First I want to say that I am in favor of The Act, in fact I would be even more in favor of a Universal Health Care.
And, I don't like the Rights's way of trying to denigrate The Act by calling it Obamacare. I don't remember Medicare being called Johnsoncare, do you? Or how about Social Security was that called Rooseveltcare? I don't think so. We don't even call The Massachusetts's Health Care, Romneycare!
While it is far from perfect , it is a HUGE improvement on what we had before, when we could have our Health Insurance cancelled, because we got sick and made a claim! Or we could be refused Insurance because we were sick! Or coverage could be denied for any number of reasons. The American Health Insurance BUSINESS had more workers figuring out reasons to deny coverage than for any other part of their BUSINESS.
Yes that's right, your Health Care is a BUSINESS, the USA is the ONLY civilized country in the entire World where your health care is a business! Run for PROFIT! Should our health be a FOR PROFIT BUSINESS? It is not anywhere else. And don't try to say, "Would you want to work as a Doctor or a Nurse for nothing?", because of course you know this is not the case. Doctors and Nurses and all health care workers are of course paid in Switzerland, and Taiwan, and the UK, Japan, Canada, Germany, France, and all the other countries that cover ALL of their citizens for HALF or less than half of what we pay here in the United States!
Other countries don't have Health Care Insurance Executives who are paid millions and get millions more in Bonuses - because they made such a huge profit for their investors! Companies can have hundreds of Executives, and each one can "earn" millions in bonuses, paid for by you! The investors have to paid too, and they are paid well, and the insurance companies make sure they are paid well. They make sure that there is lots of profit by cutting off people who are sick! Or who get sick. And by figuring out ways to deny coverage for various reasons.
This is the only civilized country in the world where you can go bankrupt and lose everything because you were unfortunate enough to get ill, or to get cancer, or to have an accident, or to have a family member who does any one of those bad things! Get sick in the UK, or any other country in the world and you will get treatment. You don't have to sell your house and everything you own to get treated. Or you die, because you can't afford to get care, like can happen here.
And then there are the prescriptions. Only in America are drug companies allowed to advertise on TV, on Radio, in Newspapers and Magazines etc. Half the cost of a drug here in America is in the advertising! How often have you been watching TV and seen the same ad a half dozen or a dozen times in one evening on one channel? And there are a hundred channels!
Then there are the machines that Doctors offices have, it seems that every office now has it's own, X-ray, Cat Scan, MRI etc etc, so naturally as they have huge payments to make on them, almost everyone has to have a battery of expensive tests. So that the Doctor's office can make the payments on their expensive equipment!
How is it possible for all these other countries to give coverage for everyone, for half or less than half of what we pay? Well for a start EVERYONE pays in, just like EVERYONE pays in for Social Security or car insurance or for any form of insurance. So when someone gets sick they are covered. Here, only sick or old people get insurance, the young and the healthy "Don't need insurance", so they don't get it. But just like with car insurance - how about if only people who were going to have accidents bought insurance? Saying, "I am not going to have an accident, so I don't need insurance." won't wash! What happens to those people who, "Don't need Health Insurance." if they get sick or get into an accident? They get treated, because Hospitals and Doctors HAVE to treat them, by law. Then WE pay, you and me. So they get a free ride. Same with Car Insurance. If only people who are going to have an accident buy it, it would be VERY expensive (Just like Health Ins that is only bought by sick people.) but then there IS an accident, a tire blows on your car, someone pulls out in front of you, you fall asleep, you hit another car which hits another one, a bus goes over an overpass. You caused 10 people to die and 30 to be injured. Can you afford that? No! That's why we have car insurance, because if you didn't, everyone else would have to pay for that. You wouldn't - you are either dead or you can't afford to!
So, to review, other countries pay less because - Everyone pays in. There are no investors pulling profits out. Prescriptions cost half, because drug companies are not spending Billions on advertising. The system is run by executives who are paid to run it, and don't receive millions in pay, profit sharing and bonuses. The whole system is run at cost, not at a profit. If you need an MRI you are sent for one, you don't get one because the Doctor has a payment due on his half million dollar machine.
I have to get an MRI on my brain every year to check up on my tumor. That costs, my insurance company, $1,500. The same MRI in japan is $93. An Angiogram in the US averages $798, in Canada it costs $35.
I can hear you now, "But our care is so much better here." We live longer, we are healthier.
OK, The average life expectancy in Italy is 82, in the US it is 78. The percentage of people in the US with diabetes is 10%, in the UK it is 4%. Child mortality in the US? We are number 30, even below Somalia! we used to be below Pakistan!
If we had a Universal Health Care System our Corporations would be better off! Now they are in the position of having to pay Billions in Health Care premiums while Corporations in other countries don't have that disadvantage. So they could compete better.
An aside here, we have heard that US Corporations have the highest tax rate in the world (at 35%). Now we find out that it is actually the LOWEST in the world!! With the possible exception of Iceland. The reason for this is that they have so many exceptions, loopholes, special interests and so on that they actually only pay 10%. This is of course because we have the most corrupt Congress in the world. It is legal for Corporations, and even people, to bribe Congress! In most countries bribery goes on of course, but there they meet in dark alleys, or under bridges, or in bars, and cash changes hands. Here in the US, Congress has actually made it legal for them to be bribed. They call them Lobbyists. Lobbyists pay Congress to do their bidding. The Health Industry for example pays Congress one million dollars A DAY through Lobbyists. And there are hundreds of other companies doing the same, Big Oil, Big Coal, Big Agriculture, Big Banks, Insurance Companies, Mortgage Companies, Wall Street, all pushing and shoving to hand money over to the Best Congress That Money Can Buy. No wonder they want to stay on for year after year after year. And if they somehow go too far for even the American voter to put up with, they retire, on full pay! Yep they can serve just ONE term in the House and receive full pension for life. $174,000 a year! Just imagine how much they must be raking in if they prefer to stay in Congress if they make more than if they just retire and sit back and pick up $174,000 a year. And of course they get free health insurance, paid for by us of course. And all kinds of other percs, like an office etc etc etc.
Finally a family member who, 25 years ago, was treated for cancer in Johns Hopkins Hospital for more than a year might well be dead now if we had then, the Health care System that we will return to if the Republicans have their way. Even then, 25 years ago, with a good insurance policy, our out of pocket costs were more than $50,000. If we had been denied coverage, as we would under their idea of "care", it is doubtful that we would have been able to come up wih the necessary more than half a million dollars needed for treatmnet.
I beg of everyone to fight for a Universal Health Care System for America, so that we can finally have Affordable Health Care for all of us. Like the rest of the world enjoys.
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Friday, March 23, 2012
A Change of Pace.
At this time of year, mid-March, in most years you are likely to find me outside wielding a snow shovel or a bucket of salt and sand. However this year you are much more likely to find me wielding a fishing rod! Instead of bundling myself up in layers of clothing, boots, gloves, a scarf and a hat against the Mad March Winds, I am instead lightly clothed in summer pants and a thin summer shirt. Yes, the world has gone crazy. We have been enjoying temperatures in the 70's and even the 80's for 2 or 3 weeks now with no sign of it abating.
Flowers like the daffodils have not just come out, they are almost finished! I have already mowed the lawn once, blossoms and flowers are everywhere. Birds and fish are ubiquitous, as of course are weeds and insects.
As I often seem to do, I planted early. Let's hope this will not bring the wrath of Mother Nature down on me!
A couple of years ago I bought a snow blower, after the "Snowstorm of the Century". We have had very little snow since. Of course! I anticipate no more heavy snow until the snow blower rusts up solid and is unusable. This year I prepared by placing a bucket of salt and sand and a snow shovel outside of the back door And also outside of the front door. I dug out a selection of waterproof gloves, boots and coats, as well as hats and the inevitable scarf, and placed them strategically close. None have seen service. In fact I replaced the buckets of salt and sand and the snow shovels back in the basement. Nervously, I have to admit, but that was a few days ago and 'they' are still calling for warm weather. Today is warm and sunny with temperatures expected to top 80 degrees.
What can I say? Dare I say Climate Change?
Flowers like the daffodils have not just come out, they are almost finished! I have already mowed the lawn once, blossoms and flowers are everywhere. Birds and fish are ubiquitous, as of course are weeds and insects.
As I often seem to do, I planted early. Let's hope this will not bring the wrath of Mother Nature down on me!
A couple of years ago I bought a snow blower, after the "Snowstorm of the Century". We have had very little snow since. Of course! I anticipate no more heavy snow until the snow blower rusts up solid and is unusable. This year I prepared by placing a bucket of salt and sand and a snow shovel outside of the back door And also outside of the front door. I dug out a selection of waterproof gloves, boots and coats, as well as hats and the inevitable scarf, and placed them strategically close. None have seen service. In fact I replaced the buckets of salt and sand and the snow shovels back in the basement. Nervously, I have to admit, but that was a few days ago and 'they' are still calling for warm weather. Today is warm and sunny with temperatures expected to top 80 degrees.
What can I say? Dare I say Climate Change?
Food Waste Friday.
Nothing much ever seems to go to waste around here. How could it with my favorite saying being, "I will eat anything that doesn't eat me first!"
If by some miracle something does escape my roaming appetite, there are the Chickens who will gladly fight me for it, or the fish in The Lake, or the Final Frontier of The Compost Heap!
Nope, nothing for the Food Waste Friday Folks again, I am glad to say.
David The Silver Fox.
If by some miracle something does escape my roaming appetite, there are the Chickens who will gladly fight me for it, or the fish in The Lake, or the Final Frontier of The Compost Heap!
Nope, nothing for the Food Waste Friday Folks again, I am glad to say.
David The Silver Fox.
Fog.
Once again there is a thick fog over the area. Most mornings I wake at around 6.00 AM. For the last two weeks when I pry open my eyes and peer out at my world I am greeted by a blank wall of fog. As I lay there, with my mind running at a million miles an hour, the fog horns sounding from time to time - why are they so few? - I contemplate the coming day, it's delights and it's fears.
Of the Delights there are many, the biggest of which is Julia's smile. But this won't come yet as she is still asleep. Then there are the antics of The New Cat - Monty - the friendliness of our "Old" cat Muffey, my morning cup(s) of coffee, the view of "My" Lake and it's teeming wildlife, a walk outside to pick up the morning newspaper, checking my e-mails, maybe seeing my neighbor Mike, watching The Lake come alive - usually this is a varying process of The Lake being like a mirror, or not, and the sun coming up - that always happens! - and as it comes up it "Sets fire" to the trees on the other side, it causes The Still Lake to ripple, or sometimes it causes the rippling Lake to calm. Always the birds appear, flying over, landing, fishing, fighting, splashing or just sitting. If I just sit and watch The Lake I might see a Muskrat or a Snake swimming across, a bunch of Cormorants fishing, little Diving Ducks, a Great Blue Heron winging across looking like a miniature Pterodactyl. Sometimes there is a surprise - a Buzzard or even an Eagle and very rarely a deer, a fox or a raccoon. Any or all of these could happen today.
