SOPA and PIPA - The Path To Obstruction

Ok, I know I am a little late to the game with this piece, but I feel this needs to be said therefor I am saying it.  The subjects I am going to talk about are the now infamous SOPA and PIPA bills that have yet to be presented in Congress.  Luckily SOPA has been set on the back burner for now while congress tries to figure out a way to change the language so that it is not as intrusive as it is in its current form.  At least that is the story that is being fed to us.  I believe that Congress is just waiting for our short term memories to forget about SOPA so that they can try to pass it again under a different name.  PIPA is still up for a vote soon unless something drastic happens.  Hopefully, the internet wide protests that occurred when SOPA was about to be brought up will have had an impact on PIPA, if not, then maybe we will have another protest only wider spread.  Ok, I guess since not everyone out there keeps up with current events, I need to start out by telling you all what SOPA and PIPA are.

I will start with SOPA, which stands for “Stop Online Piracy Act”.  Of the two bills, SOPA is the more extreme in its language and potential execution.  It intended to help fight copy right infringement on foreign websites.  One of the tools SOPA provided allowed the U.S. Department of Justice could seek court orders requiring Internet service providers such as AOL, Comcast and Charter to block the domain names of “infringing sites”.  For example, Comcast could prevent its customers from accessing megaupload.com.  Luckily, this was one of the parts of SOPA that was dropped due to the opposition as well as the impracticality of actually enforcing it.  The other tool would allow rights holders to seek court orders requiring payment providers, advertisers and search engines to stop doing business with an “infringing site”.  Because of this, the rights holders would also be able to request for funding to be cut off from an “infringing site”, and that all search links leading to the offending site be required to be removed. Then site in question would have five days to appeal any action taken against them.  Also, SOPA defines an “infringing site" as any site that is "committing or facilitating" copyright infringement, this blankets both domestic and foreign sites.

Now on to the subject of PIPA.  PIPA stands for “Protect Intellectual Properties Act”.  For the most part, PIPA is almost identical to SOPA with the main difference being the language.  As I said before SOPA is the more extreme of the two.  Whereas SOPA is very broad in its reach when it comes to a site that is committing or facilitating" copyright infringement, PIPA only target sites that have “no other significant use other than copyright infringement”.  What this mean is, if any website has any purpose other than providing copyrighted material it should be safe from the ramifications of the bill, though a site will still have to prove that it is for other uses other than pirating.  Sites that fileshare such as Rapidshare should, in theory, be safe from prosecution because they remove copyrighted material as soon as the owner of copyright requests it, while sites like Megaupload and PirateBay would be targeted due to their attempts to obstruct any attempts to force the removal of copyrighted material. 

Speaking of Megaupload… want to see something that should terrify you?  Go to megaupload.com and then come back here, I’ll wait…  See?  That is terrifying.  Why?  Because, Megaupload is based out of Hong Kong and the owner of the site was arrested from his home in New Zealand when the FBI had the site brought down.  Yeah, anyway, Megaupload is supposedly NOT a victim of the fallout from upset bureaucrats over the dismissal of SOPA, yet I find the timing very suspicious.  But I digress.

Now that I have given you some info on SOPA and PIPA I am going to tell you about my opinion of these two bills.  SOPA and PIPA both are good in their intentions, they are.  The main problem with them comes in the language that is used in the bills.  I am all for protecting an individual’s intellectual properties, I am, but this hits a little close to home with me in the aspect of writing, therefor I am going to approach this from that viewpoint.  After all, if someone stole the novel I wrote and distributed it without my permission and I, then, was unable take make any money off of it due to that, I would be upset.  I know some people think that authors that get published make tons of money on their books, but unless an author is extremely prolific or well sold, such as Stephen King, they are not going to make a lot of money off of their writing (unless they are very lucky).  When someone takes their book and uploads it to a site so that it can be distributed illegally that cuts into the sales of the book which cuts into the profits of the publisher and the royalties of the writer.  Lack of sales creates lack of prints which then, if taken to its ultimate end, creates lack of work for the author.  There are some companies that have found a way to profit from allowing books to be downloaded free of charge on select titles (Baen is one of them) but once again I digress.

