Howard_T

Obama's Fiscal Stimulus Has Saved Jobs

Here in southern NH is a great example of the way jobs were "saved". Construction was underway to create a new access road from the Everett Turnpike to the Manchester Airport when the stimulus bill was passed. Suddenly, the $300 dollar signs were put up around the construction site, and when the workers came back to work after the weekend, there jobs were magically "saved". I think there are examples like this in every state. Isn't it wonderful how a job that existed and wasn't about to disappear was saved.

Democrats Headed for a Train Wreck

The CARS (or Cash for Clunkers, if you must) is by most current assessments considered a success. (Let's disregard for the moment the arguments of short-term gains being offset by long-term effects) As good as CARS might have been for sales, I read this morning that roughly half of the 425 dealers in the Greater New York Automobile Dealers Association are no longer offering the program. The reason is that they have not yet been reimbursed by the government for the rebates that they have given to their customers. In short, they just don't have the cash to continue. Now imagine you are a health care provider servicing patients under a government health care plan (This is the case right now under Medicare/Medicaid). You provide the services, using your valuable time and some material resources, but have to wait a long time to receive your "pay". How long will it be until providers begin dropping out. This is already the case in Great Britain, where vacancies in health care jobs have risen greatly in the past year. The arrogance of the Obama administration is frightening, but then I suppose I shouldn't worry. Any liberal will tell me that it's all for my own good to save me from myself.

If Americans Don't Want Another Stimulus, Why Are We Having One?

A metaphor for the current stimulus package is some merchandise you might order via the internet. It comes in a large box, which when opened, you find contains a lot of Styrofoam "peanuts". Once you have waded through all the packaging, you find a much smaller box with the stuff you really wanted. Problem is that you are left with all of these "peanuts" that you can't recycle and will take up space in a landfill for centuries. The "peanuts" are the parts of the current stimulus that establish long-term entitlements. We're stuck with them until we can find a way to get rid of them without messing things up for a lot of years. We just don't need another box like this showing up. If the first had been done correctly, we wouldn't have these problems.

Is the Populist Mob Right?

The captain of the Titanic went down with his ship, but then he had a lot more integrity than some of the bankers.

My dad used to tell me that near his 8th birthday, when news of the Titanic disaster reached his remote Nova Scotia fishing town, the people were not sad, but rather were celebrating. You see, the liners had a habit of speeding through the fishing grounds and causing dories to capsize and the occupants to suffer drowning. Contrary to the laws of the sea, they never slowed down to attempt rescue. What drove this behavior was the desire of passengers to book their passage on the fastest and most luxurious ships, and anything that slowed the ships down was bad for business.

Perhaps you see where I am going with this. We are the passengers who through ignorance or greed allowed the captains (the investment bankers) and their agents (the politicians and those who headed federal agencies) to continue a course of conduct that would eventually result in disaster. Well, the disaster has happened, the Titanic has struck the 'berg and sunk, and we are left to celebrate or to swim for it. After 1912, some changes were put into effect for safety. They did not address the practices that had caused the disaster, but rather made loss of life less likely. The opportunity we have now is to throw the politicians out of office at our earliest opportunity. We must also identify exactly who is culpable in all this mess, whether out of ignorance or greed, and remove them from any position of trust or leadership in government or the financial industry. Finally, we must change the laws so that safe, conservative financial practices must be followed, and anything else must be punished.

U.S. Market - Is the Bear Mortally Wounded?

Any hunter can tell you that a wounded bear is a very dangerous bear. In the immortal words of Elmer Fudd, "Be vewy, vewy careful...".

Why the Fed's TALF Is Bad for America

TALF is like trying to prop up a weakened structure by using the same building techniques that caused the structure to weaken in the first place. What ought to be done is to let the thing fall down. After the dust has settled, go in and find out exactly what went wrong (already obvious), salvage whatever good pieces remain, then start building all over again, but without making the same mistakes. Sure, there'll be pain, but it will be over a lot sooner than frantically trying to prop up something that's doomed to fail eventually.

As GM Goes, So Goes the Nation (Part 2)

The solution for GM is obvious; let it go bankrupt, liquidate, sell the pieces to those who know how to use them, and perhaps some entrepreneur might be able to make something good out of the residue.

The solution for the US follows the same lines. Those who persist in leading us into solutions that will work toward the long-term detriment of our country must be declared bankrupt and expelled. I propose we start now so that phase 1 of the bankruptcy goes into effect in November of 2010. Look at the congressman from your district. Does he support real solutions to our problems, or does he work toward increasing government involvement in our lives? If the latter, and your congressman is a member of your particular political party, find someone to run against him in your primary. Otherwise, make sure that the opponent supports the reduction of government and the making of fiscally sound decisions. We have to begin now to stop our rush over the cliff.