Then there are The Fears. I imagine that we all have these? At least I hope that I am not the only one. There are the Terrible ones, too terrible even to contemplate, like Nuclear War, the Death of a Loved One or Republicans taking power. Then there are the Mid Size Fears such as illness, an accident, losing my job, the economy getting worse, what will be in the news today, and a host of others, then finally the Small Fears - are we out of milk, do I have enough coffee, am I going to have to cut the lawn again, what's for dinner, what - it's laundry day AGAIN.
Of the Delights there are many, the biggest of which is Julia's smile. But this won't come yet as she is still asleep. Then there are the antics of The New Cat - Monty - the friendliness of our "Old" cat Muffey, my morning cup(s) of coffee, the view of "My" Lake and it's teeming wildlife, a walk outside to pick up the morning newspaper, checking my e-mails, maybe seeing my neighbor Mike, watching The Lake come alive - usually this is a varying process of The Lake being like a mirror, or not, and the sun coming up - that always happens! - and as it comes up it "Sets fire" to the trees on the other side, it causes The Still Lake to ripple, or sometimes it causes the rippling Lake to calm. Always the birds appear, flying over, landing, fishing, fighting, splashing or just sitting. If I just sit and watch The Lake I might see a Muskrat or a Snake swimming across, a bunch of Cormorants fishing, little Diving Ducks, a Great Blue Heron winging across looking like a miniature Pterodactyl. Sometimes there is a surprise - a Buzzard or even an Eagle and very rarely a deer, a fox or a raccoon. Any or all of these could happen today.
Then there are The Fears. I imagine that we all have these? At least I hope that I am not the only one. There are the Terrible ones, too terrible even to contemplate, like Nuclear War, the Death of a Loved One or Republicans taking power. Then there are the Mid Size Fears such as illness, an accident, losing my job, the economy getting worse, what will be in the news today, and a host of others, then finally the Small Fears - are we out of milk, do I have enough coffee, am I going to have to cut the lawn again, what's for dinner, what - it's laundry day AGAIN.
Thursday, March 22, 2012
A new form of taxation.
Dare I say a BETTER way of taxing us?
I propose a three tier taxing system.
The first tier would be very simple and very easy and everyone would pay, albeit at a much lower rate than at present.
The second tier would be difficult to escape, but it would be possible to limit how much you pay. It would be easier for poorer people to limit how much they pay.
The third tier would almost be voluntary! While it would not be possible to escape it completely, you would be able to decide not to pay it. And if you did not pay it you would be healthier and not only you, but everyone else would be better off!
So here goes;-
Tier one, a flat tax that increases as your income increases. I suggest 5%, 10%, 15%, 20% and 25% rates, based on income. The tiers would need to be set. Up to a certain amount a person would pay 5%, then on the amount OVER that first level the rate would be 10%, and so on. The higher levels would only be on the amount OVER the previous level, not on the entire income earned. This is the same as it is now. But the rate would be MUCH lower. There would also be NO deductions, allowances, loopholes etc. You report your income and you pay on that income.
Tier two, a sales tax. To pick a number I suggest 5% for the States and 5% for Federal. With no tax on food, medical and services. This would reduce the bite on essentials and help people with lower incomes more than the richer. I see you being able to reduce the amount of tax you pay in this level, although it would be difficult to impossible to escape it completely. But you can see that someone with a very low income who could only afford the essentials like food and medicine would pay little tax, while someone with a large disposable income would be paying more tax as they would buy more. It would also be difficult to avoid this tax as it would be added at the source, or even before the item is priced! (One possibility here might be a couple of levels of tax, for example 5% on most items but a higher rate on luxury goods like expensive jewelry, cars, boats, planes etc.)
The third tier, a "Health and Safety" tax. Many people would be able to choose to avoid this tax completely! Anyone who did pay it would not only be hurting themselves financially but also their health, and/or the health of us all and of the Planet. Quite simply there would be a substantial tax on such things as Cigarettes, Alcohol, Fat, Sugar, etc. We would be able to CUT DOWN ON THE BAD STUFF, stuff that hurts us, and save money! we would get stronger and healthier and wealthier! Who could argue with that?
We would also tax Carbon, Gasoline, Cars (The bigger they are the bigger the tax), Pollution - or Polluters, etc. Again we could reduce our use of scarce stuff, CUT DOWN ON POLLUTION AND HAVE CLEANER AIR AND WATER. And save money doing it! And breathe cleaner air and drink cleaner water and have healthier kids and us! Who could argue with that?
We would also tax Guns, Ammunition, Speeding, Murder, Rape, Theft, Drunkenness (in public), Assault, Violence, etc. WE WOULD ALL BE SAFER. And save money doing it. Who could argue with that?
With my idea the total tax paid would be the same. (Actually it is obvious that we need to increase our tax level as we are not collecting anywhere near enough taxes to pay for even basic services. But that is another thing.) So the tax paid would be the same. It would just not come from income alone. Instead the lions share would come from the bad stuff that we do to ourselves, our world and our fellow man. This would give us a reason, and an excuse, if we need one, to stop doing bad stuff.
Don't take so much of our hard earned money, tax us for doing things that are bad for us and everyone else. This should also cut down on our Health Insurance premiums as we would all be healthier! And cut down on money spent on insurances - by cutting down on speeding etc. Less of our money would go to prisons, people might think twice for example if they were going to lose money if they are violent. Money for all those crimes would be confiscated and used to pay for the prisons.
Want to keep more of your money? Do good stuff. Be good to yourself. Be good to the Planet.
I propose a three tier taxing system.
The first tier would be very simple and very easy and everyone would pay, albeit at a much lower rate than at present.
The second tier would be difficult to escape, but it would be possible to limit how much you pay. It would be easier for poorer people to limit how much they pay.
The third tier would almost be voluntary! While it would not be possible to escape it completely, you would be able to decide not to pay it. And if you did not pay it you would be healthier and not only you, but everyone else would be better off!
So here goes;-
Tier one, a flat tax that increases as your income increases. I suggest 5%, 10%, 15%, 20% and 25% rates, based on income. The tiers would need to be set. Up to a certain amount a person would pay 5%, then on the amount OVER that first level the rate would be 10%, and so on. The higher levels would only be on the amount OVER the previous level, not on the entire income earned. This is the same as it is now. But the rate would be MUCH lower. There would also be NO deductions, allowances, loopholes etc. You report your income and you pay on that income.
Tier two, a sales tax. To pick a number I suggest 5% for the States and 5% for Federal. With no tax on food, medical and services. This would reduce the bite on essentials and help people with lower incomes more than the richer. I see you being able to reduce the amount of tax you pay in this level, although it would be difficult to impossible to escape it completely. But you can see that someone with a very low income who could only afford the essentials like food and medicine would pay little tax, while someone with a large disposable income would be paying more tax as they would buy more. It would also be difficult to avoid this tax as it would be added at the source, or even before the item is priced! (One possibility here might be a couple of levels of tax, for example 5% on most items but a higher rate on luxury goods like expensive jewelry, cars, boats, planes etc.)
The third tier, a "Health and Safety" tax. Many people would be able to choose to avoid this tax completely! Anyone who did pay it would not only be hurting themselves financially but also their health, and/or the health of us all and of the Planet. Quite simply there would be a substantial tax on such things as Cigarettes, Alcohol, Fat, Sugar, etc. We would be able to CUT DOWN ON THE BAD STUFF, stuff that hurts us, and save money! we would get stronger and healthier and wealthier! Who could argue with that?
We would also tax Carbon, Gasoline, Cars (The bigger they are the bigger the tax), Pollution - or Polluters, etc. Again we could reduce our use of scarce stuff, CUT DOWN ON POLLUTION AND HAVE CLEANER AIR AND WATER. And save money doing it! And breathe cleaner air and drink cleaner water and have healthier kids and us! Who could argue with that?
We would also tax Guns, Ammunition, Speeding, Murder, Rape, Theft, Drunkenness (in public), Assault, Violence, etc. WE WOULD ALL BE SAFER. And save money doing it. Who could argue with that?
With my idea the total tax paid would be the same. (Actually it is obvious that we need to increase our tax level as we are not collecting anywhere near enough taxes to pay for even basic services. But that is another thing.) So the tax paid would be the same. It would just not come from income alone. Instead the lions share would come from the bad stuff that we do to ourselves, our world and our fellow man. This would give us a reason, and an excuse, if we need one, to stop doing bad stuff.
Don't take so much of our hard earned money, tax us for doing things that are bad for us and everyone else. This should also cut down on our Health Insurance premiums as we would all be healthier! And cut down on money spent on insurances - by cutting down on speeding etc. Less of our money would go to prisons, people might think twice for example if they were going to lose money if they are violent. Money for all those crimes would be confiscated and used to pay for the prisons.
Want to keep more of your money? Do good stuff. Be good to yourself. Be good to the Planet.
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
"Guns don't kill people, people kill people."
HOWEVER, apparently people in the US kill more people than in, say the UK. Some figures, just for interest of course, (All figures are per 100,000 people) : -
Gun ownership. US 89,000. UK 6,000 15 times as many.
Murder by gun. US 6.24 UK .13 48 times as many.
Accidental death by gun. US .58 UK .02 29 times as many.
Suicide by gun. US 7.23 UK .33 22 times as many.
Now maybe it is just coincidence, but I do notice that gun ownership seems to increase the number of deaths by gun! Also the number of suicides and accidents by gun. Now to a person like me who is fascinated by numbers and figures it is clear that guns kill people. The more guns people have, the more people die by the gun - ergo Guns Kill People.
What is further of interest is that in the US the numbers all show that although gun ownership is "only" 15 times higher than in the UK, murder by gun is 48 times higher, suicide by gun is 22 times higher and accidental death by gun is 29 times higher.
Common sense or the law of averages would say that all those figures should be 15 times higher - the same as the number of guns higher - but instead we see figures of 22X, 29X and 48X which is of interest to me. Does it mean that instruction in gun safety is better in the UK than in the US, or that the UK has safer guns than the US, or that people in the US are more angry or unstable or less civilized than in the UK? Surely not, but certainly there is something about either the guns or the people in the US that causes them to murder and commit suicide by gun at a much higher rate than almost any other country in the world.
Another figure that will almost certainly be brought up in any argument by gun proponents in the US will be gun ownership in Switzerland which is 47,000 per 100,000 of the population. US murder rate by gun is 11 times higher than the murder rate by gun in Switzerland, accidental death rate by gun - US is 5 times higher - and suicide by gun in US is only 1.3 times higher than in Switzerland!
All great fun - for someone who enjoys figures.
Gun ownership. US 89,000. UK 6,000 15 times as many.
Murder by gun. US 6.24 UK .13 48 times as many.
Accidental death by gun. US .58 UK .02 29 times as many.
Suicide by gun. US 7.23 UK .33 22 times as many.
Now maybe it is just coincidence, but I do notice that gun ownership seems to increase the number of deaths by gun! Also the number of suicides and accidents by gun. Now to a person like me who is fascinated by numbers and figures it is clear that guns kill people. The more guns people have, the more people die by the gun - ergo Guns Kill People.
