Love My Country, Loathe My Government: walmart

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Sunday, August 19, 2018

The Horrors and Destruction that Donald Trump Has Imposed On America...Just Kidding! Part 11

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 120 good things that have happened to America and Americans since Trump became President:

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2017/12/the-horrors-and-destruction-that-donald.html

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2017/12/the-horrors-and-destruction-that-donald_31.html

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2018/01/the-horrors-and-destruction-that-donald.html

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2018/01/the-horrors-and-destruction-that-donald_27.html

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2018/02/the-horrors-and-destruction-that-donald.html

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2018/03/the-horrors-and-destruction-that-donald.html

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2018/04/the-horrors-and-destruction-that-donald.html

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2018/05/the-horrors-and-destruction-that-donald.html

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2018/06/the-horrors-and-destruction-that-donald.html

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2018/06/the-horrors-and-destruction-that-donald_21.html

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2018/07/the-horrors-and-destruction-that-donald.html

- U.S Steel is investing about $300 million in its domestic steel production operations including building a steel coating plant in Ohio and restarting two blast furnaces, creating new, high paying manufacturing jobs.

- Another steel manufacturer, Nucor, is creating hundreds of new jobs by building two new steel mills.

- The Trump administration has placed sanctions on two Myanmar military units and others for violence that has been committed against native Muslims, kind of taking the steam out of Trump’s enemies who accuse him of being a Muslim racist.

- The U.S. economy continues to get stronger and stronger while other major economies around the world are slowing down considerably.

- According to a recent Rasmussen poll, Trump’s approval level among likely voters hit 49% vs. a 41% disapproval level, i.e. more American likely voters approve his performance than disapprove.

- This level is about 5 points higher than Obama’s approval level was at the same time in his Presidency.

- According to a recent Gallup poll, Trump is at his highest approval level since taking office.

- Another Rasmussen poll found that Trump’s current approval rating among African-Americans is 36%, almost double the 19% level it was a year ago.

- Walmart recently announced quarterly financial results which showed the highest year over year growth in ten years with sales rising 4.5%, about double the growth rate that the experts were expecting.

- According to the Commerce Department, sales at restaurants and bars rose 1.3% in July, and the growth in the previous quarter was the highest quarterly growth level on record.

- As the Trump economy has gotten stronger and stronger, over 2.8 million Americans are no longer dependent on food stamps from the Federal government and American taxpayer, with Federal food dependency now under 40 million for the first time in a very long time.

- The unemployment rate in my home state of Florida just hit 3.7%, the lowest it has been since the year 2007.

Another twelve reasons to add to the previous 150 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

Saturday, March 24, 2018

March, 2018, Part 5, Political Class Insanity: Anti Semitic DC Politican, Anti Tax Cut Schumer, and Nancy Pelosi Still Out Of Touch

Let's get started:

1) Stupidity and brain dead statements do not only come from Federal government politicians. Consider the stupidity of the statements from a local DC politicians, as reported by Caleb Hull, writing for the Independent Journal Review on March 18, 2018:

Trayon White, a member of the town council in Washington, DC, recently blamed a DC snowstorm on Jewish bankers.
Yes, according to this politician, bankers actually are able to control the weather, a snowstorm in DC, and the climate, calling their ability “climate manipulation.”
Stupidity in his own words: “Man, it just started snowing out of nowhere this morning, man. Y’all better pay attention to this climate control, man, this climate manipulation. And D.C. keep talking about, ‘We a resilient city.’ And that’s a model based off the Rothschilds controlling the climate to create natural disasters they can pay for to own the cities, man. Be careful.”
When he realized how inane he sounded, he finally apologized: “I work hard everyday to combat racism and prejudices of all kinds. I want to apologize to the Jewish Community and anyone I have offended. The Jewish community have been allies with me in my journey to help people. I did not intend to be anti-Semitic, and I see I should not have said that after learning from my colleagues. I have spoke to leaders and my friends at Jews United for Justice and they are helping me to understand the history of comments made against Jews and I am committed to figuring out ways continue to be allies with them and others..."

How has the “Jewish community have been allies with me” and yet he issues these stupid type of comments? His apology falls far short of being sincere when they are that insulting and bigoted in the first place.

2) The Trump tax cuts have had a wonderful set of positive outcomes:

140 million taxpayers are being taxed at lower levels, both consumers and businesses.
Over three million Americans received at least a thousand dollars in bonuses as a result of lower business taxes.
Millions and millions of Americans received a pay raise as a result of the tax cuts including thousands and thousands of Walmart employees.
Businesses have expanded their education programs for their employees as a result of having more cash from their tax savings.
Some businesses have expanded their charitable donations since they have excess cash from their tax cuts.
The unemployment rate at all levels, overall, African American, Hispanic, is plummeting as businesses use the extra cash to expand employment opportunities.

All kinds of good things have happened for over 100 million Americans. Which means that the Democrats insanely want to raise taxes. According to a recent article on the American Liberty website:

Democrats in Congress recently and publicly declared that if they take over the House of Representative in November they intend to RAISE tax rates for Americans and American businesses.
In an excellent example of idiocy, Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer recently described the Trump tax cuts as “unpopular.”
Yeah, getting pay raises, getting large bonuses, getting a lower tax bill, getting better job training, etc. is such a bitch. Talk about being out of touch and delusional.
Schumer intends to raise the corporate tax rate, robbing companies of cash they have used to satisfy employees, shareholders, and charities, raise taxes on ordinary Americans, and reinstating the alternative minimum tax.

