July, 2014 Political Class Insanity, Part 4: Killing Our Veterans, No Accountaiblity In Oregon, More Record Low Approval Ratings For Congress

Today we continue our review and discussion on the latest political class insanity that has arisen in the past month or so from our politicians. As we do every month, we continue to prove that given their lunacy, ineffective programs, criminal fraud, and the inability to resolve any major issues continues to convince many Americans that we are currently living through the worst era of politicians in the history of our country. Today’s review of more insanity does no nothing to refute that claim and reality.

1) Yesterday we reviewed the latest Gallup poll results that found an all time low of Congressional approval at around 7%, a historically low figure that is trending downward. We have also come across a similar survey, this one done by CBS News, that found even worst results:

• A mere 5% of those polled think most members of Congress have done a good enough job to deserve re-election.
• 5% is the lowest ever recorded in this CBS News poll.
• Nearly nine out of ten polled think its time to give new people a chance. 
• Only 29%, another record low rating, believe that their own House member deserves re-election.
• A whopping 62% think it's time for someone else to be elected in their district.

The problem is that while the overwhelming majority of Americans think we need to clean house in Washington, according to CBS News, since 1994, the House of Representatives has seen a reelection rate of over 90% in every election except once where that reelection rate was 85%. This proves once again that our election processes are very, very broken. 

Incumbents can control so many things, from the gerrymandering of Congressional districts, to free publicity from being in office, to being able to trade government favors and cronyism for campaign contributions, putting outsiders at a distinct election resource disadvantage, etc. 

The only way to bring sanity to this situation is to install term limits for all Washington politicians, one and done. Without term limits, the current entrenched political class will continue to under perform at historically and insanely bad levels but be able to protect themselves from being held accountable and responsible for their meager performance. 

You can help bring this change about by visiting:

www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com

2) Speaking of a lack of accountability and responsibility, consider two other pieces of insanity from the political class. We have previously discussed the fact that the state of Oregon’s Obama Care online health insurance exchange was a total disaster. It was so bad that well into the program, only one person had been successfully enrolled in an Obama Care insurance policy and the whole system was eventually shut down despite having cost hundreds of millions of dollars to futilely build.

In real life outside of government, those responsible for spending so much taxpayer money and delivering so little benefit would have been fired immediately. Unfortunately, real life does not exist when it comes to government workers and the politicians that oversee them, at least in Oregon.

Citing recent news stories, the wonderful website. “Bankrupting America,” reviewed that employees of the failed Oregon healthcare exchange would be receiving $650,000 in bonuses to keep them on the job as they transition over to the Federal healthcare exchange. Yes, even though the Oregon Obama Care state website failed miserably, and wasted hundreds of millions of dollars, those same employees are being richly rewarded for this fiasco.

I cannot imagine what they would have received as bonuses if they had actually created something that was of value. Instead, the same people that royally screwed up the first attempt in Oregon are being rewarded for staying around to try to fix what they screwed up originally. Only in government work can you mess up so much and be rewarded financially for your incompetence and not be held accountable or responsible for your failed work.

3) Let’s continue along this theme of rewarding government incompetence by moving over to the disaster that is the Veterans Administration. Most knowledgeable people know that that the Veterans administration has been revealed to be one of the most inept and corrupt government bureaucracies in existence today.

The truly sad part of this Obama administration scandal is that it is costing lives as veterans have their files destroyed, their medical appointments arbitrarily delayed or secretly cancelled, etc. Valid news reports now put the death toll at over a thousand veterans who unnecessarily died as a result of Veterans Administration incompetence.

But despite killing off veterans due to their own incompetence, many high ranking and other employees within the veterans Administration have been handsomely rewarded financially for their less than stellar management efforts. When people are dying due to your incompetence, you should not even have a job in that area never mind getting bonus payments.

The insanity of the whole affair was captured again by the Bankrupting America website. Below we see the result of their research and reporting on how many in the Veterans Administration are getting very hefty bonus payments for incompetence. High financial reward with no accountability or responsibility for the deaths of our veterans:

All Senior VA Executives Received Ratings Of “Fully Successful” Or Better During The Past Four Years. “The data also showed that in 2013, nearly 80 percent of the senior executives were rated either ‘outstanding’ or as having exceeded ‘fully successful’ in their job performance” (Richard A. Oppel, Jr., “Every Senior V.A. Executive Was Rated,” The New York Times, 6/20/14).