What is further of interest is that in the US the numbers all show that although gun ownership is "only" 15 times higher than in the UK, murder by gun is 48 times higher, suicide by gun is 22 times higher and accidental death by gun is 29 times higher.
Common sense or the law of averages would say that all those figures should be 15 times higher - the same as the number of guns higher - but instead we see figures of 22X, 29X and 48X which is of interest to me. Does it mean that instruction in gun safety is better in the UK than in the US, or that the UK has safer guns than the US, or that people in the US are more angry or unstable or less civilized than in the UK? Surely not, but certainly there is something about either the guns or the people in the US that causes them to murder and commit suicide by gun at a much higher rate than almost any other country in the world.
Another figure that will almost certainly be brought up in any argument by gun proponents in the US will be gun ownership in Switzerland which is 47,000 per 100,000 of the population. US murder rate by gun is 11 times higher than the murder rate by gun in Switzerland, accidental death rate by gun - US is 5 times higher - and suicide by gun in US is only 1.3 times higher than in Switzerland!
All great fun - for someone who enjoys figures.
Saturday, March 17, 2012
Bits and Pieces.
Our new Cat/Kitten, Monty reports that he received a B+ in Pouncing School. Well so he should, he has been doing an awful lot of practicing lately. But Julia and I do agree that he receives an A+ in cuteness. And as for climbing, he sems to be at the top of the class, there can be no doubting that.
Meanwhile the Chickens are doing very well as we are getting 5 or 6 eggs virtually every day. Unfortunately this is more than we can eat! I do have one customer who buys a dozen of our beautiful organic eggs every week or so. Kristen The Frugal Girl is very into Fresh, Organic Food, as we are of course. This does not reduce the stock sufficiently and the supply of eggs is building. We do provide our neighbor Mike and his lovely wife Christine with some eggs, and in return they supply the chickens with their surplus food. Any left over fast food from Chinese to Pizza is welcomed by our Ladies, gobbled up and turned into fine looking eggs. What a miracle that is! But more customers are needed.
Out on The Lake, the Cormorants have arrived. Could this be because of the early arrival of Spring, and with it the Fish? Yellow Perch arrived about three weeks ago and White Perch about a week and a half ago - much earlier than I have ever seen before. But I have yet to see an Osprey. A neighbor tells me that we can expect more Eagles this year. We have indeed been seeing several pairs of Eagles during the last few years but Mike says he heard that there are even more coming. He claims that the Eagles like to let the Osprey catch the fish and then steal them. Lazy tykes! Certainly there has been a sufeit of Osprey lately, although I have not seen any yet this year. What with the Cormorants and the Osprey, not to mention the Seagulls who also seem to get their share of fish, I despair that there will be enough for us! So I guess I will have to satisfy myself with the sight of this glut of nature.
The weather has once again exceeded all expectations with temperatures in the 70's and even 80 degrees or more over the last week or two. the weather forecasters are calling for temperatures in the 70's for at least another week. It is only mid March but there are Cherry trees in bloom all over, not to mention the Bradford Pear trees and all manner of other bossoming trees. Of course Snowdrops, Daffodils, Tulips, Hyacinths and Pansies are everywhere. The Holly trees are loaded to the point of the branches sagging under the weight of their berries, so those who claim that a rash of holly berries foretell a cold winter are wrong! Along with all the other "old wives tales" that supposedly foretell the weather several seasons into the future.
Well I am going to wrap this up now.
Meanwhile the Chickens are doing very well as we are getting 5 or 6 eggs virtually every day. Unfortunately this is more than we can eat! I do have one customer who buys a dozen of our beautiful organic eggs every week or so. Kristen The Frugal Girl is very into Fresh, Organic Food, as we are of course. This does not reduce the stock sufficiently and the supply of eggs is building. We do provide our neighbor Mike and his lovely wife Christine with some eggs, and in return they supply the chickens with their surplus food. Any left over fast food from Chinese to Pizza is welcomed by our Ladies, gobbled up and turned into fine looking eggs. What a miracle that is! But more customers are needed.
Out on The Lake, the Cormorants have arrived. Could this be because of the early arrival of Spring, and with it the Fish? Yellow Perch arrived about three weeks ago and White Perch about a week and a half ago - much earlier than I have ever seen before. But I have yet to see an Osprey. A neighbor tells me that we can expect more Eagles this year. We have indeed been seeing several pairs of Eagles during the last few years but Mike says he heard that there are even more coming. He claims that the Eagles like to let the Osprey catch the fish and then steal them. Lazy tykes! Certainly there has been a sufeit of Osprey lately, although I have not seen any yet this year. What with the Cormorants and the Osprey, not to mention the Seagulls who also seem to get their share of fish, I despair that there will be enough for us! So I guess I will have to satisfy myself with the sight of this glut of nature.
The weather has once again exceeded all expectations with temperatures in the 70's and even 80 degrees or more over the last week or two. the weather forecasters are calling for temperatures in the 70's for at least another week. It is only mid March but there are Cherry trees in bloom all over, not to mention the Bradford Pear trees and all manner of other bossoming trees. Of course Snowdrops, Daffodils, Tulips, Hyacinths and Pansies are everywhere. The Holly trees are loaded to the point of the branches sagging under the weight of their berries, so those who claim that a rash of holly berries foretell a cold winter are wrong! Along with all the other "old wives tales" that supposedly foretell the weather several seasons into the future.
Well I am going to wrap this up now.
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
Another funny story about our favorite daughter Sarah.
When Sarah was about seven she was reluctant to eat her greens. One day Julia said to her "Eat your beans dear". Sarah said I don't eat beans since the accident. "What accident?" said my wife. "When I accidentally ate one." said Sarah.
She was a smart little . . . . something, sorry can't seem to find the right word here! But it will give you an idea of the problems we had raising this one.
But I guess it was worth it.
She was a smart little . . . . something, sorry can't seem to find the right word here! But it will give you an idea of the problems we had raising this one.
But I guess it was worth it.
Saturday, March 3, 2012
Hey, we won the lottery!
- - - by being born in he West! With a world population of 7 Billion there are at least 5 or 6 Billion people that we are lucky not to have been born as, including China, India, Africa, and much of South America and Asia.
We are all among the top 1% of the world in income, even the people on welfare in the West rate among the top 1% in wealth in the world!
So you see you DO have something to be happy about!
(If only we could send some of those politicians and Rush Limbaugh to one of those other countries we could all be even happier!)
David.
We are all among the top 1% of the world in income, even the people on welfare in the West rate among the top 1% in wealth in the world!
So you see you DO have something to be happy about!
(If only we could send some of those politicians and Rush Limbaugh to one of those other countries we could all be even happier!)
David.
Thursday, March 1, 2012
Our new cat.
We are the "proud parents" of a new kitten who we have named Monty. He is just about 7 weeks old and left his mother to come and live with us about 2 weeks ago. A cute gray and white kitten he has captivated Julia's heart and receives the kind of attention from her that I would love to have!
His first doctor's visit was a few days ago and he was given a clean bill of health. No sign of the dreaded feline leukemia, but he does have ear mites, for which we douse his ears twice daily with some revolting, expensive, medicine that seems to be doing the job. Monty does not like it, nor do we as we get a dose too as he shakes his head after it is poured in (Well 5 drops are put into each ear!) this results in a shower of the medicine all over us and whatever else is within 10 feet. And presumably a bunch of dead and dying ear mites are in the resulting spray too.
Anyway this little story was prompted by Julia's remark this morning that Monty needed a bath. When I asked why, she pointed out that his little face was covered in food and the medicine. He washes himself, but is not too successful. The thought of washing this little guy, who even hates having a few drops put into his ear, and which when we do it results in vicious lacerations to both of us from his nasty claws, OK from his little needle like claws, that he is not yet able to retract, fills me with dread.
So my simple answer was, "Let's get Sarah to wash him." I then made an up and down motion with my hand as if I were dipping a cat into a barrel of water and pulling him out again, repeatedly. This brought laughter to us both as we remembered our daughter Sarah washing her cat Andrew like this some 38 years ago.
Here is the story.
We came upon Sarah just after she had put her small cat Andrew into the tumble dryer. Fortunately she did not know how to turn it on! We retrieved the miserable wet animal and asked her why she has put him into the dryer. Her simple answer was, "Because he is wet." When we asked her why he was wet she said, "Because I washed him." Asked how she had washed him, she explained she had washed him in the water barrel in our greenhouse. Of course we had to ask why she had washed him and received the answer, "Because he has paint on him." Indeed, on close examination poor Andrew appeared to have been painted green. Asked why he had green paint on him - remember at the tender age of 3 we don't know how to lie - she said, "Because I painted him."
So all was revealed and yet another episode of, "Life with Sarah", entered our repertoire.
His first doctor's visit was a few days ago and he was given a clean bill of health. No sign of the dreaded feline leukemia, but he does have ear mites, for which we douse his ears twice daily with some revolting, expensive, medicine that seems to be doing the job. Monty does not like it, nor do we as we get a dose too as he shakes his head after it is poured in (Well 5 drops are put into each ear!) this results in a shower of the medicine all over us and whatever else is within 10 feet. And presumably a bunch of dead and dying ear mites are in the resulting spray too.
Anyway this little story was prompted by Julia's remark this morning that Monty needed a bath. When I asked why, she pointed out that his little face was covered in food and the medicine. He washes himself, but is not too successful. The thought of washing this little guy, who even hates having a few drops put into his ear, and which when we do it results in vicious lacerations to both of us from his nasty claws, OK from his little needle like claws, that he is not yet able to retract, fills me with dread.
So my simple answer was, "Let's get Sarah to wash him." I then made an up and down motion with my hand as if I were dipping a cat into a barrel of water and pulling him out again, repeatedly. This brought laughter to us both as we remembered our daughter Sarah washing her cat Andrew like this some 38 years ago.
Here is the story.
We came upon Sarah just after she had put her small cat Andrew into the tumble dryer. Fortunately she did not know how to turn it on! We retrieved the miserable wet animal and asked her why she has put him into the dryer. Her simple answer was, "Because he is wet." When we asked her why he was wet she said, "Because I washed him." Asked how she had washed him, she explained she had washed him in the water barrel in our greenhouse. Of course we had to ask why she had washed him and received the answer, "Because he has paint on him." Indeed, on close examination poor Andrew appeared to have been painted green. Asked why he had green paint on him - remember at the tender age of 3 we don't know how to lie - she said, "Because I painted him."
So all was revealed and yet another episode of, "Life with Sarah", entered our repertoire.
Monday, February 27, 2012
Running down the Republicans.
Well at least I am being honest!
We all know who got us into the mess we are in now - The Republicans. The only thing that they are any good at (apart from running up the National Debt - 2/3 was made by Republicans) - is critizing the guy who is trying to fix the mess THEY made. I will give them that they are very good at critizing, but that is about all. They certainly are no good at connecting or compromising or helping. They are going all out to sabotage Obama at every turn. They seem to have no interest at all in fixing problems - problems that they made - or in helping anyone else to fix them.
