Merry third day of Christmas

 

And Merry Christmas. We have been so busy, yet that is no excuse that I also need to focus on what is important.

I hope you had a great Christmas, got what you wanted and found a moment to find joy in your heart. And for those of you that normal life overwhelmed your Christmas and holidays, I hope you too can find a moment to quietly enjoy the season.

Merry Christmas and Peace on Earth. 

So, it is about that election year time again

 

First I will eventually, hopefully write a Christmas post. Right now the hectic, crazy, unsettling moments of the holidays are driving me bonkers. I know everyone wants peace on earth right now and yours truly is no exception. Which in some says brings me to what I have planned for the first of the year. If you are a regular reader you know every four years I offer a potential platform of a party not named democrat or republican. The current morass in my head not withstanding I will be putting this together for next year.

And the current morass and maybe even molasses in my head is preventing me from thinking clearly this wonderful holiday season. I cannot even write two sentences before I sidetrack myself no end. I have already forgotten more thoughts in the last two minutes than I can conceive. And another reason I am trying to write something today. I plan on including in this post an outline of what the platform may encompass once I finally get around to it after the year starts.

Some other quick thoughts. First the Cowboys have no business being in the playoffs if they cannot win two competitive games in a row.  They beat the Eagles then lay an egg against the Bills. They have to be ready to beat teams that are desperate this time of year because all teams will be or at least should be desperate for the playoffs. And I had no intention of saying anything about the Cowboys when I sat down, but my brain is on synopsis overload and nothing is firing in any kind of order. The Mavericks are still interesting at this point, but who knows where they really are as a team since they can’t get Luka and Kyrie together consistently yet. And I don’t blame Kyrie for anything, that was a freak injury situation. I just hope they let him fully heal so sometime in January we have a real idea of what this team can do. And yes Lively II is a wonderful and needed surprise along with and I am going to avoid saying role players because teams have stars and players. Some players have a specific role, but the term role player is way over used in pro basketball. For some people to say Exum or Jones are role players takes away from the great job they are doing as players on the Mavericks. The press, and this includes Barkley ad Shaq, needs to go back and focus on saying players on teams. Oh boy I am way off track.

Any way shape or fashion, it is the holidays, we need more of them, and even though I celebrate Christmas I am somewhat glad we say holidays for this time of year. Whether I like it or not, many people around the world are celebrating right now and of course for all the Western world it is followed by the new year parties, events and thinking. Now I will say Merry Christmas come next weekend and say it with complete joy, meaning and giving, yet it is nice to realize the world is round and we need to celebrate all of us. Yet by no means do I feel woke about all of this, just truthful.

And then back to reality. I do plan on sitting down and creating a somewhat comprehensive platform and topics will include economic, tax structure, social security, healthcare, education, world peace (foreign policy), and even wokeness. This is where it is headed for now. Things could change in a couple of weeks, heck in a couple of seconds. For now I do want to address these topics and thoughts are already creating plaque in those synopsis, but hopefully I can find enough electric impulses to push through the debris field that is my mind.

I had all sorts of thoughts when I first sat down and I wanted to talk more about what is happening on the other side of this keyboard, yet to say something now would be just too confusing. I will say right now I wish I was sitting on a beach with a very high dollar and fine glass of wine or stiff drink staring at the ocean doing nothing. Or even a coffee drink because I need to stop drinking coffee and right now in the middle of the afternoon I have a hankering to go make another pot of coffee. I am fighting the urge as I type, yet realistically I would even settle for that glass of wine even a “table” wine right now while I type. The better half and I just cannot get a moment to feel like we are living in the holidays.

And there was so much I wanted to say when I sat down that I have totally forgetten. Shoot I just got up for three minutes and have already lost track of upteen thoughts.

So I am going to end with this thought for you to digest with your eggnog. I know what heaven smells like. And if I shared the smell with anyone they would immediately get angry, scream at the top of their lungs that I have no idea what I am talking about. Heaven would never smell that way, and it is not an unpleasant order, definitely not. It is not flowery or has a bouquet smell or sweet or wispy or any other adjective that might create a sense of that is so beautiful it must be heaven. They would call me grinch for my smell because it creates no image of what people think what is heaven and here is the catch…. What heaven may smell like because….they do not realize we will not have our earthly senses in heaven. People want to project what they know upon the unknown. There is nothing inherently wrong with trying to do that, yet it can leave us gasping at a reality that does not exist. We have no idea what is heaven so my smell is just as viable as any other, and since we won’t have earthly senses in heaven and yes I know we may rise body and soul into heaven or at least some thought patterns suggest as much, we do not know at all. Everything that we interpret is a complete guess and yes I do believe in Christmas and everything it stands for including the knowledge the sole purpose of Christmas is Easter. I am not trying to burst any bubbles, or ruin your Christmas, but again just trying to get you to realize we are not as smart as we think we are and we need to sit back and smell the roses while we are alive. And that brings me back to one of my original thoughts when I sat down and why I try to write a better platform for our country than the garbage we will received from the democrats and republicans, mankind should have better. I avoided saying deserves or a right to something better, yet mankind can have better. It is up to us. I always pray and hope that all of us, from the Atlantic to the Pacific and everything in between and outside of those boundaries have a terrific Christmas and a life where they are treated with respect and can enjoy much of what our given earthly senses has to offer, whether it be a beautiful blue sky or ocean, a breeze blowing through leaves, a nice glass of wine or even ice tea, a rose placed on your breakfast table, a kiss from a loved one tender on your cheek, the feel of warm cotton against your skin, a drive down a wide open highway, or a horse ride across a field, or maybe just standing out in the middle of the desert feeling the warmth of the sun penetrating your being, so whatever it may be, all of us should be able to enjoy this wonderful planet we have been given with all our senses, and the ugliness of what we do to each other be washed away in a strong rain.

Cheers and Happy Holidays

Not that it really matters, but it is too late to worry about it

 

Okay okay, I am not young anymore so out of a moment of trying to act responsibly for my age, I caved. Yep gave in to rational thinking, did what I was supposed to do, behaved, and so forth and so on.

I regretted it from the moment I sat down.

We went to Braum’s. If you do not know Braum’s it is a pretty unique environment. It is simple, but has quite a bit going on. It is a fast food restaurant or a comparable step above, it is an ice cream store and carries groceries.  So you can go get a burger and then some ice cream. Simple but wonderful stop to enjoy.

I always and I do mean always get a double dip hot fudge sundae. Today though for some ill conceived notion I thought I should get a single since I was already a bit full and you know that age thing.

I sat down and looked at the puny ass serving and am still regretting not getting the double dip and it has been well over a hour since we got home.

Never again will I make that mistake, overly stuffed or whatever. Shoot at my age I should go ahead and get what I want, too late to worry about it now.

Cheers

Practical versus moderate or people compromising

 

At first I almost wrote compromised policy, yet doesn’t make the presentation I wanted. This is about public policy and this obsession with people that if Democrats and Republicans get together and either compromise their positions or find a middle ground (moderate) we have better public policy.

I am not saying you cannot achieve strong policy goals through compromise or with a “moderate” bent. I do state that if you look at public policy practically you might create much better public policy.

So many people are trying to find a solution to getting things done in Congress that I think they confuse what you can accomplish by trying too hard to say Congress passes better legislation when the two parties compromise. This can be a fallacy. The nature of compromise in and of itself does not necessarily make something better. It can complete a task or finish a project, yet are you really achieving the best result? I think people have seen so much failure as of late that they are trying to find a route to success without defining what success may look like first.

To me success is what is best for the country as a whole without taking away the freedoms and interests of a minority or groups that do not directly benefit. Yet if you put the general populace first the policy will eventually be beneficial to most if not all. The benefits may not be dispersed equally, however if the results reach the vast majority then you probably have a better policy.