Still no cure for stupidity or robbing taxpayers. Fortunately, Trump would veto any such legislation if it ever did happen but this type of thinking shows again how out of touch American politicians are with reality and the needs of Americans.

3) A recent article on the Eagle Rising website documented another in a long line of inane Nancy Pelosi comments and views of reality. Apparently, she thinks that having a wall to protect the country along the Mexican border is “too high.” Yes, the purpose of the wall is to keep drug runners, human traffickers, gang members, and terrorists out of the country and she thinks the wall is too high.

If the wall is too low then it is useless and a waste of taxpayer money, Ms. Pelosi. Perhaps you do not understand the concept of a wall: “Did you see it? How high it is? … I mean, really? In a civilized society, we [would] do something like that? A wall that big separating people? I mean, really? This is a big wall.”

Again, perhaps she does not understand the purpose of the wall: it is too separate people and make immigrants obey the laws of the land when it comes to immigration. A short wall is a waste. You cannot make up this type of idiocy and insanity.

That will do it for today’s insanity: Taxation insanity from Schumer, bigoted anti-Semitic insanity from a DC politician, and Nancy Pelosi still out of touch with this world’s reality. 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:

Saturday, February 10, 2018

February, 2018, Part 6, Political Class Insanity: Pelosi Still Living In A Different Reality and FEMA and DHS Incompetence Shining Through Again

Let's get started:

1) We have not reported on a good old fashioned government wasteful spending project so let’s review a doozy today. The Freedom Outpost website reported a recent FEMA screw up as reported by the New York Times:

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) contracted with a company owned by Dr. Tiffany Brown to provide 30 million meals to Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria.
The cost to taxpayers was $156 million.
Unfortunately, Brown’s company, Tribute Contracting LLC, ended up delivering only 50,000 meals.
By the way, Brown was the only employee of her company that had just received a $156 million government contract.
Brown also runs three other companies including Tiffany Brown Designs (women’s clothing line), Tiffany Brown Holdings Inc. (a consulting firm that has five divisions: entertainment, vending, radio, food, nonprofit management and book publishing, and Luxe Fuel (a beverage delivery software app), leading one to believe that she may have not been the best, most experienced business person to deliver life saving meals to Puerto Rico.
Not only did Brown have no experience in large scale disaster food relief but she had at least five canceled Federal government contracts in her past.
She ended up hiring an Atlanta wedding caterer which had a staff of only 11 people in order to deliver the millions of meals she had been contracted to provide.
By the time that 18.5 million meals were due for delivery Brown had only delivered 50,000, at which point her contract was terminated.
To add to the insanity of the situation, Brown is now suing FEMA and the American taxpayer for $70 million for breach of contract.
The New York Times summarized some of her past shenanigans: “The government has also canceled Tribute contracts on at least five occasions. Four cancellations involved the Federal Prison System, which found that Tribute failed to deliver meat, bakery, cereal and other food products to various correctional institutions. A fifth termination involved the Government Publishing Office, which terminated a contract for 3,000 tote bags after Tribute failed to print the Marine Corps logo on both sides of the bags. An investigation by the office’s inspector general found that Tribute “altered and submitted a false shipping document and subcontracted the predominant production function on two contracts without proper authorization,” according to a 2015 report submitted to Congress.”

And despite this pathetic history of wasting taxpayer money, FEMA STILL went ahead and granted her another big contract that, surprise, surprise, was another failure.

2) But as we all already know, FEMA is not the only inept Federal organization:

According to Mark Swanson, writing for the NewsMax website on February 5, 2018, somehow a set of Department of Homeland Security (DHS) anti-terrorism documents were found by a CNN employee in a seat back pocket on a commercial airline flight.
The documents were marked "for official use only" and "important for national security."
They contained strategies for after action government responses to a simulated biological attack.
The documents apparently belonged to DHS microbiologist Michael Walter since his boarding pass and travel itinerary were attached to the secret government documents.
A former DHS official, Juliette Kayyem, who is now employed by CNN, stated the obvious, that leaving the documents behind on a plane was a "really stupid thing:" "Who knows who else could have picked this up. The biggest consequence of this mistake may have less to do with terrorists knowing our vulnerabilities and more to do with confidence in the Department of Homeland Security. In the end, confidence in the federal government at a time of crisis is what the American public deserves."
CNN reported that the documents showed shortcomings in local state, and Federal agencies responses to a potential attack in Minneapolis, the recent site of the Super Bowl.

So FEMA is stupid and wasteful when it comes to resolving a problem and DHS cannot keep secrets secret. Insanity.

3) We have discussed the many real benefits that the Trump tax cut has had on millions and millions of Americans:

Hundreds, if not thousands, of American companies have given millions of Americans bonus checks of upwards of $3,000 as a result of the tax cut.
Many companies have raised the minimum wage they pay their workers (e.g. Walmart, CVS, etc.) as a result of the tax cut.
Over a hundred million taxpayers will see a reduction in their 2018 tax bills as a result of the tax cut.
Companies have promised to increase their domestic spending on capital improvements, employee training, and donations to charities as a result of the tax cut.

Some of these benefits can be viewed in more detail by accessing the following post:

https://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2018/01/the-horrors-and-destruction-that-donald.html

Americans get to keep more of their hard earned money, great! Employees are getting higher wages, bonuses and more job training, great! Companies are bringing up home overseas earnings to invest in the domestic economy, great! Charities are seeing greater contributions from companies, great!