Rep. Phil Roe (R-Tenn.), Member Of Veterans’ Affairs Committee: “Do you think that’s normal in business, that nearly every executive is successful? That means you put the bar down here, so anybody can step over it” (Richard A. Oppel, Jr., “Every Senior V.A. Executive Was Rated,” The New York Times, 6/20/14).

The VA Claims Innocence, Says That Gov’t Inefficiencies Did Not Affect Veterans. John Berman of CNN’s “Early Start”: “Here’s what is really disturbing. The VA admits patients were neglected but denies that this mistreatment had any impact on their health” (Nelli Black and Scott Bronstein and Drew Griffin, “Veterans neglected for years in VA facility,” CNN, 6/23/14).

VA PAID OUT $10 MILLION IN BONUSES IN THE LAST THREE YEARS The Government Rewards These Executives For Their Poor Performance. “The embattled Phoenix branch of the Department of Veterans Affairs apparently has paid out $10 million in bonuses during the past three years” (Craig Harris and Rob O’Dell, “Phoenix VA gave out $10 mil in bonuses in past 3 years,” Arizona Republic, 6/17/14).

Who’s In Charge Here? “Bonus payouts increased significantly under Sharon Helman, who became director of the Phoenix VA in February 2012” (Craig Harris and Rob O’Dell, “Phoenix VA gave out $10 mil in bonuses in past 3 years,” Arizona Republic, 6/17/14)

Phoenix CA Administrator Placed On Leave, Still Getting Paid: “The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs disclosed Friday during a congressional hearing that Sharon Helman, the former Phoenix VA Health Care System administrator placed on leave last month amid a patient-care scandal, continues to receive her full salary — roughly $170,000 annually” (Craig Harris, “Phoenix VA: Ousted exec keeps salary while on leave,” The Arizona Republic, 6/20/14)

New VA Chief Won’t Face The Music. He was “speaking in North Carolina last week when he was asked about whether bonus money could be used to ‘actually having a human being pick up the phone when a veteran calls the suicide crisis line’” (Pete Kasperowicz “New VA Secretary’s Shocking Answer,” The Blaze, 6/16/14).

Veterans Die Waiting For Care, Only Revealed When VA Whistle-Blowers Speak Out. “Wednesday’s testimony came amid . . . allegations by VA whistle-blowers who have complained about falsified records, preventable or premature deaths, mismanagement and other systemic problems”(Dennis Wagner, “Deaths at Phoenix VA hospital may be tied to delayed care,” Arizona Republic, 4/10/14).

Rep. Jeff Miller (R-Fla.), Chairman Of Veterans’ Affairs Committee: “‘It appears as though there could be as many as 40 veterans whose deaths could be related to delays in care,’ Miller announced to a stunned audience during a committee hearing Wednesday” (Dennis Wagner, “Deaths at Phoenix VA hospital may be tied to delayed care,” Arizona Republic, 4/10/14).

ABSOLUTE CHAOS: “Medical record-keeping so backed up the system is 250,000 pages behind, and millions of records reportedly are missing [and a] compromised mental-health system where patient suicides doubled in the past few years” (Dennis Wagner, “Deaths at Phoenix VA hospital may be tied to delayed care,” Arizona Republic, 4/10/14).

Still Waiting In North Carolina. “Patients seeking care through the Fayetteville VA Medical Center are waiting an average of 83 days for their first appointment with a primary care doctor — nearly six times longer than the department’s goal” (Nicole Carr and Greg Barnes, “Durham, Fayetteville VA Hospitals Have Among Longest Wait Times in US,” ABC11, 6/09/14).

Isaiah Perry, Former Marine, On His Experience Getting Care: “I’ve been about two years [without seeing a primary care provider]. I’m not the only one” (Investigative Team, “Veteran Shares His Durham VA Wait Time Horror Story,” ABC11, 6/11/14).

Veterans Died While The VA Spent Millions Maintaining Abandoned Buildings. “The Government Accountability Office estimates that the VA has spent $175 million every year since 2007 [maintaining] hundreds of buildings — most of them vacant — that have fallen into such a state of disrepair that many of them are considered health hazards” (Jana Winter, “VA Spends Millions to Maintain Vacant and Hazardous Buildings,” Fox News, 9/01/10).