A quick example might be where you lower the taxes on the middle class where they can save more, have money to spend, or able to pay down their personal debt. The wealthy may say what do we receive if the middle class has a tax break and we do not. I use this example because I want to say the phrase trickle up. Instead of relying on big business to pass their tax savings down with all their trumped up logic, the tax break to the general population spreads out and up. Note the word rely on in the above sentence. The whole point of the trickle down theory was that it required the upper echelons to take actions that would filter down to everyone else, such as lower prices or invest in better products to create new jobs, but yet it had to be relied upon by the general populace for the wealthy to share this gain to them. With shifting the tax relief to the general populace they naturally will do one of the three facets listed above. Savings and investments by the general populace creates stability in the economic system, banks benefit because they now have more resources to make loans, the general populace has more confidence in the system and there is a possible reduction in the wealth gap. Less taxes also mean the general populace has more money to spend so businesses benefit by increased revenues. And finally if the general population pays down debt it lessens stress on the economy. Banks and lenders such as mortgages are writing off less bad debt. There cash flow increases and they can loan more money as needed into the economy and can offer more competitive rates to a larger audience.

This example is not perfect, but hopefully can give a snapshot of the difference one policy change can make. The policy though is not based on Democrats and Republicans compromising on tax policy, or some moderate idea, but trying to find the most practical tax policy for the whole country. It is not perfect by any stretch of the imagination and some groups will try to shoot down the logic. Their arguments though are based on where they fall into the economic spectrum. Large corporations see the smallest immediate gain, yet if the whole economy is strong they benefit whether they will publicly admit it or not. Wall Street may not like it because the investment money is coming to them in slow waves as the general populace makes slow incremental increases to their savings, 401ks other investments etc. Wall Street has less of their own money to double down on their own wealth, hence increasing the wealth gap. Yet in the long run, a more practical policy is not based on either a conservative or liberal bias, but more towards the larger beneficial aspect.

And some may say since you are lowering taxes this is a conservative policy. I ask are you sure.

One difference to highlight is offering a practical policy can be compromised a bit to take into account factors not originally considered versus a policy that is compromised by one side trying to accommodate another side. Or they change the goal or initiative and the policy becomes watered down to appease groups trying to achieve a political win. It is the latter that I see many of today’s advocators of compromise trying to achieve. They may think compromise will get us better policy because of the extremes hijacking policy, however are they doing a litmus test of who actually benefits once they make a compromise. Or maybe in today’s world they think of a compromise they wish happened. I do have to admit not much is being done right now.

And many liberals will say the far right are the ones hijacking public policy right now and they are correct, however if you look closely though there are groups on the far left trying to create their own goals that will not benefit the general populace. They are just quieter in their public discourse so if you dig deep enough into what each side is saying a person may find the distinction. I just hope I made it clear. Neither side wants to admit that their ideas lack in merit, yet you have to step back and again do a litmus test to determine exactly who benefits.

And in researching what is needed versus being preoccupied that it needs to have a liberal or conservative bias, you can write, produce and evaluate better policy from the beginning. And of course as an independent conservative, even my public policy I discuss in my posts starts with a conservative frame, yet that does not mean it can be adjusted through analysis and evaluation to be changed to a more suitable practical end result. Policy can be liberal or conservative, it shouldn’t be driven by it has to be liberal or conservative to appease the majority of the moment. I have always said sometimes we need liberal policies and sometimes we need conservative policies. The moment should be a more important driver of the policy needed, not the politics.

And so the next step is how do we step away from the need to rationalize our compromises and step into policy writing to achieve what is truly needed.

And the irony of this post is I am trying to reach out to a moderate audience. Ha ha ha. Okay not really a moderate audience, but to the vast majority of the country who by nature are generally moderate in their views.

Something even I forget, and Happy Thanksgiving

 

So the better half and I had to go out of town to take care of some family business and on the way back we decided to take the scenic route. We had a wonderful 2/3 of a trip. The last third it began to drizzle so it took some of the luster off the whole trip, however the first part was all sunshine and blue sky.

You forget how beautiful this country is when you take the interstates all the time. I was thinking as we were driving that everyone in D.C. needs to get off their back ends and go see America. It might remind them of the people they should be representing. I know it is too late for road trips back home for Thanksgiving for all our Representatives and their staffs, but sometime soon they need to make it a priority.

They might see parts of the country that make up our agriculture, the solar power plants, the wind farms the oil pumps, and even the road work on the two lane highways. Yes we drove mostly through Texas and all of the above was almost side by side as we drove. You pass a field of cotton, then cattle grazing, a solar field, some oil pumps still going and it was quite an eye opening experience. And all of it with the horizon stretching forever. And this was especially nice with the sun shining.

You pass through many small towns and see the old businesses boarded up and the new chains taking over and wonder what could be done to revitalize local economies. Towns where main street is thriving, but the periphery is old boarded up hotels and restaurants, yet the fast food chains and chain hotels thrive. You see buildings of unknown businesses falling apart. At one time each of the towns had their own economy, yet either through various recessions or changes in the local economy it has slowly disappeared to be replaced by the various corporate entities that populate suburbia. These towns are losing their character. These are the descendants of the people that made this country great and yet they are the visible signs of the wealth gap in this country. People that use to own local businesses have children that make minimum wage in the corporate world.

And you know their educational opportunities are slowly disintegrating as the town loses its economic base. Those corporations are not reinvesting in local infrastructure. All those profits are going back to Wall Street. Schools in these towns are ignored in state capitals and then you read about the school voucher system in Texas and wonder what it all means for the children of farmers and the energy laborers. Will they be able to have the wherewithal to rebuild their towns? If the family is struggling, if the opportunities are working for out of state profiteers, if the schools are rotting, what does this mean for the future of what use to be the backbone of this country. Yes I am being somewhat idyllic, however we need the caregivers of our open spaces and producers of what we eat given the opportunity to thrive. If we let the corporations run everything, they will run everything into the ground then move on. If profit is our country’s only goal then when the well run dries what happens next? Death, depletion, desertion, despair for large portions of our country do not make for greatness.

And if you stop and do grab a bite to eat, or get gas you find they are the same wonderful people you might want them to be. They are friendly, cheerful on the outside, but when it is slow in the convenience store you can see in their eyes the fatality of having no future. The children still behave as children, laughing, talking running in and out, yet you worry what happens when they turn 18. What do they do next? I think it was fortunate that not too many Wal marts dotted the landscape, yet they were there slowly sapping the money out of the town to make billionaires even richer while the worker bees struggle to pay for housing and food. A few do well, especially the people who owned land and were able to hold onto it. They had the oil boom, now it is windfarms, but they are the minority. They lease the land and take in their royalties, but their money is spent either at the chain restaurant or they go out of town to buy what they need such as brand new trucks or other luxuries that they alone can afford. The car dealerships are scarce, the repair shops are non existent, an occasional real estate company has a sign, there are no farmer markets, no grocery stores, just the Dollar General, where the market isn’t big enough for a Wal Mart, which is an overpriced substitute for basic necessities.

Yes, it is Texas but the price of gas in these towns is much higher than the truck stops on the interstate. And honestly some of this is because the markets are not big enough to support large businesses, but that same small market at one point had an economy and people thrived, hair was cut or styled by local people, furniture was bought or was available in one town for a few, sundries existed so people could do their sewing or craft work that was actually needed and wasn’t just some hobby for people at church.

So what can be done to bring back strong local economies, give people an opportunity to thrive again, and why does Washington ignore so many of our own?

The drive is beautiful, the scenery breathtaking, the rounding of a bend to see more and more, the cattle eating lazily near the fences by the side of the road, a horse galloping by, the field full of cotton or other deep green crop, (couldn’t tell what it was, but there were quite a few fields of this really deep green, and it wasn’t too tall either) fills the land between the towns. And yet the towns are losing their luster, their hometown feel, their people so what becomes of not a nostalgic era, but of the livelihoods of so many who choose not to live in a big city. Does Washington think they do not matter?

Yes it would be a fantasy to believe that all of a sudden thousands of pretentious lawmakers take it upon themselves to do a bit of fact finding on the future of large swaths of our country. Unfortunately it is necessary. Instead though they take the lobbyists money and campaign donations to stay in power. Their stench stays in Washington to appease Wall Street and a few others, but what would make the country great again rots away with a different kind of stench. The stench of economic decay. And at some point it will be too late and the greed of the uber wealthy will not be able to sustain any economy as it sucks dry the people it has built its wealth upon.

These small towns are the first to go. They have survived hard times before, yet as corporate greed takes over their economies the well will run dry and many beautiful locales will be like the withering structures of a bygone era that now appear on the roads in and out of town. Main street still has some continuity going, but if you actually drive the speed limit through town it is way too easy to see the dye cast for their lack of future.

