Politicians Telling the Truth

Politicians Telling the Truth:
      Last night I was watching Jay Leno and he said something that I observe frequently in the press and public. He was interviewing Rick Santorum who said his policy on Same Sex Marriage was the same as Romney and Obama. If you look up their stated policy, all three, as of that time, supported the current federal policy supporting male-female marriage. The issue I have is Leno's comment, "Yes, but they are just saying it, you really believe it." I know I'm getting a little long in the tooth, but I thought what you say is what you believe.
      I like Leno and, while he's more liberal than I prefer, I can watch him and have a good time. His comment just brought home the often quoted position that a candidate will change their position after they get the nomination or get elected. We watched Obama in the run up to the 2008 election during the primaries run closer to the left. Then during the election, move closer to the center than he had in the primaries. Once elected, he shifted back toward the left by pushing health care through to the detriment of the economy and jobs.  
      Recently we have heard the press state that Romney, now that he has the nomination wrapped up, will pivot to the center. I can understand evolving positions; but, I don't agree with pandering to what is perceived to be the more popular position. As time passes, it is appropriate for everyone to re-evaluate their positions.
      Currently it seems that the Obama administration seems to be evolving their position on Same Sex Marriage. I find it convenient that a recent CBS poll shows gaining support for Same Sex Marriage. While I understand the shifting positions on this issue, this is typical of what we see from our elected officials. A thoughtful, long discussed, and evolving position over several years is what most of us do. We do not look for the latest poll, focus group, or targeted voters to determine new positions on issues.
      Now we need to watch and see if Romney "shifts to the center" or Obama backs off on taking money from senior citizen funding to pay for his other pet projects. Not to jump on Obama any more but his taking credit this week for the death of Osama while he is dramatically defunding the military is just wrong. Sorry, just had to get that off my chest.
      The bottom line is: I want a candidate that will say what they believe. I may not agree with everything they say but at least I know what they'll do. Also, then I vote on the character of the individual and that's what I have to trust when the pressure gets high and they have to do the right thing, not the popular one.

Work Ethic - Ben Franklin

Blast From The Past – Work Ethic: Ben Franklin Style

      Ben Franklin is known for his work leading up to the Declaration of Independence, his scientific interest in electricity and his financial acumen with his Poor Richards Almanac. He was truly a Renaissance Man. What can we learn from his guiding principles?

     "Energy and Persistence Conquer all." Stick to your plan and work until you complete it. This is rarely seen today with the perceived need to show results quickly. With weekly/ monthly / quarterly results used as measuring tools, many plans requiring long term planning and financial commitments needed to be in place for years are constantly modified. I have seen this frequently while managing shipbuilding programs. We have the Energy part down. It's the Persistence part with the constant modifying of the plan that needs work.

     "Well done is better than well said." Can't say enough about this one. In our current society, for many of us it seems like people are getting ahead by talking a good story but not actually doing the job. In the political and entertainment arena this seems to be more prevalent. Electing people because they are likable shouldn't replace voting for people that have a proven track record. I don"t know about you, but I want someone who has "Been there, Done that." Fortunately in the engineering, scientific and medical fields this fame for fame's sake is not true.

     "Diligence is the mother of good luck." Almost all of us who have been successful recognize that this is true. We've seen many folks punching the clock. Those end up being the people that miss out on promotions and end up complaining they are being treated unfairly. The American work ethic has always been to go above and beyond. Our record of innovation and accomplishment is unsurpassed. We must continue to pass this on to the next generation.
   
     "When you're finished changing, you're finished." Most of the successful people I know have re-invented themselves several times. I've gone from being a ship driver to a meteorologist to a Project Manager in the Electrical business to a Program Manager building ships. While this is not uncommon for someone with 35 years of work experience, it is what you have to do to stay relevant. Many of the following generation are finding this re-invention as a way to get ahead. One of my children has changed jobs 3 times and the other 4 times. Each move either brought them closer to what they wanted to do or a pay raise. This is what I see as the way ahead for the our generation.