In fact any plans that they do have - mostly cutting taxes for the wealthy and increasing taxes on the poor and middle class (soon to be the new poor if the GOP has it's way) will increase the National Debt substantialy. The WSJ and Money magazine etc agree that if any of the GOP candidates do what they say they want to do - cut taxes to the rich, they don't have any other plans that I can see - the National Debt will skyrocket again, as it always has under the Republicans.
It is not really necessary but I might as well point out that the present increasing National Debt is almost exclusively the fault of Republican policy. Namely starting two wars and not increasing taxes to pay for it, and then cutting taxes - to the rich - at the same time as they made no provision to pay for two wars!
Beyond belief.
We all know who got us into the mess we are in now - The Republicans. The only thing that they are any good at (apart from running up the National Debt - 2/3 was made by Republicans) - is critizing the guy who is trying to fix the mess THEY made. I will give them that they are very good at critizing, but that is about all. They certainly are no good at connecting or compromising or helping. They are going all out to sabotage Obama at every turn. They seem to have no interest at all in fixing problems - problems that they made - or in helping anyone else to fix them.
In fact any plans that they do have - mostly cutting taxes for the wealthy and increasing taxes on the poor and middle class (soon to be the new poor if the GOP has it's way) will increase the National Debt substantialy. The WSJ and Money magazine etc agree that if any of the GOP candidates do what they say they want to do - cut taxes to the rich, they don't have any other plans that I can see - the National Debt will skyrocket again, as it always has under the Republicans.
It is not really necessary but I might as well point out that the present increasing National Debt is almost exclusively the fault of Republican policy. Namely starting two wars and not increasing taxes to pay for it, and then cutting taxes - to the rich - at the same time as they made no provision to pay for two wars!
Beyond belief.
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Theology or Environment?
Either way, in my opinion he is wrong. Who is wrong? Rick Santorum.
He cleared up when he said the President had phoney theology he was not questioning his faith. One thing that tells me, is that he needs to be careful when he talks, about just what he means, as President you need to be very clear about what you mean. Especially if you are talking to leaders of other countries that have "The Bomb" among other things!
Mostly what he, and the other Republican candidates, talk about seems to be Religion, Gays, Contraception, Etc. There is very little said about the Economy or Foreign Policy except to say that Obama is responsible for everything bad that happened to the Economy, the USA and the World since God made it! But no mention is made of how they will "correct" or "fix" whatever is wrong with it. Instead, we hear about "attacks" on our faith, our beliefs, etc etc. Whatever happened to separation of Church and State? Why are they more concerned about people who love each other wanting to get married, or people who don't want children, or more children, having access to birth control, or sick people having access to Affordable Health Care, or people being able to afford to give their children a good education.
In the latest attack by Santorum it would seem that President Obama is now responsible for public education! Even I know that was instituted before he was born! But no, the fact that the Federal and State governments pay for public education is "anascronitic", and wrong. People should be responsible for their children's education, according to Rick. I guess that is OK for people like him who can afford to send their children to private schools.
But the main thrust of his attack is that The President is an "Environmentalist" or a "Tree Hugger", that he wants to save an endangered plant or animal at the expense of people. But if you look at the kinds of environmental policies Obama pursues we see that they are for the health and well being of us all.
For example he wants to increase the fuel efficiency of vehicles. (This gets angry attacks from Republican - anti environmentalists - everywhere) Every President for the last 30 years or more has required more efficient vehicles, but this doen't stop the haters from telling us that President Obaman has no right to tell us that we need to produce more gas efficient vehicles. There was no problem when Bush mandated it. He wants power plants to reduce mercury emissions. He wants to encourage green energy, all environmental things that help human health.
But Mr Santorum would remove all environmental, endangered species and habitat protections. All attempts at reducing pollution and Global Climate change - he denys all science that shows we are dramatically changing our environment, acidifying our lakes and oceans, rising sea levels, loss of farm land, greenhouse gases, more and bigger storms, heat waves etc. He favors using polluting fuels like coal and oil and stopping research on non-polluting renewable fuels like solar, wind, wave and geothermal. Apparently endangered species have no value to Rick, (they do to that "Dangerous" man Barrack.) They do to me too, lack of biodiversity is important, we are missing chances of new medicines for every plant and animal that we lose.
Santorum is so anti-environment and so extreme in all his views that the thought of him becoming President is literally terrifying to me.
He cleared up when he said the President had phoney theology he was not questioning his faith. One thing that tells me, is that he needs to be careful when he talks, about just what he means, as President you need to be very clear about what you mean. Especially if you are talking to leaders of other countries that have "The Bomb" among other things!
Mostly what he, and the other Republican candidates, talk about seems to be Religion, Gays, Contraception, Etc. There is very little said about the Economy or Foreign Policy except to say that Obama is responsible for everything bad that happened to the Economy, the USA and the World since God made it! But no mention is made of how they will "correct" or "fix" whatever is wrong with it. Instead, we hear about "attacks" on our faith, our beliefs, etc etc. Whatever happened to separation of Church and State? Why are they more concerned about people who love each other wanting to get married, or people who don't want children, or more children, having access to birth control, or sick people having access to Affordable Health Care, or people being able to afford to give their children a good education.
In the latest attack by Santorum it would seem that President Obama is now responsible for public education! Even I know that was instituted before he was born! But no, the fact that the Federal and State governments pay for public education is "anascronitic", and wrong. People should be responsible for their children's education, according to Rick. I guess that is OK for people like him who can afford to send their children to private schools.
But the main thrust of his attack is that The President is an "Environmentalist" or a "Tree Hugger", that he wants to save an endangered plant or animal at the expense of people. But if you look at the kinds of environmental policies Obama pursues we see that they are for the health and well being of us all.
For example he wants to increase the fuel efficiency of vehicles. (This gets angry attacks from Republican - anti environmentalists - everywhere) Every President for the last 30 years or more has required more efficient vehicles, but this doen't stop the haters from telling us that President Obaman has no right to tell us that we need to produce more gas efficient vehicles. There was no problem when Bush mandated it. He wants power plants to reduce mercury emissions. He wants to encourage green energy, all environmental things that help human health.
But Mr Santorum would remove all environmental, endangered species and habitat protections. All attempts at reducing pollution and Global Climate change - he denys all science that shows we are dramatically changing our environment, acidifying our lakes and oceans, rising sea levels, loss of farm land, greenhouse gases, more and bigger storms, heat waves etc. He favors using polluting fuels like coal and oil and stopping research on non-polluting renewable fuels like solar, wind, wave and geothermal. Apparently endangered species have no value to Rick, (they do to that "Dangerous" man Barrack.) They do to me too, lack of biodiversity is important, we are missing chances of new medicines for every plant and animal that we lose.
Santorum is so anti-environment and so extreme in all his views that the thought of him becoming President is literally terrifying to me.
Cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay.
A lot has been written lately about cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay. One of the main pollutants is animal waste, mostly chicken poop. Apparently chicken farmers have a lot of pull when it comes to stopping attempts to get them to treat their chicken's waste before dumping it onto their land from where it simply washes into The Bay. (I wonder how the public would feel about thousands of tons of human waste being dumped into The Bay untreated?)
Anyway here are two procedures placed side by side for your consideration.
In the first the chicken farmers dump several thousand tons of chicken manure into The Chesapeake Bay. (For drama lets have them back their trucks up and dump some of it say off the beach at Sandy Point State Park, and some off of the Bay Bridge, maybe a few into the Annapolis and Baltimore Inner Harbors, and of course don't forget your favorite fishing spot, the waterfront property of a few politicians and just for good luck your waterfront, if you happen live on the water.) Now we go back a week, or a month, or a year later and "Clean it up" Yep we go out there and "Clean up The Bay". Find all that chicken shit that we dumped in there, get it out and treat it. I imagine it would be very very expensive, and of course impossible.
Second alternative, treat the manure BEFORE putting it into The Bay. Or even don't put it into The Bay, even after treating it.
A revolutionary idea?
Could it even be cheaper to treat it BEFORE rather than AFTER dumping it into The Bay? After all we do treat human waste first, why not animal waste? It would have to be cheaper than trying to clean it up after it has been put in there.
As an experiment try taking an armload of newspapers and dumping them off the end of a pier. Then go back, just the next day, and pick it all out. It would take a while, possibly your whole lifetime, much will have floated away, all will be so wet and soggy you won't even be able to pick it up. Now compare the alternative - dump the armload of newspapers into your recycling bin. There, wasn't that easier, quicker, cheaper and less messy?
Anyway here are two procedures placed side by side for your consideration.
In the first the chicken farmers dump several thousand tons of chicken manure into The Chesapeake Bay. (For drama lets have them back their trucks up and dump some of it say off the beach at Sandy Point State Park, and some off of the Bay Bridge, maybe a few into the Annapolis and Baltimore Inner Harbors, and of course don't forget your favorite fishing spot, the waterfront property of a few politicians and just for good luck your waterfront, if you happen live on the water.) Now we go back a week, or a month, or a year later and "Clean it up" Yep we go out there and "Clean up The Bay". Find all that chicken shit that we dumped in there, get it out and treat it. I imagine it would be very very expensive, and of course impossible.
Second alternative, treat the manure BEFORE putting it into The Bay. Or even don't put it into The Bay, even after treating it.
A revolutionary idea?
Could it even be cheaper to treat it BEFORE rather than AFTER dumping it into The Bay? After all we do treat human waste first, why not animal waste? It would have to be cheaper than trying to clean it up after it has been put in there.
As an experiment try taking an armload of newspapers and dumping them off the end of a pier. Then go back, just the next day, and pick it all out. It would take a while, possibly your whole lifetime, much will have floated away, all will be so wet and soggy you won't even be able to pick it up. Now compare the alternative - dump the armload of newspapers into your recycling bin. There, wasn't that easier, quicker, cheaper and less messy?
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Good Stuff?
We don't yet know the cause of Whitney Huston's death which was reported just a few days ago. Apparently it will take "a few weeks" to get the results of the tests. (How come they manage to do these "tox screens" in a few hours on our favorite TV shows but it takes weeks in real life?)
But I think we all suspect that it will be found to be an overdose of drugs that caused her early death at the age of just 48. Thus the title of my Blog today - Good Stuff?
How Good must it be to give up, what 30 or even 40 years of life for? It boggles my mind that someone would sacrifice years of their life for a hit of a drug. Even if it turns out to have been an accident in Whitney Houston's case. An accidental overdose or some other cause, we have all read about celebrities who have died of drug overdoses. Not to mention the bodies picked up off of the streets of our cities every day.
Knowing that they may well end up this way - after all if someone famous with millions of dollars in the bank can't make it work, what makes the "man in the street" think he/she can get away with it?
Just look at a long list of people, only the famous are listed, who died of deliberate or accidental drug overdoses and you should realize that these are people with strong wills, with money, with powerful friends, people who can afford the best doctors, people who have much to live for and to look forward to in life, and yet even they, with all those advantages, succumbed. What makes you, without any of that, think that you can do it and live?
As the ads say "Just Say No." Please.
