If there is anything worse than gloating Democrats, its gloating Republicans.
You would think, from listening to Republican rhetoric, that the current rise in public dissatisfaction with the Obama administration, highlighted by the tea parties, town hall meetings, and culminating with the “March on Washington”, signified a seismic shift toward their party by the electorate. Many, who were wringing their hands six months ago are now eagerly rubbing them and salivating in anticipation of the upcoming 2010 elections, expecting huge gains for the GOP.
They may be correct. Perhaps the GOP will see gains. But they miss the point entirely. This is not a sign of new support for Republicans; it’s simply that people are fed up – with both parties, and they want their country back.
It’s not that people now love Republicans, it’s that they don’t like what the present administration, and the radical left in Congress, are proposing. They don’t like the spending without limit and without end that they see. They are afraid that all they have saved for will disappear in a puff of smoke, and are not happy with what they see as a dire threat to their economic, indeed, their actual freedoms they enjoy as Americans.
One of the reasons moderates and independents turned on the GOP in the first place was because of seemingly out of control spending and the meltdown of our economy. The Obama administration makes GOP spending look positively miserly. How can you take seriously a president who vows to cut the deficit by half in four years, when first he pumps it up to four times what the previous administration overspent?
It’s like those sales at some stores where they crank the price up and then announce a “sale.”
For the President to run trillion dollar deficits year after year and then claim that, in his last year, he will cut the deficit in half is so breathtakingly and totally disingenuous that it just makes me want to stand there with my mouth hanging open. Mr. Obama; I took high school math (and calculus and differential equations too, but simple arithmetic suffices for this one); half of 1.5 Trillion dollars is still $750 billion. Even if it doesn’t buy what it used to, and it won’t in four years guaranteed, it is still a chunk of change; and twice as big as George W. Bush’s biggest deficit.
Back in March, we raised the Federal Debt ceiling $900 billion to $9 trillion; and unprecedented amount. This was the fourth increase in the nation’s debt limit in five years. Now, only six months later, we are told that the ceiling must be ratcheted up yet again by mid-October. Not by $900 billion this time; we don’t deal in paltry amounts like billions of dollars any more. No, now we are told that the limit must go from $9 trillion to $12.1 trillion; a jump of 3.1 trillion dollar, increasing the amount we as a nation may overspend by 1/3 in one fell swoop!
We will need to go through the same exercise at least once again next year, as the projected federal deficit for FY 2010 is over $1.5 trillion again. So explain to me one more time why we have a “debt ceiling?” If we simply increase it every time we approach it, it really doesn’t seem like a limit to me. Why not just come right out and say we intend to spend without limit? It’s like having a credit card with a limit, except that whenever you bump up against it, the bank increases the limit. That’s not really a limit, is it?
When will the spending stop? Looks to me like this administration will continue to “have fun, fun, fun until someone takes the credit cards away.”
Not that the Republicans were any better. We got this bunch of bozos in the first place because people were fed up with Republican spending and business-as-usual politics. So what makes Republicans think that now we are ready for them to stick their tongue in our ear again? Do you think that they have “learned their lesson?” I doubt it.
On the other hand, with the current crew we seem to be on the fast track to a socialist society that bears no resemblance to the America I grew up with and learned about in my history books. Hey America! Is this the “change” you were asking for?
Given the choices, it will be interesting to see exactly what Americans do when they go to the polls next November. Will they “throw the rascals out?” Will they just stay home in disgust? One thing is certain, someone will win election in every race; who those someone’s are will determine if we stay the path or change direction once again. Assuming that these changes aren’t rammed down our throats before, that is.
As far as the economy goes, let’s ask the perennial question politicians always ask when they are trying to unseat an incumbent; “are you better off today than you were before?” Despite spending us into oblivion with no end in sight, the unemployment rate continues to climb. Its way past where the administration warned us it would be if we didn’t pass the “stimulus”; and that’s just the “official” numbers. Estimates of the “real” unemployment rate are significantly higher. (Click here for an explanation of how the unemployment rate is calculated, and what the “real” numbers actually look like.)
Where are the new jobs, “green” or otherwise? The only “business” that actually seems to be growing is the federal government. Guess what? The federal government does not contribute to the gross national product. Every dollar spent by the government, every job “created” comes out of everyone else’s pocket. The federal government is a parasite. It sucks money out of the economy; it does not create new wealth.
As the government continues to grow, and the private sector continues to shrink, the deficit continues to grow. And not content to pile up debt via current programs and entitlements, this administration wants to add new ones. Let’s take a look at our government’s fiscal track record.
How about these already existing paragons of Federal Health care? Why don’t we look at the Federal Government’s track record with what they already provide?
Then explain to me why alternatives that have been floated to fix the current system, such as tort reform, allowing us to purchase health plans across state borders (like we already do for auto insurance, life insurance, home insurance, and other insurance products), and health care portability are nowhere in your health care plan? Why can’t we have tailored plans? What’s wrong with high deductible plans and health savings accounts?