SOPA and PIPA, like I said before are written with good intentions but they take the anti-piracy laws that we currently have and hype them up on steroids creating monstrous blanket laws that will infringe upon everyone’s life negatively in some way.  I don’t care who you are, once these laws go into effect no one will be safe from them, and if taken to the extreme that everyone is afraid they will be taken to, even the owners of the properties that these laws are meant to protects will be harmed by them.  Imagine an internet without ANY copyrighted material on it.  That is the most extreme that these laws could potentially be taken too.  I doubt they would go that far but dumber things have happened, after all look at who we currently have as President.  

A realistic example of what is most likely to come out of either of these laws being passed is something along these lines…  If you like to read or write fan fiction (fan stories based on intellectual properties such as popular books, games and TV series), you would no longer be allowed to write and distribute your stories nor could you receive and read the stories of others.  Sites like YouTube and Deviant Art would have over 90% of their content stripped from them if there were not shut down.  You could no longer read movie or book reviews online because they are based off of intellectual properties.  Keep in mind, this is a realistic scenario.  Sites that offer services like Netflix could be shut down at the whim of someone who thinks that they are not getting paid enough for the rights to be displayed by those services.  The internet as we know it would go away. 

SOPA and PIPA don’t need to just have the language changed; they need to be completely retooled in order to help strengthen our current anti-piracy laws instead of trying to override them with blanket laws that are so vaguely worded that they can be interpreted however anyone wants to interpret them to suit their desires.  As it is, the laws we currently have are not effective, but I would take what we have over having our freedoms online striped from us almost completely.  When we go down the path that SOPA and PIPA inadvertently will place us on, we will be brought that much closer to a communistic society. 

Here in America we should realize the value of freedom and work to defend that freedom.  For too long we have let the politician that sit in Washington slowly strip us from our natural born freedoms while telling us that it is for our own good.  Hell, we currently have 32% of the population of this country who are happy with a President that has effectively said he wants to be our Dictator and will do what is necessary to become said Dictator (more on that in my next post where I tear apart Obama’s State of the Union speech.) if re-elected.  We need to stand up and tell Washington DC “NO MORE!”  and then start pushing for a real change that preserves and restores our freedom to where it should be.

The Pipeline Of Shattered Dreams or Obama Is Playing Politics Again... Big Shock.

OK, today’s topic is the Keystone Pipeline.  Why am I talking about the Keystone Pipeline?  Because I feel that this is going to become a key issue in the Presidential election.  For those of you who have been living under a rock or that just don’t keep up with the news, the Keystone Pipeline is supposed to be a massive pipeline that carries oil all the way from our neighbors in the north, Canada, to the grand state of Texas.  The Canadians have a bunch of oil but no refineries to process said oil into viable fuels.  They offered to let the USA have a portion of said oil (lessening out dependence on the Middle East for oil since our politicians are too scared of environmental terrorist (environmentalists are terrorist as defined by me because of their attempts to terrify people over the effects we have on the environment) to drill here in the USA any more) if they could use the refineries in Texas.  One of the catches to this deal was that we would be responsible for constructing and maintaining our portion of the pipeline.

Naturally one of the biggest draws of this project would be the amount of jobs that would come from the massive amounts of construction to build this pipeline across the US.  Then, not only do you have the construction jobs for building it, you also have the jobs that come with maintenance on the pipeline as well as the extra Jobs that would open in the refineries that are all along the Gulf Coast.  The jobs at the refineries would help stimulate the economies all along the Gulf Coast which has been suffering since the Obama/BP oil spill by putting people back to work in those regions that were laid off because of the Obama administrations actions afterword.  But, as it turns out, this wonderful pipeline that would have been a God send to our struggling economy will probably never happen.  Why?  Because Obama is afraid of losing his environmentalist voting base. 

