L u k e n . O r g

The President will be making a speech today at the National Urban League, so I don’t expect much other than pandering. Education is in a real bind and frankly, there are already simple and innovative solutions out there. First, the biggest hinderance to education reform are the various teachers unions. Now, I’m not attacking them but just point things out.

Let’s follow the system in Denmark, where funding per child is not given directly to a school district, but instead is assigned to the parent or guardian, who in turn decides where to send their child, and applies those funds to that school. If the parent chooses a private, public, religious or secular school, their choice. What this fosters is a competitive environment and spurs innovation. Todays system lacks innovation and accountability simply because it doesn’t have to. Regardless of how it performs, people still get paid, with guarantees on salary, earlier retirement and job security.

There was a segment on 20/20 some years back that talked about the Denmark(?) system and how it worked. As a result of their initiative, public schools were on par with private schools, were just as innovative and had equal achievements. I would love to be able to choose what school our boys go to, and what curriculum they had.

Another issue is these bad a** kids and their parents who apparently don’t know what to do or simply don’t care. I scratch my head when I see a child that is on reduced lunch, but their parent shows up to a school event with custom nails, expensive handbags and clothing, driving a Mercedes. It happens more than not, where some parents use the schools as their dumping grounds. I once heard a parent tell a teacher “he’s your problem now….”, while dropping off their child. I am not making that one up….

Here in Wake County, NC., there is a real issue around school diversity and busing vs. local schools. Now personally, I support local schools vs. busing kids half way across the county to achieve diversity. People choose where they want to live and is primarily based on economic status and what they can achieve. Can’t fault people for that. To achieve equal opportunity for all kids, you should’t have to upset half the families by shuffling their kids to create diversity. New schools should not be built until all existing schools are maintained and upgraded to the standards of a new school. This keeps the facilities on par. Next, there is a fixed amount of funding per student.

Now, for poor behaving students in schools, I’m sorry but that is where parent involvement comes in. At some point, instead of looking outwards to resolve problems, you have to look inwards.

So with regards to segregation that the NAACP is talking about in Wake County schools, the most segregated time in the county is Sunday mornings. So if that can’t be resolved what makes you think anything else can be resolved. Just my opinion.

I would love to be able to get a letter in the mail with a voucher, then interview various schools, and send our boys to where WE feel would suit them best and derive the best value and education. Instead, we’re stuck with, here’s your assigned school, deal with it….

Washington CNN — President Obama will deliver a major education reform speech at the National Urban Leagues 100th Anniversary Convention in Washington Thursday morning.The president will discuss how his signature Race to the Top program and other initiatives are driving education reform across the country and focusing the nation on the goal of preparing students for college and careers, a statement from White House said.”Now, I know some argue that during a recession, we should focus solely on economic issues,” Obama says in prepared remarks released by the White House ahead of the address. “But education is an economic issue — if not the economic issue of our time.”The Obama education plan champions better teacher pay, but also asks for tangible results.”I want teachers to have higher salaries. I want them to have more support. I want them to be trained like the professionals they are — with rigorous residencies like the ones doctors go through,” Obama says. “All Im asking in return — as a president, and as a parent — is a measure of accountability.

via Obama to deliver major education reform address – CNN.com.

You simply cannot make this stuff up. So congress votes o a healthcare bill, without actually reading the bill. Only to find out that it may adversely affect them and their staff. So if the plan negatively affects them directly because they didn’t read it and don’t know what’s in it, how does it affect me and my family?

This is what happens when you take a kneejerk reaction to a big and critical issue.

In a new report, the Congressional Research Service says the law may have significant unintended consequences for the “personal health insurance coverage” of senators, representatives and their staff members.For example, it says, the law may “remove members of Congress and Congressional staff” from their current coverage, in the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, before any alternatives are available.The confusion raises the inevitable question: If they did not know exactly what they were doing to themselves, did lawmakers who wrote and passed the bill fully grasp the details of how it would influence the lives of other Americans?

via Washington Memo – Baffled by Health Plan? So Are Some Lawmakers – NYTimes.com.

