Welcome

This is my first blog ever and hopefully it goes well.  I have a web page that I just made, well revamped, and I want to add a blog feature to it so I have it linked to here.  I have also designed from scratch some other sites and some of them are in the links section.

 

So I just realized that usually people don’t make remarks on blogs but I want you to. So go for it.

Country never learns from its mistakes

So AIG just got a bunch more of taxpayer money and so it through another party for the execs.  I guess we should have known that the government doesn’t learn from its mistakes.  The economy and wars have been places the country’s leaders have fallen prey to making errors over and over.  Seriously, how can people not get so enraged by the Treasury’s bailout plan.  The companies aren’t trying to get back on the right track, instead they’re taking their huge gift and taking a vacation.  Absurd, people are losing their jobs and struggling to get by while the execs who make millions sit by the pool sipping martini’s bought and paid for by the hard working people who hope that they’ll still have a job tomorrow.  We, the taxpayers, are bailing out gamblers who hedged their bets too high knowing/hoping that their company was too important to let fail.  What does that mean, that the company profits when they win their bets, but when they lose, the taxpayers take the fall.  They knew full well what they were doing and yet continued to do so because of their greed.  The only way to correct this behavior is punishment, aka letting them take responsibility for their actions and not being such a protective parent.  This bailout seems no longer to be about housing, instead it’s about banks including the bank Henry Paulson was formerly an executive of, Goldman Sachs.  Stop the corruption.  http://www.stopthehousingbailout.com/

Balance that Budget

Income tax over the years:

Partial History of U.S. Federal Income Tax Rates
Applicable Year	Income brackets	First bracket	Top bracket	Source
1971-1981	15 brackets	14%	70%	IRS
1982-1986	12 brackets	12%	50%	IRS
1987	5 brackets	11%	38.5%	IRS
1988-1990	3 brackets	15%	33%	IRS
1991-1992	3 brackets	15%	31%	IRS
1993-2000	5 brackets	15%	39.6%	IRS
2001	5 brackets	15%	39.1%	IRS
2002	6 brackets	10%	38.6%	IRS
2003-2008	6 brackets	10%	35%	IRS

Taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_tax_in_the_United_States

Bush has been president from 2001 to 2009.  Clinton was president from 1993-2001.  Bush senior was president from 1989-1993, and Reagan from 1981-1989.  Then each only serving one four-year term were Carter and Ford, who took over from Nixon (1969-1974).

There’s this thing called the Hauser Law where no matter what the tax break down has been, the amount of revenue from taxes is around 19.5% of the country’s GDP.  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121124460502305693.html

So about balancing the budget?  Clinton was determined to do this and he did.  How did it happen, especially if the Hauser Law is true?  Well numbers and charts and graphs may look very convincing but one has to look closely at everything.  Terms can be defined one way and then slightly differently rendering any direct comprison not applicable.  However, to prove a point, many will not disclose such discrepancies.  Now take this 19.5% average.  So where’s the flaw.  Check out this article.  It explains it so well. http://www.portfolio.com/views/blogs/odd-numbers/2008/05/20/lying-with-charts-wsj-edition?rss=true

During the Clinton years the real GDP (based off year 2000 dollars) rose 30% whereas during the Bush years, it rose only 16.5%.  Take into consideration the costly wars during the Bush years and it’s no wonder why the Bush years led to unbalancing of the budget.  There may be something in the GDP afterall.  But let’s not forget that the Iraq war is costing us at least 10 billion dollars a month (If you factor in the interest we’re paying on debt it’s much more).  To save the taxpayer’s our country needs to balance that budget again.

So will Obama be able to do this?  Well, he is for getting out of Iraq (unforunately not as fast as one would hope) but he has not specifically made it a pertinant point to balance the budget. 

Ok well, at least my taxes are going to go down right?  They should.  However, do note that it has recently come to my attention, that the tax plan of Obama is going to be sticky.  Bush has tax cuts in place right now that are set to expire.  So how will your taxes change?  Is it good?  Will Obama continue the tax cuts?   One thing is for sure, if it turns out that lower and middle income people are paying more taxes, there will be upheaval.

Here you can read about taxes directly from the US Treasury website: http://www.treas.gov/education/fact-sheets/taxes/ustax.shtml

Military Spending

10 Billion dollars (actually more) a month in Iraq alone.  Money definitely better spent elsewhere.  But even though President-elect Barack Obama wants to end the war in Iraq, he will continue our fight in Afghanistan.  Peace, we just need a little peace.

Early Christmas Gift

Recently, due to the election, Henry Paulson was able to make a deal with ‘wall street’ under the radar.  The Treasury has investing $125 billion dollars in nine larger banks.  One of these nine was headed by Paulson, namely GoldmannSachs.  The deal end up being 50% gift.  It has been compared to something for twice what it’s worth.  Now what person would ever do such a thing.  Surprisingly there has been no mention of this in even the ‘left-wing’ media.  It has been overlooked because of the coverage of the election.  Well, now that it is over, we need to speak out.  If we keep giving these companies gifts they will have no risks because if they fail we’ll have to bail them out because otherwise we’ll lose.  In the end, Paulson is putting the people in a lose-lose situation by tying the people’s tax dollars with failing business.  Not only is the $125 billion a gift but it is a gift with no strings attached.  They are not funneling the money down or lending it out.  Instead, because it is such an amazing gift, using the money to pay off their high interest debts.  As the people, we are taking on the risks of ‘wall street’ and leaving ourselves with no control, no outs, no benefits, and no help for the struggling economy.  It appears that all other countries are having difficulties as well.  Maybe then there is no way to bailout wall street because there is intrinsically something wrong with the way it is run.  It needs to be fixed and the bailout is not the answer.