Well not so great if you are Nancy Pelosi. According to a recent article by Caleeb Hull, writing for the Independent Journal Review on February 1, 2018, Pelosi characterized these benefits to the American worker and American economy as “crumbs”: “In terms of the bonus that corporate America receives versus the crumbs they are giving to workers to put the schmooze on is so pathetic.”

So, employees getting $1,00, $2,000, or possibly up to $3,000 in bonuses is crumbs? Families getting a doubling of the child care credit is crumbs? Employees saving on their taxes on every paycheck for at least eight years is crumbs?

This idiotic response to the tax cuts raises two questions Ms. Pelosi:

Isn’t giving Americans “crumbs,” crumbs that were basically theirs to begin with before the government confiscated their “crumbs” via high taxes, better than nothing, which was the position of you and every other Democrat who voted against giving American back some of their hard earned wealth or crumbs?
Second, how is a tax cut and thousand dollar bonuses crumbs when back in 2012 you hailed the $40 tax cut you engineered several years ago as the best thing in the world: “160 million Americans will continue to receive their payroll tax cut — nearly $40 per paycheck in the pockets of the average family. I salute the work of the unified House Democratic caucus on behalf of the American people.”

So the Trump tax cuts and the reduction in taxes every paycheck AND millions of Americans getting thousands dollar bonuses is crumbs but in your world $40 is worth saluting? I still wonder what the color of the sky is in Pelosi’s world because she is certainly not living in this world.

That will do it for today’s insanity: Pelosi is still living in another reality, FEMA is still inept when it comes to managing taxpayer wealth, and the DHS cannot keep a secret. 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:

Tuesday, May 2, 2017

May, 2016, Part 1, Political Class Insanity: MInimum Wage Insanity, Buying Too Many Government Cars, and Congress Resolving A Non-Problem

It is the beginning of 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.

Today and for all of the insanity posts this month, let’s start off with a welcome piece of honest political dialog. It comes from a State Department spokesperson. Mark Toner, who is about to start the daily State Department press briefing. In a joking matter, he makes the following quote: "Welcome to the State Department. I think we have some interns in the back. Welcome. Good to see you in this exercise in transparency and democracy."

He then burst out laughing at his own quote, indicating he also knew what a joke the Obama administration has been, especially Mr. Toner’s State Department, when it comes to cover ups, lack of transparency, denial of Freedom of Information Act requests, the prosecution of whistleblowers, etc. But at least it was a little refreshing to finally hear some actual honesty out of Washington as we see from the actual clip of the news conference:

http://www.againstcronycapitalism.org/2016/08/when-even-the-state-department-spokesperson-cant-keep-a-straight-face-about-things-anymore-video/

With that context of honesty, let’s see what other insanity has been going down:

1) Most of the world heard the story from last month on how aviation police in Chicago went onto a United Airlines flight and roughly and physically dragged a paying and sitting United Airlines customer from his seat to make room for a United Airlines flight crew. The poor customer ented up seriously injured, injured enough to be hospitalized.

Obviously, United Airlines put itself in the middle of a terrible public relations mess. The incident was all over the news and likely has had a significant impact on customer sales and financials. No one really wants to go on an airplane and then get physically dragged off despite paying for a ticket.

In other words, the market is correcting terrible corporate behavior and customer service from a service provider. And, by the way, the airlines and the attacked customer have reached what is probably a lucrative settlement for the customer, costing the airlines plenty no doubt.

But of course, and unfortunately, the Washington political class thinks it needs to get involved, as outlined by an April 27, 2017 NewsMax article:

The House Transportation Committee scheduled hearings to hear from the United Airlines CEO and other airlines about the incident.
The official reason for the hearing is to see "what can be done to improve the flying experience for American travelers."
Congressman Bill Shuster, who chairs the House committee holding the hearing Tuesday, got his name in the papers when he said the committee was looking for "much-needed answers about airline customer service policies and what is being done to improve service for the flying public."

Wonderful, Congress, as always, gets into the act, after the problem arises. The market and the lawyers have already cleared up the situation, the airlines have already taken steps to avoid these types of problems in the future, and life goes on. Except in Congress where action after the fact is a fact of life. Of all the problems facing Americans today, why are we wasting Congressional resources on such a gnat of a problem that has already been addressed? Insanity.

2) One reason we have an almost $20 TRILLION national debt is that the Federal government constantly spends money on stupid and unnecessary expenses. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently uncovered a whopping waste of taxpayer money:

Between 2011 and 2015, the Obama administration spent $1.6 billion to buy a whopping 64,500 cars at an average cost of $25,600 each.
This comes out to an unheard 1,290 new cars per state if you prorate the purchase.
Not only is the amount of cars mind boggling but according to the GAO, most of those cars are not used or are under used.
The biggest offenders were the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Justice, and the Department of the Interior.
But wasting money in the Obama administration was not restricted to buying tens of thousands of vehicles that were not needed but let’s not forget the half billion disaster called Solyndra, the bogus and failed solar panel company, the running of guns to Mexican drug cartels in the failed Fast and Furious campaign, and a myriad of other failed spending adventures.

Imagine how many hungry Americans could have been fed for that wasted $1.6 billion. Imagine how many drug addicted Americans could have been treated with that wasted $1.6 billion. Imagine how many additional teachers could have been hired with that wasted $1.6 billion. The misspending and bad priorities of the Washington political class and the Federal government continue to amaze and frazzle those that work hard to pay those taxes that get wasted with no redeeming social benefit.

3) We have often showed how at all levels of government, from local towns up through the Federal government, politicians have no economic education, common sense or strategy abilities. They institute economic policies that usually do the exact opposite of what they think will happen.