So as you enjoy your Thanksgiving dinner and even though this is bleak I do hope I haven’t ruined it. I just want to remind you that we still can be a thankful nation, but it takes action and understanding. Why give up on something that was so integral to our country’s growth? We should be thankful for what we have, have had and what we can have, and not lose sight of the whole of our country and what everyone brings to the table.

Cheers

A lay person’s discussion of the difference between agnostic and atheist; and further thoughts

 

I by no means am a theologian, apologist, or even moderately educated in religion, however I do have some thoughts on this subject that have consumed by brain on occasion. And tonight is one of those occasions so for my benefit I am attempting to write them down. I do this because it consumed by thoughts for a bit this evening and I want to see if I can expound on them to see if I can make sense of this madness permeating my thoughts. Also I do feel that general comparison do not get to the heart of the problem and also really address that if you believe which is worse.

So to start some basic definitions or explanations, an agnostic according to one source (Oxford definition)  is a person who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God or anything beyond material phenomena; a person who claims neither faith nor disbelief in God.

And I stress it is important to note the last sentence. I will come back to this point.

Atheism or atheists is in some cases broken down into various distinctions. Generally most people will define atheism has the belief there is no God. One resource not identified in my internet search says there is implicit atheism and explicit atheism and goes on to identify positive and negative atheism. This might be much for my thoughts tonight, yet I did want to mention that some identify more to atheism than I want to travel through.

And the definition of agnostic mentioned above is generally how I view it and so my off and on internal ramblings and arguments have stuck with this approach. Atheism though I have always viewed as more of an active approach to the belief in God and that their active approach I treat differently than the viewpoint that discusses the various distinctions mentioned above.

To me an atheist believes in God, that person is fighting that belief. Now at what level is where it gets murky. Or may I should phrase it an atheist is the active disbelief in God, however to disbelieve are you not denying existence and if you are denying existence then the act of denial is fighting against acceptance. Now even to me this argument does appear somewhat circular, however bear with me as an amateur writer to get to my point. I truly believe this thought and I cannot think of a better way to phrase it at the moment. Yet to fight against something means you are fighting it. So if you say no God exists, why does it matter to you to vocally denounce it. Unless there is something that is driving you to deny the existence.

I think people forget the fallen angel, Lucifer, the evil one or however you want to identify this entity not only believes in God, but is on a campaign to destroy God. Yet this is not the same as an atheist, but this entity may play a factor in why an atheist is an atheist or at least for some. Some atheists just may not want to own up to the fact that if you believe in God you must follow God. And most people that believe in God or the Judeo Christian world knows how hard it is to follow God. No small feat to live according to the teachings of God. Throw in the concept of faith and mysteries and your brain is mush in no time.

Let me get back on topic. An atheist can be what is described above as an implicit atheist or “the absence of theistic belief without a conscious rejection of it” (again there is a reference here, but I don’t have it and it is referencing another work. My apologies for the lack of thoroughness here). I do not believe though based on this reference that there is an implicit atheist. To me an atheist may be a person, but that person is a verb also. Their atheism is an action. They are creating action or wanting to create an action within someone else. This exact same argument can be made for a Christian, which tends to put an atheist as a person trying to convince someone there is no God. And here we are again. They are denying something, yet you have to believe it to exist to convince others not to believe in it.

A really bad example is saying that wonderful t bone steak you want to eat does not exist. I take the plate away and you no longer see it so why would you think you are going to eat it. And the way I phrased this sentence is important. To me atheists are wanting you to not believe in God because you cannot see, feel, touch, smell etc… God. There is no truth to a physical presence of God or none that can be identified or ascertained.

I work backwards here and as a teenager and long before I knew of St. Augustine I had a internal working knowledge of something St. Augustine said: “what you understand can’t possibly be God” As a teenager I struggled with religion, yet I believed in God. I didn’t articulate this as St. Augustine did, however I felt there was more to God than what I saw on TV from the tele evangelists or some of the churches I had attended. Church to me kept trying to define something that couldn’t be held essentially as if it could be held. And they worked hard at it. Now honestly I wasn’t catching onto the faith based arguments, and or maybe I couldn’t comprehend them. Which goes back to what you understand can’t possibly be God because God is beyond our comprehension. You hear God’s word, but until you realize where it derives or who is God is beyond our imagination. Some people try to manipulate your imagination and in doing so fail God.

And again back to topic. So why the big to do about the difference between agnostic and atheists tonight. For some reason I started thinking about which is worse, being an agnostic or being an atheist and surprisingly to me at the moment, yet the more I thought about it the more I felt I am correct. An atheist on the surface appears to be the worse of the two if you are a believer, however, remember I said they believe in God, they are trying to convince themselves and you not to believe. Hence their belief is misguided and can be addressed. I am not saying it will be easy because atheists can be true believers or in the case true non believers, so they tend to be entrenched into their believes. Yet, the argument is already in their brain so once past the entrenchment, another argument can be presented.

An agnostic has no belief. There is no argument, there is no denial, there is no existence or no reason to even contemplate the existence. The thought comes, the thought goes. Outside of curiosity or moving towards atheism an agnostic doesn’t care. And the not caring is the more dangerous aspect. Can you change a true (non) believer, possibly? Can you motivate someone who doesn’t care? Much harder. If the entity above is lazy then an agnostic is a best friend. An atheist for this entity takes constant work to keep them in line.

Just what this madness is about sometimes unsnaps a few synopsis.

And let’s move onto another topic that drives me mad. God is not liberal or conservative. These are man made constructs. So it irks the heck out of me when we get into the discussion of liberalism and conservatism in the Church. Does the Pope teach the faith, the magisterium, the sacraments, or is the Pope saying Jesus is not divine, not the Trinity, there is no apostolic tradition or any other tradition of the Church? That is how you tell if you the Pope is teaching and living the faith. If you do not agree with the Pope about certain people he is trying to reach out to and it pushes your acceptance of others, yes the Pope might be moving socially liberal points, but the Church does not become liberal because the Pope pushes buttons. If the Pope now says a marriage in the Church between two people of the same sex is now a sacrament then this Pope has strayed from the belief and should no longer be Pope. Adam and Eve defined marriage and is now a sacrament to further your communion with God. The Pope can say certain people need to be heard as people since it is our role as a Christian to reach out to those that need God in their lives. It is not our role to define whether a bishop or Pope is liberal or conservative as teachings of the Faith. Remember as Christians we are to love, even those that insult us, step on our toes, live a lifestyle not of our faith, and yes the proverbial enemy. We are not to judge. One of my favorite points in the Bible is after the people are told those that have not sinned throw the first stone the next moment is the people leave and the oldest are the first to leave. Yeah I ain’t young anymore so I can certainly understand where that is coming from. More importantly we are not God, we cannot judge. We can hold fast to our believes, our faith, our teaching, yet being liberal or conservative is not part of the Church. We pray for each other, not label each other. And if you ask me, if you are labeling either way, maybe it is time you spent some time with God, not man.

Finally to Bishop Barron. I have all the respect in the world for you and have enjoyed what you have done to further my knowledge of our faith. However this certified yellow check idea is horrible. How can we know the saints if we assume only certain people know the word of God? Hope you think about it. Goes back to the argument above, if the Pope loses it, who are we to trust unless we can identify the Pope or a Bishop has lost their way. And I am not talking about me, this post is definitely one man’s opinion, yet who is to say one person may come along that knows more or more specifically taught more than all of us. Would Moses get a yellow check?

 

Happy birthday Mom

Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) is failing Dallas

 

First of all I do have to admit I do not have much experience riding mass transit, however the ones I have rode are significantly much better than what Dallas is giving us right now. Second I have always felt one reason for rapid transit is to help get cars off the road. And if there is ever a city that needs to get cars off the road it is Dallas. Two other cities that could use reduced traffic that I know of are Los Angeles and Houston. I have spent some time in both of those cities and all day long traffic just doesn’t benefit anyone, however I live in the Dallas area so I will want to talk about where we stand.

I am going to speak most specifically about the train system, yet I have traveled by bus in Dallas and Austin long before the DART train system was ever built. Basically at various times in my life I have tried to do what is right for our environment and use mass transportation. And if you live in Texas you already know that is actually a bit of a chore.