But I think we all suspect that it will be found to be an overdose of drugs that caused her early death at the age of just 48. Thus the title of my Blog today - Good Stuff?
How Good must it be to give up, what 30 or even 40 years of life for? It boggles my mind that someone would sacrifice years of their life for a hit of a drug. Even if it turns out to have been an accident in Whitney Houston's case. An accidental overdose or some other cause, we have all read about celebrities who have died of drug overdoses. Not to mention the bodies picked up off of the streets of our cities every day.
Knowing that they may well end up this way - after all if someone famous with millions of dollars in the bank can't make it work, what makes the "man in the street" think he/she can get away with it?
Just look at a long list of people, only the famous are listed, who died of deliberate or accidental drug overdoses and you should realize that these are people with strong wills, with money, with powerful friends, people who can afford the best doctors, people who have much to live for and to look forward to in life, and yet even they, with all those advantages, succumbed. What makes you, without any of that, think that you can do it and live?
As the ads say "Just Say No." Please.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Correcting false e-mails, posts, sites etc
Obviously this would be a virtually impossible task. Because almost ALL posts and e-mails on the Internet are false, incorrect, blatant lies or in some other way wrong.
As it is impossible to correct them all, the best we can do is say - remember, whatever you read on the Internet is most likely incorrect, untrue or wrong AT LEAST 95% of the time.
However I am going to take a few minutes to give just three examples of e-mails that are either blatant lies or at best mistakes or untruths.
First - The D.C. story that its Animal Control people are required to capture Rats and Their Families without hurting them and relocate them to new quarters in Maryland or Virginia. This story I read on the Internet with Rush Limpburger ranting on about Liberals wanting to treat Rats with care and to relocate them and their entire family etc etc. This is obviously not true, but unfortunately the damage has already been done when he spends hours going on and on on his radio show lambasting the DEMOCRATIC councilwoman who sponsored the law. Now it was obvious to me that it could not be true, but to the millions of extreme Conservatives who listen to, and believe, Rush Limpbugger it MUST be true.
So I checked out the law, and sure enough it refers to catching ANIMALS such as Raccoons and SPECIFICALLY excludes rats and mice on the very first page of the law. The reason for the law was that they wanted to remove Raccoons from D.C. because there are a large number of them and they are causing problems. Also they wanted the animals to be treated humanely. If they were to be destroyed they should be destroyed humanely - instead of being beated to death for example. If they were to be relocated it was to be some distance from D.C. and only with the permission of the landowner where they were placed. They did want the whole family to be removed together if possible, because if the young are left behind a parent will go to great lengths to return to retrieve them and could do a lot of damage to the house where their babies are.
Seemed like a perfectly reasonable law to me.
You would not believe the vile e-mails that the councilwoman received, including death threats to her and her family. Over a reasonable law that was deliberately misinterpreted.
Next one was an e-mail that gave a list of items that were supposedly in the Affordable Health Care Act (Called Obamacare by some)The list was supposed to be written by a judge. Again, as I read it, it was almost impossible to believe that anyone could think that even a Democrat would put such things into a bill. But there it was being forwarded eagerly, to me, and all of his friends, by a Republican who apparently thought and was horrified by its contents (Had any of them been true) Even a few seconds of thought on the part of any reasonably intelligent person would have them question it. But that is not the way of these disgusting political forwards. It seems that the more outrageous and unlikely they are the quicker they are forwarded.
A few minutes of research brought out that it started 3 or 4 years ago by a letter from the Judge to his local newspaper making some points about the Affordable Health Care Act that he disagreed with. (I even found a post from him saying that he wished he hadn't written the letter)Some nut then picked up the letter added a bunch of things to it that he said was in the letter and forwarded it out to millions of Conservatives, who eagerly grabbed it and forwarded it on without bothering to check it out. Now it is gospel to the likes of Rush and all of his Fox "News" buddies. A check to Snopes found that they read the Act through completely and sent it to a Health Care Company to read. Both came to the conclusion that it was "Flat out blatant lies" and "Absolutely false." But again it had already gone out to millions of people to whom anything that contains anything that has hate and lies about any Democrat has to be true. Any reasonable person reading the e-mail would have come to the conclusion that it could not be true. One statement was that everyone would be required to carry a national ID card. This apparently reffered to the goal of putting everyone's medical records on computer. Most of us already have this. If you have a Doctor or been to hospital at some time your records are on computers. The idea here is to centralize those records so if you are in an accident for example and are taken to a hospital they could access those records and find out your blood type, any allergies, previous operations etc.
Another one said that once you reach 60 or 65 you must visit your doctor every 5 years to discuss end of life. (Death panel) It turns out what it said was when you reach 60 or 65 you should visit your doctor every 5 years for a medical check up. Other statements did not even have those slight references, they were mostly just made up. Having done that the author - nameless of course - sent it out under the Judges name, to all his contacts, who doubtless eagerly forwarded it as The Truth.
As it is impossible to correct them all, the best we can do is say - remember, whatever you read on the Internet is most likely incorrect, untrue or wrong AT LEAST 95% of the time.
However I am going to take a few minutes to give just three examples of e-mails that are either blatant lies or at best mistakes or untruths.
First - The D.C. story that its Animal Control people are required to capture Rats and Their Families without hurting them and relocate them to new quarters in Maryland or Virginia. This story I read on the Internet with Rush Limpburger ranting on about Liberals wanting to treat Rats with care and to relocate them and their entire family etc etc. This is obviously not true, but unfortunately the damage has already been done when he spends hours going on and on on his radio show lambasting the DEMOCRATIC councilwoman who sponsored the law. Now it was obvious to me that it could not be true, but to the millions of extreme Conservatives who listen to, and believe, Rush Limpbugger it MUST be true.
So I checked out the law, and sure enough it refers to catching ANIMALS such as Raccoons and SPECIFICALLY excludes rats and mice on the very first page of the law. The reason for the law was that they wanted to remove Raccoons from D.C. because there are a large number of them and they are causing problems. Also they wanted the animals to be treated humanely. If they were to be destroyed they should be destroyed humanely - instead of being beated to death for example. If they were to be relocated it was to be some distance from D.C. and only with the permission of the landowner where they were placed. They did want the whole family to be removed together if possible, because if the young are left behind a parent will go to great lengths to return to retrieve them and could do a lot of damage to the house where their babies are.
Seemed like a perfectly reasonable law to me.
You would not believe the vile e-mails that the councilwoman received, including death threats to her and her family. Over a reasonable law that was deliberately misinterpreted.
Next one was an e-mail that gave a list of items that were supposedly in the Affordable Health Care Act (Called Obamacare by some)The list was supposed to be written by a judge. Again, as I read it, it was almost impossible to believe that anyone could think that even a Democrat would put such things into a bill. But there it was being forwarded eagerly, to me, and all of his friends, by a Republican who apparently thought and was horrified by its contents (Had any of them been true) Even a few seconds of thought on the part of any reasonably intelligent person would have them question it. But that is not the way of these disgusting political forwards. It seems that the more outrageous and unlikely they are the quicker they are forwarded.
A few minutes of research brought out that it started 3 or 4 years ago by a letter from the Judge to his local newspaper making some points about the Affordable Health Care Act that he disagreed with. (I even found a post from him saying that he wished he hadn't written the letter)Some nut then picked up the letter added a bunch of things to it that he said was in the letter and forwarded it out to millions of Conservatives, who eagerly grabbed it and forwarded it on without bothering to check it out. Now it is gospel to the likes of Rush and all of his Fox "News" buddies. A check to Snopes found that they read the Act through completely and sent it to a Health Care Company to read. Both came to the conclusion that it was "Flat out blatant lies" and "Absolutely false." But again it had already gone out to millions of people to whom anything that contains anything that has hate and lies about any Democrat has to be true. Any reasonable person reading the e-mail would have come to the conclusion that it could not be true. One statement was that everyone would be required to carry a national ID card. This apparently reffered to the goal of putting everyone's medical records on computer. Most of us already have this. If you have a Doctor or been to hospital at some time your records are on computers. The idea here is to centralize those records so if you are in an accident for example and are taken to a hospital they could access those records and find out your blood type, any allergies, previous operations etc.
Another one said that once you reach 60 or 65 you must visit your doctor every 5 years to discuss end of life. (Death panel) It turns out what it said was when you reach 60 or 65 you should visit your doctor every 5 years for a medical check up. Other statements did not even have those slight references, they were mostly just made up. Having done that the author - nameless of course - sent it out under the Judges name, to all his contacts, who doubtless eagerly forwarded it as The Truth.
Friday, January 27, 2012
Crazy Weather.
When I woke up at 6.00 o'clock this morning it was already 57 degrees! Hello, is this JANUARY?
The Wild Ones don't know what to do - the animals that is, the Canada Geese never left this year, we have a flock of perhaps 50 that just stayed with us!
The two Swans are still here, even though they went away for about a month from mid December to mid January. Vacation perhaps? And the male has started his annual, "Chase everything larger than a blackbird away from our nesting area" campaign, already. There is no way that starts before they are ready to set up nest and the female sits on her eggs in the spring - which is still a couple of months off.
I am still picking Roses! The bulbs are coming up! The Lawn is still green!
Is this The New January?
Meanwhile I am hearing that Texas - the driest one or two years ever - was almost washed away by rains yesterday, and there have been more Tornados in January all over, but not here, yet! Last year we had a Tornado, an Earthquake, a Hurricane and Floods, all within the space of one week! I sure hope that does not become The Norm! We escaped that week with minimal damage right here, but I would hate to have to endure that week over and over!
Well, onward we go, and I go back to work today , gotta go.
The Wild Ones don't know what to do - the animals that is, the Canada Geese never left this year, we have a flock of perhaps 50 that just stayed with us!
The two Swans are still here, even though they went away for about a month from mid December to mid January. Vacation perhaps? And the male has started his annual, "Chase everything larger than a blackbird away from our nesting area" campaign, already. There is no way that starts before they are ready to set up nest and the female sits on her eggs in the spring - which is still a couple of months off.
I am still picking Roses! The bulbs are coming up! The Lawn is still green!
Is this The New January?
Meanwhile I am hearing that Texas - the driest one or two years ever - was almost washed away by rains yesterday, and there have been more Tornados in January all over, but not here, yet! Last year we had a Tornado, an Earthquake, a Hurricane and Floods, all within the space of one week! I sure hope that does not become The Norm! We escaped that week with minimal damage right here, but I would hate to have to endure that week over and over!
Well, onward we go, and I go back to work today , gotta go.
Thursday, January 26, 2012
More "Interesting" figures.
Mitt Romney's income in 2011 was $22 Million dollars.
That doesn't mean much to most of us, but what MAY be of interest to you is that if you worked, and earned $60,000 in 2011, a figure way above what the average American earns - you made WORKING, less than Romney made NOT WORKING, in ONE DAY!!
Did you get that? He makes more than $60,000 A DAY, NOT WORKING. (The median Americans income is $26,000.)
Now if you WORKED and EARNED $60,000 you will pay about 30% of those earnings in taxes. Mr Romney made (not earned) $22 Million NOT WORKING, and paid, are you ready for this? 13.9% in taxes!!!!
