September, 2018, Part 1, Political Class Insanity: Room Temperatures Are More Important Than Issues, Idiocy In Connecticut, and Hillary Gets U.S. Spies Killed

It is another month which means it is again time to review the latest political class insanity from Washington and around the world. Political class insanity takes many forms including the wasting of taxpayer wealth, criminal fraud within government programs, inane and stupid political quotes and actions, the inability to create and implement effective and efficient government programs, stupid and ill performing economic policies and strategies, and other forms of insanity that continue to evolve and surprise and shock us.

Let’s get started:

1) I always felt that it must be tough to be a liberal today. It takes 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to micro examine every aspect of everyone else’s actions and words to find even the slightest trace of real or more likely, imagined, racism, sexism, ageism and who know what other type of ism. Such is the case in the race in New York to be the next governor:

• Actress Cindy Nixon, a second tier TV actress with no government or political experience, is challenging current New York governor Andrew Cuomo to be the next governor of the state.
• Apparently there will be only one face-to-face debate between the two candidates.
• One would think that failing schools, crumbling infrastructure, jobs, and other big issues would be the hot topics of the debate.
• Instead, both sides cannot agree on what the temperature should be in the room where the debate is going to take place. 
• Nixon wants a higher temperature and Cuomo wants a lower temperature.

And, wait for it…. Nixon calls a lower temperature “sexist.” Who knew that the “wrong” temperature of a room can be considered sexist? Forget the issues, sexist temperature settings is what these yahoos consider critical in the lives of the people they want to elect them. Idiots with idiotic priorities.

2) As we discuss the next piece of political class insanity, ask yourself if you really want these types of people in government office, people that really did not think through their campaign idea:

• Ned Lamont is running to become the next governor of Connecticut.
• He and/or his campaign people decided they wanted a cute, memorable slogan that would combine his first name with the state of Connecticut.
• They decided to print campaign signs that incorporated his name into the state name, “Vote conNEDicut.”
• While the combined word sounds like Connecticut phonetically it embeds the word “conned” into the slogan.

Now either this is a refreshingly honest statement of a politician, admitting that he is conning the residents of his state, or someone did not really think through this idea. In the latter case, it brings into question of how thorough and effective will Mr. Lamont be if elected if he cannot even notice this obvious screw up?

3) It is not debatable that Hillary Clinton broke Federal laws and government regulations when she decided to operate her State Department business on a rogue, unsecured computer in her home as opposed to government secured computers. In 2016, former FBI director James Comey stated publicly that the computer could very well have been hacked.

Now we see that her carelessness or deviousness may have gotten U.S. spies killed relative to China:

• According to the Gateway Pundit website, Chinese government operatives may have hacked that unsecured Hillary computer, implanting computer code that made sure that whenever she sent an email, a secret copy was sent to the Chinese government.
• Which may have led to the death and/or imprisonment of 18-20 U.S. spies that the Chinese took action against between 2010 and 2012 when Clinton was Secretary of State and using that unsecured computer.
• The code reportedly was discovered in 2015 by the Intelligence Community Inspector General (ICIG), which then warned FBI officials of the intrusion.
• And yet the FBI never reported that the code existed, further proving that the FBI has been compromised from an integrity and unbiased law enforcement perspective.
• But since the info was given to ex-FBI agent Peter Strzok, the disgraced and fired FBI agent who was in charge of investigating Hillary’s computer shenanigans, finding nothing wrong, it is no surprise nothing was done.
• But a May, 2016 from Strzok stated clearly that “we know foreign actors obtained access” to some Clinton emails, including at least one “secret” message “via compromises of the private email accounts” of Clinton staffers.
• And still nothing came of this situation from the corrupt FBI.

So sad that government organizations, especially an entity, the FBI,  that was once viewed as being filled with people of integrity and diligence, as fallen so far down the political rat hole. So much so that it is now getting important intelligence sources killed around the world.