This weeks best quote goes out to Senator Lamar Alexander of Tennessee.

It is arrogant to imagine that 100 senators are wise enough to reform comprehensively a health care system that constitutes 17 percent of the world’s largest economy and affects 300 million Americans of disparate backgrounds and circumstances

Exactly, especially when a majority of them do not have backgrounds in economics, finance or medicine. The industry knows best. What’s needed is oversight and basic regulation and a few simple rules. Those rules to come in another post shortly.

via On Health Bill, G.O.P.’s Road Is a New Map – NYTimes.com.

Today, I officially declare my candidacy for congress. Nothing personal but first off, I can care less about you people, I’m not going there to represent you. I’m going for the perks. All I need is to get elected and get sworn in. I promise that right after that, I’ll bring some pork project to Wake County, then resign.  It’s a win-win for us all. You eventually get who you want after I leave, and I get all the perks.

First off, the health plan, why not run for Congress. Take a look at this. This is totally worth lying and kissing babies for.

Personal doctors on call 24/7. Coverage that knows no caps. No exemptions for pre-existing conditions.Those are the sorts of benefits members of Congress currently enjoy on the taxpayer’s dime, and the kinds of benefits Americans on a government-run public health care plan will never see if Obamacare passes.“One thing is certain: Congress will exempt itself from whatever lousy health care system it forces on we little people,” said Michael Cannon, director of health policy studies at the Cato Institute. “Congress will get better insurance than you do because politicians always get a better deal under government-run health care.”While it’s not news that Congressional health insurance plans are posh, CBS News recently uncovered the details of plans – right as the details of the Baucus health care bill are being hashed out.Members of Congress can choose from five different plans, and have access to both the VIP Bethesda Naval Hospital and a reserved spot Ward 72 at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, an elite division usually reserved for military members. Their everyday medical concerns can be taken care of at a doctors office located inside of Congress.Their premiums are the same as those of insurance plans with half the benefits, and the plans last a lifetime; not until Medicare kicks in do ex-Members or loose their Congressional health benefits. Congress has repeatedly voted down any provision that would switch their insurance plans to the lower-grade public option if Obamacare goes through.

That’s just great, regardless what I subject my constituents to whom I’m supposed to represent, I get a premium plan loaded with perks. I also hear that the lifetime pension is a great deal too. So just serve a single two-year term and collect money the rest of my life.

And in related humorous news, check out how it’s going in Britian with their health system. It’s soon to collapse under it’s own weight.

THE National Health Service has spent £1.5m paying for hundreds of its staff to have private health treatment so they can leapfrog their own waiting lists. More than 3,000 staff, including doctors and nurses, have gone private at the taxpayers’ expense in the past three years because the queues at the clinics and hospitals where they work are too long.

via Gateway Pundit.

Ah..the south. At times it’s just a reminder of just how far we have to go. The last sentence just kills me, talk about a self-fullfining prophecy. He should start with himself, then there would be one less problem.

NEW ORLEANS — At least two civil and constitutional rights groups in Louisiana are calling for a justice of the peace to resign after he refused to issue a marriage license for an interracial couple.The head of the American Civil Liberties Union in Louisiana and the Center for Constitutional Rights and Justice said Keith Bardwell should quit immediately.Bardwell is a white justice of the peace in Tangipahoa Parish in southeastern Louisiana. He refused earlier this month to issue a license or marry Beth Humphrey, who is white, and Terence McKay, who is black.Bardwell said he always asks if a couple is interracial and, if they are, refers them to another justice of the peace.He says children of such unions face troubling futures.

via The Associated Press: Groups upset man wouldnt marry interracial couple.

So some history, a few years ago, NC bent over backwards in attracting Dell to come to NC. All kinds of tax breaks and incentives were given to them. So now, the recession hit, they are closing the plant, 900 workers are gone and NC is out literally millions of dollars that they gave Dell. I’ve never liked the idea of a states bidding for business with lucrative incentives like tax breaks. They never work in the states or public good’s favor. Frankly, I think it should be illegal for states to gamble away tax payers money like that. A company should locate a facility based on the merits of the state, the available talent pool, utility costs, land costs, etc. Not by how much money a state can stuff in their pocket. It’s been an ongoing trend here in NC and I just think it’s worth the cost in the long term.