So if you are rich and wealthy, you pay a tax rate LESS THAN HALF of what the average WORKING American pays!!!
What is wrong with this picture? Why are we happy with this? Why do Republicans want the rich and wealthy to pay LESS taxes? Yes that's right they are fighting tooth and nail to have the "top" 1% of Americans pay even LESS tax!!
And yet 50% of Americans vote Republican! Why would ANYONE vote for that kind of abuse? There is no interest from ANY Republicans to do anything other than cut the taxes of the rich. Other than trying to CUT Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid to the poor and the middle classes.
It seems to me, but what do I know? that everyone should pay AT LEAST the same tax rates. In fact I would think that it would be fair for the tax`rate on UNEARNED INCOME to be higher than the tax rate on EARNED income, wouldn't you?
I mean wouldn't that make perfect sense? If you sit and do nothing and the money comes rolling in, or you go out and work for your money, who should pay the higher rate? It is just common sense that the person who is making no contribution to the well being of the country - just sitting doing nothing - should pay a higher rate.
But that is not the way that it is. The rich pay less! Please explain that to me. Could it possibly be that the rich and the wealthy OWN Congress, the very bunch who pass laws that say "The rich shall pay less tax." Is it possible that they, Congress, are Bribed to pass such laws?
That doesn't mean much to most of us, but what MAY be of interest to you is that if you worked, and earned $60,000 in 2011, a figure way above what the average American earns - you made WORKING, less than Romney made NOT WORKING, in ONE DAY!!
Did you get that? He makes more than $60,000 A DAY, NOT WORKING. (The median Americans income is $26,000.)
Now if you WORKED and EARNED $60,000 you will pay about 30% of those earnings in taxes. Mr Romney made (not earned) $22 Million NOT WORKING, and paid, are you ready for this? 13.9% in taxes!!!!
So if you are rich and wealthy, you pay a tax rate LESS THAN HALF of what the average WORKING American pays!!!
What is wrong with this picture? Why are we happy with this? Why do Republicans want the rich and wealthy to pay LESS taxes? Yes that's right they are fighting tooth and nail to have the "top" 1% of Americans pay even LESS tax!!
And yet 50% of Americans vote Republican! Why would ANYONE vote for that kind of abuse? There is no interest from ANY Republicans to do anything other than cut the taxes of the rich. Other than trying to CUT Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid to the poor and the middle classes.
It seems to me, but what do I know? that everyone should pay AT LEAST the same tax rates. In fact I would think that it would be fair for the tax`rate on UNEARNED INCOME to be higher than the tax rate on EARNED income, wouldn't you?
I mean wouldn't that make perfect sense? If you sit and do nothing and the money comes rolling in, or you go out and work for your money, who should pay the higher rate? It is just common sense that the person who is making no contribution to the well being of the country - just sitting doing nothing - should pay a higher rate.
But that is not the way that it is. The rich pay less! Please explain that to me. Could it possibly be that the rich and the wealthy OWN Congress, the very bunch who pass laws that say "The rich shall pay less tax." Is it possible that they, Congress, are Bribed to pass such laws?
Leaping Clams?
I went down to my pier yesterday and there were about 40 broken clam shells laying on it. Maybe a year ago I watched a Gull dropping something that turned out to be a clam, onto the pier. It then picked it up again, flew up into the air and dropped it back onto the pier.
I have been very busy lately so had not seen this happening again although Julia, who spends time on her couch in the bedroom reading, has observed it.
Judging by the number of empty Clam shells on the pier, there must be a lot of that going on. There must also be a lot of Clams in The Lake.
Anyway, as I said to Julia, the Clams spend their lives buried in the sand at the bottom of The Lake, so how do the Sea Gulls get a hold of them? That is the question. In order to extract the Clams from their home under the sand the Gulls would have to dive down under the water and dig into the sand. It is true that the water around the pier is not very deep, often six to 12 inches, but I have trouble imagining a Sea Gull diving under water even that shallow. And how would they know where to dig? Perhaps they see "Air" coming up from where the Clam is?
I have watched to find the secret, but am unable to even see the Gulls dropping the Clams, let alone digging for them!
My only answer is that there may be a new breed of Leaping Clams. They launch themselves into the air, and the Sea Gulls snatch them out of the air!
Yes that must be the answer.
I have been very busy lately so had not seen this happening again although Julia, who spends time on her couch in the bedroom reading, has observed it.
Judging by the number of empty Clam shells on the pier, there must be a lot of that going on. There must also be a lot of Clams in The Lake.
Anyway, as I said to Julia, the Clams spend their lives buried in the sand at the bottom of The Lake, so how do the Sea Gulls get a hold of them? That is the question. In order to extract the Clams from their home under the sand the Gulls would have to dive down under the water and dig into the sand. It is true that the water around the pier is not very deep, often six to 12 inches, but I have trouble imagining a Sea Gull diving under water even that shallow. And how would they know where to dig? Perhaps they see "Air" coming up from where the Clam is?
I have watched to find the secret, but am unable to even see the Gulls dropping the Clams, let alone digging for them!
My only answer is that there may be a new breed of Leaping Clams. They launch themselves into the air, and the Sea Gulls snatch them out of the air!
Yes that must be the answer.
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Another comment on the Tax Farce in America.
Just a couple of quick facts : -
The average American pays 30% of his/her income in taxes.
OK, the average American in the "bottom" 99% of earners.
The "top" 1% of Americans pay about HALF of that! Or 15%. We just heard today that Mitt Romney, one of the "top" 1% with an income in the $20 million plus area paid 13.9% last year!
Now I don't know how that makes YOU feel, but it makes me feel VERY frustrated. If you are a Republican apparently you not only AGREE with that but you want those very rich, very wealthy 1% to pay even LESS!!! Some Republicans are calling for the rich to pay NO tax! I guess they would be the 1%?
So lets get this straight, if you work and EARN your money you pay 30% tax. If you don't work and get UNEARNED income, you pay 15% tax. Now I may be missing something here but it seems to me that it should be the other way around. Surely if you WORK you should get a better tax break than if you DON'T work, and instead just sit back and collect money for doing nothing. Tell me how does that help the country?
Just asking.
The average American pays 30% of his/her income in taxes.
OK, the average American in the "bottom" 99% of earners.
The "top" 1% of Americans pay about HALF of that! Or 15%. We just heard today that Mitt Romney, one of the "top" 1% with an income in the $20 million plus area paid 13.9% last year!
Now I don't know how that makes YOU feel, but it makes me feel VERY frustrated. If you are a Republican apparently you not only AGREE with that but you want those very rich, very wealthy 1% to pay even LESS!!! Some Republicans are calling for the rich to pay NO tax! I guess they would be the 1%?
So lets get this straight, if you work and EARN your money you pay 30% tax. If you don't work and get UNEARNED income, you pay 15% tax. Now I may be missing something here but it seems to me that it should be the other way around. Surely if you WORK you should get a better tax break than if you DON'T work, and instead just sit back and collect money for doing nothing. Tell me how does that help the country?
Just asking.
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
It was a gray, gray day!
Monday dawned GREY, or is it Gray? Who knows. But it sure was Grey, or Gray, here. Actually I think it was Gray, for some reason or other Gray sounds more like the way the day looked.
As I struggled up in bed and looked out of the window at The Lake, it was a Gray, Gray day that met my eyes. A thick fog or mist covered everything. The far side of The Lake was completely out of sight.
Later that day, it lasted all day long, Julia and I discussed whether it was a fog or just some mist. I talked about how I could remember, in England, driving along with my door open to enable me to see the curb! It was actually IMPOSSIBLE to see more than a few feet. There could have been a car 2 feet in front of me and I would not have been able to see it. The car's hood (bonnet in England) was about 6 to 8 feet long. (My car was a 1933 Singer Le Mans sports car.) Now THAT was fog! In London they talked about "Pea Soupers", the air was so thick in those fogs that if you held your hand stretched out in front of you you could not see it. "You could not see your hand in front of your face." was the saying. Both Julia and I experienced it. It was scary to say the least.
This was just a mist. Driving across the Bay bridge we could see halfway across the bridge.
Anyway, the mist was very thick on The Lake and we could hear fog horns on The Bay.
The next day was very clear and much warmer. The temperature went from the upper 20's and low 30's up to the mid 50's. There were a lot of Canada Geese on The Lake and also on our lawn and the neighbors lawn. Here we are in late January and have yet to have a cold spell of more than a couple of days.
As I struggled up in bed and looked out of the window at The Lake, it was a Gray, Gray day that met my eyes. A thick fog or mist covered everything. The far side of The Lake was completely out of sight.
Later that day, it lasted all day long, Julia and I discussed whether it was a fog or just some mist. I talked about how I could remember, in England, driving along with my door open to enable me to see the curb! It was actually IMPOSSIBLE to see more than a few feet. There could have been a car 2 feet in front of me and I would not have been able to see it. The car's hood (bonnet in England) was about 6 to 8 feet long. (My car was a 1933 Singer Le Mans sports car.) Now THAT was fog! In London they talked about "Pea Soupers", the air was so thick in those fogs that if you held your hand stretched out in front of you you could not see it. "You could not see your hand in front of your face." was the saying. Both Julia and I experienced it. It was scary to say the least.
This was just a mist. Driving across the Bay bridge we could see halfway across the bridge.
Anyway, the mist was very thick on The Lake and we could hear fog horns on The Bay.
The next day was very clear and much warmer. The temperature went from the upper 20's and low 30's up to the mid 50's. There were a lot of Canada Geese on The Lake and also on our lawn and the neighbors lawn. Here we are in late January and have yet to have a cold spell of more than a couple of days.
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Mitt Romney and Taxes.
Mitt Romney is set to release his tax returns in April 2012. This gives him time to show us a "clean" return. I'd sure like to see his previous returns!
How about some predictions? I predict it will show an income in the millions, and a tax rate of around 14% or 15%. Less than HALF of what the average American pays!
His tax will be so low BECAUSE HE DOESN'T WORK! In other words UNEARNED income is taxed at less than half of what you pay if you WORK! Can anyone tell me what is wrong with this picture? If you work for your income you pay MORE (a lot more) than if you don't work for it. If that is not the wrong way around I don't know what is.
How did that happen? No prizes for an answer! The wealthy OWN our Congress, and Congress passes the tax laws.
Q.E.D. (Quod Erat Demonstradum - Which was to be proved.)
How about some predictions? I predict it will show an income in the millions, and a tax rate of around 14% or 15%. Less than HALF of what the average American pays!
His tax will be so low BECAUSE HE DOESN'T WORK! In other words UNEARNED income is taxed at less than half of what you pay if you WORK! Can anyone tell me what is wrong with this picture? If you work for your income you pay MORE (a lot more) than if you don't work for it. If that is not the wrong way around I don't know what is.
How did that happen? No prizes for an answer! The wealthy OWN our Congress, and Congress passes the tax laws.
Q.E.D. (Quod Erat Demonstradum - Which was to be proved.)
