Oh yeah, Sarah Palin is enjoying her “15 minutes of fame” and serves a great entertainment value, but she poses no threat to our country. I wish I could say the same for our current “leadership” in Washington.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704533204575047720489119784.html

To sum up these articles, the proposed budget does increase taxes for all of us by taxing your healthcare benefits at work, the energy tax (still in proposal) and increase in capital gains tax to name just a few. His proposal to tax only the “rich” (families over $250k, individuals over $200k) by his own admission would raise only $700B over 10 YEARS. The rest of the 1.8 TRILLION per year in revenue he needs to generate is going to come from “backdoor” taxes that may only partially show up on the FICA line of your W-2, but certainly will impact your pocket book as the increased taxes on energy and other businesses are passed on to all consumers in the form of price increases. In the end, we ALL end up paying more taxes. (FYI – he is also laying claim to a tax cut that was enacted by Bush and just left in place by Obama. He is letting the top two brackets’ cuts expire along with some ancillary cuts (death tax, capital gains, etc) that are not limited to a particular income bracket. The only people you’ll hear saying Obama is responsible for the “biggest tax cut ever” is Obama and folks like MediaMatters – an outlet for the DNC, which consistently conveniently forgets to mention ALL of the facts on any single issue if it disagrees with their political agenda. Note that both of the links I reference are from sources that were supportive of Obama during his campaign, so it clearly is not “Republican fodder”.

You did, however, prove my point about the childishness of the American public devolving any election into a pure popularity contest. Thank you.

Just look at the childish responses in this thread: personal insults, name-calling, hate-mongering. Only one person actually responded with any data, and even she made generalized assumptions about my viewpoint without knowing what I really thought based on her assumption that, if I didn’t think Obama was the greatest man ever I must be a greedy, hateful Republican Conservative. This is a direct result of our press and politicians conditioning us to categorize each other as “Republican Conservatives” or “Liberal Democrats.” Although recently I have tended to vote Republican because the Democrat candidates were far too liberal for my taste, I am really a middle-of-the-roader who carefully researches candidates before I support them since I can no longer trust the press to truthfully vet the candidates on my behalf. It is my hope that the American people will raise their standards and demand that we all focus on what’s right for our country rather than drinking the whole bottle of kool-aid of one party or another offers us. I myself did not believe that either of the Presidential candidates the major parties presented us this past election were actually qualified to run our country. Obama’s “hope” platform was not realistic, nor did he have enough experience in government or the business world and did not appear to have any real training or experience with finance and economics. His entire short career prior to politics was in law, which is very separate from the types of businesses that drive our economy and does not offer much opportunity to develop management skills. McCain was under-educated, having never obtained a degree, and, though well-qualified as an experienced member of both sides of Congress and a Naval veteran, also did not possess significant background in business, economics, or finance and showed little background in working within the realm of civics, as had Obama in his time as a civil rights attorney.

And for Sue and Rachel – I initially supported Obama’s bid for the Presidency, because I too was dazzled by his well-groomed image and ability to deliver a great speech. Then I read what he intended to do and, based on my education and experience with economics and the business world, determined that he did not have a realistic, sustainable plan for our country and would likely do more damage as result of his naiveté. I am not a staunch supporter of either party, but am a realist with a degree in business and 18 years of experience in the work force. I don’t believe any of us should jump on the bandwagon just because one party or another tells us to do it. Neither party operates based on truth, (nor do their supporters in the press), so it is our responsibilities as citizens of this country to look at the actual data and make up our minds for ourselves and stop parroting back the talking points we hear ad nauseum from both camps.

Unfortunately, medical treatment is expensive. It costs close to $200,000 to just get a medical degree and secure a license to practice these days in the United States. Doctors must constantly continue training to stay up on the latest research and treatments and to learn about new conditions and illnesses. (If they didn’t, we’d still be using leeches to treat many diseases.) Equipment required to diagnose and treat patients is extremely expensive because it is expensive to develop and manufacture. Pharmaceutical companies spend billions developing a single drug. Not millions, billions. The docs and pharmaceuticals have to recoup that cost when they treat you or sell a drug, because they have to have money to pay their employees, facility & equipment costs, continue research and to produce the equipment and drugs needed to keep us all healthy. (The work/life balance of your average doctor is the worst in the country – don’t they deserve to earn a little money for themselves, too?) These things are not cheap, despite the bill of goods the government wants to sell you. As result, if we want premium care, we have to pay for it. And we need to stop suing all the time so the cost of malpractice insurance would stop comprising a large portion of any medical practitioner’s income/revenue. What’s most disconcerting is that much of the data our government is basing their health care assumptions around is a decade old. Shoot, even many of the studies referenced on Wikipedia are that old. Obama is concerned about the 18,000 deaths per year by the uninsured. What about the 435,000 Americans killed by tobacco in 2009? Or the 365,000 who died because they sat around watching TV and eating junk food? Or the 107,000 who died as result of drug and/or alcohol abuse? More people were murdered (20,308) or killed by an STD (20,000) last year than those who died as result of lack of medical care. We have MUCH bigger problems than the number of uninsured in this country, and most are self-inflicted by the individuals who have those problems, but could be controlled somewhat by reducing crime and battling addiction rather than trying to socialize health care. Hey, but private industry – you know those evil pharmaceuticals and over-paid medical researchers, did manage to find a prevention for uterine cancer, cures for common carcinomas, and a probable cure for debilitating osteoporosis in the mean time.