Dell Inc. DELL will close a North Carolina plant, putting some 905 employees out of work, as the personal-computer maker continues its restructuring.The company is in the midst of cutting $4 billion in costs the next two years as Dell deals with slumping profits and still-weak demand, especially among its key corporate customers.

via UPDATE: Dell To Close N.C. Plant, Affecting 905 Workers – WSJ.com.

Cash for Clunkers are driving people into the showroom. the new problem is that there may not be enough cars since Detroit has scaled back. This got me thinking about how to create a permanent incentive for car purchases. How about no sales tax on purchasing a qualified efficient vehicle and no property tax on that same vehicle for the first four years? Wow, what an incentive, but that would be to practical. Providing real solutions to job creation would be out of the question.

Which leads to the never-ending debate. Either a national consumption tax or a flat income tax, one or the other. How about an experiment, alternate between the two on an annual basis for the net few years then compare it to the current system to see how it fares. I don’t think politicians would like that because it would obviously be successful and they would loose their biggest power tool, the tax code.

Car dealerships all over the country are bracing for a spike in sales thanks to the “Cash for Clunkers” program. However, some car dealers said they fear the program could end up being a victim of its own success.

The Federal Government is offering a credit of up $4,500 off the purchase of a fuel efficient and environmentally sound car or truck in exchange for old cars.

via Cash for Clunkers Driving Cars off Dealerships Lots – NewsOn6.com – Tulsa, OK – News, Weather, Video and Sports – KOTV.com | .

Whether it be radical Islamists or Christian fanatics, Dream Theater’s lyrics for the song “In the Name of God” comes to mind. Apologies but I just had to post it, hope I’m not violating their work but these are just deep and to the point.

How can this be?
Why is he the chosen one?

Saint gone astray
With a scepter and a gun

Learn to believe
In the mighty and the strong

Come bleed the beast
Follow me it won’t be long

Listen when the prophet
Speaks to you
Killing in the name of God

Passion
Twisting faith into violence
In the name of God

Straight is the path
Leading to your salvation
Slaying the weak
Ethnic elimination

Any day we’ll all be
Swept away
You’ll be saved
As long as you obey

Lies
Tools of the devil inside
Written in Holy disguise
Meant to deceive and divide
Us all

Listen when the prophet
Speaks to you
Killing in the name of God

Passion
Twisting faith into violence
In the name of God

Blurring the lines
Between virtue and sin
They can’t tell
Where God ends
And mankind begins

They know no other
Life but this
From the cradle
They are claimed

Listen when the prophet
Speaks to you
Killing in the name of God

Passion
Twisting faith into violence
In the name of God

Hundreds of believers
Lured into a doomsday cult
All would perish
In the name of God

Self-proclaimed messiah
Led his servants
To their death
Eighty murdered
In the name of God

Forty sons and daughters
Un-consenting plural wives
Perversions
In the name of God

Underground religion
Turning toward
The mainstream light
Blind devotion
In the name of God

Justifying violence
Citing from the Holy Book
Teaching hatred
In the name of God

Listen when the prophet
Speaks to you
Killing in the name of God

Passion
Twisting faith into violence
In the name of God

Religious beliefs
Fanatic obsession
Does following faith
Lead us to violence?

Unyielding crusade
Divine revelation
Does following faith
Lead us to violence?

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord:
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword:
His truth is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!

I was watching the evening news last night and they were doing a fact check on Obama’s claim that he created 150,000 jobs. Christina Romer who chairs the Council of Eeconomic Advisors and is Obama’s top economic advisor said the following:  “When we have the tax cuts that we’ve had and the spending that we’ve had, historically it has shown that jobs has been created”. And that the number is a statistical figure so it can be presented as fact. So the point is that the numbers aren’t factual, but statistical, so can be presented as fact. I pondered over that but then something hit me.