Tailored health plans would be a market-based way of allowing individuals to choose the type of health care insurance they want to buy, much like the sorts of decisions people make when they buy auto insurance. Do I want collision? That’s extra. Do I need towing insurance? That’s extra. How about uninsured motorist coverage?
Explain to me, Mr. President and progressives in Congress how you can claim that “if you like your current plan or your current doctor, you can keep them”, when you have provided built in incentives for businesses to drop their private plans in favor of the “public option”, and disincentives for them to keep private plans?
Explain to me how it is that a business that must make a profit to survive can compete on a level playing field with a “business” that does not have to make a profit, because it is subsidized by the taxpayers? How does this not turn into a government monopoly? Where are Amtrak’s private sector “competitors?”
Lowering premiums past the point of economic viability (and making up the difference from the public coffers) and payouts to health care providers (and requiring them to take the lower payments) does not provide “competition” to lower health care costs. It simply drives legitimate companies, who don’t have public money to make up the difference and don’t have the ability to change the rules of the game to whatever they want, out of business.
You decry “gold plated” health care plans without explaining exactly what you mean by the term. Is it “gold plating” for me to be able to receive a hip replacement when it is unlikely that I will need one before I am 60? Perhaps. But then again, if people don’t pay for that “gold plating” when they are less likely to need it, how could they possibly afford it when they do? That’s how insurance works. I can’t apply for car insurance after I have the accident. I can’t buy fire insurance while my house is burning down. At that point, I am not insuring a risk, I am trying to get someone else to pay for my problem.
Insurance is made cheaper by spreading the risk across everyone. It is a practical application of probability and statistics.
Many things in current health insurance plans are there because of government regulatory requirements, or because of "defensive medicine", required because of your inability or disinterest in pursuing tort reform. It is disingenuous, Mr. President and members of Congress, to complain about the health care system requiring certain types of coverage that you term “gold plated”, when the government itself has mandated that such coverage be provided.
Why should I turn these decisions over to faceless government regulatory agencies? Why should someone with a political agenda decide for me what my health insurance policy should contain?
How about you Mr. President? How about you Congress? Are you willing to give up your “gold plated” health plans? Of course you aren’t. You are too important for that. For you, such plans are necessities; who would run the country if something happened to you? One-size-fits-all public plans are for us plebeians, not you.
Except in reality, you are not all that “special”. You too are men and women, citizens of this nation; you put your pants on one leg at a time just like we do. None of you are irreplaceable. We can always elect new folks to do the job you do. Ted Kennedy recently passed away, and despite wall to wall media coverage of every second that passed between his death and burial, the world continued to spin, and soon the citizens of Massachusetts will elect a replacement who will sit in the same seat.
And it’s an ironclad cinch, from remarks I have heard you make, that you certainly are not any smarter than many of us out here, no matter where you went to school.
We The People are fed up. We are fed up with your spending, your delusions of grandeur, and your attempts to ram legislation down our throat. We are fed up with your demonizing anyone who disagrees with your ideas as racists, “Astroturf”, Luddites, “flat-Earthers”, ignorant, ill-informed, or stupid. We are fed up with your elitist “we know what is best for you” attitudes. We are fed up with your attempts to change our country into just another failed socialist workers paradise.
We are fed up with your attacks on our religious faith. We are fed up with your attacks on our country. We are fed up with your appeasement of our enemies. We are fed up with your unwillingness to compromise, your unwillingness to debate, and your unwillingness to listen. We are tired of you saying one thing and doing the opposite. We are disgusted when you establish ethical rules, such as not hiring lobbyists, and then violate them at will when it suits you to do so. We are sick to death of the corruption, sex scandals, and hypocrisy emanating from within the beltway on a daily basis.
We are tired of the lies. We are tired of being “jollied along.” We are tired of having to parse every word in every sentence you utter to try and figure out what you “really” mean. We don’t want to have to worry about what the definition of “is” is. We have lives out here, and dreams and aspirations. And we are tired of you flushing them down the toilet because you think you know what we should be doing with our lives, time and money better than we.
We don’t hate rich people, those who have made it from the sweat of their brow; we want to emulate them. We want to live in a society where we believe we too can become wealthy; not from government largess or winning the lottery, but from smarts, hard work, and yes, perhaps a certain degree of luck or divine intervention, call it what you will.
We love our country, warts and all. We want to make it a better country, yes; but in the context of the country our founders fought for, not some radically new departure. We do not want to fundamentally transform America. We like our freedoms, liberties, and constitution just fine, thank you. I know we didn’t make that clear during the election. Perhaps many of us were asleep at the switch. Perhaps many of us were complacent. Perhaps many looked at it as just another election with the usual throwaway campaign rhetoric and bombast. Perhaps many of us didn’t know what we had until it became apparent that we were about to lose it.
Perhaps some thought “change” simply meant electing the first African-American President. Perhaps some thought “change” mean throwing out the Republicans and giving the Democrats a shot. They couldn’t possibly be any worse, could they?
Hey America! The next time you decide to vote for “change”, how about getting a concrete definition, in writing, of exactly what “change” the candidate is talking about before you pull the lever?