This is particularly true when it comes to drastically raising the minimum wage. The ignorant politicians think that they will be raising the living standards of the people working near the current minimum wage level. But they do not realize that wages are a major expense line of a business and when you raise the expense line of a business without raising the revenue potential of that business, bad economic things usually happen.

And with the substantial raising of the minimum wage that bad something is usually that people get paid more but more people lose their jobs, i.e. the good news is that you got a raise, the bad news is that you lost your job. Consider how this simple economic process recently played out in Los Angeles:

Alan Stein, writing for the US Herald website, reported that the city of LA had recently raised the local minimum wage level to $15 an hour.
For a big company with a lot of employees, that means a big increase in its wages expense line.
Such a big company, namely Walmart, decided that raising the minimum wage in one of its LA stores made that store so unprofitable that Walmart made the right business decision and closed the store rather than lose money operating a store at a loss.
As a result, all of the residents who worked hard and pleaded with Walmart to put one of its stores in the residents’ Chinatown neighbor now no longer have that store, all because local politicians, wanting to look good for their minimum wage voters, have now turned those minimum wage voters into unemployed voters.
The article also reported on how even government entities pinch pennies when their wage line raises dramatically because the University of California Berkeley recently announced that it was laying off 500 workers because it could not afford the ramping up of the state minimum wage level.

The good news is that your wage level went up, the bad news is that you lost your job because your wage level went up.

That will do it for today’s political class insanity: stupid political economic actions, still wasting billions in Washington, and Washington politicians getting involved in a minor problem they should stay out of AFTER the problem has already been resolved.

More insanity to come in the coming days.

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:

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

June, 2014 Political Class Insanity, Part 1: Exposing Our Own Spy's Cover, Our Lost Freedom Of The Press, Losing Libya, and More

It’s the beginning of another month, which means time for one of our regular features, political class insanity. The political class of America has been working overtime in the past month or so on their idiocy so we probably have a substantial number of days ahead of us to get all of the insanity in.

1) We have often made the case that we really no longer live in a free country. You cannot live in a free country when:

The government controls most of your retirement income via Social Security.
The government controls most of your retirement medical needs via Medicare.
The government controls much of the pre-retirement medical needs via Obama Care.
The government taxes you so much that in many states you do not starting working for yourself and your family until April of each year.
The government decides that it can assassinate American citizens without legal due process.
The government decides that it can hold citizens in custody for an unlimited amount of time without due process.
The government spies on just about every piece of electronic communications that you use.
The government controls most of the election processes that allows ill performing Washington politicians to manipulate those processes to stay in office despite their ineptness.

We could go on and on but you get the idea, anyone who still thinks we are living in a free country has not been paying attention.

And we now have another item to add to that list of our dwindling freedoms. The state of the free press in the U.S. is also on the endangered freedom list, according to the latest 2014 World Press Freedom Index. This index is annually compiled by Reporters Without Borders (Reporters sans frontières).

Unbelievably, in their current analysis the U.S. was ranked 46th among the 180 nations surveyed relative to freedom of the press in this country. This is a dismal drop of 13 places since last year. Finland, the Netherlands and Norway are among the most free nations for journalists. Iran, China and North Korea are among the most restrictive for reporters.

America's bad ranking was based on the conviction of WikiLeaks' informant Bradley (Chelsea) Manning and the treatment of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, along with the Obama administration's "increased efforts to track down whistleblowers and the sources of leaks." These infractions include but are not limited to:

In 2013, it became known that the Justice Department had secretly obtained phone logs of Associated Press reporters. The Justice Department was also caught monitoring the personal email account for FOX News reporter James Rosen in order to discover government officials speaking to the press.
They also monitored and sought the testimony of James Risen of the New York Times to testify against a former CIA employee accused of leaking classified information.
Obama said in May 2013 that he was "troubled" at the possible overreach by the Justice Department and ordered the agency to review its guidelines on dealing with press investigations.
The latest analysis accused the Obama White House of shielding the President from the press by not allowing the White House Press Corps sufficient access to photograph and question Obama during his official duties.

And when the Obama friendly New York Times agrees with the general conclusion of this analysis and index, you know things are getting bad from a freedom of the press perspective: "I would say it is the most secretive White House that I have ever been involved in covering," New York Times Executive Editor Jill Abramson told Al Jazeera America in late January. "The Obama administration has had seven criminal leak investigations. That is more than twice the number of any previous administration in our history. It's on a scale never seen before."

2) The Obama administration violated the Constitution when it involved the U.S. and our military forces in an illegal and unnecessary military action in Libya several years ago to oust Ghadaffi. The actions put U.S. military personnel in harm’s way and ate up well over a billion dollars of taxpayer wealth.

And we did all of this for apparently no gain since earlier this week, the State Department issued a warning and advised all Americans who remained in Libya to evacuate immediately: “The Department of State warns U.S. citizens against all travel to Libya and recommends that U.S. citizens currently in Libya depart immediately. The security situation in Libya remains unpredictable and unstable. The Libyan government has not been able to adequately build its military and police forces and improve security following the 2011 revolution.”

The State Department explained that a number of threats by “various groups” have been made against Americans in the nation while reinforcing the reality that its capability to offer protection or emergency services at this time is “very limited.” Staffing at the U.S. Embassy in Libya’s capital city of Tripoli has been pared down as a result of the ongoing threats, the statement indicated.