Whoa, did she just say that tax cuts creates jobs? Well….. we won’t see her on camera anymore. The notion that tax cuts spurs the economy is the antithesis to the idea that government must do all to create jobs. At best, the government can create temporary jobs, mainly on infrastructure and those jobs are not sustainable. Tax cuts essentially make people who have all that excess cash, invest in things to make more money which creates jobs, which is sustainable. If government creates jobs by increasing the size of the government, then mathematically, there will eventually be less private sector jobs to support the government payroll. Take a look at the state of New Jersey. Private job payrolls are falling while government job payroll is increasing. The result? Increased taxes to support government and an exodus from the state. But back to my original point. The chief economic advisor states that tax cuts creates jobs. Following that rationale, the more taxes are cut, the more jobs are created? Is that possible?

Direct video link here…

WASHINGTON (AP) – Health and Human Services nominee Kathleen Sebelius recently corrected three years of tax returns and paid more than $7,000 in back taxes after finding “unintentional errors”—the latest tax troubles for an Obama administration nominee. The Kansas governor explained the changes to senators in a letter dated Tuesday that the administration released. She said they involved charitable contributions, the sale of a home and business expenses.

Taxes are a necessity for the services that are provided, and its a good thing. I think most people’s reservations stem from the fraud and waste that they see, from still subsidizing helium production for dirigibles (that’s right) to trying to fund a multi-million dollar “bridge to nowhere”. People need to feel and see that their dollars are used wisely and for good purpose, and value. Next, the tax itself, 10, 15, 20%, and it should be adjustable twice a year, at the discretion of the Treasury, the CBO and GAO, with a plus and minus maximums of a percent or two. Just like the Fed with the short term lending rate to regulate the economy, this measure would help regulate the federal income.

With todays structure, you have people sheltering their money in tax havens and other trickery like for example, the Kennedys. They’re a clear example. Ted Kennedy was once quoted saying ”The estate tax is the most progressive of all federal taxes. It would be terribly unfair to tax work while giving inherited wealth a free ride” but in one year, the family only paid $137K on a $300 Million estate due to creative trust funds that were set up. Do as I say, not as I do. Pay what I say, not what I pay. But it’s more than that, there seems to be a culture amongst those that craft these tax laws. They seem to be above them. Lets level the playing field. Today, the top 5% of income earners bear almost 50% of the nation’s tax burden. And to say that because they are rich, they can afford to and should is not the correct answer. Remember that the 5% has an adjusted gross income of ~150K. So we’re not talking about just the Bill Gates here, but also the everyday person who from whatever means, be it luck, silver spoon, or just hard work, have entered into that space. Tax by class is not the answer it’s what creates malcontent and what drives people to pull these tax stunts, even by those who write the code. Tax equality and fairness is the correct answer. Note that if our President’s recommendations go through, almost 50% of eligible tax payers will not any tax burden at all. So who will shoulder all this? You can only tax the rich so much until hey kick in their influence and withhold political contributions. It will fall on the ever tightening middle class which doesn’t have the financial resources to reach their congressional representatives.

So in summation, flat tax, based on a percentage, allowing for a means test to reduce the burden on lower income earners and those at or below the poverty level.

via Sebelius admits errors, pays $7,000 in back taxes.

From an article by George Will, Perils of a Bright Idea.

“Clear people and pets from the room and open a window for at least 15 minutes if possible. Avoid vacuuming. Scoop up larger pieces with stiff paper or cardboard, pick up smaller residue with sticky tape, and wipe the area with a damp cloth. Put everything into a sealed plastic bag or sealed glass jar. In most cases, this can be put in the trash, but the EPA recommends checking local rules.”