You see, three years ago when this project was first proposed Obama was for it.  He had three years to make sure all of the environmental impact studies were done and completed.  As well as making sure that all the plans for the pipeline were drawn up and complete as well as alternative plans in case something were to happen to prevent the initial plans from being used.  Then when crunch time came around he froze.  Why?  Because of an issue that was raised about an aquifer that supplies water to five states was right in the center of where the pipeline was planned to go.  Naturally that raised concerns for the people in those states about potentially having their water contaminated.  The solution seemed easy, use one of the backup plans to reroute the pipeline to bypass the aquifer, but, as I said before, Obama froze.  He sat around for days trying to decide on what to do (I suspect that his teleprompters were on the fritz) because the environmentalists were raising hell about the apocalyptic ramifications for building this pipeline.  Eventually he announced that he had made a decision… to not make a decision, at least not until after the 2012 election.

This is playing politics at the expense of everyone in the entire USA.  There is no way to deny that.

Since Obama refused to act the Republicans in the House decided to force him to make a decision on the issue.  They include a provision in the “Obama Tax Cut Extension Bill” (You can find my earlier post on that if you look) that required him to make a decision on the pipeline in order for his “Tax Cut” to be extended.  They were generous and gave him till March to make a decision to either state building the pipeline within 6 months of his decision or to not build it.  Obama chose not to build it, going against not only the Republicans, but even his own union base that were hopeful for the jobs and the money that came with them. 

Now he is trying to blame HIS decision on the House Republicans for forcing his hand.  Fact of the matter is no one can make you do anything.  Obama chose this all on his own.  Because of Obama decisions, Canada isn’t going to wait around for us to get with the program.  They are going to sell their oil to the Chinese and Russians instead because they can’t afford to not do anything with it. 

As I said before, this is playing politics at the expense of everyone in the entire USA.  There is no way to deny that.

Obama keeps talking about how much he has helped and improved our economy since Bush messed it up.  The simple fact is, if you look at the major factors that screwed our economy, you will find Obama’s name on most of them.  Obama took the mistakes that Bush started and made them worse with his policies.  Now, a recession that should have been relatively easy for us to climb out of is still slowly dragging us down, despite how much Obama wants us the think otherwise.  It is kind of like the games he is playing with the unemployment numbers.  He keeps claiming unemployment is going down and, according to the numbers he presents, it is.  But the numbers he is flashing everywhere are extremely falsified.   To get the true unemployment numbers you have to count not only the people currently getting unemployment, but also the people who can’t get it anymore because they either have given up on finding a job or have been on it for so long that they no longer qualify for it.  The real unemployment numbers are closer to 18% instead of the 8.4% Obama is bragging about. 

On top of preventing thousands of new jobs that will come with the pipeline, Obama has also added to the unemployment numbers by firing thousands of soldiers in the military with his plan to cut defense spending.  In fact here is something interesting for you to go and research… Go and look up all the things that led to 9-11 happening.  Look at all of the things that Clinton did that allowed 9-11 to happen.  Everything that Clinton did, Obama is now trying to do.  Why?  Well that is material for another post, but it is something that you might find interesting.  Now that I have successfully gotten off topic why don’t I try to get back on.

The whole point that I am trying to make with the Keystone Pipeline is that just like everything that Obama has done since he has taken office, his decision on it is harmful to our economy and our job market.  The pipeline is just one in LONG list of screw ups that have harmed our nation as a whole and unlike the Bush screw ups, Obama’s screw ups are intentional.  He is cold and calculating in what he is doing in an attempt to get us to give up and turn to someone to save us.  He thinks that if he can get us to that point then he can swoop in and rescue us from ourselves by becoming Supreme Leader (sound familiar?) who knows all.  I believe that this is Obama’s plan.  Of course he initially thought that we would be at that point by the end of his first term, but he didn’t count on the intelligence of the American people as a whole.  We need to stand against him in the ballot box and let our voices be heard, not only in the Presidential election, but the Congressional, Senate, State and local elections as well.  We need to get rid of anyone who has supported Obama and his politics of destruction, then and only then will we begin to heal as a nation while becoming strong once again on the World Stage.