The gift:

Ron W. Bloom did an analysis for the United Steelworkers which proved that Paulson’sinvestment of $125 billion in nine large banks is 50% gift.  The president of United Steelworkers, Leo W. Gerard has signed a letter to Paulson raising the specific concerns over the investment that it is in fact not a good deal.  You can read the letter here: http://assets.usw.org/News/GeneralNews/paulson-letter-final.pdf.

Comparatively, Warren Buffet is making out like a bandit.  If Paulson is such a good financial expert why can’t he make investments like Warren Buffet.  It doesn’t take a genius to figure it out; the letter from the United Steelworkers sums things up nicely.

Paulson’s investment is a travesty that is slipping under the radar. Write to your congressmen and representatives.  Let them know that there’s more to being in congress than getting elected and the executive branch is still at work even if congress is not in session.

McCain’s Heatlth Care Plan

So McCain’s Health Care Plan is to give tax credits to buy health care and to eliminate the current tax deductability of health care premiums for individuals and employers.  This totally changes health care completely and if you look closely will end up making health care more expensive for everyone.  Businesses who provide health care for their employees will have no incentive to anymore and the tax credits McCain is giving won’t even cover half of a person’s medical premiums.  Seriously how can anyone think this is a good plan?

What’s a good MPG?

So obviously gas prices are a big concern now and thankfully for people who don’t have other options the prices are going down.  But we still need to consider becoming less dependent on gas.  Because of the concern about gas prices, car companies have been running ads boasting of their models being super fuel efficient.  But the question is what is actually a good MPG rating?  Without doing research yet I thought I’d just let you know from a little personal experience that if it’s not 30 MPG it’s not the best you can do for sure.  Car companies shouldn’t even be allowed to say that it’s super fuel efficient if the car doesn’t get at least 30 MPG.  You can definitely get cars that have 35 MPG and so anyone boasting of such great gas mileage at 24 MPG or even 27 MPG needs to put a lid on their advertising because their MPG rating just doesn’t cut it.  I’ll write more after a little research.

Antenna for Chicago High Rise

I just moved to Chicago and am living in a high rise.  I’m about 3 miles from the Sears Tower and I can’t get ABC or NBC to come in well (on anolog).  Then of course the country is switching to digital and that means that I don’t even get those two channels.  I get FOX in analog perfectly but I don’t get the digital channel.  I get some local digital channels but I just want to be able to watch the big four (CBS, NBC, ABC, and FOX).  I get CBS beautifully, in HD too.  What kind of antenna works best in a high rise in Chicago?  I think I got the RCA ANT1251 Antenna from Best Buy and my make shift antenna with a hanger works almost just as well.  Help.

Voter Fraud

So we have all this great technology yet we have a voter fraud problem.  Everyone in the country who is a citizen has a social security number right.  So why don’t we use that to make sure people don’t vote more than once.  Plus their names and ssn’s must match.  We have the technology to do this and for some reason the requirements for electronic voting aren’t held to the high standards that those of us use everyday when we buy stuff online.  So I know you need an address for voting because that’s what you need to have in order to vote in the correct local elections but isn’t there an address associated with your ssn.  Even if there isn’t atleast people could vote in the state or national election.  Politicians should stop spending money on voter fraud cases and focus on fixing the system so that we don’t have to worry about voter fraud.

Another Nuclear Arms Race

Why have we signed this agreement with Indian that lifts the ban (3 decade ban) on nuclear trade with India.  This agreement also India to expand it’s nuclear power industry while not requiring them to sign the non-proliferation treaty as other nations have to. 

 ”India will continue to build on its strong record of its responsibility in operating its nuclear facilities and India and the United States will cooperate more closely to keep the world’s most dangerous weapons out of the hands of extremists and terrorists.” – President Bush

Umm, how it is responsible if it doesn’t sign the non-proliferation treaty.  Aren’t we saying go ahead and get nuclear weapons.  What message does this send to other countries?  Indians are upset because they are worried about sovereignty.  If I was them I would be too.  Shouldn’t we want to get rid of nuclear weapons all together.  They can only mean one thing, disaster.

Bailout Betrayal

Though it is my personal opinion that the government bailout of wall street is not the answer to the financial crisis, the bigger crisis is the falling apart of our government.  The passing of the bailout is a slap in the face.  Our congressmen represent us and with peoples votes being more influential than money right now with the nearing election, the people are not heard.  This top down approach leaves the majority of Americans with nothing.  Our only hope is that greedy wall street extends the help of the government down and I for one don’t see this happening.  Our congressmen are bought out.

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2008/10/06