My experiences using train or metro systems previously include Washington DC, London and Madrid. I first used the metro in DC when I was a teenager and outside of getting the hang of it so to speak I managed to get around quite well. It was not a large system at that time, yet it got me to where I wanted to go. I have used it since including recently with my youngest daughter who lives there now. My family once visited DC in the early 2000’s and rode it from a hotel outside of DC into downtown and it was rather nice generally speaking. By no means I am saying it is perfect, but it is definitely functional and has only minimal of the problems that Dallas has.

I spent a week or so in London while I was in college and rode their system extensively. We did not rent a car so to go anywhere we had to use their metro system. And it got us around the entire London area including riding out to the equivalent of suburbs in the United States. I was able to find some pretty unique things to do and had no trouble getting there. The trains ran regularly and same as DC has little of the same problems that plaques Dallas.

We also spent a week in Madrid and pretty much the same. We had to use the system to get around and outside of the forced marches our daughter took us on (family joke) it was very beneficial. The phrase it is just over there means something completely different to a college student than an older couple.

Another aspect of these other systems is that you can connect to trains that go to places less than a hundred miles away so there are day trip options you just don’t have from Dallas even though there are places you could go that would be entertaining for tourists visiting Dallas.

The problem is getting people to ride DART that normally drive. And I hate saying this, but DART does not manage its riders well. It is almost like DART is taking a Christian approach and letting the homeless and mentally unstable have carte blanche on their system. I saw an occasional problem in the above mentioned systems, but nothing like what goes on in Dallas. Even the regular riders that use mass transportation because they need it are frustrated.

I reread my first sentence and I guess I should clarify. I do ride DART in Dallas to get around for many reasons from going to work, to going to my doctor and for other various destinations. My wife and my oldest daughter do not want me to ride. My wife has been on DART trains and buses and she is just not comfortable with some of the clientele. And I understand why, there are people on the system that take away from feeling safe, secure, even healthy in fact way too many. Yes some people should be able to ride, but when the system is bogged down so much that regular riders are uncomfortable there is a general problem that needs to be addressed. No one wants to say it out loud because we all want to be considerate, yet for a system to work people have to see a benefit to riding it. That is not happening in Dallas and it is the people who need mass transportation to get to work, shopping or other necessities that provide the bulk of the revenue are hindered and uncomfortable and if they could they would not ride. This would of course doom DART.

I think most of the problem is a logistics problem with how DART is set up. I do not manage nor understand the management of mass transportation so I do not feel confident in making a complete overhaul recommendation, but it feels that is what is needed.

To be successful DART needs paying riders and to help make DART beneficial to Dallas many of those paying riders need to be people that would normally drive to work at the very least. And that will not happen until DART decides to address the problem with the people who are not just impoverished, but significantly marginalized. It sounds cruel, but they cannot continue to allow these people to be such a problem that other people do not want to use the system.

And I know we need to do more as a society to help the marginalized people, but if we also want to increase ridership and help those who need mass transportation to go about their daily lives, DART cannot be a surrogate answer to homelessness. I have seen fights between people who could barely understand who they are and for many average Americans they just aren’t going to accept this while riding. It is a harsh reality, but true that most Americans do not want these types of problems interfering with their lives or worse subject them to conditions that make them uncomfortable to downright scared.

I would love to continue to ride DART, but am under orders from family members not to even think about it. (I have though). It is rough when you have seen other cities do very well with their systems and outside of an occasional individual most riders are going about their general day and you feel little concern.

Management of DART may need to make some hard decisions or they will continue to struggle with limited ridership in a city that desperately needs them to fill up those trains.

And again I know we need to do more for the marginalized, yet those answers are even more difficult.

No Labels, exactly what are they and for me this is more of the same nonsense that isn’t going to produce anything and is a big waste of time,,,,but don’t you want new parties you ask?

Yes I do want new parties, but from the little bit I have read they really aren’t a new party even though they are trying to get on ballots in states as if they are a political party. You cannot make any headway or productive change if you just try to upset the apple cart in one election. As of this morning they are on the ballot in 14 states and do not have a ticket yet. Not having named candidates right now though isn’t an issue. Shoot the Dems and Reps haven’t had one primary vote yet so No Labels does not need to be in a hurry.

And what really irks me about all the No Labels talk is that this is a broken record. Does anyone remember American Elect? And yes the exact same Democrats who were against them are against No Labels because they are afraid that they will siphon votes from the Democratic Candidate which is presumable Joe Biden, but not guaranteed yet. Essentially the Democrats fear any moderate candidate outside of them is not good for them. Yet if they had done what is right for the working and middle class all along these attempts at independent candidates would gain no head way. So first they should not be allowed to prevent No Labels from being on the ballot anywhere because second their failure here is their own fault. And going back to first point, it is un-American to deny people the right to be on a ballot unless they try to shoot themselves onto it.

And going back to American Elect moment in time I wrote a post on this blog on December 30, 2011 and a follow up on January 01, 2012. You can go back and check me, however basically I was against the run back then for the same reasons now. You cannot make significant change in the body politic of our country just by electing an independent candidate to the Presidency. Why, well you need a political party in Congress to help support your legislative agenda. Much as the two major parties are failing with new initiatives right now, to get legislation passed you need to have someone bring a bill to the floor of the House and Senate.  Here is one paragraph from the previous post”

            Now back to the comments about the America Elect process. I am not going to get into the splitting of the vote, CNN and others are pretty ramped up about that. And yes it could be a concern, but lets take a look at the America Elect group actually winning. The problem is that they have no other support. Legislation gets passed when you have support in Congress and most of the time that comes from your own party. American Elect is not trying to create a third party so they run into a huge wall when dealing with Congress if they win the Presidency.  This would create a gigantic stalemate or even something more interesting where Republicans and Democrats agree on some issues and pass what they want and override Presidential vetos left and right (pun intended). So the goal of America Elect is thwarted by the very group they are trying to by pass to run this country. Basically we get more of the current situation which is partisan arguing and no real and new policy development. And if you are a libertarian you might be able to claim victory this way if the government cannot do anything for four years.

I just copied and pasted and even left the misspelled word from the original post. Here we are almost 12 years later and no one has figured out that to overcome the current morass in Congress you need to bring in full scale change. Well maybe some people have figured that out, but no one is doing anything about it. Go back to my blurb about this blog” an editor is worth their weight in gold, too bad I have neither.” If I had the gold I would at least try to pull something together because I obviously need the editor to make sense of my thoughts to get people to make changes, yet again almost 12 years ago I saw the same attempt as No Labels, explained why it would fail if they won and yet here we go again with no change that would be successful. Anyone wonder why I walk the thin line of madness?

Also if you do go back and read the full two parts of the post it also contains a small history of third parties in the United States. And if you are reading this on Tumblr or Wordpress, you will have to go to blogger or blogspot or whatever to read the original. I basically do the same blog on three platforms, but did not start the other two until sometime later.

No Labels is a waste of time and money, no matter how sincere they may be. If we want real change, we need to do real work. Where is the gold?

No cheers, this is maddening. 

Signs of a possible recession from someone not even an amateur economist and other thoughts

 

There is a company that started in Texas called Bucee’s. It has grown pretty significantly in Texas and lately is branching out to other states. It is not a truck stop, yet it is a place where you can stop get gas, food, an enormous variety of souvenirs, trinkets, road trip supplies, t-shirts with their logo, they tout their bathrooms being the cleanest and more. It isn’t a store that sells primarily necessities. It is quite an impressive size store that derives most of its business from people traveling. Or you might think that based on locations, however quite a few people go to one that is close to their house.

I use them as sort of a tongue in cheek marker for road trips. They are positioned near large cities in Texas, but mostly about 30-40 miles away so I say if you pass one on the highway going out of town you are now officially on a road trip according to my logic.  Their target audience is basically working and middle class families on the go.

So what has this got to do with a recession. There are now billboards where they are advertising 5% off the whole store. So this says to me sales may be slumping a bit. Most retailers have sales, however when the whole store goes on sale even a small amount something is usually amiss with total sales. The billboards lean into the idea that they are inflation fighting, but I am not buying it. I am not saying they are struggling, however, signs like these might mean leaner times are coming for the consumer economy. This is a very popular store where they are located and can be overwhelmed by crowds. I have made that stop on occasion over the last few years and it can be busy. There is always a line at the register which is a good sign for the company. I haven’t been in a few months so seeing this billboard makes me wonder. I am not about to make a special trip just to find out, yet if you are reading the tea leaves this billboard isn’t screaming optimism.