Thus, by not having a long term strategy or knowledge of the whole Libyan situation, our participation in that internal civil war has resulted in a lawless, terrorist infested land that apparently has no sense of gratitude for us helping the Libyan citizens get rid of their long term dictator and tormentor. But this insanity should come as no surprise, this administration and the Washington political class have repeatedly shown absolutely no ability to think strategically and long term, think and act within established legal parameters, or generally get anything done right. The evacuation of Libya is just another failure on a long line of foreign policy failures of Washington over the past fifty years, regardless of who is in office in the White House or in Congress.

3) But American politicians are just as good as wasting money within our own borders as they are in wasting money in far flung disasters around the world. Researchers from George Mason University’s Mercatus Center recently completed a corporate cronyism study which found an incredible amount of taxpayer money being given out freely to corporations. A small sample of the wasteful spending includes:

As of 2013, Walmart had received at least 260 special state benefits worth more than $1.2 billion. But for every 100 new Walmart jobs, an average of 50 existing jobs disappear as other retailers are crowded out so the incremental benefit of Walmart jobs is offset substantially by the killing off of other state jobs.
Apple got $370 million in state tax breaks for setting up in North Carolina. Since only 50 jobs were created within the state, North Carolina taxpayers ended up paying $7.4 million per incremental job created within the state.
New York granted aluminum giant Alcoa free electricity for more than 30 years (estimated value: $5.6 billion). In return, Alcoa pledged to make a $600 million investment and promised not to fire more than 165 workers. Subsequently, to pay for the deal, New York had to raise taxes multiple times on its citizens. This deal was even worse than the Apple/North Carolina deal since if we divide the 165 saved jobs into the $5.6 billion spent to save those jobs, the cost per saved job comes out to over $38 million per job.

Total insanity. Don’t these politicians know how to do simple math: spending taxpayer money at the rate of millions of dollars per job is no way to expand an economy. Stupid is too tame a word to use for these examples and others pointed out in the study.

4) The CIA has been around for about seventy years. The White House has been around for over two hundred years. Given the longevity of each, one would have thought they both would know how to keep a secret. After all, the CIA is our primary spy organization within the Federal government. They should be keeping all kinds of secrets and have processes in place to do so since a broken secret is highly likely to get somebody killed who is inside the CIA or working for the CIA and its spying and covert activities.

Well, one could think that but one would be wrong. In one of the most dangerous and idiotic goof ups of the Obama administration,

the White House inadvertently blew the cover of the CIA’s top officer, its station chief, in Kabul. Afghanistan during President Obama’s recent surprise trip to Afghanistan. Unbelievably, the name of the spy agency’s station chief in Kabul was included on a list provided to news organizations participating in Mr. Obama’s visit with U.S. troops.

Nobody had to hack a CIA computer to get the name of the local CIA boss. Nobody had to capture and torture a CIA operative to get the information. Nobody had to plant a mole deep inside the CIA to ferret out the name of the CIA station head. No, the Obama administration just typed the name out on a piece of paper and then distributed it freely to many people.

You cannot make up this type of incompetence. If you went to Hollywood and had a movie idea that involved the President’s staff freely handing out the name of its top spy in one of the most dangerous areas of the world, they would laugh you out of the office. But that is what happened and that is why I continue to assert we are living through a period of our nation’s history where the most inept and incompetent people are in charge in Washington.

That will do it for today but plenty more insanity will be headed this way over the next week or so so brace yourself for more wasteful spending, ineffective programs, and the ongoing lunacy that is the political class.

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

Sunday, April 6, 2014

April, 2014 Political Class Insanity, Part 1: Wasting Taxpayer Money In Every Conceivable Way

Every month since this blog began back in 2009, we have spent some time writing about the insanity, idiocy, ineptness, and wasteful spending of the American political class. Back then, we could usually cover all of the insanity in one post.

However, over the years, it seems as if the politicians in this country have created more insanity and problems at a faster and faster rate. This has pushed the number of days each month required to cover such insanity to more and more over the years.

This month should be no exception. Even though we spent two weeks last month covering the idiocy and fiascos of Obama Care and political class corruption, there is still enough insanity this month to cover at least a week or so of posts. Today starts the process. Hopefully, at the end of this week of insanity you will feel compelled to join our effort to implement term limits at:

www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com

Because really, as you will see from the political class incompetence we will document this week, how much worse could it get with a whole new set of people sitting in elected office?

1) Many Americans like to think that we live in a capitalistic society where companies compete fairly in a free market. That is really not true. We live in a crony capitalistic society where cronies and friends of politicians use and abuse those political connections to get favored treatment at the expense of their competitors of the American taxpayer.

This point was recently driven home by a study from an organization called Open the Books. They issued a new report that went to great effort and detail to document all Federal grants, loans, direct payments, and insurance subsidies that the Federal government and political class hands out at taxpayer expense. The amount of money given to each company is relatively small in the context of the multi-TRILLION Federal budget. But when added up together, we see that the American taxpayer is paying out tens of billions of dollars to some to the largest and least needy businesses on the planet.