     Ben had many applicable quotes. He is a great example of what we should ascribe to. I know this is a little different than my usual entry, but sometimes I want to hit other areas of interest.

United Nations Power Grab

United Nations newest power grab

            It often amazes me that the politicians think we, the general public, don’t remember what they have done in the past. This time I’m referring to the United Nations. They are trying again to take over our nation’s environmental policy and use it to drive our economy. In the recent meetings leading up to the U. N. sponsored Rio 20 in June of this year, the philosophy behind the decisions will include “capacity building,” which means, in this context, an agreed system of wealth transfers to prepare recipient nations for future, larger transfers. In other words transfer money from wealthy nations, us, to less wealthy nations under the guise of Green environmental philosophy.

            If this sounds familiar, it is. Remember as recently as Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth and the use of bias scientific data. Also even the United Nations own environmental data has been shown to be manipulated. I may focus a little more on the science than most due to my background as a Meteorologist. The manipulation of data is probably the most egregious thing a scientist can do. By biasing the base data, any other scientist using the data will have their results skewed and in the end positions based on their studies will have false results.  This is what has happened with the U. N. data, which most scientist were not allowed to verify all of the base data. These are not things to base changing our economy and political system.

            This does not even address the philosophical view of shift earnings from your pocketbook to less wealthy nations. It is my belief that Americans do want to help out where we can. Currently we send $6.3 Billion to the U. N., $52 Billion in Foreign Aid and $24 Billion in private contributions.  No other nation comes anywhere close. This does not count the lives that we have lost saving millions of people from tyranny and disease.

            Our revolution to get away from the tyranny of Great Britain was to give us freedom to make our own decisions. For over two hundred years we have followed that philosophy and helped the world become a better place. As Ronald Reagan said, “America is a shining city upon a hill whose beacon light guides freedom-loving people everywhere." Turning our economy and political system over to the United Nations is returning to the tyranny our ancestors fought so hard against.

The Land of Opportunity

            I know you have observed that almost all immigration for the United States involves people coming to the U. S. versus leaving us. The vast majority of workers in the world that are allowed to see the opportunities available in America want to take advantage of those possibilities. The reason for these opportunities is the basis that the United States was founded on: Individual Liberty, Freedom of Choice and the Opportunity for All to Succeed. As you can tell that is a recurring theme of my belief in America. Recently, I believe the Federal government has moved away from those principles.

            We need to go back to the founding of the country to establish the purpose of our Federal Government. It is to defend the country and provide equal opportunity to all citizens. There is much more detail provided but they always come back to those principles. While we initially failed to recognize the rights of people of color, females and numerous other minorities, we still use the guiding principle of equal opportunity for all. I’ll leave the discussion for minority rights for another discussion.

            It is my belief that the best way to provide equal opportunity is through education. Many decry our education system, yet from my observation there is a tremendous input of the best students from other countries attending college here and very few Americans moving overseas for four years of college. We do need to improve our secondary education in many areas but we do have excellent public schools in areas throughout the country. My children have attended secondary education and college in the public arena and all three are very successful in their fields. My desire is to return education policy and funding to the local level; at least the state if not county level. As I’ve learned throughout the years, it’s best to solve the problem by being closest to it. The Department of Education’s main purpose is to collect revenue from taxpayers and redistribute it back to the states as they see fit. While the Federal Authorities believe they know best, I believe the State, County and individual schools know what they need to do best. Let them have the reins and run with it. Hold them accountable and reward success.

            This is really more of a chicken and the egg issue: improve the school and parents get involved or parents get involved and the school improves. We have many superb educators who want to improve the system. Let’s get out of their way and let them provide the equal opportunity to all.

Discretionary vs Entitlement Spending? What's the difference?

Discretionary spending? Entitlement Spending? What’s the difference?