What kind of horrid device in your home and around your children, would carry such a stern warning? An Easy Bake Oven – Anthrax Edition? What household item could this possibly be? A CFL, Compact Fluorescent Lightbulb. I never thought about how dangerous these things are. Now many people believe that using CFL’s is the way of the future to use less energy and cut carbon emissions. Maybe so, but at what cost? Health risks and injury? Now before you start getting all beady-eyed while reading this, note that I’m not against these bulbs, we have them throughout half the house. But we’ve notices some problems and I thought they were exclusive to me, based on my wife’s belief in karma and that I haven’t always been a good boy in my life. Bulbs going out way before the suggested 10,000 ours and taking a while to light up. Then I read this…

Although supposed to last 10,000 hours and save, the Times says, “as much as” $5.40 a year in electricity costs, some bulbs died within a few hours. Some experts, reports the Times, “blame the government for the quality problems,” saying its push to cut the bulbs’ prices prompted manufacturers to use inferior components. Furthermore, some experts have written a guide saying the new bulbs require “a little insight and planning.  ” The Times says that “may be an understatement. “The bulbs, says the Times, “do not do well in hot places with little airflow, like recessed ceiling fixtures,” and some do not work “with dimmers or three-way sockets.” And: “Be aware that compact fluorescents can take one to three minutes to reach full brightness. This is not a defect.” Well, if you say so. Because all fluorescents contain mercury, a toxic metal, they must never be put in the trash, so Home Depot and other chains offer bins for disposing of dangerous bulbs. Driving to one of these disposal points might not entirely nullify the bulbs’ environmental benefits. Besides, the Times summarizes the Environmental Protection Agency’s helpful suggestions for coping with the environmental dangers caused when one of these environment-saving bulbs breaks. Worrywarts wonder what will happen when a lazy or careless, say, 10 percent of 300 million Americans put their worn-out bulbs in the trash. Stop worrying. What do you think? That Congress, architect of the ethanol industry and designer of automobiles, does not think things through?

So in an effort to get these bulbs out, the government pushed companies to get prices down, and how do companies rapidly get pricing down? Use less quality components, doe less research and take short cuts. But I don’t recall that stern warning on the box, or it must be in real fine print that we all ignore. I’m not sure what the ordnance is in my town. I can imagine many people have just dumped them in the trash. And to think, after 2014, you won’t be able to purchase an incandescent light bulb, they are banned as of 2014, part of that recent energy bill.

When it comes to reducing the carbon footprint and greenhouse gases, one cannot simply mandate new technology until it’s fully proven and also  note that alternatives and additions to the problem must be considered. Items like increasing energy output with clean technology, and smart energy usage. We have these CFL’s in our family room which are recessed lights. They are not as bright, and do take the three or so minutes to get to full lumens. Frustrating to say the least. Well, unless that’s resolved and the labels clearly states, we fixed it, I’ll be sticking with the traditional recessed bulbs until 2014. The rest of the house can use the CFL’s, they’re working OK, unless I start noticing the actual reduced hours vs. what’s advertised. You know, for centuries people used candles. Hmmm….

via George Will : Perils of a Bright Idea – Townhall.com .

“You never want a serious crisis to go to waste,” said Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. “This crisis provides the opportunity for us to do things that you could not do before.”

Proves my point about a stimulus bill really being a spending bill. Purely an opportunity to leverage a crisis to push through an agenda that really does not address the problems at hand, but does get a particular agenda going. Under normal circumstances, this bill would have never made it throu without the proper debate requirements in congress, and that’s what troubles me. Just like George Bush with the Patriot act, we knee-jerked a reaction and we’re dealing with that hangover, as we will with this.

When the reasons for the current economic situation stems from lack of and poor banking regulation, greed, Fannie and Freddie pushed into making bad loans, corrupted bond-rating agencies, house-flippers and homebuyers who knew they couldn’t afford what they were buying, and also fly-by-night mortgage companies taking advantage of home buyers who didn’t understand what they were signing, you would think that those would be the first issues to be addressed. Instead, we have a bill that doesn’t address the root causes of the problems, but a large social program to act as a stop gap, so the problems still remain and will sooner or later have to be addressed. The fact that today, as an investor, I could still go out and buy an unregulated CDO and CDS is a problem.

Indeed, one could perversely make the case that, if anything, the proliferation of overeducated, Gucci-wearing, smart-ass MBAs inventing ever more sophisticated and opaque mathematical models and debt instruments helped get us into this credit catastrophe in the first place.