Of All The Starving Children

First off, this is a rant.  Why because I can contain it no longer.  There is a certain commercial that has been playing on the radio where I live now for about a year.  I will not name the organization or its web address because I don’t want to promote them.  This organizations commercials usually feature a pathetic sounding child (sometimes an adult but mostly children) talking about how they struggle with hunger.  They quote some statistics then talk about how they were told they could grow up to be anything they want to.  The ending line is literally “I want to grow up to be someone who doesn’t go to bed hungry at night”.  Then an announcer starts talking about who you can donate money on their web site and that each dollar you donate provides seven, yes you heard right, seven meals. 

Ok, let’s start with the statistics.  In the commercial they claim that 1 in 4 children in America “Struggle with hunger”.  How do they get that number?  Doesn’t that seem a bit high?  I have a theory about how they get that statistic (aside from the fact that, as anyone who has studied statistics would tell you, you can make statistics say whatever you want them to say) and I am going to share it with you now…

Time – 5:45pm Setting – Jessica (age 11) is on the phone in her home while her parent is busy cooking supper.

Caller: Hello little Jessica, how are you today?

Jessica: I am good, how are you?

Caller: I am doing well, thank you for asking.  Jessica, I want to ask you a question and you can answer me honestly.  Have you been hungry in the last week?

Jessica: I am hungry right now, but-

Caller: Thank you Jessica, That is all I need to know.

Jessica looks confused as the caller hangs up on her.

Maybe I am being mean or maybe not, but I really find the 1 in 4 hard to believe.  I am not denying the fact that there are children that go hungry here in the USA but, the fact remains that we as a nation have the world’s fattest poor people.  Now you don’t get fat (at least not the type of fat that we are) by going hungry… Unless…  There is a statistic that says that 1 in 6 adults are morbidly obese… Hmmm… Couple that with the 1 in 4 children struggle with hunger… Eureka!  I have got it!  All the adults are eating the food for themselves instead of giving it to their children!  Yes I know I am being ridiculous, but I am just expressing how ridiculous I feel these commercials to be.  Like I said before, I know that there are children in America that go hungry and my heart goes out to them, really, but I think that this organization is a fraud. 

Let’s look at the other huge problem I have with this ad, the line about every dollar you donate.  If food was that cheap nobody in America would have to worry about penny pinching when it came to buying groceries.  This line is just ridiculous.  If they were really serious about feeding people, then they would be asking for non-perishable food items to fill food banks that they could then give out to families in need before asking for money.  The fact that they only ask for money sends red flags up for me.  I can understand the organization wanting money, after all you have to pay for a way to transport the food, store the food and pay the people to do all the work that comes with all that food.  But the fact that they don’t want food, they just want money?  It seems suspicious to me, just saying.

Now on to what I think is the true heart of the matter.  If there are this many children in the USA “struggling with hunger” then why haven’t the states stepped in with DHR and removed those kids so that they can go somewhere that they will be fed?   Also, what about the school systems?  Children from “under privileged families” (I always hated that term, but that is a whole other rant) have programs where the get free breakfast and lunch at school on the taxpayers dollar.  The schools in most places will even feed them when school is not in session.  On top of that they are talking about implementing a program to cover supper as well.  Guess the next thing to happen will be that the schools just let the children live there, call is a taxpayer funded boarding school.

Also, what about the communities that the hungry children live in?  One of the things that used to make our country so great was the generous nature of the American citizen.  What has happened to that?  Once upon a time, if a community knew that it had a family that was suffering from hunger that was a part of that community, then the people came together and helped that family out as best as they could.  Not everyone in that community could afford to help with money or food, but they could at least give time if nothing else. 

What has happened to the generous nature we had as a nation?  I personally blame the Government.  The reason for this is that once the government started raising taxes so that it could step in and provide services like child welfare, WIC and food stamps, the people of the community saw two things happen.  First they saw that they had less money with which to provide help to their neighbors in need.  Second since the Government was handling the responsibilities of the community, they saw that there was no need for the community.  This broke the communities and neighborhoods down to the point that the people in them started to ignore one another as well as the needs of those around them.  I don’t mean to say that this applies everywhere or to everyone, but it does apply to more than not and to make matter worse, it is getting worse with each generation. 