That will do it for today’s political class insanity insanity: bad priorities in New York, carelessness in Connecticut, and Hillary Clinton chutzpah that may have gotten U.S. operatives killed. More insanity to follow.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:



www.loathemygovernment.com It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday. Please visit the following sites for freedom: http://www.reason.com http://www.cato.org http://www.bankruptingamerica.org http://www.conventionofstates.com http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

The Horrors And Destruction That Donald Trump Has IMposed On America...Just Kidding! Part 12

Before we start today’s discussion, let’s review my voting history: 

• I have never voted for a Republican for President in my life. 
• Thus, I did not vote for Trump. 
• I have rarely voted for a Republican for national office in my life. 

About 18 months ago, many liberals, Democrats, and millennials were besides themselves with grief and fear because their pre-ordained queen, Hillary Clinton, was not elected President. Instead, Donald Trump was elected, an individual that these same people despised, hated, and feared, an individual they felt would endanger and possibly destroy the country and our democracy. For the past year and a half they fretted, worried and lashed out at anything or anyone that even remotely smelled of Donald Trump.

Given that Trump has been in office for over 18 months, I thought, that as someone who did not vote for him, it would be a good idea to review the horror, trauma, and terrible things that Trump has subjected the country to in just eighteen month’s time. This is obviously a very sarcastic comment when you take an unbiased look at what has happened during the Trump Presidency. The many previous posts we did on this topic identified over 160 good things that have happened to America and Americans since Trump became President can found listed in the previous post we did in this series:

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2018/08/the-horrors-and-destruction-that-donald.html

To those over 160 good things that Trump has done, let’s us today add another ten positive contributions to the country:

- U.S. median household income has risen 4% since Trump took office, rising to an all time high of $62,450, compared to the measly .3% rise over the eight year Obama Presidency.

- In addition to the tariff reduction agreement that Trump got with the European Union earlier in August for non-auto industrial goods industries, a European Union top trade official said that the Union is willing to include autos in a duty free agreement.

- The 4.2% growth in the U.S. GDP in the second quarter has been revised upwards from 4.1%, the best GDP growth performance in almost four years.

- A recent Harris poll found that American blue collar workers believe their lives are heading “in the right direction,” a level probably deemed impossible during the Obama years.

- Also in the Harris poll 55% of those polled said they are better off than they were five years ago, they believe they have a bright future, and 88% believe that, “My children will have a better future than I will.”

- While Trump only attained 8% of the African-American vote in 2016, his current approval level according to a recent Rasmussen poll is 36%, almost double what it was a year ago.

- According to the Conference Board’s research, 51% of American workers are satisfied with their jobs, the highest level since 2005.

- According to the Wall Street Journal, there were 6.7 million job openings in early August, the highest level since 2001.

- Trump has frozen the pay levels of 2 million Federal non-military employees in a hopefully a first attempt to reduce out of control Federal government spending and get high Federal government employee job compensation in line with non-government compensation levels. 

- The Trump administration’s ICE entity recently identified and departed a former Nazi back to Germany.

Another ten reasons to add to the previous 160 or so reasons why the first year and a half of the Trump Presidency has not wrought disaster on the country.

For those of you that have hated on Trump since day one, and given your obvious gross error in judgment relative to Trump, let me ask that you to do us all a favor by implementing the following changes in your behavior and attitude:

• Chill out, tamp down your TDS affliction. No matter how much you hate Trump on a sexist, personal basis, get over it. He is the legally and duly elected President, he will be around for a while so refocus your hatred on more constructive issues and matters. You will live a lot longer if you take your hatred out of your heart and soul and devote it to something positive.
• I would really appreciate it if some of you would apologize to the Trump voters you have disrespected in some of the grossest terms possible over the past year. You have called millions of voters racists, ignorant, stupid, Nazis, KKK members, and other horrible names simply because you disagreed with their voting choice. No American should be called such disgusting names simply because they exercised their Constitutional rights to the best of their abilities. Plus, slandering over 60 million Americans is no way to unite the country and get it focused on the real issues facing us all.
• More personally, I would like, no I am demanding, an apology from some of you for your slanderous and disgusting name calling because in doing so, you insulted and disrespected my sister, my family members, my friends, and my co-workers who simply voted their conscience. I will defend their right to vote anyway they wanted and will no put up with your childish and vicious venom and bile directed at them, very important people in my life.
• And finally, I challenge you to read the following blog post, a post that shows quite clearly that it was hateful people like some of you and your silence during the Obama years that actually caused Trump to be elected. Thus, the people you hate for voting for Trump are actually looking back at you in the mirror:

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2016/03/how-american-liberals-and-washington.html

If you were silent in the dozens of instances listed in this post then you were responsible for the very thing you hate: a Trump Presidency. Or put another way, a so far successful and productive Trump Presidency. Over 160 accomplishments in a little more than a year and a half is not too shabby despite many of you wanting both Trump and the country to fail.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

www.loathemygovernment.com

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:


http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

August, 2018, Part 3, By The Numbers - The Implosion of Social Security and Medicare and The Numerical Stupidity of "Medicare For All"

On a semi-regular basis we do a post under the theme, “By The Numbers.” Under this theme we analysis the crazy ways that politicians use numbers, from making them up outright, to using them inappropriately, to using them to lie to us. The problem for them when they do that is it is so easy to show how either stupid they are or how conniving they are.

As an FYI, as you read my analysis of the misuse of numbers, keep in mind that I have a masters degree in statistics and for most of my life have been involved in analyzing numbers and stats. Politicians misuse of numbers and statistics is taken as a personal and professional affront to me and my profession.

1) We have often discussed the serious and dire straits that Social Security and Medicare are in. The numbers are not good as more and more Americans retire and burden the systems with fewer and fewer workers to finance the needs of Baby Boomers' income and retirement needs. And as always, American politicians have neither the brains, will power or courage to fix what ails both systems.
A recent article in USA Today highlighted how bad the numbers are:

• The Social Security Trust fund will go broke in 2034 and Medicare’s trust fund will go broke in 2026, eight short years from now.
• But we know from previous discussion that this is fake news since the trust fund really does not exist as anything but a cruel accounting trick, Social Security has been in a negative cash flow situation for years.
• Former head of the Federal Reserve Board, Ben Bernanke, warned Congress of this situation in 2011: "The unsustainable trajectories of deficits and debt [under current policies] cannot actually happen, because creditors would never be willing to lend to a government whose debt, relative to national income, is rising without limit." [Side note: maybe he should pass along this insight along to the Chicago politicians who want to issue another $10 billion in debt to help fund a $28 billion debt liability shortfall, i.e. “creditors will never be willing …”]
• The numbers spelling out the crisis is pretty simple: Social Security and Medicare have unfunded liabilities over the next 30 years of of a whopping $82 trillion because 74 million Baby Boomers will be entering both systems over that time period.
• To fund this shortfall without changing benefits or the parameters of the program, taxes would have to be raised over $2.7 TRILLION a year for 30 years. 
• This would raise the annual Federal budget by over 60%.
• It also means that on average, every American family would have to pay an additional $22,000 a year in extra taxes to cover the shortfall.
• And taxing the rich, the inane all-purpose solutions from Democrats does not work since even if you doubled the existing top two tax brackets to 70% and 74%, that would only close 20% of the deficit.
• And it probably would not even do that since who would work hard and long to earn a lot of money just to give over 70% of it up to inept government bureaucrats , thus, making the shortfall covered less than 20%.
• And what if you did not tax the rich more but somehow could confiscate all of their money and liquidate it, something that would be impossible to do but what if: if you took the wealth of the ten richest people in the county and somehow used it to fund the $82 TRILLION shortfall you would cover about….1.4% of the $82 TRILLION.
• If you took the the wealth of the next 10 richest Americans you would not come close to that 1.4% of the first ten since those top ten folks are truly head and shoulders above even the 11th to 20th richest Americans.
• So “taxing the rich” is stupid if you think that it will close the $82 TRILLION gap, the numbers do not lie.
• Totally eliminating the defense budget for 30 years, which will never happen, would cover less than 25% of the $82 TRILLION.
• Eliminating all anti- Federal government spending for 30 years, which will never happen, would not do much better.