 

And as you know someone drove the House of Representatives off a large cliff. There are many culprits and suspects, yet generally there is a problem. I know some will say that the Democrats aren’t the problem, yet they are part of the disease as a whole. There is an article in from Time by Lee Drutman titled: “The only way to fix Congress”. First of all that is a bit presumptuous. Second Mr. Drutman mainly addresses the well known problem of the two party system is marching further and further to the right and left based House districts being safe for the respective partly. And as you know means the real election is in the primary for most House seats. Mr. Drutman works through this premise for the first half of his piece and discussing a bit of the current situation and history.

He then suggests that we should adopt a proportional representation system to elect House members. I have seen this discussed before and I certainly understand how it works. I am just curious about it. I think Mr. Drutman is also in favor of expanding the number of political parties which you know I am very in favor. The question is how do we break up the monopoly of the two party system. Do we sue them via the Federal Trade Commission? Probably won’t work, but at this point anything is worth a try. Going back to his proposal I am not sure how it would get implemented. You could still have just the two party system and maybe obtain better representation. I do not know, yet he tends to think so.

I think in some ways what he is proposing or the concept is somewhat done in the primary elections or at least it use to be. The primary candidates for President would receive delegates based on the percentage or some other formula used so it wasn’t winner take all. I think that might have changed, not sure. I do not vote for the two parties in an election, however I treat the primaries differently and have voted in Democrat and Republican primaries, mainly for the entertainment factor. I have been to precinct meetings and one year ended up being the person to help with the math to determine how many delegates each candidate received to go to the County or State totals. This was years ago so do not remember the exact details. I do remember it was a convoluted formula. The problem with voting in a primary is you receive inordinate amounts of campaign solicitations from various candidates from that party. It becomes way too much of a cost to opt out of it all just for one day of watching people behave like crazed baboons to sway how the results are determined and especially since it is a fixed formula. Or it was, not sure nowadays.

We do need to change processes up since the House is definitely at the bottom of a cliff right now. The idea in Mr. Durtman’s article won’t change our current disaster, yet it is a consideration for the present moving into the future.

And for me as always, we do need new major parties and maybe some different electoral maps.

Cheers

Okay this time I’m not critical and other thoughts

 

So I read a story by Jay Caruso in the Washington Examiner titled “The House Freedom Caucus Chickens have come home to roost” and it is written before the third vote for Jordan’s attempt at being Speaker. I have to say I like what he says. Here we have someone in the Examiner laying out exactly what has happened. It isn’t earth shattering reporting or opinion, just some plain facts and thoughts as to as why the Speakership is in such turmoil.

He mentions that Jordan may eventually win, but since this was written before the third vote I do not see how that is going to happen. And he asks even if he were to win, what kind of governing coalition will he have. Since it doesn’t look like he will win since he lost three more votes Friday morning, I am feeling better about what that coalition might have looked like.

Yet here we are. The Freedom Caucus members do not seem like they want to budge since they do not want to support the interim Speaker’s powers be expanded, but they have no plan. Nothing, nada, squat, diddly squat, big bag of nothing is the plan being put forth by them. They do not want to accept any compromise or work with the Democrats to do anything. It boggles the mind that they cannot just accept something to get a portion of what they want to move on some issues. And this is pretty much the point of the article I read, that they apparently have no idea what they can do.

And unfortunately the members trying to find a way forward with some attempt at conservative policy are attacked, berated, stymied, harassed, and the madness goes on. Mr. Caruso goes through these points that the House Freedom Caucus lost either the will or the ability to do the real work to get conservative policy enacted. Now to me that seems like a lost dream.

And switching gears the legal news is not going well for one Mr. Donald Trump. Will the New York Judge overseeing his business trial slap consequences on him for maintaining or not taking down something from one of his websites that was ordered two weeks ago? I haven’t seen any actual fine or jail time perpetuated on Mr. Trump yet, but keeping an eye on the news today.

Second two of his attorneys in the Georgia case have now pleaded guilty with Chesebro’s plea coming today. This could start heading further south than the Gulf of Mexico fast.

And with Jordan’s Speakership potentially fading into a footnote of history, Mr. Trump’s influence on everything but his supporters is one heck of a leaky ship out there in the aforementioned Gulf.

Cheers

Let’s open this can of worms, pro life versus pro abortion.

So did you catch the phrasing, some will say pro choice versus anti abortion. The way it is phrased automatically shows which side you fall on the debate. Or at the very least it is an interesting tell.

Everyone has an opinion and of late I am struggling with many others’ opinions. I recently read a piece by Amanda Marcotte titled: “Keep her legs closed!” Republicans are mad one of them said the quiet part out loud.

Her opening is that Republicans definitely want to punish women for having sex- but they don’t want voters to figure that out. And then ties her argument to the Dobbs v Jackson decision overturning Roe v Wade and then ties all this to the idea that all Republicans have a long standing dream of using forced child birth to punish women for having sex.

I seriously struggle with this over handed reach as to why people are against abortion. Could there be a few Republicans who fit her description? Probably, but to lump all people who believe that life begins at conception and many of us truly believe all life should be protected is definitely reaching. The actual definition of pro life is the respect and dignity of life from conception to natural death. And yes there are some politicians who are pro life for political expediency, not because they have true understanding or belief in what it means to be pro life. Yet for Ms. Marcotte to espouse this monstrous definition that all of us want to punish women for having sex is absurd. And as always I do need to say I am not a Republican, but an independent conservative, but for her purposes I do not think she worries about that difference.

We have too much extremism in this country as it is, so to lump everybody in one category to brand everyone sex haters to me is an extreme position. And I am being a bit short on purpose.

The pro life pro choice argument is one of the most difficult discussions to have in this country. So her choosing the verbiage “…punish women for having sex” or me calling her opinion monstrous does not do the debate any favors. Yet we, as humans, all fall into this emotional trap when we try to discuss topics we have hard opinions. And this debate is top of the list in this country for rousing our deepest angers.

I truly believe that life begins at conception so I struggle with the concept of pro choice. Yet I am not here to say women or men cannot have sex. I wouldn’t be here without it. And should it be considered that if we believe in the dignity of life from conception to natural death, where do we draw the line at natural death? Is a women suffering in child birth a reason to have an abortion to save her life? That is a damn good and difficult question to answer. The choice between saving one of two lives is a struggle for mankind in general much less for one doctor that has about thirty seconds to make a decision. So I believe we should not condemn any one for making that choice either way.

Yet where do the nuances become an easier choice? Well, that depends if you say, pro life or pro choice. So that leads back to the circular arguments that each side will make to justify their decision. And most of us tend to be birds of a feather that flock together. The vast majority of my friends are pro life so I would tend to use our arguments in a discussion with someone who is pro choice. And I will say unequivocally we are right. Life begins at conception. So how do you explain dignity of life until natural death and for the unborn child that dignity exists and it is up to us to protect their life since they cannot.

Some will argue that since an unborn child cannot exist outside the womb that allowing a woman to choose to make decisions regarding her body preempts the life argument. And honestly I may have missed the exact argument there so if you want to clarify it, please do in the comments, just be respectful to the debate and not use emotions.

And Ms. Marcotte’s article does not immediately reference a religion argument, yet she heavily attacks the general concept that all or most Republicans (again not the verbiage pro lifers, but Republicans, I am curious as to why) and specifically calls out a State Senator in New Jersey, Sen. Durr who apparently said “a women does have a choice, keep her legs closed” which seems to have set her head on fire and inspired her to write her piece. And apparently this State Senator had liked some other anti woman phrasing. Yet if she really wants to make headway this anger fueled post is not going to change any minds. And as I said earlier this national debate is one we struggle with mightily with entrenched opinions And we all know how difficult it can be to change an opinion. I once wrote a short story to try and create a way around the debate and to change people’s hearts. For true pro lifers we know that this is not a debate, but an understanding of the value of life and to get people to understand this we need to change what is in the heart. And yes we struggle when people who call themselves pro lifers stick their foot in their mouth ie the above referenced Senator. Yet I feel that Ms. Marcotte needs to be called out for lumping the entire pro life debate into a false narrative to vent her anger with one person or a few people who truly do not represent what it means to be pro life.