If another 20-30% of my income (and I have NOT been paying only an “effective 19% tax rate” – that’s the folks with 7-figure incomes, not me nor any of my dual-income “rich” neighbors – I’m at 25%), you can bet your sweet bottom that I won’t be giving to charity, nor would I or any of my neighbors be able to support our local economy any more, which is what is about to happen to our entire area thanks to Obama’s redistribution of wealth and “creation of jobs” policies that put hard-working middle-class people out of work. You CANNOT improve the economy by raising taxes on such a steep curve in such a short time frame on only a small subset of the tax-paying citizens, regardless of what the liberal press tells you. Those economic analysts are the President’s yes-men and other supporters of a socialist economy, most without degrees in finance or economics. What you WILL do is put those who were still solvent into bankruptcy when their propensity to save is typically 15-20% and the tax increase is 20-30%, adding more to the foreclosure stats and further depressing the market. The reality is, (and even Colin Powell, an Obama supporter, repeated it at the event I attended yesterday), that EVERYONE who pays taxes will be paying substantially more to cover Obama’s spending. And it WON’T help the economy because you have to have more DISPOSABLE income to increase spending and therefore the GDP. At this event another economic guru,(well-regarded and a frequent CNBC and MSNBC analyst) agreed with this as well. My favorite quote of the day came from a well-regarded finance specialist, “Those of you waiting for the politicians to save you -STOP! It ain’t gonna happen!” The point all of the speakers made somewhere in their talks was that if we want to dig ourselves out of this mess, the American people are going to have to take control of their own destinies again and stop depending on someone else to bail them out. Most advised that we return to a 20% propensity to save/invest instead of spending every penny we make. And don’t tell me people HAVE to spend every penny to get by – most Americans don’t. I was there in the middle of it all when the Katrina victims took their $2000 debit cards and bought designer purses, tattoos, alcohol and the like, then returned to the shelters and federal housing with their booty, quite high from their spending spree. It was depressing and pathetic. Anticipating your next assumption, I’m not saying all of them did that, but sadly enough the majority who remained on assistance did squander what they were given by the government. They also made no effort to resolve their own problems and planned on living on the government dime as long as they could because apparently the rest of us “owed” them. As Rudy Guliani proved, people are more apt to be self-supporting when they are productive. Just giving them money only leads to increased crime and higher dependence on the government. He proved this principal out in New York when he reduced the welfare rolls by over 60% and crime even more by simply forcing all welfare recipients who were capable to work for their welfare funds. (He waived the requirement for the infirm and during pregnancy.) Having a job improved their pride and self-worth, as well as reduced idle time and the propensity to commit crimes as they no longer felt entitled to other people’s money and possessions.