Picasso’s Blue Period Never Looked So Good. “This past week, the Department of Veterans Affairs bought $562,000 worth of artwork. This string of big-ticket purchases was an unmistakable sign: It was ‘use it or lose it’ season again in Washington.” (David Fahrenthold, “As Congress fights over the budget,” Washington Post, 9/28/13). 

Veterans are dying and the VA is buying artwork rather than hiring more medical staff. Veterans are dying and VA executives are getting millions of dollars in bonus payments. Veterans are dying and even when the VA suspends an incompetent executive, she still draws a full salary. Veterans are dying and the VA wastes millions of dollars on abandoned buildings rather than hiring more medical staff. 

Of all of the political class insanity we have covered over the past five years in this blog, this shabby and fatal treatment of our veterans is the most despicable and disgusting we have ever come across.

More insanity tomorrow including additional insanity from the Veterans Administration the government bureaucracy that keeps on screwing up beyond what we have already talked about.

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.robertringer.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w

Part 7, Freedom and LIberty Guest Speaker: Antonio West, Speaking For All Of America's Youth

This is the seventh and final post we will be doing that is dedicated to the decline of freedom and liberty in this country, all presented by guest writers and not myself. Many Americans are starting to wake up to the fact that the Federal government is growing and spending at out of control levels, levels that continually eat away and erode our freedom and the privacy rights.

Whether it is saddling current and future generations of Americans with mountains of debt, invading our privacy with drones and interceptions of all of our electronic communications, using instruments of government, such as the NSA, IRS, EPA, etc., to harass and abuse the rights of private citizens, or the outright designation for assassination of American citizens by the Federal government without due process of the law, the land of the free is quickly becoming the land of the oppressed and fearful. The speakers over the past week or so have eloquently pointed out how and why we have seen this erosion in our rights and liberty.

Today’s approach takes a little different approach. There is no greater loss of freedom than the loss of one’s life. Unfortunately, the unnecessary loss of life happens way too often in the country today. The Trayvon Martin situation is just one example where the failure of the political class has led to the unnecessary death of a young American. We will get into the bigger issue of unnecessary loss of life in this country and the failure of the political class to address the issue tomorrow.

However, in the heat and emotion of the Trayvon Martin incident, I wanted to address the unnecessary loss of freedom of another American. While these words were not actually spoken by today’s guest writer, they could have been. They accurately point out how his loss of freedom has been lost and buried by the political class in America today and the mainstream media, who are also as culpable as the political class in the portrayal of only the side of reality that makes them political points or TV rating points.

Today’s guest speaker/writer is a very young gentleman named Antonio West. Here is a picture of him:

The following is his story and how we as a nation caused him to suffer the greatest loss of freedom possible, his life:

**************************

Who is Antonio West

Hello. Don’t recognize me? That’s OK; I understand.

My name was Antonio West. I was the 13-month old child who was shot in the face at point blank range by two black teens, who were attempting to rob my mother, who was also shot.

I think my murder and my mommy’s wounding made the news for maybe a day, and then disappeared.

A Grand Jury of my mommy's peers from Brunswick , Georgia ruled the black teens who murdered me will not face the death penalty... too bad it was me who got the death sentence from my killers instead, because Mommy didn’t have the money they demanded.

See, my family made the mistake of being white in a 73% non-white neighborhood, but my murder wasn’t ruled a ‘hate crime’.

Oh, and President Obama didn’t take a single moment to acknowledge my murder. He couldn’t have any children who could possibly look like me - so why should he care?

I’m one of the youngest murder victims in our great Nation's history, but the media didn’t care to cover the story of my being killed in cold blood.

There isn’t a white equivalent of Al Sharpton, because if there was he would be branded a ‘racist’. So no one’s rushing to Brunswick , Georgia to demonstrate and demand ‘justice’ for me. There’s no ‘White Panther’ party, either, to put a bounty on the lives of the two black teens who murdered me.

I have no voice, I have no representation, and unlike those who shot me in the face while I sat innocently in my stroller - I no longer have my life.

Isn’t this a great country?

So while you’re out seeking ‘justice for Trayvon’, please remember to seek ‘justice’ for me. Tell your friends about me, tell you families, get tee-shirts with my face on them, and make the world pay attention, just like you did for Trayvon.

I won’t hold my breath.

I don’t have to anymore.

