Hope and Change

The deficit for April was $82 billion.  That is four times larger than last April.  April is normally a non-deficit month (there is a special day of celebration for the IRS in April, the 15th, remember?) for the treasury.  How’s that ‘Hope and Change’ working out for you?

NCAA’s Inconsistency

It continues to amaze me that the University of Memphis has to vacate their basketball wins and Final Four appearance and Duke does not.  Both teams played with what the NCAA considers an ineligible player.  Both teams were National Runner-Ups.  Yet only one team has to vacate their wins and their Final Four appearance. 

If you remember, Corey Magette was the player for Duke in 1999 who was paid by a former crack dealer and AAU coach, Myron Piggie prior to attendingDuke.  Piggie admitted to the law that he paid Magette and four other players $35,000 from 1996 to 1998.  Magette also eventually admitted that he took the money.  

The only explanation the NCAA gives for not requiring Duke to vacate its wins (besides the “its still being investigated” line) is that Duke was not aware of Magette’s activities and they happened prior to his being a student, therefore Duke cannot be held responsible.  Even in the NCAA’s own findings they do not find that Memphis was negligent in the Derrick Rose case, only that Rose was not an eligible player, yet Memphis has to vacate their wins because Rose was allegedly not an eligible player and Duke does not have to even though Magette was not an eligible player.  Lets see if I have this straight:

Memphis
   Rose ineligible player
   Memphis not at fault for said ineligibility
   Result - Memphis has to vacate wins because
   they played with an ineligible player
Duke
   Magette ineligible player
   Duke not at fault for said ineligibility
   Result - Duke keeps wins and record intact
   because Duke not responsible for ineligibility

Sounds consistent.  Now, I realize that the NCAA has never officially declared Magette ineligible, but we all know that is a Red Herring with the amount of evidence available, especially considering that the basically the only evidence they have to declare Rose ineligible is that his score was higher and one (read it, one) handwriting expert testifies that the handwriting appears to be different.

Kind of makes you say “hmm”, doesn’t it?  It certainly makes anything the NCAA says ring hollow.

You Must Buy Insurance

We are being told by congress that everyone must purchase health insurance.  Why?  Well the argument is based on the “logic” that when someone doesn’t have insurance and they go in for medical treatment they cost everyone else because the taxpayers have to pay for it.  That would be a somewhat understandable argument if not for the fact that it leaves some important information out.  First, if you can afford health insurance and you choose not to purchase it and you then incur a medical expense you will have to pay for it - not the taxpayer.  If on the other hand, you are someone who cannot afford to pay for a medical expense that you incur, you are also someone who cannot afford to purchase health insurance.  In which case it will be provided to you by the government.  So, the people who can afford insurance and choose not to purchase it do not cost the taxpayer anything and they will be fined for not purchasing the insurance.  The people who are currently costing the taxpayer money when they incur a medical expense, such as going to the emergency room for a cold, will still get their health care provided by the government through their “insurance policy” and will still cost the taxpayer.

The second part of the argument put forth is to compare health insurance to auto insurance.  Our leaders rationalize it like this.  “In several states people are forced to purchase auto insurance because if they have an accident they must be able to cover the costs. This is just like requiring health insurance will be.” Again, lets put in the rest of the information.  A) Driving is a privilege.  You don’t have to do it and you don’t have to have a car, therefore you don’t have to purchase insurance.  You purchase insurance to help cover your decision to use this privilege and to protect others who are sharing the infrastructure where this privilege is used.  B) It is the states that currently require auto insurance.  By the US constitution and their own state constitution they have the power to do so.  The US constitution nowhere grants the federal government the power to require such, and it certainly does not grant it the power to require the purchase of health insurance.

So now, why do we have to purchase insurance?  Why do we not have the freedom of self-determination?