Nasty numbers telling a nasty story. And the longer that Washington waits to fix what is clearly broken and breaking, the harder the solutions will be to find and the harder the consequences will be on those that rely on Social Security and Medicare to live and stay healthy.
So don’t worry about whether the Russians colluded with Trump or Hillary. Don’t worry about who wins the midterm elections. Don’t worry about climate change. Because within the next ten years, a whopping and growing $21 TRILLION national debt and an $82 TRILLION Social Security and Medicare shortfall will crush any petty concerns you have today. The numbers do not lie.

2) So Medicare is racing towards financial insolvency and yet, stupid politicians in D.C. want to go to a single payer health insurance program for all Americans, the so-called “Medicare for all.” This means that the government would take over all aspects of every American’s health insurance and medical care needs under the Medicare umbrella even though it cannot fund its current needs and never mind adding hundreds of million Americans onto the program.

And as we have pointed out any number of times, such a government take over of a country’s health care industry has been a financial and quality disaster. From Canada to England, wait times for medical care goes up and the quality of that care goes in the dumper. Never mind the cost of this inane “Medicare for all” nonsense:

• According to an analysis by the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, The “Medicare for all” program would increase government healthcare spending by a whopping $32 TRILLION over just the next ten years.
• Thus, given the $21 TRILLION national debt and the $83 TRILLION shortfall in the current form of Medicare and Social Security, this program would bring total Federal government debt in these areas to an unfathomable $136 TRILLION.
• This would put the per household debt burden on average to over $1,000,000 each.
• Obviously, the whole system collapses long before we actually get to this $1,000,000 level.
• At $32 TRILLION in the first ten years, the average increased government spending on healthcare would be about $3.2 TRILLION a year.
• This would mean that the Federal government spending, and increased taxes, would have to go up by over 70% a year.
• And as we discussed above, raising taxes on the rich to pay for this is still a stupid idea since confiscating the entire wealth of the ten richest Americans would cover about 3% of this increased government tax need.
• If you only took 10% of their wealth you would cover only .3% of the program’s cost and raising taxes on only their income would be too small to measure.
• And since the current Medicare program loses tens of billions of dollars every year from criminal fraud, imagine how many hundreds of billions of dollars would be lost annually to criminal fraud in a “Medicare for all” program.

Now, supporters of “Medicare for all” would claim that the country would see savings elsewhere from this type of program since Medicare would pay all of the country’s healthcare expenses. But the supporters fail to point out that their program requires doctors and hospitals to accept 40% less than what they get paid today which would result in:

• Doctors getting less compensation are less likely to stay in the profession, making the current doctor shortage even worse, greatly expanding the time it takes to see the remaining doctors, and increasing costs since the supply would go down without a corresponding decrease in demand.
• Future doctors are less likely to enter the profession since their earnings would be greatly reduced and they would spent so much more of their time dealing with likely inefficient and ineffective government bureaucracies than actually caring for people.
• And the Mercatus study showed that reducing hospital payouts by 40% would result in about 80% of those hospitals to be in an unprofitable mode almost overnight.

Thus, the numbers show that “Medicare for all” would result in longer wait times, lower quality, fewer doctors, financially at risk hospitals, more bureaucracy, more fraud, and unbearable Federal government debt. The numbers do not lie.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

www.loathemygovernment.com

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:


http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

August, 2018, Part 2, By The Numbers - Murders and Financial Suicide In Chicago and Massive Street Cleaning In San Francisco

On a semi-regular basis we do a post under the theme, “By The Numbers.” Under this theme we analysis the crazy ways that politicians use numbers, from making them up outright, to using them inappropriately, to using them to lie to us. The problem for them when they do that is it is so easy to show how either stupid they are or how conniving they are. 

As an FYI, as you read my analysis of the misuse of numbers, keep in mind that I have a masters degree in statistics and for most of my life have been involved in analyzing numbers and stats. Politicians misuse of numbers and statistics is taken as a personal and professional affront to me and my profession.