The reality is you cannot turn the economy on a dime by any government action. And it may be tough medicine, but those banks should have been allowed to fail. They cannot legally foreclose on non-default mortgages in the process of bankruptcy. (And if you were already in default, chances are Obama’s individual bail-out hasn’t helped you because only 30% of applicants even qualify with that program. Most are still losing their homes. FYI only 50% of people in foreclosure got there because of job loss or medical bills, the rest did it through poor financial management.) Instead, the law would force those banks to sell their remaining mortgages to a more solvent bank that would be required to maintain the same terms of the mortgage in accordance with the clause that allows the mortgage to be sold, or that would eventually foreclose on those mortgages that could not be saved. FYI – Mortgages are bought and sold on a regular basis, and this situation would be no different. Bailing these failing banks out, which was the mistake of both the out-going and incoming administrations, only forstalled the inevitable: banks with bad loan practices will eventually fail, pure and simple, and well they should. Normally a failing bank is purchased part & parcel by a successful bank, and the majority of American banks got through this mess without the tiniest bit of “help” from the government. But, you don’t hear the press talking about that, nor do you hear Obama’s analysts mention one word of the fact that MOST banks survived on their own, because that only goes to prove that a sound bank with solid business practices in a capitalistic society will remain solvent, even in difficult times like these, because they play by the rules, make good loan decisions, and don’t spend more than they have coming in, which was the case of the big banks and funds that were plastered all over the news. And yet you suggest the “rich” should down-size their homes to pay for your medical bills. How, pray tell, do you suggest anyone sell their home for more than they owe in a market where home values have dropped so low that almost everyone is underwater on their mortgage? What would that do other than to further depress the market and extend the recession? Who’s going to buy those homes but the very people who are expected to pay 50% of their income in taxes? (By the way, your math on disposable income does not follow logic. If you make $250,000/year and ALREADY have a $3000 mortgage payment based on a perfectly viable standard of living pre-Obama and the average 2 cars per family for the working parents plus an average child support payment, how is it you think there is going to be anything left to put back into the economy? That’s $125,000 – $36,000 (mortgage/ins) – $14400 (auto & other debt) – $8000 (local taxes) – $5000 (child care) – $9600 (utilities in HE home) – $4500 (insurance) – $9600 (groceries for 5) – $12000 (child support) – $6750 (gas/tolls for work) – $15,000 (6% retirement) – $25,000 (charity) – $1400 (school clothes, shoes, supplies for 3 kids) – $5000 (extra-curriculars) – $1440 (lawn care) – $1100 (general maintenance & HOA) – $1200 (dining out/entertainment) = -$30990. (Note this did not include vacation trips or other major expenditures people seem to think the folks on our income bracket make on a regular basis.) You recommend down-sizing, but if everyone in that bracket is trying to downsize, who’s going to buy that $300k-$400k house in a bad market? No one, that’s who. That cost of living is fixed with the exception of the portion of spending that supports the local economy. So the charitable giving would have to drop drastically, as would the extra-curriculars and non-essentials, like eating out, just to break even. These so-called “rich” couples in the $250,000 to $300,000 range are not living high on the hog like everyone thinks. I also do not see the logic in blaming it on Bush when the entire planet is in the same boat. Did Bush hose up the economy in every other country, too, or do you think maybe, just maybe, this is part of the natural cyclical ups and downs of a global market?

Yes, the debt of Americans increased a large percentage in recent years. Not because people were buying groceries on credit cards or paying their medical bills (less than 25% of debtors were in that category), but because they were spending above their means on non-necessities. This is not the fault of those who watched their P’s & Q’s and practiced good financial habits and are weathering this storm now as result, nor was it the fault of the government. It is the sole responsibility of those individuals who chose to spend more than they made without a clue as to how it would be paid back. I know several people in this predicament. They bought more house than they could afford hoping they’d grow into the payment, and they bought it on ARMs to boot. They bought designer clothes, (I shop Wal-mart and Target, by the way), ate out frequently, went to the movies, clubs, bought new furniture and so forth, took expensive vacations, all on credit. And I have little sympathy for those screaming for a government bail-out because I’ve lived this in the past.

My parents were big spenders on small salaries in the 70’s. The four of us moved in with my grandparents (2 bedroom house) several times because they couldn’t pay the bills they never should have taken on, and still my mom would keep placing “bill me” orders with Fingerhut. We lived on beans, rice and stale bread. We went through 2 bankruptcies, lost cars, homes and sold everything else. I went without birthday party or gifts so they could pay their taxes under Carter’s tax and spend plan. We sat in line for hours just to get gas so my dad could get to work that week. (Eventually, he took a job within walking distance but got laid off from that during the oil embargo.) Sometimes we lived in a trailer. For a while, we even lived in a pop-up camper and cooked our meals on a gas stove. But my parents were proud and we got no food stamps and no other government assistance. We had no insurance, so we saw dental students and medical interns instead of more expensive doctors and dentists. When my bother contracted a rare and nearly fatal disease in the early 80’s requiring a specialist be flown from New York to Texas to save his life, they finally broke down and sought assistance from a charity and our church, which were more than glad to help out and still would do so today. So don’t tell me I’m some hostile, heartless rich person who has no clue what it’s like at the bottom. I’m a hard-working, second generation American woman who knows the meaning of poverty all too well, but I know even more the potential every individual has and can choose to live up to if they will simply stop thinking like entitled victims and take responsibility for their own lives. (It took me working, scrimping and saving for 15 years to get where I am.) For those 18% who are out there really seeking jobs, there are charities, churches and existing government programs to help them out, just like there were during the Reagan years when my brother got sick. This hasn’t changed – in fact it’s even easier to get help now, sans Obama’s grand plans to place the entire country on the government payroll.

Wake up, and look at history if you need a clue as to how our economy will recover. We’re in a major slump, yes. But if you’d paid attention in economics class, you would know that happens about every 8-12 years regardless of government behavior and goes on just as long. We’re actually in year 10 of this slump and should see the natural up-turn any day now if Obama will just let capitalism do its job, leaving disposable income free to allow investors to get back in the market and spending to increase as prices hit bottom. He can extend the recession another 5 years by raising taxes, though, because history has proven that higher taxes = lower spending and deepen the recession curve. I guess the new generation has to learn that lesson now, though, at the expense of those of us who have already been through it before and survived just fine without government assistance.

I’m really starting to wonder if Dennis is just having us all on.