And yet with our financial house on fire, Obama makes clear both in his speech and his budget that the essence of his presidency will be the transformation of health care, education and energy. Four months after winning the election, six weeks after his swearing in, Obama has yet to unveil a plan to deal with the banking crisis.

So why has the market dropped so rapidly over the last couple of weeks. Because investors understand several things. First, nothing is being done about the root causes of the banking system. Second, they know the spending hangover is coming in the form of very high taxes, and know that will slow growth even further.

Clever politics, but intellectually dishonest to the core. Health, education and energy — worthy and weighty as they may be — are not the cause of our financial collapse. And they are not the cure. The fraudulent claim that they are both cause and cure is the rhetorical device by which an ambitious president intends to enact the most radical agenda of social transformation seen in our lifetime.

The time to address healthcare, education and energy is not now. Trying to address these without first addressing the core financial problems will only make these initiatives falter. I would like to see fair and equal access to primary, secondary and higher education, but that costs money. We need to generate wealth to create the money to pay for these programs. Healthcare is not a right, not an entitlement. But it’s in our best interest to help those who cannot afford it to get coverage somehow. That also takes money. Alternative energy. And we definitely can’t artificially inflate the costs of fossil fuels to make expensive alternatives palatable via cap and trade systems.

via Townhall.com – Printer Friendly .

As the economy continues to contract, and job losses continue to increase at an alarming rate, Obama is being pressured to take more action. Now that we have a 2 trillion deficit, folks are calling for more stimulus next year. Well, if there was a stimulus plan in 2009 instead of a spending bill, we would have seen a real impact already.

“You may need more fiscal stimulus in 2010,” Jan Hatzius, chief U.S. economist for Goldman Sachs Group Inc., said in a Bloomberg Television interview. The impact of the package already passed will start fading by early next year, he said.

Obama said yesterday that the “astounding” job losses show “bold action and big ideas” are needed to revive the economy. “We have a responsibility to act, and that’s what I intend to do,” he told a group of Ohio police recruits aided by his stimulus package.

Wasn’t the stimulus package just signed several weeks ago? And weren’t these recruits already in training? Which means they was already budgeted by the state. Sounds like a little positioning and salesmanship here to sell something we know is a broken idea. These 25 police recruits can’t possibly have started training and graduated after the signing of the bill. But he did state that without this stimulus spending bill, they would have been let go.  And lets say that in a few months, more graduates enter the police force that are directly related to the spending bill, the problem is that it’s unsustainable. You pay for public services through taxes that is generated from a vibrant economy, not by endless borrowing which results in hampering an already fragile economy.

Obama spoke at the graduation ceremony for 25 police recruits who owe their jobs to the $787-billion economic recovery bill he signed into law less than three weeks ago.

via Obama touts jobs in Ohio he says stimulus saved — Newsday.com.

President Obama said Tuesday that now is a good time for investors to buy stocks if they focus on the big picture.

Mr. President, if you want to encourage investors to purchase stocks, get rid of capital gains. In fact, remove the financial tax barriers to investing. I’m not sure how you can encourage investors to take their money and buy stocks to prop up companies in an environment where success is penalized. You’re about to raise taxes on the 5% of people who already pay 45% of the taxes, and who are the ones who can directly invest and drive the economy. Whether you like it or not, its people with money who are the ones that can spend it.

I myself am not spending, and we here have a good capital reserve. We’re not spending because of uncertainty. Uncertainty in the sense that I expect things to get worse, or drag on for a long time because of the stimulus spending bill. The recently landmark spending bill really has nothing to do with jump-starting the economy, but is a collection if ideas that has finally found an excuse and opportunity to be implemented. What we wanted in a stimulus package was something that would actually stimulate the economy today. A good litmus test for the package would have been: anything that does not directly provide a positive impact in improving the economy (jobs, spending, etc.) within five months cannot be in the stimulus bill. Those would have to go through the normal debate process for a spending bill.

via Obama: It’s a Good Time to Buy Stocks – First 100 Days of Presidency – Politics FOXNews.com .