For example, according to the website, www.openthebooks.com:

$21.3 billion was doled out in the form of outright income-transfer subsidies to corporate America last year.
On average, each Fortune 100 company received about $200 million in such handouts.
General Electric received $380 million in taxpayer financed handouts.
General Motors received $370 million in taxpayer funded handouts.
Boeing received $264 million in taxpayer funded handouts.
Archer Daniels Midland received $174 million in taxpayer funded handouts.
United Technologies received $160 million in taxpayer funded handouts.
The $21.3 does not include the billions of dollars in housing, bank, and auto-company bailouts in 2008 and 2009 since those payments are kept mostly invisible within the Federal government accounting system.
It also does not include the asset purchases of the Federal Reserve, indirect subsidies such as the ethanol mandate that enriches large agribusinesses like Archer Daniels Midland, or special tax breaks for wind and solar manufacturers.
About $8.5 billion of these financial gifts were in the form of taxpayer-subsidized loans. The big winners here were Chevron, Exxon Mobil, Ford Motor Company, and other multibillion-dollar corporations whose franchisees who somehow qualified for Small Business Administration loans despite the financial size and power of their parent companies.
Archer Daniels Midland, the giant agricultural business, got just under $1 billion for USDA farm-program loans which does not include ethanol subsidies, a fancy name for another form of crony capitalism
The No. 1 federal insurance program, the Export-Import Bank provides subsidizes insurance and marketing aid to such financial giants as Wells Fargo and JPMorgan Chase with both receiving more than $3 billion in such aid and Citigroup and Bank of America receiving more than $1.5 billion in taxpayer backstop insurance. (Remember, this doesn’t include TARP bailout money.)
John Deere, American Express, and even Walmart have historically reeled in taxpayer funded and backed Federal insurance support as well.
The National Review Online article from March 27, 2014 that documented these findings pointed out that only one of the Fortune 100 companies did NOT receive taxpayer funded support and crony gifts from the American taxpayer over the time frame that Open The Books studied.

This documented $21.3 billion in crony capitalism/corporate handouts comes out to about $185 for each household in the country. Thus, as you are writing your check this month to pay your Federal income tax bill, remember that $185 of that payment is being used to give political and financial favors to the biggest banks, the biggest companies, and likely the biggest campaign donors to the politicians in Washington.

It is just so unfair that we cannot claim Wells Fargo, American Express, Exxon and all the others as dependents on our tax forms since they truly are dependents, courtesy of the Washington political class.

2) But it is not just big corporations that the American political class wastes taxpayer wealth on. According to an April 1, 2014 article from the Independent Journal Review, the Federal government has recently spent taxpayer wealth on the following dubious projects:

$3 million to create a safe street crossing for turtles.
$137,500 for the creation of a video game called “Layoff.”
$71,623 to study cocaine use in monkeys.
$3 million for NASA to study Congress, giving hope that we may finally find out what color the sky is in Nancy Pelosi’s world.
$15,551 to study drunk mice behavior.
$544,338 to update the Justice Department’s Linkedin page.
$17.4 million to install broadband capability to serve 30 people.
$10,000 to develop a moose-themed musical called “Moosical.”

I dare anyone justify to me these kind of expenditures being worthy of taxpayer money. Useless, wasted spending on programs that do nothing to resolve the half dozen major issues facing the country today.

3) But the Independent Journal Review was not done with just documenting these eight wastes of taxpayer wealth. The day before exposing the above eight atrocities of waste, they identified massive wasteful spending by the National Science Foundation (NSF) in any number of areas that have absolutely minimal impact on the vast majority of Americans

Let’s start with the a Federal funded musical play. The NSF has spent nearly $700,000 of taxpayer money on a “climate change-themed theatrical production” entitled The Great Immensity. The theater company “The Civilians” applied for and won a grant in 2010 to produce the play. According to the musical’s website, The Great Immensity is “a thrilling and timely production,” presented by an “investigative theater company.”

Useless spending. The Federal government, especially one of its primary science agencies, should not be in the mode of financing the production of musical plays on an issue that is far from settled in the minds of many, many Americans, including myself.

This NSF musical funding effort was just one of several questionable expenditures that were recently scrutinized by U.S. Senator Lamar Smith of Texas. He recently interrogated the White House “science czar” John Holdren in a committee hearing about how the NSF is choosing to spend its money. Along with the musical, Smith specifically queried asked Holdren about the following questionable and idiotic NSF projects:

A $15,000 study on the fishing practices in and around Lake Victoria in Africa. In Africa, not America, Africa.

$340,000 study on the examination of the “ecological consequences” of early human fires in New Zealand. In New Zealand, Not America, New Zealand.

$200,000 towards a three-year study of the Bronze Age.

Another $50,000 towards the survey of archived lawsuits from 17th century Peru. Not this century, not America. Three centuries ago in Peru.

$20,000 for a study on the causes of stress in Bolivia. In Bolivia, Not America, Bolivia.

Ridiculous wastes of money. If the Federal government is going to have a national science agency, and I question the need for one given the abject failure of the NSF to recently develop and deliver any kind of useful scientific breakthrough or technology despite spending tens of billions of dollars over the years, shouldn’t the projects it is funding be geared to resolving the major issues of our times?

I can think of seven areas where I would want scientific breakthroughs to happen to address the major issues facing most Americans today:

Find a cure for the leading cancers of today such as breast and lung cancer.
Find a cure and treatment approach for aging diseases such as Alzheimers and Parkinsons, diseases that will ravage our aging population.
Find a way to make coal a clean fuel since most of the world will be using it for decades into the future on a worldwide scale.
Find a way to treat addiction to break the deadly hold drug addiction has on millions of Americans.
Find a way to make clean energy cheaper, more efficient, and more accessible.
Find a way to reduce the ever escalating health care costs in this country since it is now obvious that Obama Care will not be able to resolve that issue.
Find a way to make existing and new energy sources cheap, plentiful and clean.

If the NSA could fund research that would solve just these seven issues, most of America would be able to pay their tab. However, the political class has allowed the NSF to waste money in New Zealand, Bolivia, Peru, and Africa on projects that are of absolutely no concern to the American public. That is insanity and that is why the NSF should either get refocused on what is important to Americans or be disbanded and their budget redistributed back to Americans.

