen that I think every one should know about and take into consideration if you want her leading our country. I guess one of the questions I would have is how vindictive she would be if she could not get her way in the position of either vice president or president? This would leave me to question her stability and capacity to lead a country. I do not want an unstable person in office ever. And I certainly don't want somebody who's going to go off half cocked or who might become unstable under pressure.

Heaven help us if she was forced into a position of authority and something really bad happened to our country. I don't want somebody who's going to be come vindictive or explosive in a highly volatile situation. This I am afraid can lead to very direct consequences and possibly even lead us into a world war or some sort of nuclear confrontation which I don't think anyone wants to see happen. Anyone who is elected president or vice president must be very stable and I don't know if they're psychological profile shows that. And I really think that this is something that should be looked into and very carefully considered. I don't think that this is the proper type of behavior that I want to have for somebody in a high office and I don't think you do either. It sure would be nice to know what other people think. So if you would like to leave a comment please do so.

Deregulation is the problem

This may be a short post, but I think or should I say I know that the problem is deregulation. Under the Bush administration most of the stuff has happened has been caused by the deregulation of most industries especially the banking industry and mortgage industry. I would strongly suggest that the next president whoever he may be, including Congress and the Senate implement regulatory measures on our financial industries. The problem with deregulation is that it has allowed those greedy people who are thinking nothing but how much money they can make by any means possible that has caused all these problems. A we need laws to stop the hemorrhaging of the financial industry and we need checks and balances to regulate our banks, our mortgage industry, and the stock market. We especially need to regulate, or at least put on the brakes on short sales and on futures within the stock markets. This is precisely what is driving up the price of oil and gasoline. By putting a cap on the futures market we can regulate the wild fluctuations in our gasoline prices and oil prices. This is critical to the stabilization of our economy.

Secondly I think it is imperative that we demand that the countries we are spending billions of dollars in like a Iraq and Afghanistan which has a huge surplus of oil reserves. Instead of asking them to pay back with dollars we should demand that they pay us back with the oil reserves that they already have. This in turn would alleviate some of our oil problems. Of course this will not solve the problem but it will help it somewhat.

Thirdly we need to develop new sources of energy especially renewable energy. It is critical that we get away from fossil fuels such as coal and oil. We need to turn to alternative energy sources especially organic sources. Although many people will squawk, I think wind energy is one of the ways that we can go to produce electricity. Also I think that atomic energy is another way to go. Although with atomic energy we also need to know how to reprocess it so that it can either be used over again or we need to find better ways to store spent fuel in as safe a manner as possible until we can devise a way to use it once again. I am sure that as our technology progresses and it seems to be happening logarithmically, that we will be able sometime in the not-too-distant future to find a way to reprocess spent uranium that we use our power plants. Perhaps by the knowledge we gain from the hadron collider that we may be able to develop some sort of propulsion system to be used in outer space. Perhaps sometime in the future we may learn through our use of quantum physics how-to use uranium or its byproducts in space travel. Who knows, we may even develop some sort of warp drive for spaceships. You never know. Right now that may seem like science fiction but in the not-too-distant future it may become science fact.

The other possibility is to use battery powered vehicles. But first we need to develop a much more efficient electrical storage system for those vehicles. They need to be much lighter and more efficient than the batteries we now use. Instead of using wet cells perhaps we can develop a dry cell battery or batteries that can be recharged over and over. They also need to hold their charge longer so that we are able to drive farther without having to plug the car in to recharge it. Another thing is that we can also use solar energy which unfortunately at this time is pretty expensive, but I think if we can develop new technology to increase the efficiency of solar energy collectors this may also become a viable source of energy especially in the home.

We need to also build a more energy efficient houses in order to conserve our energy usage. We need to develop new materials that provide much better insulation for our homes. The better insulated our homes are the more energy efficient they will be both during the summer and the winter. We need to develop systems to both heat and cool our homes much more efficiently than the systems we are currently using. We could possibly even use a solar heating and cooling system combination that would be used in the summer to cool our homes and into winter to heat it. That my friends is my take on the situation.

Seven billion-dollar bailout defeated

House Narrowly Defeats Bailout Legislation - washingtonpost.com



Is it a surprise, I don't think so. As I explained in one of my posts before I really didn't want to see this pass because it may have been a blank check to bail out the greedy financial institutions and possibly let executives get off Scott free. I'll say it again and again, we need government oversight and we also need government regulation, not deregulation. That's how this whole thing got going in the first place. It is my opinion that deregulation and unmitigated greed by not only executives and high up positions but investors looking to make a quick buck.

If they do put something forward again, I think it has to contain checks and balances similar to our Constitution so that this does not happen again. What was the old saying, "history repeats itself", how true that is.

I certainly hope something can be hammered out otherwise our economy is in(pardon my French) the toilet. Unfortunately now is the time that people are going to start the blame game. First it was Nancy Pelosi and it will be somebody else and another person after that because no one wants to take responsibility. That is the crux of the problem. That's why we are where we are at this point in time. We have to take responsibility for what we do if we do not do that then we're going to have history repeat itself.

Now more than ever, it is very important that those people in the house and congress get together and construct a plan which checks and balances, and not just a blank check, to fix the problem. I don't even want to think of what will happen if they don't. And I'm sure neither do you. So let's not go away with our tails between our legs, but instead let us pick ourselves up by the bootstraps, square our shoulders and march back in and hammer out a deal.