1) Walter Williams, writing for the Heritage Foundation earlier this month, listed out some very distressing numbers coming out of Chicago, a gang and violence infested city. Mr.Williams, by the way, is an economics professor so he probably has a pretty good handle on numbers:

• During the weekend of August 4 -5, 12 residents of Chicago were shot to death and over five dozen were wounded.
• In the first seven months of 2018, 1,718 Chicago residents had been shot and 306 had died from their gunshot wounds.
• The law enforcement authorities in the city have cleared only about 15% of all of the shootings which means that if you are a violent criminal you have pretty goods odds (85%) of getting away with your crimes in Chicago.
• As of early July this year, 626 people had been shot by police officers this year of which 114 (18%) were black and all of last year, 987 people were shot by the police of which 223 were black, 23%.
• While these percentages were higher than the percentage of blacks in the U.S. (12%), in Chicago in 2017 there were 674 homicides of which a whopping 80% were black residents.

So while people are getting bent out of shape because Tiger Woods recently refused to denounce Trump and protesting NFL football players show such “bravery” on the football field every Sunday but contribute nothing to bringing down these Chicago shooting numbers, the killing and maiming numbers continue to march on in Chicago.

2) Let’s stay in Chicago because the financial numbers are just as disastrous as the murder and wounded numbers. We have previously discussed the reality that the financial situation in Chicago, and the state of Illinois also, is horrible. There are unfunded future liabilities, the schools are in terrible shape, and the most productive citizens continue to move out of the city as taxes go higher and higher without a commiserate drop in city expenses. Things are so bad that the city bonds have basically been dropped in value to junk bond status.

The local CBS outlet recently dropped two distressing numbers on the politicians in Chicago. The city apparently has unfunded future liabilities of about $28 BILLION. A single city that is short an amazing $28 billion. 

And rather than do the right thing, reduce city spending to cover this future shortfall, the city plans on issuing additional debt of $10 billion. Yes, great strategy, dig yourself an overwhelming debt hole and the proposed solution is to take on more debt! According to the report: “[Mayor] Rahm Emanuel suggested the city issue billions in obligation bonds. The plan aims to inject more cash into the pension system now in order to leverage a higher rate of return to exceed the interest that will accrue on the bonds, the Illinois Policy Institute says.”

Think about these numbers. Why would anyone want to own any of these new city bonds worth $10 billion when it still leaves the city short $18 billion? Does anyone really think that the $10 billion would ever be completely repaid when more city debt continues to pile up? And if Chicago is serious about issuing more debt, how high will the interest rates have to be to attract anyone to by basically junk bonds? 

Thus, it is obvious from these numbers that Chicago is in a financial death spiral: to pay off current debt they need to create more and more debt which drives up the interest rate they have to issue for the latest bonds which increases debt even more, etc., and the death spiral is underway.

3) We have previously discussed the reality that San Francisco has been turned into a third world hellhole. The streets are overrun with human defecation, urination, and illegal drug usage and needle use. So much so that the city actually has both a hotline for citizens to report human feces on the streets of the city and a five person full time pooper squad that goes around the city scooping up human feces from the street.

The numbers are unbelievable:

• The city has received a whopping 20,000 reports of human feces on the street.
• The five person city pooper squad costs almost $1 million a year just in salaries for the squad since each person on that assignment makes an obscene $185,000 a year.
• According to the San Francisco Chronicle: “San Francisco Public Works has a $72.5 million-a-year street cleaning budget — including spending $12 million a year on what essentially have become housekeeping services for homeless encampments. The costs include $2.8 million for a Hot Spots crew to wash down the camps and remove any biohazards, $2.3 million for street steam cleaners, $3.1 million for the Pit Stop portable toilets, plus the new $830,977-a-year Poop Patrol to actively hunt down and clean up human waste.”
• But beyond the popper squad, the city has budgeted $700,000 for a 10 person needle cleanup squad to cleanup the drug needles strewn about city streets.

Would one ever expect to see numbers like this in a modern American city? Pretty disgusting numbers with no relief insight. What is the great idea that the incoming mayor, Landon Breed, wants to implement to combat this problem? She wants to ask non-profit organizations serving the 7,500 homeless souls in the city to ask their constituents to stop pooping in the streets. Yeah, that will work.

As always, the numbers show just how ineffective and useless our politicians. Numbers do not lie but politicians do. More numbers to follow.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

www.loathemygovernment.com

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w