We know we are human and have faults. And maybe all our are arguments aren’t perfect, but we believe that people should be engaged with each other, believe women have the right to choose who their partners are and to engage with them sexually. We know that saying keep your legs closed is not the answer. We were or are young. We know we can make mistakes, yet to vilify us for I think reasons not stated is beyond the pale.

In the Gospels there is the story of the woman about to be stoned due to accusations of adultery. Jesus steps in and calls out everyone there, saying those who have not sinned cast the first stone. And then they all leave and I love this part, starting with the elders.

Not one of us is perfect, but that is one of the main reasons to be pro life. We need to treat each other with dignity and respect until our natural death. Sure our politicians could do better in helping with adoption laws, better healthcare programs for young and old, leading by example and not denigrating each other, and so much more, but to arbitrarily attack a group of people using labels because a few people present a false front is not an answer to solving this debate or more hopefully to a change of heart. Until then as pro lifers we need to remember we are not perfect and cannot lecture or berate especially us elders. That will do more for the change of heart for people who call themselves pro choice than any argument. Maybe one day Ms. Marcotte will be able to see beyond what is fueling her anger to get to the real answer.

When exactly did you say this happened? Republicans and the deficit, a brief not sure what.

 

I read an opinion piece by W. James Antle, III from the Washington Examiner who states that the Republicans that ousted McCarthy as Speaker have valid points that we need better control over spending and returning to regular order in the House. I am totally for this proposal, however his claim that these Republicans, both the people who ousted McCarthy and the conservatives in the Party are the ones to move this forward is more than a bit outlandish. Mr. Antle goes on to state that the people that ousted McCarthy did so because we need to pass the fourteen individual appropriation measures. And yes I agree this would be a better way to fund the government since and he addresses it in his piece, the measures could be read in advanced, debated, amendments proposed and everyone knows what they are voting for or against.

First question; the House knew they wanted this in January when they elected McCarthy so why didn’t they start work then? Second question, when have the Republicans ever done this?

In 2003, 2004, 2005, and 2006 the Republicans had the Presidency, Senate and House, what happened those years. This was the era when big business was ruling the roost in the Republican party so tax breaks and heavy military spending was the main goal, yet if they really wanted to create the appropriation measures they certainly were in a place to do such.

In 2016 and 2017 during Trump’s term the Republicans held the House and Senate, yet did we have the appropriation measures Mr. Antle states the Republicans were all for when they elected McCarthy as speaker. Why didn’t they produce a full budget at that time?

And currently since Republican politicians today are remnants of the big business era and a large band of how can I get Donald Trump to like me it isn’t difficult to figure out why they couldn’t create the appropriation measures in the first place. Yet, Mr. Antle is all puppy dog in love with his argument the Republicans should listen to the people who ousted McCarthy and make sure the new Speaker makes the appropriation measures a priority. Is he kidding us?

Neither the Democrats or Republicans have any interest in actually producing a budget or one would have been completed years ago. They blame each other of course. And overall both parties struggle to even come up with constructive public policy. Well, every now and then something does get passed that resembles an idea, but since the current Republicans prefer Donald Trump’s one liners as public policy and the Democrats spend way too much time trying to make everyone happy and spend money to try and do such what do we expect. I agree there are marginalized people, disenfranchised people, rights of certain groups are stepped on, but the Democrats never address this constructively, yet find ways to make platitude speeches with no real concrete improvements for these people. We get inordinate amounts of money spent with very little actually going to poor people, but we receive platform after platform each election telling us how bad we are that we don’t do more. Well do more, but we have had Democrats in charge of both Houses of Congress and the Presidency and do you see significant tax breaks for the working and middle class passed, real health care reform, not the insurance overall of Obama, Social Security improved, and even them passing appropriation measures.

Neither party has a clue as to legislating, yet both parties are great at blaming each other for the ongoing troubles our country faces.

Today though was a bit much. Mr. Antle appears somewhat young via the picture I saw when I internet searched who he was after reading his opinion piece. And yes it is only an opinion piece not someone positing a plan to be implemented as if he was in Congress. Yet to say, the current Republican party can actually implement this wonderous dream that the House or even the Senate actually produce a responsible well thought out budget that can be reviewed, addressed and voted on is beyond the pale. They had their chance starting in January, yet spent more time waving at Mr. Trump to get his attention than doing anything else. And then at the last minute their fearless leader wanted them to shut the government down unless they got all they wanted. Great way to manage our country there Mr. I want to be President again. How does this make me trust anything the Republican Party does.

I am an independent conservative and have been for decades and it is articles like this that just reinforce my desire to stay such.

Here it is, your 23/24 US Government Shut down budget

 

Okay this is just a rough draft/guideline of some budgetary ideas since our illustrious Congress doesn’t seem up to the task.

As regular readers know I am an independent conservative so this is reflected in how this budget proposal shapes out. You can also take into account though that a government still has functions to perform and ongoing initiatives just cannot be cut or dropped at the drop of a hat. And since we live in a winner take all society which is morally wrong and economically unsustainable over time, this budget proposal will reflect that the government does need to protect the populace from individuals and groups that try to use the government to their advantage such as tax cuts and circumventing the needs of the general populace.

Knowing the government cannot do everything though and that contrary to some people’s beliefs cannot borrow incessantly we do need to reign in the budget to spend less and start reducing the debt. It amazes me that people believe we can keep borrowing and expect us to make all the payments to keep up our credit ratings. Sooner or later you cannot produce enough revenue to pay the interest and borrowing to pay interest is just ridiculous.

Finally this is an outline or guide to some changes that need to be made. Our government should be taking a multi year deep dive into repairing our budget. There are other factors to consider and I will touch on those a bit as I write. Yet to obtain a better handle on what is in front of us, we need to start somewhere. And it needs to be flexible, both in immediate needs and as a plan to move forward.

So with the above as a brief guideline, let’s get started.

The first statement is a general lets just cut 2.5 percent from the whole budget. Now we aren’t talking about cutting services or benefits by 2.5 percent, but operational budget. Another words each department etc. will need to reduce spending on how their budget operates without effecting the output that that department is required to meet via previous legislation. And each department etc. will need to work from the top down to help the various groups within it to find ways to cut. And this is for the first year so there probably is going to be some redundancies, some normal attrition, better efficiencies in tasks found and combining some operational tasks to make this goal of 2.5 percent. And it does not have to be a blanket 2.5 percent, the executive branch will be responsible to mediate costs in case maybe one department can cut 3 percent and another may only cut a bit over 2 percent. This coordination will be coming from the White House staff and Congressional committees that overlook the various tasks our government performs from National Parks to the military.

I do want to make a few exceptions. We can probably find 3 percent in the military since it is so large. One thing we do not want to cut is battle ready troops and supplies such as ammunition. Yet with the largesse of the military there will be opportunities for budget cuts by reduction of bureaucracy and better use of working with vendors to obtain better costs on what is needed. The military may not want to admit this, but they could do a better job of working with vendors and reducing redundancy.

And another aspect of the military budget we need to address is and this will take a few years to work into the budget, but is to have a fund to handle situations like Ukraine that can be kept year over year if not needed, but ready when needed. Right now we do need to fund Ukraine temporarily until their war is resolved. Many do not like this expense, but it is necessary. Yet for future planning depending on how the world is playing out, we should keep a budget for flash points that is above the normal military budget. This way we are not increasing spending ad hoc in a budget year, but can tap resources already built in, whether it be weapons or supplies or money. Again part of the military budget, but over and above what is needed for ourselves. This is somewhat like the petroleum surplus reserves that can be used when needed.

For now though we need to bake in some funding for Ukraine as we work towards the larger goal.

Second exception is the budget for immigration which needs a complete overhaul, however it cannot be overhauled until we develop a new immigration policy. Legislation needs to be written to address the changing world and our changing needs. I am not going to make immigration policy suggestions here, but they are needed and until we develop the new policies the budget will need to be scrutinized to find some cuts without hurting our immigration staff, border patrol, and handling in a humane way a crisis such as what is happening at the border. This is definitely something that will need multiple years of work both on budget and policy until completed and needs to be made a priority by the appropriate Congressional committees. Yelling and screaming there is a problem is just another problem in and of itself.