**********************************

A truly tragic story on so many levels. How did our political, moral, educational, and human compass get so screwed up that teenagers find it no problem to do such a heinous act? Why have certain politicians and a certain attorney general focused only on the Trayvon Martin tragedy and pay virtually no attention to this tragedy? Trayvon Martin, Antonio West, the annual 400 or so kids killed in the streets in Chicago, the thousands of kids abused physically and sexually every year, why, why, why?

Why have our politicians not provided the necessary leadership, direction, and morality so that these thousands of kids do not suffer the greatest loss of freedom every year, their lives and their chance at a decent childhood? I think we know the answer to these questions. It is the same answer to why the political class has not resolved a major issue in the past fifty years, whether it is a lost war on drugs, our failing pubic schools, a leaky border, etc. They do not want to resolve these issues since they are more concerned with their next reelection fund raiser, their next reelection campaign, and their own self enrichment.

This is why the need for term limits has become so important, because really, how much worse could it get for all Americans, but particularly for people like Antonio West and Trayvon Martin and thousands of others like them. Join our drive for term limits at:

www.howmuchworsecoudlitget.com

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.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.robertringer.com/  

A President Should Never Scare Any American, Unlike The President We Have Today

Yesterday, we reviewed President Obama's checklist of  "accomplishments" three years into his term in office. It was not a good report card, most of his "accomplishments" have been detrimental our our economic well being and our personal liberty. This checklist post was  congruent with one of our most popular post ever, from January 11, 2012, where we listed out the 88 reasons why Obama was not worthy of a second term in office:

  http://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2012/01/88-reasons-why-president-obama-is.html

Both of these pieces were heavy on research, data, and root cause analyses to provide as quantitative approach possible to develop a comprehensive view of this administration's many failures. We tried to stay as logical as possible in order to be able to defend the multitude of failures we documented as a result of our work.

However, today's post is light on logic, data, and analysis and is much more emotional. The following words have been circulating on the Net for a while and are attributed to Lou Pritchett, who is a former executive with Proctor and Gamble. Snopes confirms that Mr. Pritchett is the author of this piece.

I think Mr. Pritchett documents and captures the gut feeling of uneasiness and fear that many Americans have with this President and this administration. While he may not have put as much quantitative analysis into this piece as we did with our two posts, he does a fine job capturing the emotional angst that many honest, non-racist Americans have with this President.

Rather than try to explain what Mr. Pritchett was trying to communicate, why not let his actual words do it for us:

***********************

Dear President Obama:

You are the thirteenth President under whom I have lived and unlike any of the others, you truly scare me.

You scare me because after months of exposure, I know nothing about you.

You scare me because I do not know how you paid for your expensive Ivy League education and your upscale lifestyle and housing with no visible signs of support.

You scare me because you did not spend the formative years of youth growing up in America and culturally you are not an American.

You scare me because you have never run a company or met a payroll.

You scare me because you have never had military experience, thus don't understand it at its core.

You scare me because you lack humility and 'class', always blaming others.

You scare me because for over half your life you have aligned yourself with radical extremists who hate America and you refuse to publicly denounce these radicals who wish to see America fail.

You scare me because you are a cheerleader for the 'blame America' crowd and deliver this message abroad.

You scare me because you want to change America to a European style country where the government sector dominates instead of the private sector.

You scare me because you want to replace our health care system with a government controlled one.

You scare me because you prefer 'wind mills' to responsibly capitalizing on our own vast oil, coal and shale reserves.

You scare me because you want to kill the American capitalist goose that lays the golden egg which provides the highest standard of living in the world.

You scare me because you have begun to use 'extortion' tactics against certain banks and corporations.

You scare me because your own political party shrinks from challenging you on your wild and irresponsible spending proposals.

You scare me because you will not openly listen to or even consider opposing points of view from intelligent people.

You scare me because you falsely believe that you are both omnipotent and omniscient.

You scare me because the media gives you a free pass on everything you do.


You scare me because you demonize and want to silence the Limbaughs, Hannitys, O'Reillys and Becks who offer opposing, conservative points of view.


You scare me because you prefer controlling over governing.


Finally, you scare me because if you serve a second term I will probably not feel safe in writing a similar letter in 8 years.


Lou Pritchett

**************************************


I have to agree with Mr. Pritchett.

I find this President condescending to those that have an honest difference of opinion with him, implying that no one could never be as smart as him.