Park Rangers are Not Good at Distances

Just so everyone knows, Park Rangers are not good at distances.  When they say a mile they might be guessing and are likely to not be very close.  Marie and I walked a trail recently that was marked as a mile in distance.  Now I didn’t have a pedometer (that’s a device that measures how far you walk Danny), I can guarantee it was closer to 2 or 3 miles, which is even more of a problem when it is 95% hill and you are trying to get before dark.

So, a little piece of advice; when you read a trail map or marker and it says a mile, don’t believe it.

Health Care - It Has Become a Right

Years and years of entitlement mentality have so corrupted our view regarding our rights that we now as a nation believe that health care is a right. I believe it is just a matter of time that as a whole we will accept this as fact and it will be one more in a slow series of paradigm shifts that take us eventually from being a nation that treasures freedom to one that treasures comfort and being taken care of.

Here’s a good article written by Leonard Peikoff, Ph.D., delivered at a Town Hall Meeting on the Clinton Health Plan in 1993.

Health Care is Not a Right

It gives some good illustration as to why health care is not a right provided for in our Constitution. Sadly, I believe the tide of popular opinion has turned against this way of thinking as the argument is not whether health care is a right or not, but rather what kind of health care reform do we need to insure this right. Health care will not be the last item that will become a ‘right’ for the American people.

Health Care vs Health Insurance

For some reason in the recent national debate concerning health care it seems we have created a new synonym.  Somehow health care has come to mean the same thing as health insurance.  Health care is something that is provided by medical professionals and managed by the individual receiving the care or their qualified guardian.  Health insurance is a way ( one way ) of paying for health care. 

The problem of making the two synonomous is that we automatically think they must be provided as a package.  Everyone should have the right to pursue health care and to do so however they wish.  Everyone should have the responsibility to pay for their health care and to do so however they wish.  For example, if they want to use insurance to do so, fine.  If they want to put money into savings to do so, fine.  If they want to take out a loan to do so, fine.  Sure, some will need help in paying for health care from time to time.  Lets help them, but lets expect them to take some personal responsibility to manage it.

Porkupus Not Working

When it was all being debated the Porkupus, er stimulus bill was suppose to create between 3.5 and 4 million jobs.   Well here we are and instead of millions of new jobs unemployment is at 9.4%, the highest rate since 1983.  Now some will argue where would it be if they hadn’t put all of that money into the economy.  No one can with certainty answer that question, nor will I try to do so.  We just don’t know. 

The argument was made though that we needed to do something and do it now, fast, to turn around the economy quickly.  We were told that the porkupus would quickly make an impact.  Regardless of where we would be if they hadn’t spent the money, they were wrong when they made that argument.   The prediction was that without the porkupus we would be at 9% unemployment by 1st quarter of 2010, but with the bill and all of the money thrown in to the economy we would be at 7.6% unemployment and quickly trending downward.  The prediction showed unemployment as leveling out and beginning to trend downward by this time.  Instead we are at 9.4% (higher than any predicted point with the porkupus bill) and still trending upward.  They were wrong.

http://innocentbystanders.net

Now they have revised their predictions to say the efforts will create or “save” 600K jobs over the next quarter.  Hmm, 3.5 million vs 600,000, there’s a slight miss of 83%.  And now the prediction includes the term “save” jobs.  How will they measure what that 600,000 jobs were saved?  Thats the point, they won’t.  They’ll just say the saved them and state that they would have been lost if the bill and the spending had not taken place.

The worst part is millions of Americans believe them.  They believed them during the campaign.  they believed them during the debate and implementation of the porkupus bill and they believe them now.  Seriously, have we lost our ability to think?

Offended? Get Over it.

For some reason we’ve all become hyper-sensitive about the idea of people being offended.  Lets face it, sometime, somewhere, we are all going to get offended.  Its part of being alive and living among other people who have their own opinions and ideas. 

During the recent health concern involving the Swine Flu, we were implored to start calling it H1N1 because someone of Jewish decent might be offended by the term swine.   Wait a minute, if you are Jewish, you believe swine are unclean to eat, not that they don’t exist.  If I were Jewish I would have been offended that people thought I would be offended by the use of the term swine.  How thin-skinned and shallow do you think I am? 