That will do it for today, the myriad of ways our politicians have found to waste our money on their business cronies and other stupid porgrams and projects. The insanity is just getting started, much more to follow in the next few days.

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

Friday, January 24, 2014

January, 2014 The Unfolding Disaster That Is Obama Care, Part 5: Walmart Insurance Policies Crush Obama Care

This is the fifth post in this month’s series that looks at the unfolding disaster that is Obama Care. We have covered the dozens and dozens of already evident disasters coming about because of the provisions in the Obama Care legislation for the past three years. Since August of this year, we have had to devote upwards of 6-7 posts a month, each month, just to try and cover all of the insanity, stupidity, and suffering that it has caused.

The first post in this month’s series can be accessed at:

http://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2014/01/january-2014-political-class-insanity_5.html

Today we will focus on one topic and on topic only: how the current health insurance plans offered to Walmart workers are actually substantially better in cost and quality than Obama Care programs. This may come as much as a surprise to you as it did to me because the President, other proponents of Obama Care, the mainstream media, and unions have constantly portrayed Walmart as a bad employer that offered almost useless insurance policies to its workers.

But an in-depth analysis commissioned by the Washington Examiner using actual, real life data and information and subject matters experts crushes that false perception of Walmart’s health insurance polices and benefits for its employees, relative to Obama Care policies.

This analysis and reversal of perception is important for two reasons:

The President has always claimed that policies Americans obtain from his legislation will reduce the cost of insurance an average of $2,500 a year for the average American family.
When the lies and deceptions started to tumble out of the Obama Care rollout and it became evident that millions of Americans would have their current and preferred policies terminated as a direct result of Obama Care, the President tried to claim, falsely and deceptively, that those losing their policies would be happier because all of those policies offered inferior health insurance coverage for high costs.

Now, if you believe real data and real analysis as done by the Examiner, it is the Obama Care policies that are inferior but cost more. The exact opposite of what Obama claimed, an exact lie of reality.

The highlights and findings of the research and analysis includes the following points and conclusions:

1) The article was written by Richard Pollock and was published on January 7, 2014 under the title: “Surprise! Walmart health plan is cheaper, offers more coverage than Obama Care”

2) Walmart has been the target of unions and liberals for years who have harshly criticized the company's health care plans, calling them “notorious for failing to provide health benefits” and "substandard.”

3) However, the Washington Examiner comparison of the two health insurance programs, Walmart’s current plan vs. Obama Care plans, found that Walmart's plan is more affordable AND provides significantly better access to high-quality medical care than Obama Care.

4) The Examiner used independent insurance agents from the National Association of Health Underwriters and other health policy experts to compare the different policies.

5) Walmart corporate relations provided its employee benefit information for the analysis.to the Examiner.

6) Walmart currently offers its employees two health insurance plans, a Health Reimbursement Account and an alternative, "HRA High." This latter option costs employees more every month but has lower deductibles. Blue Cross Blue Shield manages both plans.

7) Walmart even offers is a Health Savings Account (HAS) plan that includes high deductibles but allows tax-free dollars to be used for coverage.

8) For a monthly premium as low as roughly $40, an individual who is a Walmart HRA plan enrollee can obtain full-service coverage through a Blue Cross Blue Shield preferred provider organization. A family can get coverage for about $160 per month.

9) A main difference from Obama Care with these Walmart options is that there are no income eligibility requirements. Age and gender do not alter premium rates. The company plan is the same for all of Walmart's 1.1 million enrolled employees and their dependents, from its cashiers to its CEO. Apparently, big shots at Walmart do not get special treatment like Congressional bigshots granted themselves and their staffs relative to Obama Care.

10) The Examiner article claims that a Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) analysis from September, 2013 concluded that unsubsidized Obama Care enrollees will face monthly premiums that are five to nine times higher than Walmart health insurance premiums.

11) The JAMA analysis found that the unsubsidized monthly premium for a nonsmoking couple age 60 can cost $1,365 per month versus the Walmart cost of about $134 for the same couple.

12) The medical journal estimated that a 30-year-old smoker would pay up to $428 per month, in contrast to roughly $70 each month for a Walmart employee.

13) But there are even more differences than just cheaper monthly rates. We have previously reported on how many Obama Care policy purchasers are finding out that their Obama Care policies severely limit the number of doctors and hospitals that are available to them.

For example, almost a million people in New York state will get access to the best cancer hospital around, Sloan-Kettering, since that top notch hospital is not available through Obama Care policies, opening up Obama Care policy holders to inferior medical care.

However, Walmart employees have access to eight of the country's most prestigious medical facilities, including the Mayo Clinic, Pennsylvania's Geisinger Medical Center and the Cleveland Clinic.

At these medical centers, "Centers of Excellence" in Walmart language, Walmart employees and their dependents can get FREE heart or spinal surgery. They can also get FREE knee and hip replacements at four hospitals nationwide.

The Examiner article points out that many top-rated Walmart hospitals, including the Mayo and Cleveland clinics, are not available to Obama Care exchange policy holders.

14) Former New York Lt. Gov. Betsy McCaughey, who is now a health care advocate, is quoted in the article stating how Obama Care's lack of first-class hospitals is a big problem: “It’s not just the number, but who they are. You’ll find under the Obama Care exchanges that the academic hospitals have declined to participate, along with the specialists who practice at those hospitals. The same is true of cancer hospitals. People who are seriously ill need to stay away from these [Obama Care] exchange plans.”