We as a nation, as a people, need to learn to come together once more and support those that are in need.  We need to elect people into office who will have the guts to stand up and shut these programs down that have only served to make up more dependent upon the Government, then have the integrity to also lower taxes so that we the people will have the money that should rightfully be ours anyway.  I am not saying that this is a change that needs to occur overnight, it needs to be done slowly so that the people of this nation have time to adjust back to where we came from.  I believe that if that were to happen, we as a nation would learn once again what it means to be a community which will in turn make us stronger.

Welcome to Dictatorship

You know what really disturbs me about this election year?  Well, several things do, but I will try to approach them one at a time.  As I have mentioned on my previous post, I feel that we the American people, are getting shafted no matter who wins the Presidential election this year.  On one hand we have a President who is trying to become a Dictator and on the other hand we have 5 fools who are ripping each other to shreds in order to become top dog so that they can then take on said Dictator President.

Why am I calling Obama a Dictator?  Well, simple fact is that he has placed himself in a dictorial role in the last year and wants to strengthen that roll to give himself absolute power that he thinks he naturally should have as President.  But how do I know that is what he thinks or wants?  Honestly, I don’t, but given his past actions and some of the things that he has said recently, I challenge you to say I am wrong with a straight face.  Listen to some of the things Obama has said in some of the speeches he has given recently. No really, go listen to them right now, I’ll wait.  You back?  Good.  Now tell me with a serious face that Obama doesn’t want to be a Dictator went he said that it was his duty to bypass Congress when Congress failed to act as he wanted them to act.  I believe, and I may be a little off on this, but I believe his exact words were “If Congress fails to act as they need to, then it is my duty as President of the United States to use my authority to dictate through executive order what needs to be done.”  Like I said, I may be remembering that wrong, but I do know for a fact that if I am not remembering the exact wording correctly, then at least the exact nature of what he said is there. 

As disturbing as it is that we have a President that has gone power mad and breaking the law constantly, that is not the most disturbing thing, nor is the fact that no one in Congress will step up and file a motion for impeachment against this despicable excuse for a President.  No, the most disturbing thing about this whole thing in regards to Obama is what I call the “Obamites” or sometimes I call them “Obamies” (Obamies = Obama zombies).  During Obama’s first Presidential election, these were the idiots that sat there moaning out the “Yes we can” chant which reminded me of either zombies or cultists as that are only capable of thinking what their master (Obama) tells them.  These Obamites are eating Obamas words up when he goes on about how he is going to do what it takes to pass his agenda even if it means throwing the Constitution and all the laws of the land out the window.  These idiots were actually cheering him on and encouraging him to go even further then he has so far.  These dunderheads want to be ruled with an iron fist as long as it means that they won’t ever have to think for themselves.  And yes, the Occupy idiots as a whole fall into this category too, I will explain that in a later post when I can find their “list of demands” (yes, like what hostage takers have). 

On top of all the stupidity I have mentioned so far surrounding Obama, to make matters worse; we have the Republican field of candidates that are destroying each other for the chance to then have what is left of them destroyed by someone who, by all rights should be imprisoned, should not even have a chance to win the Presidential election because of how badly he screwed up during his first term.  The one person who I think had the best chance of beating Obama got ran out of the race due to his opponents and the liberal media trying to remove him due to the fact that he was clearly the best choice.  Yes, I am talking about Herman Cain.  The man had to quite due to all of the deceitful attacks against him from both sides because he was the biggest threat.  How do I know that the attacks, or if you prefer, sexual allegations against him were false?  Simple.  That fact that once Mr. Cain announced that he was suspending his campaign, all the women accusing him vanished from the limelight.  Now what are we left with?  Five bickering fools who all think that they have a chance against Obama when they are doing all of his dirty work for him in the primaries. 

To be fair, they do have a chance to beat Obama, an idiot who is brain dead from huffing too many fumes would have a chance at beating Obama, that is how bad he screwed up in his first term.  If you are listening Barack, that is what governing against the will of the people gets you.  But the fact still remains that by the time one of them gets to Obama, they will have bloodied and bruised themselves so bad that they won’t stand a chance.  What the Republicans should have done is focus on how they as individual candidates compare to Obama then let the people chose which one they think is the best candidate to go against the Dictator.  Instead, they try to go after each other while going after Obama.  Idiots. 