Cutting Taxes On The Rich.
We have a huge National Debt. This is due in part because of tax cuts to the wealthy and to two wars, that were not paid for.
A Trillion Dollar war, with no provision to pay for it. (For those who don't know, when you go to war you raise taxes on everyone to pay for it. That is how it should be, everyone should feel the hurt, not just our children who get maimed and killed.)
A Trillion Dollars a year in tax cuts for the rich - at the same time as we go to war!! (Yes we are a rich country, but not that rich!)
Result a bigger National Debt, which is ongoing because the Republicans - George W Bush in particular - left us a legacy of two unfunded wars and a huge tax cut for those who least need it!
The wealthy can take care of themselves - isn't that pretty obvious? Duh! That is how and why they got rich, because they are able to take care of themselves. They don't need any help from us - and yet we INSIST on trying to get their taxes cut, again and again!! How dumb is that? Here we have one of the two strongest political parties (do I need to say the Republican Party?) using all their effort and influence to cut taxes to the wealthy! They seem to have no interest in anything else. They barely mention the deficit, the illegal immigrants, our crumbling roads and bridges, lack of health insurance and care for our citizens, even the "missing" birth certificate is hardly mentioned any more! No, they are instead concentrating all their efforts on reducing taxes for the wealthy. And even more amazingly, 50% of the population goes along with this! People who have been ruined by mortgage scams after credit default swaps disgrace, after hedge fund outrage, after - well you name it - and they still want to give these criminals even bigger tax cuts! (Most of whom already pay tax at a rate of HALF what the average American pays!)
Who can figure?
A Trillion Dollar war, with no provision to pay for it. (For those who don't know, when you go to war you raise taxes on everyone to pay for it. That is how it should be, everyone should feel the hurt, not just our children who get maimed and killed.)
A Trillion Dollars a year in tax cuts for the rich - at the same time as we go to war!! (Yes we are a rich country, but not that rich!)
Result a bigger National Debt, which is ongoing because the Republicans - George W Bush in particular - left us a legacy of two unfunded wars and a huge tax cut for those who least need it!
The wealthy can take care of themselves - isn't that pretty obvious? Duh! That is how and why they got rich, because they are able to take care of themselves. They don't need any help from us - and yet we INSIST on trying to get their taxes cut, again and again!! How dumb is that? Here we have one of the two strongest political parties (do I need to say the Republican Party?) using all their effort and influence to cut taxes to the wealthy! They seem to have no interest in anything else. They barely mention the deficit, the illegal immigrants, our crumbling roads and bridges, lack of health insurance and care for our citizens, even the "missing" birth certificate is hardly mentioned any more! No, they are instead concentrating all their efforts on reducing taxes for the wealthy. And even more amazingly, 50% of the population goes along with this! People who have been ruined by mortgage scams after credit default swaps disgrace, after hedge fund outrage, after - well you name it - and they still want to give these criminals even bigger tax cuts! (Most of whom already pay tax at a rate of HALF what the average American pays!)
Who can figure?
Monday, January 16, 2012
Sales Tax Or Gas Tax?
I'm sure you have all heard that our Govenor has proposed an increase in the gas tax or the sales tax.
Well I for one favor a gas tax. Why? Well, you can't fully avoid either one, but you can avoid the gas tax more than you can a sales tax.
How? The way I see it, you need to spend whatever you spend for items that carry a sales tax, and you have very little way to avoid it.
But with gas, there are many ways to cut your use of gas. And, by using less gas you not only save yourself money, you also help to save the Planet! You help our health - less pollutants - as well as our environment, our air and our water. We also send less money to those who hate us, which in turn reduces our balance of payments and reduces our National Debt.
Who can argue with that? It is a win/win/win situation for us, the USA, and the West.
How to reduce gas use? Here is a list of ways to do that, most of them are easy and require little or no outlay or effort by you but could be World changing! A few of the ideas would involve expenditures, but these could be expenditures that you would need to make one day anyway. If you just make different decisions at that time, you can make a difference to us and the USA and The World!
Use your smaller more efficient car. Sell your SUV and buy a Prius. (They make a seven seater now!) Drive less - hard to do, but possible - combine trips, share rides.
Keep your car(s) efficient, tire pressure up, tune ups, do less hard accelerating and braking, (that is a BIG one) Accelerating hard can use 10 times as much gas. And every time you brake, you have just completely wasted the gas you used to get up to that speed!
The biggest way of saving gas available to everyone is to only run the engine when you are driving. To set your mind straight on this one - a small car idling uses about 2 ounces of gas a MINUTE! A large Pick Up Truck or SUV uses 4 ounces OR MORE PER MINUTE, when just idling! It uses less gas to shut off your engine and restart it if you will be stopped for more than 10 SECONDS!
For example, you don't need to "warm up" your engine. If you are really hot on this gas waster, at least keep it down to 10 seconds or so.(A neighbor that I had once, let her HUGE Pick Up Truck idle for a half an hour or more before she left for work every day! She'd go out and start it, go back into the house and come out again a half hour later! At 4 ounces per minute that was 120 ounces of gas, or about a gallon a day! I'm sure she also left it running when she stopped at the 7-11 to get her morning cup of coffee, cigarettes and a chat.)
In contrast when I get into my car I wait until everyone is in and their seat belts done up before I start the car. Think about that for a minute, I expect you, like I used to do, get into the car and start it up right away. Then you wait for your spouse and children to get in, maybe you even get out and clean the windshield or go and get the mail, pick up the newspaper from the driveway etc. That could easily be 5 minutes or more of idling. Even in a small car that's 5x2oz=20oz of gas, and let's face it most people are driving large SUVs nowadays - 5x4oz=20oz of gas! Do that just a few times with an SUV - it could be in one day - and you just wasted a whole gallon of gas!
Next you stop at the bank and go through the drive through. When I do my transaction I shut off my engine as soon as I stop at the container that zooms my deposit to the teller. THEN I get the container, put in my deposit, write anything if I need to, send it off. The teller then takes her time doing the work. Asks me if I want anything else, etc, etc, I get the container back, remove my paperwork, replace the container, check my paperwork, put it away AND THEN restart my car. Rarely does this take less than 5 minutes. 5x4=20 ounces of gas SAVED!! Imagine if everyone did that! 100 million car owners, twice a week, for 52 weeks = 3.25 Billion gallons of gas = 77 million barrels of oil! A barrel of oil sells for around $100 now, or $7.7 Billion. Just for shutting off the engine when going through your bank drive through!
Imagine the savings in oil use if you don't leave your engine idling while you go into the 7-11 for coffee, while waiting for your kids outside the school, while waiting for your spouse while he/she goes into the store, while sitting in your car reading and waiting, leaving it running to keep it warm/cool - while you do your grocery shopping or whatever. And I don't mean just the savings to you, I mean to the country. To our air, to our children with asthma, to global climate change, to our balance of payments, National Debt, and on and on, I'm sure that you can think of other reasons to not waste a resource like the World's limited supply of oil which can be used for such a myriad of uses other than burning it up. (Just in case you didn't know, although I think everyone does nowadays, it is used to make plastic - at least a million different things are made of plastic, maybe a billion different things - it is used in perfume, make up, shampoo, toothpaste, soap, man made fibres, vitamins, detergents, film, CDs, clothing, shoes, wax, fertilizer, cleaning products, oil for engines of all kinds, for lubrication, etc, etc ,etc, the list is endless.) and yet we are burning up this resource that our modern world could not exist without.
We should be conserving it while we find a way to replace it with something that does not dirty our air and water and is not so irreplaceable.
Another reason to use less oil, perhaps the best one is to preserve our children's arms, legs and lives. To maintain our wasteful lifestyles (every American uses, on average, more than twice as much energy as every European. Per person.) we regularly go to war, sending our most precious resource, our children, to fight, and die, so that we can live "The Good Life". Or as one friend says, and insists, that it is his right to choose. He should not be forced to use less of oil or electricity or anything. He thinks he should be allowed to use incandescent light bulbs instead of CFLs or LEDs if he chooses. He is an intelligent man but thinks that his, "right to choose", is more important than anything! Surely not more important than our children's lives?
Where was I? Oh yes saving gas. It's so easy, and SO important, please just DO IT, for all our sakes, and for the Planets sake.
Oh, and as I said at the start, I would favor an increased gas tax over an increased sales tax. Now you know why. Wy not just expand the sales tax to cover gasoline?
Good night, sleep tight.
Well I for one favor a gas tax. Why? Well, you can't fully avoid either one, but you can avoid the gas tax more than you can a sales tax.
How? The way I see it, you need to spend whatever you spend for items that carry a sales tax, and you have very little way to avoid it.
But with gas, there are many ways to cut your use of gas. And, by using less gas you not only save yourself money, you also help to save the Planet! You help our health - less pollutants - as well as our environment, our air and our water. We also send less money to those who hate us, which in turn reduces our balance of payments and reduces our National Debt.
Who can argue with that? It is a win/win/win situation for us, the USA, and the West.
How to reduce gas use? Here is a list of ways to do that, most of them are easy and require little or no outlay or effort by you but could be World changing! A few of the ideas would involve expenditures, but these could be expenditures that you would need to make one day anyway. If you just make different decisions at that time, you can make a difference to us and the USA and The World!
Use your smaller more efficient car. Sell your SUV and buy a Prius. (They make a seven seater now!) Drive less - hard to do, but possible - combine trips, share rides.
Keep your car(s) efficient, tire pressure up, tune ups, do less hard accelerating and braking, (that is a BIG one) Accelerating hard can use 10 times as much gas. And every time you brake, you have just completely wasted the gas you used to get up to that speed!
The biggest way of saving gas available to everyone is to only run the engine when you are driving. To set your mind straight on this one - a small car idling uses about 2 ounces of gas a MINUTE! A large Pick Up Truck or SUV uses 4 ounces OR MORE PER MINUTE, when just idling! It uses less gas to shut off your engine and restart it if you will be stopped for more than 10 SECONDS!
For example, you don't need to "warm up" your engine. If you are really hot on this gas waster, at least keep it down to 10 seconds or so.(A neighbor that I had once, let her HUGE Pick Up Truck idle for a half an hour or more before she left for work every day! She'd go out and start it, go back into the house and come out again a half hour later! At 4 ounces per minute that was 120 ounces of gas, or about a gallon a day! I'm sure she also left it running when she stopped at the 7-11 to get her morning cup of coffee, cigarettes and a chat.)
In contrast when I get into my car I wait until everyone is in and their seat belts done up before I start the car. Think about that for a minute, I expect you, like I used to do, get into the car and start it up right away. Then you wait for your spouse and children to get in, maybe you even get out and clean the windshield or go and get the mail, pick up the newspaper from the driveway etc. That could easily be 5 minutes or more of idling. Even in a small car that's 5x2oz=20oz of gas, and let's face it most people are driving large SUVs nowadays - 5x4oz=20oz of gas! Do that just a few times with an SUV - it could be in one day - and you just wasted a whole gallon of gas!