I find his silence deafening when he allows members of his own party to demean and slander honest Americans who voice an honest difference of opinion with him.

I find his leadership non-existent when any controversial issue of problem arises, I prefer dealing with more forthright and honest politicians who step out and take the heat for stating an opinion and a position while this President hides in the shadows of non-commitment.

I find his words constantly dishonest such as when he falsely implies that all high earning Americans pay a smaller percentage of their income in taxes than their respective secretaries or when he implies all of our fiscal problems could be solved by just taxing the wealthy more, problems that can't be solved, or come close to being solved, in this manner.

I find his anti-Constitution actions despicable, the Constitution is a far greater document than he is President.

I find his problem solving skills either non-existent or very short term and tactical besides almost always ending in failure.

I find his interest in anything but himself to be narcissistic.

And worse of all, as Mr. Pritchett says, I am very scared that if Obama is reelected, having opinions like those expressed above could be very dangerous to my health, my freedom, and my well being going forward.

Any American President that scares a large group of Americans, is not a good American President.

"We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.” Albert Einstein

We invite all readers of this blog to visit our new website, "The United States Of Purple," at:

http://www.unitedstatesofpurple.com/

The United States of Purple is a new grass roots approach to filling the office of President of The United States by focusing on the restoration of freedom in the United States, focusing on problem solving skills and results vs. personal political enrichment, and imposing term limits on all future Federal politicians. No more red states, no more blue states, just one United States Of America under the banner of Purple.

The United States Of Purple's website also provides you the formal opportunity to sign a petition to begin the process of implementing a Constitutional amendment to impose fixed term limits on all Federally elected politicians. Only by turning out the existing political class can we have a chance of addressing and finally resolving the major issues of or times.

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.cato.org/
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://realpolichick.blogspot.com/
http://www.flipcongress2010.com/
http://www.reason.com/
http://www.repealamendment/

What's Next, Roulette In The Rose Garden? Poker In The Press Room?

I have never hidden the fact that I was never a big fan of Barack Obama. Back in 2008 I found him shallow, void of concrete plans, pompous, nothing more than a typical Chicago politician. However, I was willing to give him a fair shot at success even though I did not vote for him. Friends and family members whom I respect were very excited about an Obama Presidency so I was willing to accept the fact that I was possibly wrong, not able to see some attributes or qualities of leadership that they thought they saw.

After two and half years in office, I can confidently say I stick by my initial suspicion, this is not a leader by any means, this is just another politician. His economic programs have all been failures, his health care reform initiative is riddled with problems, he has not gotten our troops out of Iraq as promised, he has not closed down the prison at Guantanamo as promised, and his administration's policies and amateur hour antics have introduced so much uncertainty into the world that it has been a long time since our economic condition has been this dire. His reckless spending may have already bankrupted the country under mountains of debt.

But what really cemented my belief that I was right back in 2008 was the recent email that the President's handlers sent out and its accompanying video clip, announcing that the President would be raffling off a dinner with himself in the White House for four people. All you had to do was donate $5 to his re-election campaign fund and you would have your name entered into a raffle for the honor of having dinner with the President.

I find a number of quite despicable aspects of this whole affair:

• Should the most powerful man in the world stoop to such carnival-like antics, raffling off his valuable time to collect a few bucks from Americans? In my eyes, this cheapens the aura and respect of the office of President to unheard levels.
• Given that the country is facing a possible default on its debt, we are fighting three wars across the world, unemployment is stubbornly high, the country is as divided as ever, etc., how could this President find time out of what should be a hectic schedule to film a video for this raffle? If he performed his job like he should have wouldn't that performance be more Presidential and effective for his campaign than this cheap stunt?
• The video effort gets even stickier when put in the light of legality. According to many sources in the news, it appears that this video was filmed in a non-residential area of the White House. If that is the case, and other official videos have been presented to show the same setting and which would verify this was not in the residential area, than the President and his handlers have actually violated a Federal law which prohibits the use of the White House public areas for political campaigning. Thus, you can bet this issue will eventually take up more and more valuable time away from solving the actual problems of the nation as the political class looks for any angle to optimize this possible illegality.
• Given this administration's less than sterling record of playing by the rules, you can bet that this raffle will be rigged so that only Obama supporters win. I thought about entering but I am sure that if I was one of the winners (or Rush Limbaugh or Sean Hannity were a winner), you can bet that our entry would suddenly disappear.