I hope we will one day be able to restore this great nation back to its former glory but as long as this kind of idiocy is allowed to continue, nothing will change for the better and we will keep tracking toward destruction.

The Song Was Sung By The Fat Lady

I hate to be the one to bear bad news but I feel it necessary now.  One of the things that I feared would happen has happened.  As such, I am now calling the Presidential election.  I know, I know, you are thinking that is too early to call, but trust me when I say, no it isn’t.  No matter who wins the election at this point, none of them will be any better than what we already have in office, Barack Obama.  The real losers this election year are the American people, plain and simple.  With Michelle Bachmann dropping out there are no more real fiscal conservatives left in the running with the exception of the one person who terrifies me the most due to his global and social policies, Ron Paul.  In case you are wondering what exactly I mean, I am talking about the few choices that we have left in the Republican field. 

First, there is Mitt Romney.  If Obama had a magic mirror that would show what he would be like if he were white instead of mixed, the reflection would show Mitt Romney.  “What do you mean by that?” you are probably asking yourself.  Am I making a statement about the fact that Obama is a “black” man?  No.  I am just saying that the only difference between the two is as superficial as skin color.  As much as Mitt tries to talk about how wrong Obama is and how bad his policies have been, he can never get away from the fact that everything he has stood for in the past mirrors Obama and his policies.  Since that is the case, if Mitt gets elected to run against Obama, we will have a choice of Barak Obama the second term vs. Mitt Romney, Obama 2.0. 

Second, there is Newt Gingrich.  This little man is so twisted in his political views that half the time he is staring up his own ass.  Newt doesn’t know which way he is coming or going from, nor does her care.  He is going to keep barreling ahead, even if it means that he ends up with his head in his ass.  He calls himself a fiscal conservative but his record sings a different tune.  The man is a fan of big government and is of the opinion that government is there to help the people through increasing regulation and restrictions of freedoms.

Third, there is Rick Santorum.  This man like a spinning coin, he spins round and round.  You never know which way he is going to land till he lands and then you are not sure that you like the side he lands on, but that’s ok, he’ll just spin a little more till he thinks that you are happy.  His policies are designed to fit whomever he is directing them toward in his lackluster fashion and he will never commit to one thing or the other out of fear of offending someone, somewhere.

Forth, there is John Huntsman.  Do you know who John Huntsman is?  No?  Don’t feel too bad, most people don’t know him either.  Moving on.

Fifth, there is Rick Perry.  Ahhh, Rick Perry, lovable huggable Texan, Rick Perry…  You know what?  I am not even going to get started on him.  He is not worth the waste of space it would be to talk about.  Moving on.

Last but not least, there is Ron Paul.  Where to start with Ron Paul…  Oh, I know let’s start with the good.  Ron Paul is the only true fiscal conservative in the running.  He believes in cutting taxes as well as cutting a lot of the unnecessary and wasteful spending that goes on in Washington.  He even has the record to back up his claims of being a fiscal conservative and nobody can really dispute that fact.  Unfortunately, that is where the good ends.  On social policies, Ron Paul is a flipping nut job.  He believes that ALL drugs should be legalized and in general promotes anarchy with the rest of his social policies since he believes that ALL government regulation and control is wrong and harmful to the people enslaved by said regulation and control.  On his global policies he believes that every country should stay out of every other countries business, therefor we should let all the other nations of the world do whatever they want no matter of the potential treat it could pose to us.  This wouldn’t be a problem if every nation in the world was content on leaving each other alone, but sadly that is not the way things work.  There are real threats to the US out there that have to be addressed or else they will become a major problem.  Look at Iran, China, North Korea and Russia.  Do you honestly think that they are content to sit by and not try to bully the other nations of the world around?  No, they want to be top dog and everyone with half a brain knows it.  Ron Paul is insane if he thinks the world would ever function the way he seems to think it should.