A third exception for cuts is to start paying ahead our debt. We need to make extra payments towards reducing our debt especially if we can cut out any high interest debt. I know that most of our borrowing is issuing bonds so we may have to change the strategy around issuing new bonds or making them callable during these high interest rate times. There are probably some other ways to retire some of our debt and need to be explored. We have to reign in how much of our budget is dedicated to paying interest so we can truly make a long term dent in the budget.

And for change of course, we also need to increase revenue. And yes this is not everyone’s favorite topic. I am going to touch on a couple of items though and this is by no means an overhaul of the tax code, but some changes to help change an attitude about who should be the priority of our government and here is a hint, it is not the ultra-wealthy.

The tax brackets are interesting if you look at them in general and is hard to explain in the written word. It is better to see a chart, yet copying and pasting them in this post would take up a bit of space. You can internet search yourselves how it works, yet generally there are 7 tax brackets and 4 categories or filers. Generally though the more money you earn the higher of a tax bracket you fall into. And there is the problem that if you make enough money you can higher tax professionals to reduce your tax burden so long term there needs to be quite significant changes in the tax code. Yet for now though outside of working on reducing some of the extravagant tax loopholes, we split up the tax percentages based on income so that the lower four brackets see a reduction and the fifth bracket sees no change or slight increase and the top two brackets see increases up to 38 and 41 percents from 35 and 37. Yet you have to be careful because if you lower the tax bracket for the first three levels by the incremental way taxes are calculated (you have to see the charts) the higher brackets see their increase not increase as much as you would think. Each bracket only uses the higher percentage above the previous levels income bracket. It is difficult to explain in words, but everyone is taxed at 10 percent for the first level, then 12 percent from the first level to the second level, 22 percent on the amount from the second level to the top of the third level and so forth. So adding 41% to the top bracket does not mean by any stretch that all their income is taxed at 41%. Their total is drawn down by the lower brackets that are calculated. You don’t want to be caught up in higher earners saying their taxes are going up too much, it is not as much as they would make it out to be by saying their taxes are going up 4 percent. In totality, it isn’t.

Another benefit of changing the tax code and lowering the amount to the first three brackets is you can switch some of this reduction to social security. This will not solve the social security shortfall by itself. Also we do not include the increase to the employers contribution. Many small businesses do not need extra expenses right now, but if someone is making $50,000 and we reduce the tax level from 22 percent to 18 percent for the third level and 12 percent to 10 percent for the second level which actually increases the first level overall since the first level is taxed at ten percent then their total tax bill drops actually from $6617 to 5658.00. This example is derived from the current first two brackets being turned into one and taxed at 10 percent and the third bracket becoming the second bracket and taxed at 18 percent and the numbers are based on single filer status. So over the course of a year the single filer $50,000.00 income saves about a thousand dollars in taxes and based on my social security change approximately 50 percent or $479.50 goes to the tax payer and $479.50 goes to social security taxes. These are not astronomical changes, but do reduce the tax burden who may be struggling to pay for everything right now and helps to increase social security revenue for the future. This alone will not save social security, but with some other enhancements not added here it will definitely help alleviate the upcoming shortfall.

To recap, this year we are making soft cuts of 2.5 percent to the total budget, forcing a deep dive on the military to reshape their thinking on the budget so we can increase immediate help to Ukraine, but long term bake in a fund to have for these types of situations, forcing an overhaul of immigration policy so we can work with what we have to create a realistic budget for border security. Quite frankly building a wall that is going to be breached constantly, subsequently will need repairs and will not prevent the infamous problems at the border is a waste of money. We need some serious reflection as to what we expect from policy, where the true problems lie and yes some of it is the masses at the border, but what else is happening such as illegal immigrants being able to work cheap and corporations turning a blind eye to save on labor costs are some examples of why we cannot expect to solve problems without spending the time to create a comprehensive policy to better manage the issue. Throwing money at the border is not a sustainable immigration budget or policy.

And minor changes in the tax code to switch who should be receiving better policy by our government. And from here we take the deeper dive to remove the frivolous tax breaks that allow the headline grabbing billionaires paying very little in taxes. Some business breaks such as paying employees and investing in future products are reasonable tax breaks, but this needs to be addressed in a constructive way to better understand where unnecessary breaks are given.

We also need to start paying down the debt so more money can go to the actual services the government provides which will eventually mean we have to raise less money to have these very same services.

This is just a start. Our Congress needs to start working on each year’s budget in February so they can bring proposals to the floor by July to be reviewed, discussed, debated and voted on long before September, or at least voted on in September. And flexibility needs to be accepted. Each year brings us new obstacles to overcome.

Oh and a final point, we may need to increase the amount allocated for disaster relief. Some of these disasters are budget busters apparently so planning ahead is needed. And if we do not use all of it one year, we should rollover it over in its own fund until the disasters aren’t as expensive or be prepared for years that are more than anticipated.

The madness must end.

Are we talking about separation of Church and State or what exactly

 

Okay I admit I am not the most prolific reader, nor writer, but I do read occasionally. I also write this blog, but what you call the amount of writing I do here is waiting on a description.

Anyway I am reading four books right now, yet again do not consider me a prolific reader. I am barely covering twenty pages a week in two of them and less in the other two, however I ran across this quote and it got me to thinking:

“For see that you do not give a further ground for the charge of irreligion, by taking away religious liberty, and forbidding free choice of deity, so that I may no longer worship according to my inclination, but am compelled to worship against it. Not even a human being would care to have unwilling homage rendered him.”

The argument behind this quote is that true devotion must come from free will. The author is a Roman legal scholar who converted to Christianity and wrote Apologeticus or Apology around 197 AD. Tertullianus or Tertullian converted to Christianity and became a theological writer. Previously he was a legal scholar. If you are a religious scholar you probably know much about him, for us lay people it is quite a surprise to realize how much he influenced the early church. It is important to note though unlike many of the early writers he is not a saint and later in life he took up with or was heavily influenced by a sect called “Montanists” which took him away from the Church. His main works though are important pieces of early theology, highly regarded and are highly quoted.

So to get back to the title of this post, what on God’s green earth are we talking about here. When I read the quote for some reason I started thinking about Christian Nationalism. I do not think there is a direct correlation here, however, the rise of Christian Nationalism seems to fall into the lines of the arguments Tertullian was making against the Romans who were persecuting Christians.

You need to remember that the Roman government at times forced people to worship the Roman Gods. Actually it was required throughout the Empire, however there were times when certain leaders would issue new edicts and create times of extreme persecutions of Christians.  Tertullian was alive during one of these times and witnessed Christians being martyred. He was arguing against the Roman State and these persecutions.

Now I am not saying the Christian Nationalists are martyring people right now, but their philosophy leads to the same problem the Romans developed for themselves. By forcing a religion upon people, the people will respond against that very same religion especially if there is a choice or that phrase many Christians struggle with, free will.

 Of course at the time Christianity was a new religion, yet they were different in the way they acted and believed. In 2023 it is hard for us to understand what it meant to be a Christian in 200 AD. Most of their belief life was shrouded in secrecy yet they still tended to the basic fundamentals of Christianity. They helped each other, they lived a life free of the excesses of the Romans, they married for life, they worshipped in houses, they were being taught by apostolic teaching which meant they were taught directly from people who could follow a line back to the original apostles and this was just a few generations removed from the actual apostles.

The Christian Nationalist movement is breaking away from the true teachings of Christianity so they are breaking away from Christianity as it is historically taught. They pollute the very word, but this is not a modern theological argument.

Going back to the original quote, it is more a realization of irony that Tertullian used the argument that the State or government cannot force their religion upon people, in this case Christians, because it is less likely to have people believe in that religion. The Christian Nationalists may want to make note of that thought.

And also there is the fact our Constitution allows for the free choice of religion and that the State or government or Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion. This essentially bans a national church. Another point the Christian Nationalists seem to miss, yet they are trying hard to change this fact. And another fun point the Constitution doesn’t exactly say separation of church and state, but the above sentence that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.  The phrase separation of church and state came a few years later.

And I do not think there is a direct correlation from Tertullian to our founding fathers in the creation of the infamous separation of church and state, yet even early Christian theologians understood that it is faith and living the life of a Christian which brought more people to Christianity than how a government tried to force people to believe in their gods.

