Friday, May 11, 2012

Spending.

The Republicans want to ADD 7 billion to the defense budget. This is MORE THAN THE DEFENSE DEPT ASKED FOR! The Republicans are the party who want to cut spending! Now they do want to cut taxes to the rich.

Romney had $21 MILLION in income last year. Yes, thats right in just one year he brought home ten times as much as most people earn in their lifetime! And he paid a measly 12.8% tax on on it, compared to the average Americans 30%. But the Republican party wants to CUT the tax that he and millionaires like him pay. So, the Republicans want to cut spending, but they also want to spend more on defense (Even more than the defense dept wants) and they want to give rich people more money. (These are people who already have so much money that they can't even spend it all.) How do the Republicans plan on doing this? Easy they want to cut food stamps, Medicare and Medicaid.

Is that clear? They want to CUT from the poorest of society, people who can't afford to feed themselves or their children. Young families, the unemployed, the old, the sick and the disabled. People who can't defend themselves. They want to take from those and give it to the richest among us. Those who already have more than they need or can use, who already pay a half to a third of what the average person pays in tax, and have the biggest slice of the pie that this country, or any other country has ever had. And the Republican party want to give them more!

I don't know about you, but it makes me sick.

I'm a reasonable man. I know we have problems. (Caused almost exclusively by Republicans, I know.) But I and most Democrats want to fix those problems and we are prepared to make sacrifices to do that. It needs to be across the board. There are people who are cheating the system with food stamps and in other areas. But guess what, while these people are stealing a hundred dollars a month or even a week from the country there are other stealing millions of dollars a month or a week! There was the case recently  of the BILLIONAIRE who tried to steal $70,000 from the government. There are dozens stealing millions from Medicare and Medicaid, 60 minutes exposed them, nothing happens. Congress takes millions in bribes - a MILLION dollars a DAY from the Health Industry alone! Imagine how much THEY steal from us! All the BIG businesses, banks, agriculture, wall street etc etc are bribing Congress DAILY. And our Congress - the best Congress that money can buy - made a law making it LEGAL to bribe them!! They call it Lobbying, by calling it Lobbying apparently it makes it LEGAL to bribe Congress.

Enogh already, I'm feeling sick again.

Confrontation or Compromise?

Well which sounds best to you? Confrontation or Compromise? Any person of normal intelligence and temperament would obviously say Compromise. But not the Republicans, it seems that any one of their Congressmen or Senators who is even slightly moderate or progressive is villified.

If anyone shows a willingness to find common ground they are treated as treacherous. Instead of reason, compromise and finding common ground, they are looking instead for even more partianship.

The more reasonable of the more and more extreme Republicans are being forced out - Olympia Snow and and Richard Lugar, as are the more moderate Democrats like Jim Webb and Evan Bayh. All replaced with more extreme and less open minded politicians.

How can we ever have any decisons made for the good of the country when Congress is full of people determined to stress Confrontation instead`of Compromise.

I see more paralysis in our future. (And I might add I blame it mostly on the Republicans who will not give an an inch on anything in spite of repeated attempts by the Democrats to try to meet and discuss.

Climate Change.

New evidence, or just coincidence? The average temperature for the whole US was the highest on record! And not by a little bit. When records are broken it is usually by tiny amounts, maybe a tenth or at most a few tenths of a degree for example. But in this case, to use words that are used way to often, it was smashed! The temperature over the last 12 months was 2.8 degrees above average. For Maryland it was even bigger. Maryland had a temperature over the last 12 months that was 4 degrees above the average. That is since records began in 1871, 142 years ago. To repeat 4 degrees higher than the average! So, we have had higher than average temperatures for 15 straight months now. This led to a "Winter" with only 1.8 inches of snow! Total for the whole winter! Rainfall continues below average. Groundwater and streams are below average. Parts of Maryland are under drought watch. We`are 5 inches below normal for rainfall so far this year - and that is during the wettest part of the year, and only 4 months into the year! I would think that we should be concerned. Instead of just saying, nothing is happening, it is normal, don't worry, etc. Sometimes action is needed. The scout motto of "be prepared" is a good one, but not one that the USA or the world seems to think applies here. Well let's hope they are right. Hope for rain and return to normal temperatures.