But, despite the sour and pessimistic note I started this post on there is actually hope.  Something to strive for since the Presidency is lost.  We all need to work hard to get fiscal conservatives that have some backbone (unlike John Boehner) who are not afraid to stand up to not only the Dems, but the establishment Republicans who are content with the status quoi.  We need to fill the House and Senate with people who truly want to see this great nation rise up once again and become the light of freedom for all the world that we once were.  We need to elect people who will stand on principle and not back down because this poll or that poll says that they should.  On top of that we need to elect enough of them to get a veto proof majority so that no matter which one of these 7 losers (count Obama) gets elected into the office of President, they can’t screw up this nation any worse.  I know that electing enough to have a veto proof majority is tough.  It’s a lot harder than focusing on the Presidency alone but we are left with no choice. 

We no longer have Herman Cain or Michelle Bachmann to look too as the next Presidental hopefull.  As I said before, all the options that we have left are no better than what we have now.  We are at a crossroads with this election and I’m afraid that we may have already committed to a path that we can no longer divert from.  We have already lost the Presidency, let’s not lose anything else and maybe we will have the chance to turn this boat around and get back on the right course.

Social Security Relief... Tax Cut or Investment Cut?

I know that this is a little late but, this has been bugging me all of the Christmas holiday so I am going to address it now.  For those of you who do not know, Speaker Boehner caved in to the Senates demands that the House pass their 2 month extension of the Obama “tax cut”.   Speaker Boehner had been standing strong (or so it appeared) against the 2 month extension in order to get a 1 year extension instead.  This would be good for businesses because a tax that only lasts for 2 months guaranteed is hell on them when it comes to doing payroll, where as a 1 year guarantee will insure that the businesses will not have any surprises during the fiscal year to throw them off in accounting.  But I get ahead of myself; let me start with telling you about this “tax cut”.

The “tax cut” that Obama and Reed (as well as the majority of the Dems) have been bitching about is not really a tax cut at all… that is unless they are now admitting that Social Security is a tax.  Up until recently the Dems have always sold SS as an investment into your future for when you retire.  You pay into the system then when you reach a certain age; you get the return on the money you put in.  This would work fine if it were executed the way that it was originally intended to be executed, but instead of the money sitting there waiting for you to claim it, the Federal Government spends it in ways that it was not meant to be spent.  The fact of the matter is; the money that we as tax paying citizens put into the system is already claimed by someone or something (other programs that are deemed important) else instead of staying put for the rightful owners (the people who are paying in.. aka us) to claim at a later date. 

I, myself have said for years that this makes SS a tax as opposed to an investment and the fact that money gets given to other people rather than the ones that put it there.  By this I mean the people who are currently putting the money there, I know the people who invested in the years long gone are now getting paid for what they put in, but the simple fact is, the money they are getting is our money not theirs… theirs got wasted years ago.  I know it sounds cruel to talk about it like that but the simple fact is once we get to the point to where we are supposed to get our return on out SS investment, we will be the ones leeching off of the current generation that is paying in.  That is if SS can last long enough for us to even see a return on our “investment”.  This is one reason I supported George W. Bush’s push to allow people to invest the money that would have gone to SS in stocks instead, there would be a better chance for us to see an actual return on our money.  But once again, I am getting off topic.  Fact of the matter is, the only way that Obama and the Dems can claim what that the “tax cut” that they were pushing for is just that… a tax cut, is to say that SS is a tax which is something that they have vehemently denied for decades.

Now on to what this “tax cut”.  What the Dems want to do is provide an extension for the current “Social Security Tax Holiday” which reduces the amount of SS that is cut from your check when taxes (and your “investment”) are taken out.  The Dems did this to make it look like they could be tax cutters like the Republicans were under George W. Bush.  But the reality of the situation is this… the money that they have cut from being withdrawn goes into the SS system which is already being strained because of wasteful spending and a lack of planning ahead.  Because we are now putting less money in the system that means that when it comes time for us to get out return (once again to remind you… if SS is still around at that point, which would be a miracle) there will be even less money there for our twilight years because we put less in then we should have.  On top of that, the people who are currently receiving our money (because their money has been wasted) have less money to pull from because of the decreased revenue, therefor the Federal Government has to borrow the remaining amount that SS is supposed to cover from other countries or the Fed (but that is a whole other topic all together).