            In today’s heated rhetoric, much of the conversation seems to center on what we are “entitled to.” The differences highlighting this assumed division are apparent in the current budget and national debt discussions. The numbers being used today split our current spending into - $ 1.3 Trillion discretionary spending and $2.1 Trillion entitlement spending. About $200 Billion go to pay the interest on our debt. The press and much of the public are convinced one side wants to leave the country defenseless and the other side will push our less fortunate over a cliff. While I don’t believe that either argument is accurate, I feel that both sides are trying to paint the others position as completely unreasonable, but not show why their own position is the right one. That’s for another discussion.

            The bottom line is: It’s our money! While it is interesting to me and other tax payers that the expenditures go into different programs; at the end of the day, it is money that we earn and the Federal Government takes from our earnings. When you look at your pay check the government takes out what it considers its share. They split it up between Income Tax, Social Security, Medicare and a myriad of other categories. These divisions have become transparent from the governments point of view ever since they began to use the “Trust Funds” to borrow against. For us, the tax payer, it basically means the federal government gets a significant portion of our hard earned dollars.

On top of this business’s are forced to match several of the taxes you pay. This means that the company you work for has to pay the government earnings from what you earned the company. In other words they have less profit to pay the investors, who put their hard earned money into the business, or pay the workers full value for their work. While the government collects taxes using these different line items, it is still means we get smaller pay checks. I have several issues with this, but for this posting, I would rather the government was up front with us and gave us one bill to be paid.

            I do have a problem with the identification of Discretionary vs. Entitlement. By splitting the expenditures this way, the government is facilitating the argument between the defense of the country against the internal support structure it has established. This is not helpful and only serves the politicians and press. The politicians use the division to play to the fears of their constituencies and the press report on the “conflict” to raise their ratings.

For those of us tax payers, it’s still our blood sweat and tears that pay for everything.

The Federal Government's Responsibility

USA: The Federal Government’s Responsibility                                                                                                                      

            The precepts America was founded on are Individual Liberty, Freedom of Choice and the Opportunity for All to Succeed. Our fathers and mothers fought and won the battle to establish these as rights for every American citizen. We, Americans of all races & creeds, have defeated monarchs and dictators throughout the years all over the world to help establish the same rights for those that are downtrodden and egregiously treated. Our ethos is to: work hard, protect our family, defend the country and provide for those less well off. At least that is what many of us were raised to do.

            This is being broken down. While the often quoted “over half of the population gets a governmental hand out.” is inflated with those that earned their benefit, a significant part of our population is dependent on the government taking money from someone that earned it and giving it to someone who didn’t. Many of us want to help those that are having a hard time: but, most of us would rather teach them to fish, not just give them the fish. Virtually all of us want those that earned their checks (social security, Medicare, government retirees, injured veterans and military retirees) to keep getting them.

            Somehow we must re-instill into those that use the system to get something for nothing a desire to earn their own way. During the current economic downturn, we must continue to provide the safety net to keep those in need housed and fed. However, the best/ only way out of the morass is to get Americans working. As was proven after the last great recession (unemployment: 7.5%, inflation: 13%, mortgage rates: 21.5%), lowering taxes provided the money for businesses to invest. This resulted in more jobs for millions which created more dollars for the workers to enhance their standard of living and more money to be taken by the government in taxes. For the majority of the post Reagan years, most of the people’s money was spent on programs that had been established over many years and provide support the American workers and families.

            In the last few years, this trust has been broken. This should not be a Democrat, Republican, Tea Party or Libertarian issue. This is a Common Sense issue. We, the tax payer, cannot spend more than we take in. Sure in the short run we can run up our credit cards. But, at the end of the day we have to pay what we owe. The Government is made up of people we hired and are obligated to follow the same rules we are. Most of the Cities, Counties and States are beginning to reign in their overspending: ie. live within their budget. The Federal Government is not. Even though we hear the President and Congress talk about “cutting the budget” they are only passing very small limits to the rapid expansion of the budget.

            The Federal government is tasked with very few duties. The bottom line is to protect the country and regulate interstate trade.