But the most obnoxious part of this whole affair is the following quote from the email invitation:

"Most [election] campaigns fill their dinner guest lists with Washington lobbyists and special interests. We're running a different kind of campaign. We don't take money from Washington lobbyists and special interest PACs - we never have and we never will."

Wow, a campaign based on the little people in the country, the individual Americans, the true essence of America. Not! Does the President and his handlers think we are that stupid to believe that he is a man of the people, that he shuns politically motivated, large sums of money when it benefits his election campaigns? Let's look at his track record when it comes to being a "man of the ordinary people:"

- On August 3, 2011, the day that the country might start running into debt ceiling and financial problems, a massive birthday party/campaign event in Chicago is planned for the President. The event will consist of several events including a Jennifer Hudson concert ($50 per ticket), admission to the birthday party ($200 a ticket), a premium seat $1,000), a souvenir photo with the President ($10,000) and VIP seating and dinner with Obama ($38,500). Kind of makes that $5 raffle ticket a bargain.

The President could not care less about your $5, he wants the big spenders and your raffle entry is nothing but political PR and a way to get your email address to hit you up for money later in the campaign. Trust me, at $10,000 a picture, there will be alot of special interest money banging around on Birthday night regardless of what the raffle email said.

- A short article in the May 20, 2011 issue of The Week magazine described how a group of Democrats have announced that they were putting processes in place to collect campaign funding from anonymous sources for the 2012 elections, using a funding model that Obama labeled a "threat to democracy" when Republicans successfully used in last November. This process allows people to donate money without divulging their names. Seriously, ask yourself: do we think that this will consist of a bunch of $5, non-special interest donations or will it consist of much larger corporate, union, lobbyist, and PAC donations? Given this announced Democratic Party strategy, the President's  claim that "we don't take money from Washington lobbyists and special interest PACs" is now out the window from a credibility perspective.

- Consider an article in the April 25, 2011 issue of Business Week that described some of Obama's recent and historical fund raising efforts:

• He recently attended a fundraising dinner at the home of Marc Benioff, chairman of www.salesforce.com, which had an admission price of $35,800 per person which was to be split between the President's re-election campaign and the National Democratic Committee.
• At the time the article was written, the President was scheduled to attend another fundraiser on April 27 in new York City. Price of admission? $35,800 per person.
• In 2008, Microsoft gave the Obama campaign over $830,000.
• In 2008, Google gave the Obama campaign over $800,000.
• In 2008, Goldman Sachs gave the Obama campaign just under a $1 million and Citigroup gave just over $700,000. And the political class, including Obama, eventually gave them billions of dollars of your taxpayer money via the TARP bank bailout process shortly thereafter.
• In 2008, Boston philanthropist Alan Solomont, former media executive Charles Rivkin, and lawyer John Roos each raised more than $500,000 for Obama's campaign. They are now the ambassadors to Spain, France, and Japan, respectively. These guys went to cushy jobs in exotic, faraway lands on the taxpayer expense and all you got was a raffle ticket.

It is obvious that this President will stoop to any level at any time to ensure he gets elected. So, why not go all in, so to speak. Let's put those roulette wheels in the White House Rose Garden. Let's move the press out of the White House press room and put those poker tables in. Get a royal flush, share a beer with the President. Double down on Double 00 at roulette and maybe you can shoot some basketball hoops with the big guy. He seems bored and irritated whenever he has to actually do something as required by his job so he would probably welcome the break. The integrity, status, and aura of the Presidency cannot fall much lower.

This kind of  hypocritical and demeaning behavior makes Step 39 from "Love My Country, Loathe My Government" even more important. Step 39 would impose term limits on all politicians, restricting them to one term, length to be determined. Only by imposing a one and done term limit restriction can we avoid being offended by Presidential raffles and the freedom destroying money pit that re-election campaigns have become.

Consider a quote from a June 27, 2011 article in Business Week: "If you have tens of thousands of dollars to spare, you can very easily buy face time with the President of The United States. Anything less, you're looking at a raffle ticket." So true, so please do not buy this PR raffle garbage, you are just a pawn in this high powered game of chess.



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 http://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.loathemygovernment.com/
http://www.cato.org/
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://realpolichick.blogspot.com/
http://www.flipcongress2010.com/
http://www.reason.com/
http://www.repealamendment.com/