So in light of all this information you are probably wondering why the Republicans are even wanting to push for an extension on this “tax cut” period.  The answer is simple really; they don’t want to look like the party that caused people to have less take home money on their paychecks going into an election year.  It would make them look like they have compromised their principles by “raising taxes” on hard working Americans.  Of course this isn’t true, but we are talking about politics here, are you really surprised?  So it that is the reason that they are for the extension then why are they pushing to make it last a year?  Because as I mentioned before, only extending it for two months puts an unnecessary burden on employers, making them have to spend more time and money when calculating the numbers to pay their employees.  At least with a one year extension, while not good for everyone as a whole, it would help the people who create jobs which would hopefully encourage them to create more jobs since they would have more money because the taxes would be simpler. 

So why did Speaker Boehner cave then and give the Dems the two month extension instead of holding out for the one year extension like he said he would?  I don’t know.  I know that part of that deal was an agreement that they would come back in January and begin talks about a one year extension again, but if he is going to let the Dems push him around like that, then when they go to talk about them again things won’t go as he hopes.  He has placed himself in the weaker position because now the Dems know that all they have to do is lean on him a little and he will fold…  This isn’t this first time Boehner has demonstrated this lack of spine either which only encourages the Dems further.  I am sick of the lackluster leadership that the Republican Party has had in the last few years.  It is time for someone who had the guts to stand up for the good of our nation, not the good of their political career.  Yes that means looking like the bad guy (or girl) from time to time, but something has got to change, otherwise we will become a reflection of Europe and I don’t know if you have paid any attention to what is going on over there at the moment, but it is not pretty.  We need to remove Speaker Boehner and replace him with someone who has a spine and will stand for conservative principles.  If we don’t do that, nothing will change any time soon.

Where I have been...

Hello to all the people who actually take the time to read my blathering commentary about the current political atmosphere.   I know I have not posted anything since October, so I thought I should tell you all why. 

In November, I participated in NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) and as it was such, I wrote a novel (Novel in this case is defined as 50,000 words of more).  I was able to complete my novel in by November the 25^th and because of the stress of writing that much that fast, I decided to take some time off from writing afterward.  I am not a professional writer, nor have I ever taken any writing classes, so the novel was an attempt to see if I could do it and if I enjoyed it.  Turns out I enjoyed it quite a bit, plus I think the novel isn’t half bad. 

Since that is the case once December rolled around I started the editing process on my novel.  So far I am about three quarters of the way through the first edit.  I have added about 2,000 words to the original body of work as well as correcting a lot of the grammar mistakes I have made in the initial writing of the story.  My ultimate goal by the time I finish all of the editing for the book is to have between 70,000 and 100,000 words.  I don’t know how to accomplish this, but hey, I will let the story go where the story goes.

I will be back to the blogging about politics soon, but I really feel the need to keep my focus on this book for the moment.  Lord knows I am missing out on a LOT of material that the lefties are giving me to talk about that, but with the novel I just haven’t had time to do all the research I need to do in order to make sure that you, my faithful readers, are well informed. 

If any of you readers out there are curious about the book, I am going to post some information about it on my other blog “Musings of a Mad Poet”.  This is a blog I initially started as a place to challenge myself with poetry exercises but that has initially gone by the wayside because I got to the point that I didn’t want to post any more poetry.  For a while I have been wondering what to do with that blog but now I think I have a use for it again.  I plan on keeping people who are interested in my book up to date on it through that blog.  I will still use it for its original purpose from time to time, but mostly it will be dedicated to my nonpolitical writings.  I may even change its name to something catchy like “Excessively Boring Drivel That Will Make Your Eyes Bleed” though I doubt it.

Anyways, back to the point…  I am still here, nothing has happened to me, just been busy.  Maybe as my writing improves I will be able to reach a point to where I can handle both me political and nonpolitical writings simultaneously.  Check back at least once a week here, I am going to try to have some new stuff up by mid-January at the latest, though I hope to have it much earlier.