And with true free will most people do not choose the excessive secular liberalism or the extreme religious zealot who wants to dictate their version of their religion over the actual living and teachings of faith. It is the old phrase, lead by example and that changes more hearts than threats, spears and demagoguery.

This is how they propel Trump into the Presidency

 

I do not know if it is by design or sheer chance, but the Freedom Caucus and a few of Trump’s allies in the House of Representatives seem to have the plan though.

About the only way Trump could come back into office is for this country to be in a shambles in 2024. And with high inflation and high interest rates the recipe for the shambles has a few ingredients.  Add in government dysfunction with a full blown shutdown that lasts for an extended period of time and that gives Trump the verbal fodder to attack Biden. Sure the government shutdown won’t be his fault, but the economy will be touted as his fault so adding the shutdown into the political attacks during the 2024 election cycle and we have a recipe for Trump.

And what is worse for Biden is some of the actual policies he needs to initiate would not help with inflation and with a House having a Republican majority he probably won’t get them anyway, yet if he could change the tax structure to create cuts for the middle and working class with increasing on the upper class along with finding ways to support higher wages (these are the inflationary portions) for the middle and working class he would have a recipe for potential success.  He does need to find some inflationary relief he can tout. Yet the Democrats are clueless as always and will continue to let the Republicans drive the agenda or lack of agenda to the Democrats detriment.

The Republicans do not need a plan to combat higher inflation or higher interest rates, they just need to blame Biden. And with the fact that a few Republicans could care less about this country, but more about their ego they are feeding into what Trump needs.

 Somedays I do think this is by design and other days I just cannot see how some of these characters have it in them to be this Machiavellian.  It is hard to tell either way. For example, there is Senator Tuberville with all his machinations, is he this brilliant to destroy the military so Trump can come in and say he will save it. Or is the Senator a complete buffoon? By appearance you wonder could he even spell Machiavellian, but here we have months of military promotions held up by one man. It is truly boggling if they have figured this out or their random madness is just putting all this together by chance. Another example is Matt Gaetz and just by saying his name is enough said. How is this person even newsworthy, yet the liberal media feeds this madness just as much as conservative media, so here we are with him.

And the so called liberal media with their ongoing pretentiousness do not help Biden’s cause. The articles of satire about the Freedom Caucus and Republicans in general only make their audience feel good. They have absolutely no effect on effecting public policy in a positive way.  And Biden desperately needs a positive message ringing loud and clear.

And if you have been reading my tweets or whatever it is now called on “X” formerly known as Twitter you know I am on a windmill fighting crusade for us not to have Biden v. Trump in 2024, yet I do want this country to do more than survive, yet how do we go about getting some semblance of a responsible government, it doesn’t have to be highly effective since that would cause its own problems, but at least do enough to keep our economy together and pay our bills better than this run on sentence I just created, but I am not going back and fixing. And as I always say we need new parties and new leadership.

No Cheers today folks, things ain’t looking rosey.

What can we learn from Tim Gurner’s foot in the mouth moment?

 

Yes, post his infamous statement that workers need to feel pain and know they work for the employer, Mr. Gurner has made some contrite statements, but let’s be honest he meant it.

I looked up his business and apparently it is in high end real estate. This can be an industry with serious ups and downs so maybe he is feeling a pinch. I did not look up the company’s financials.

I did decide to look at this here in the United States because are workers better off nowadays, are billionaires better off nowadays or what gives. I am not making any comparisons, but am going to lay out one of the bigger problems facing the middle class and why Tim Gurner’s comments are even worse than you think.

I am going to use one company’s financial information to spell out a very simplistic example of how things could be a bit better for the average Joe if we quit buying into the large corporation’s hyperbole about their needs. Now with any major endeavor details are important. This is a 30,000 foot view of the problem using one company, but I honestly feel it shows that workers aren’t the financial problem executives want you to think. I am not going to identify the company, but based on the information I gleaned from internet searches, articles and financials published you might be able to guess. One hint I am giving you for fun is this is one of the liberal tax the billionaires bugaboos.

And I do believe in capitalism, but what we have nowadays isn’t necessarily constructive or productive capitalism. With the wealth gap expanding we are moving away from a society that offers opportunity to many, a strong middle class and is encouraging an elitist class that is doing more harm than good by hoarding wealth. That is another post and one I touched on recently, yet there is much more to this.

For now though, let’s look at this overview example of one company.

First the median household income in the United States is $98,487 according to Nasdaq.com. Now it did not say if this was for a family of four or the family size, but it did compare it to the poverty level of a family of four being $29,960.00. And $98,000 may not sound too bad if this is where half the people make more and half the people make less, yet make note it does say median household income or another words there are many families with multiple earners to achieve this $98,000 figure which is borne out by the fact that the average yearly income of a single earner is $56,940.00 ($1,095/week) as per the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The company I am using is for my example has a net worth of 433 billion dollars so this isn’t the average size company, but is one of the leaders in increasing the wealth gap. It derives income from various endeavors. One endeavor has 4700 locations where you can find employees that are paid at hourly rates. It was difficult finding a headcount for employees for each location. I found one statistic from 2015 for an average of 6.5. I have to think that has changed since then and so I am just about doubling that number to use in my example.

I did find that there are around four job descriptions that had hourly rates and the average nationally was a bit over $18, yet I am going to use $20 for my calculations. So, as you can see I am expanding the headcount and increasing the beginning number so you can see that these numbers will be generous to the company’s viewpoint when expenses are calculated.

At this point we have 4,700 locations times 12 staff members and not all maybe hourly, but am using this headcount since any salary employees are entry level salary so they are just as impacted as the hourly wage earners in some regards.

So 4,700 times 12 = 56,400 potential hourly workers in a front line role. And with each person making $20 hour that equates to $1,128,000 just to pay all these people for one hour. And on top of that there are other expenses in having employees such as payroll employees, human resources employees, benefits, employer social security tax costs, so to get to this one million plus you have to realize this expense example is not the full picture, yet if these individuals were given a direct raise the social security taxes and the benefits would probably be what is directly impacted along with the actual raise. Payroll and human resource costs aren’t directly affected by hourly raises except all these employees may want a raise too.

Where does this lead? You have $1,128,000 hourly rate times 40 hours = $45,120,000.00 now times 52  weeks = $2,346,240,000. Yes, you are reading that correctly. For this company to have 4700 locations the direct labor cost is over 2 billion dollars and that is for $20 per hour. So how can we help these $20 workers? That is quite a bit of money to pay the employees. I say give them at least a five dollar per hour raise. And not only that we are going to calculate the increase at $8 hour to account for the other expenses the raise creates.

Now plug into the equation above a $8 increase so 56,400 times 8 =$451,200.00 times 40 hours + $18,048,000.00 times 52 weeks = $938,496,000. That is almost another billion dollars. And let’s go back in and add the $3 cost I included for the raise to the original numbers and you have 56,400 times 3=4169,200.00 times 40 = $6,768,000.00 times 52 = $351,936,000.00.

So a rough labor estimate for our 4700 locations to give our workers a five dollar raise is $2,346,240,000 plus $938,496,000 plus $351,936,000 equals $3,636,672,000.00. How can any company afford to give their employees a raise? And this raise only brings the hourly workers to $25 times 40 times 52 equals $52,000 per year, yet isn’t that less than the average income? Yep it is.

What gives you might ask. That extra almost 1 billion dollars (the original labor amount was already calculated in the previous year’s budget) to bring their employees to almost the average income affects the company how? The company’s new worth is over 400 billion, last year’s net income was 37.49 billion so this incredibly expensive $5 hour raise cost the company 1/37^th of their net income.

This is just one company and a very large public one at that, but when you hear someone say employees need to feel the pain, it is time to start asking when do they feel the relief?

A pretax income of $52,000 divided by 12 = $4,333.33 with average rent of $1702, average food cost $470, transportation costs range from $400 to a $1,000 a month, and remember the 4,333 is before taxes and probably healthcare insurance is deducted from their paycheck so exactly how are workers making ends meet, yet the CEO for this company enjoyed over $34 million in compensation last year and is worth 1.7 billion.

Yes, Mr. Gurner some people need to feel some pain, but workers? They have felt theirs for decades.