Certainly we should use discretion in what we do and say to not needlessly offend others, but It is impossible to remove and police everything that could be offensive to someone.  Here’s an idea, when someone says or does something that offends you - get over it.

Move to the Middle? Get Off the Fence

Republican Senator Olivia Snowe recently criticized the Republican party for its refusal to move to the center with its platforms.  This is an incredibly shallow position.  

The center of politics is not a compilation of well thought out compromises.  It more closely resembles a pattern of caving in by one side or the other.  When one has come to a position on an issue after having considered the available information, what would be the motive for moving to the middle on it?  Certainly we do not expect or demand that everyone agrees with our position on all items, but when they don’t neither does that mean we are wrong. 

The purpose of compromise is to move forward on an issue that requires some action and there are two differing opinions on what action is needed.  In a compromise the two sides look for common thoughts and ideas.   This does not mean either must compromise their philosophy.  A compromise requires both sides to give in to some degree on their idea of what action is needed, it does not require them however to change their philosophy.  Nothing prohibits someone who is of one persuasion politically, lets say on the right, or conservative, from compromising on a specific issue with someone of another persuasion, lets say, liberal.  Some issues do not require action.  Sometimes it is the best thing when nothing is done.  This is an idea that seems to escape our current political leaders.  It is quite possible, even probable, that America’s founders organized our political landscape the way they did with the very thought in mind that it should be difficult to make changes.  There are times when, if the ideological sides cannot agree, it may be best to do nothing.  Why have we adopted the saying of a California criminal as our political mantra - “Can’t we all just get along?”.  Making policy decisions is not about getting along.  It is about doing what you believe to be right.  Getting along is completely irrelevant when it comes to making policy decisions.

Senator Snowe argues that the refusal of the Republican party to move to the center is why they have suffered recent defeats.  A much better and stronger argument can be made that it is their very willingness to do just that, i.e. move to the middle away from their conservative roots, is the actual cause of their recent failures.  How can one say that many conservative leaders have not moved to more liberal views in an effort to appease in recent years?  Since the late 90’s Republicans have been less and less conservative and more moderate, even liberal in their opinions and policies.  Just examine social spending in the last decade.  In the early to mid 90’s Republicans achieved great success with their Contract for America, a very conservative ideology. 

The facts and history argue against Senator Snowe’s opinion.

We Really Want Socialism?

According to a new Rassmussen poll only 53% prefer capitalism to socialism.  Are we nuts?

We continue to move toward a society that is of the opinion that someone should take care of us.  Government is more than willing to fill that role.  Here’s a thought - grow up and take care of yourself.  First, why do you deserve to have someone take care of you?  Secondly, why would you want to live that way? 

Is this the mindset that made America the greatest nation on earth?  Lets all line up and get our handout from the government.  Free healthcare, free housing, free education, free food, its all good as long as someone else is paying for it.  Problem is there are less and less people paying for it.  Approximately 50% of the people in the US do not pay any income taxes.  The other 50% are paying an increasingly larger amount so that the government can take care of us. 

The founding fathers never envisioned this.  They spoke of a country of opportunity, not a perpetual Christmas.  They saw a nation where you could make something of yourself, not sit back and wait for the delivery of your check.  They envisioned a land where hard work was rewarded, not punished and taxed. 

As those who work hard for what they have continue to carry the burden and their successes not only taxed but even vilified by the pols, press and the people, what incentive will they have to succeed?  When they stop succeeding who will pick up the tab for the handouts?

Capitalism has led to some of the greatest inventions and discoveries in history.  Socialist countries are a drain on the world, not a contributor.  Great strides in medicine, technology, other sciences and industry have come about from a system of capitalism that encourages people to succeed.  Once that incentive and accompanying resources are removed the quantity and quality of great discoveries decreases.

How have we failed so in educating our nation’s citizenry of these facts, borne out in history?