WASHINGTON — The Republican National Committee chose Michael Steele, an African-American, as party chairman on Friday, putting a new face on a beleaguered party as it seeks the right posture to take on President Obama and an overwhelmingly Democratic Congress

via Republicans Choose First Black Party Chairman – NYTimes.com.

Man…we black folks are kicking off Black History Month with a bang !!!!

First, we elect our first black President. Next, the first black Republican Party Chairman. Lincoln would be proud. On this coming Sunday night, hopefully, the first black Superbowl winning Head Coach. Sometime next week, the first black Attorney General. We’z be on a roll….

Now of course this poses a problem for my beloved Republican Party. We’re obviously going to be fewer in numbers because the right wing crackpots in the south will probably form a new party. No way a self respecting southerner is gonna take orders from one of “us” (“Us” being them American folks that don’t need as much SPF protection in the summer, and have less wrinkles because their skin has more oils). I reckon the name of the new party will be named something like “The Clean Sheets Coalition”. And of course, they’ll justify their actions by misquoting something out of the bible. But that’s OK, ’cause tomorrow morning I’m heading out to my nearest militant home supply store to get that little white guy with the lantern to put in my front yard. A lantern in his right hand and a tray on his left hand holding a pack of Kool’s (that’s the black man’s Marlboro ya’ll).

Spoiler alert…for those who don’t know me, I like to instigate and poke extreme fun. Because if we can’t talk and laugh honestly about our prejudices, our nation will forever be divided. 

So, I think there is hope for my party again. No, not because they chose a black man, but because I think the party is moving to a more centrist philosophy. Individual freedoms and liberty, along with individual responsibility. Now the question that needs to be asked is this. If McCain won the presidency, would Mr. Steel have won the votes to be party chairman. That honestly is something the party has to answer for itself. Because if he was, then the party is no better off and will most likely sink further. 

YouTube – George Bush Top 10 Moments – David Letterman Show.

Had to put this here because it’s downright funny. But now that he’s gone from public life, I hope he re-engages in public service though. While definitely not suited for the role that he was in, and clearly having some bd advisors that ran roughshot around his office, I think that Pres. Bush would actually be an excellent humanitarian for social causes around the world. I think he understands the challenges in the world, and has a good faith belief to motivate him.

I hope he gets involved in third world humanitarian and social issues. His down to earth personality would benefit those causes such as AIDs campaigns, medicine and clean water initiatives. I think that is something he wanted to tackle as president, but since 911, was obviously sidetracked and never recovered. That and our party being hijacked by the extreme right.

With the historic moment that’s about to happen in about an hour, I can find no better comparison using music than Gustav Holtz’s The Planets. Specifically, there are two songs. First, Mars – The Bringer of War. I will listen to that on my iPod around 11:45am. Then at noon, I will listen to Jupiter – The Bringer of Jollity. I think its a fair representation of the next two hours, as mushy as this may sound. But I also think its relevant.

If you’ve never heard The Planets, it definitely worth getting. It’s classical music, but with a lot of breath, and expansive use of different intruments at the turn of the 20th century that weren’t typical in most orchestras. Read more about it on Wikipedia. Listen to these two songs and then decide if they don’t reflect the summation of the Bush presidency and the hopes of the Obama presidency.

Now this is interesting. On paper, half of the $700 billion financial rescue package has been spent, but it seems the Treasury Department has committed nearly $10 billion in additional TARP money before it’s been released by Congress. So are we not learning anything from this? When parts of the government is used to spending money it doesn’t have, what message is that? I truly hope the additional $350B is heavily scrutinized with loads of requirements and caveats to whoever receives it. I was reading another article where officials are stating that there is no way of accounting for what has already been spent. Just last week, American Express received over $3B as they are now a “bank”. But they have not disclosed what they have or will do with the money. My thoughts? Executive retention bonuses for those execs that are critical to the success of the company. The same ones who got us into this mess. Basically, Paulson over at the treasury is there simply to help out his buddies, nothing more…..

What Joe Biden should have done in the debate.;-)

YouTube – Terry Tate: Reading Is Fundamental.