15) Walmart also offers a free preventive health options much like the Obama Care plans. Walmart employees can take advantage of a wide range of free exams and counseling, including screenings for colorectal cancer, cervical cancer, chlamydia, diabetes, depression and special counseling for diet and obesity.

16) Walmart employee kids can also get more than 20 free preventive services, ranging including screenings for genetic disorders, autism and developmental problems to obesity, lead poisoning exposure and tuberculosis. There are also 12 free vaccinations, and free hearing and vision testing.

17) Walmart employees pay as little as $4 for a 30-day supply of generic drugs and only $10 for eye exams through a separate vision plan: “It’s a lot better program than people, I think, might assume without looking, just because Walmart has gotten such a bad reputation by some of the labor groups and other groups for its general activities,” said Gail Wilensky after reviewing the retailer's plan.

Wilensky worked under President George H.W. Bush of the Federal Health Care Financing Administration, the predecessor to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). Thus, she has some serious experience in evaluating health care options and policies.

18) David Todd, who an independent insurance agent based in Little Rock, Ark., also compared the health plans for the Examiner article, finding dramatic difference between the current Walmart plan and Obama Care plans and policies: “If I buy a family plan on the exchange, it’s still $1,000 a month. And I can buy this for ... [$160] on Walmart.”

19) Walmart also provides cash to its employees for any health care expense. The annual payments run from $250 to $1,000 and are given at the beginning of the year in an account that can only be used for health care expenses.

20) The article also goes on to examine the deductible part of the health care insurance financials. Walmart individuals face a $2,750 deductible and families need to pay $5,500 under the HRA plan. Individuals pay $1,750 and families pay $3,500 deductibles under the HRA High plan.

While these deductibles are high for an average earning American family, the bad news is that but Obama Care deductibles are higher, ranging up to $6,300, according to an analysis done by David Todd. For illustration, Todd used at 30-year-old woman who could qualify for the government subsidy: “The nonsubsidized premium is $205 a month for this 30-year-old. If they get a subsidy, then the premium is zero. But that person has to come up with $6,300 if something catastrophic happened.”

The Walmart monthly premium for the same 30-year-old woman would be about $40. Her deductible would be $2,750, minus $250 in cash advance, for a total net deductible of $2,500.

Thus, depending on whether or not this fictitious example women’s annual income was high or low would determine which policy was better. Under a high income/no subsidy scenario, the Obama Care program would four times as expensive ($205 vs. $40) and have a deductible more than twice as high ($6,300 vs. $2,500), not a very good option from Obama Care.

Under a low income/subsidy scenario, the Obama Care program would save the ficitious woman $40 a month but would be on the hook for an additional $3,800 in deductible costs ($6,300 vs. $2,500) every year. If she never or rarely gets sick, this might be one case where the Obama Care policy is better than Walmart’s option. However, that is an awfully big risk for a lower income individual, that $6,300 annual deductible.

21) Additionally, Todd claims that some Obama Care exchange family plan deductibles can go as high as $12,000 before benefits kick in. At this level it makes no sense to purchase an Obama Care policy if you need to pay an additional $12,000 a year in annual deductibles before you get any help from your insurance policy.

Who would have thought, Walmart’s current insurance plans kicks the feathers out of most Obama Care options: lower deductibles, lower monthly costs, different options, cash up front to deal with medical costs, free preventive medical tests, health programs such as obesity control, free screenings and vaccines for Walmart employees kids, access to some of the finest medical establishments and clinics in the country, no income requirements or restrictions, no age penalties, executives that are treated just like their employees, etc.

And best of all, no overbearing and incompetent government bureaucracy and political class overseeing the operations. No financial and criminal penalties for not participating in the programs. No pathetic and inefficient website sign up processes to deal with. In hindsight, maybe Obama should have just copied the Walmart policies and used them for his signature legislation, how much worse could it be than the unfolding disaster that is Obama Care?

We will keep an eye out on our news sources to see if anyone rebuts the Examiner analysis. If they do, we will provide the details of that rebuttal. However, given all we have reviewed and discussed over the past four months as it relates to Obama Care, do not hold your breath waiting for a valid, honest rebuttal of this reality,according to the Washington Examiner and the subject matter experts they employed in this analysis, Walmart health insurance policies look to be very good/excellent while Obama Care policies basically …suck.

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

Love My Country, Loathe My Government

Sunday, August 19, 2018

The Horrors and Destruction that Donald Trump Has Imposed On America...Just Kidding! Part 11

Saturday, March 24, 2018

March, 2018, Part 5, Political Class Insanity: Anti Semitic DC Politican, Anti Tax Cut Schumer, and Nancy Pelosi Still Out Of Touch

Saturday, February 10, 2018

February, 2018, Part 6, Political Class Insanity: Pelosi Still Living In A Different Reality and FEMA and DHS Incompetence Shining Through Again

Tuesday, May 2, 2017

May, 2016, Part 1, Political Class Insanity: MInimum Wage Insanity, Buying Too Many Government Cars, and Congress Resolving A Non-Problem

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

June, 2014 Political Class Insanity, Part 1: Exposing Our Own Spy's Cover, Our Lost Freedom Of The Press, Losing Libya, and More

Sunday, April 6, 2014

April, 2014 Political Class Insanity, Part 1: Wasting Taxpayer Money In Every Conceivable Way

Friday, January 24, 2014

January, 2014 The Unfolding Disaster That Is Obama Care, Part 5: Walmart Insurance Policies Crush Obama Care

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