Next you stop at the bank and go through the drive through. When I do my transaction I shut off my engine as soon as I stop at the container that zooms my deposit to the teller. THEN I get the container, put in my deposit, write anything if I need to, send it off. The teller then takes her time doing the work. Asks me if I want anything else, etc, etc, I get the container back, remove my paperwork, replace the container, check my paperwork, put it away AND THEN restart my car. Rarely does this take less than 5 minutes. 5x4=20 ounces of gas SAVED!! Imagine if everyone did that! 100 million car owners, twice a week, for 52 weeks = 3.25 Billion gallons of gas = 77 million barrels of oil! A barrel of oil sells for around $100 now, or $7.7 Billion. Just for shutting off the engine when going through your bank drive through!
Imagine the savings in oil use if you don't leave your engine idling while you go into the 7-11 for coffee, while waiting for your kids outside the school, while waiting for your spouse while he/she goes into the store, while sitting in your car reading and waiting, leaving it running to keep it warm/cool - while you do your grocery shopping or whatever. And I don't mean just the savings to you, I mean to the country. To our air, to our children with asthma, to global climate change, to our balance of payments, National Debt, and on and on, I'm sure that you can think of other reasons to not waste a resource like the World's limited supply of oil which can be used for such a myriad of uses other than burning it up. (Just in case you didn't know, although I think everyone does nowadays, it is used to make plastic - at least a million different things are made of plastic, maybe a billion different things - it is used in perfume, make up, shampoo, toothpaste, soap, man made fibres, vitamins, detergents, film, CDs, clothing, shoes, wax, fertilizer, cleaning products, oil for engines of all kinds, for lubrication, etc, etc ,etc, the list is endless.) and yet we are burning up this resource that our modern world could not exist without.
We should be conserving it while we find a way to replace it with something that does not dirty our air and water and is not so irreplaceable.
Another reason to use less oil, perhaps the best one is to preserve our children's arms, legs and lives. To maintain our wasteful lifestyles (every American uses, on average, more than twice as much energy as every European. Per person.) we regularly go to war, sending our most precious resource, our children, to fight, and die, so that we can live "The Good Life". Or as one friend says, and insists, that it is his right to choose. He should not be forced to use less of oil or electricity or anything. He thinks he should be allowed to use incandescent light bulbs instead of CFLs or LEDs if he chooses. He is an intelligent man but thinks that his, "right to choose", is more important than anything! Surely not more important than our children's lives?
Where was I? Oh yes saving gas. It's so easy, and SO important, please just DO IT, for all our sakes, and for the Planets sake.
Oh, and as I said at the start, I would favor an increased gas tax over an increased sales tax. Now you know why. Wy not just expand the sales tax to cover gasoline?
Good night, sleep tight.
Brrrr.
Yes siree, it is cold today, 25 degrees at 7.00am and The Lake is almost frozen over. I got the fire going, let the chickens out - they just shook their feathers out and got on with their business, whatever that is, I guess clearing up any bugs, insects and wayward seeds laying around in their pen.
Muffey the cat went out for a brief walk, but was soon back, scratching at the door to be let back in. By this time the fire was well under way, my coffee almost finished, the cat's food was down and the paper was in. The sun was also well up, but the temperature was still down. Eight o'clock and it is still a mean 26 degrees!
OK, I have checked my e-mails, sent some answers, shaved, showered and dressed and it is almost 9.00 and still only 27 degrees. But the sun is well up and the sky a nice bright shade of blue, I am hopeful that it will soon warm up. At least there is no sign of rain or snow.
My Grandson Bradley and I built a walkway out of composite "Wood" on Saturday on one of the coldest windiest days of the year. It was surprisingly successful. I have to go out, probably today, to pick up a couple more pieces of wood to finish it. He will be back on Wednesday to help me wrap up yet another project, on this new, still unfinished, house. But I am not going to go into that today, you will doubtless be glad to hear!
The walkway, which goes from our driveway to the bottom of the steps that go up to our front door, a distance of 22 feet, replaces a "Crazy Paving Walkway", that while attractive, was also a hazard. The stone walkway was uneven, so that I was always afraid that our increasingly elderly friends were going to fall. Being stone, there was also the danger of it being slippery in the presence of rain, snow or ice. We had planted a few sprigs of Thyme in the gaps between the stones, this had thrived and almost half of the path was now covered in the Thyme.
I think the new path/walkway will be a success. Bradley says he will set the stones, which he pulled up prior to our work, alongside the driveway as a way of separating the drive from the lawn and also giving me a hard surface to walk on when going to the mailbox. I would have liked to have continued the composite walkway all the way to the mailbox, but at some 75 feet further that will have to wait for a lottery win, the death of some, as yet unknown rich uncle, some other windfall or a better job offer.
Well time to move on, it looks like it is going to be a cold day for sure.
Muffey the cat went out for a brief walk, but was soon back, scratching at the door to be let back in. By this time the fire was well under way, my coffee almost finished, the cat's food was down and the paper was in. The sun was also well up, but the temperature was still down. Eight o'clock and it is still a mean 26 degrees!
OK, I have checked my e-mails, sent some answers, shaved, showered and dressed and it is almost 9.00 and still only 27 degrees. But the sun is well up and the sky a nice bright shade of blue, I am hopeful that it will soon warm up. At least there is no sign of rain or snow.
My Grandson Bradley and I built a walkway out of composite "Wood" on Saturday on one of the coldest windiest days of the year. It was surprisingly successful. I have to go out, probably today, to pick up a couple more pieces of wood to finish it. He will be back on Wednesday to help me wrap up yet another project, on this new, still unfinished, house. But I am not going to go into that today, you will doubtless be glad to hear!
The walkway, which goes from our driveway to the bottom of the steps that go up to our front door, a distance of 22 feet, replaces a "Crazy Paving Walkway", that while attractive, was also a hazard. The stone walkway was uneven, so that I was always afraid that our increasingly elderly friends were going to fall. Being stone, there was also the danger of it being slippery in the presence of rain, snow or ice. We had planted a few sprigs of Thyme in the gaps between the stones, this had thrived and almost half of the path was now covered in the Thyme.
I think the new path/walkway will be a success. Bradley says he will set the stones, which he pulled up prior to our work, alongside the driveway as a way of separating the drive from the lawn and also giving me a hard surface to walk on when going to the mailbox. I would have liked to have continued the composite walkway all the way to the mailbox, but at some 75 feet further that will have to wait for a lottery win, the death of some, as yet unknown rich uncle, some other windfall or a better job offer.
Well time to move on, it looks like it is going to be a cold day for sure.
Thursday, January 5, 2012
Reduce/increase spending, taxes.
I see now that we have withdrawn our troops from Iraq and are reducing our troops in Afghanistan that President Obama has proposed reducing military spending. Seems reasonable to me. As we are no longer at war, except for the one in Afghanistan that is being drawn down, it would seem reasonable that we don't need such a large military budget. Usually when you finish a war you are going to be spending less on war! When World War two ended, we spent less on war.
But no, immediately that he made the proposal the Republicans objected! They objected to us spending LESS money! For months now they have been up in arms about spending less. When Obama says we will spend less they object. I noticed that they objected to him spending more too. They also objected to him raising taxes (Which he has NOT done, not ONCE since coming into office.) But the Republicans objected anyway. They also objected when he wanted to CUT taxes!
So what does that mean to you? They object to the President increasing OR decreasing spending. They object to the President increasing OR decreasing taxes.
What does it mean? It is a mystery to be sure.
But no, immediately that he made the proposal the Republicans objected! They objected to us spending LESS money! For months now they have been up in arms about spending less. When Obama says we will spend less they object. I noticed that they objected to him spending more too. They also objected to him raising taxes (Which he has NOT done, not ONCE since coming into office.) But the Republicans objected anyway. They also objected when he wanted to CUT taxes!
So what does that mean to you? They object to the President increasing OR decreasing spending. They object to the President increasing OR decreasing taxes.
What does it mean? It is a mystery to be sure.
First snow of the season.
Here we are in January and we have just had our first snowfall, not only of 2012 but of the season. Except of course for the "Snow" of October the 30th last year - the worst October snowfall on record - which just missed us. We had a few small flurries, nothing that laid, but everywhere north of us got hammered. I think in New England they got something like 30 inches. Even Philadelphia got 6" or so and New York got a foot or something.
Last night we got a scant 1/4 inch, or less, probably less. I might not have even noticed it except that I was driving home from a Networking meeting in Bethesda at 10 o'clock last night and it was "snowing" all the way home. Well not really snowing, just flurrying. But it was right at 32 degrees and the bridges were icy, I skidded a couple of times crossing some bridges and saw two accidents. It got heavier as I approached home, but was still very light.
This morning I might have forgotten about it and thought there had been a heavy frost had I not been out in it. But what made it really noticeable was The Lake, which was covered with snow. You see, the night before we had our first cold night of the season when it went down to 17 degrees here, and The Lake froze. It was almost completely frozen over except for a couple of small areas that did not close in.
Of course when The Lake is snow covered things really look like winter. And sure enough it is winter. The temperature is still right at freezing and the bewildered birds are sitting out on the snow and ice covered Lake.
And to think that I only just picked the last of my lettuce on Tuesday! Lettuce in January. Amazing. The last of the sweet potatoes I had dug the day before that.
Last night we got a scant 1/4 inch, or less, probably less. I might not have even noticed it except that I was driving home from a Networking meeting in Bethesda at 10 o'clock last night and it was "snowing" all the way home. Well not really snowing, just flurrying. But it was right at 32 degrees and the bridges were icy, I skidded a couple of times crossing some bridges and saw two accidents. It got heavier as I approached home, but was still very light.
This morning I might have forgotten about it and thought there had been a heavy frost had I not been out in it. But what made it really noticeable was The Lake, which was covered with snow. You see, the night before we had our first cold night of the season when it went down to 17 degrees here, and The Lake froze. It was almost completely frozen over except for a couple of small areas that did not close in.
Of course when The Lake is snow covered things really look like winter. And sure enough it is winter. The temperature is still right at freezing and the bewildered birds are sitting out on the snow and ice covered Lake.
And to think that I only just picked the last of my lettuce on Tuesday! Lettuce in January. Amazing. The last of the sweet potatoes I had dug the day before that.
Monday, January 2, 2012
Science, Religion and Politics.
As time goes by, ideas coalesce in my mind. One such idea that is taking root - and scaring the heck out of me - is the idea of what will happen to America if the "Religious Right" gets into power. The changes that I can see gradually taking place would, I am sure, upset our founding fathers who advocated a "Separation of Church and State". Perhaps the "Born Again Christians" of the "New Religion" don't see this as a problem. But I do.
I see Science being relegated to a back seat in our classrooms at best and eliminated altogether at worst.
The Religious Right seems to be ignoring and denigrating science completely. They appear to be trying to push Creationism, and to ban Evolution teaching from our schools. I'm afraid if these radical, extreme views are allowed to continue to proliferate, the teaching of Science and Evolution and a host of other teachings that have been the basic tenets of America since its inception will be banned.
Why do they feel we have to have Science OR God? Why can we not have both?
I see statements like "God said it, I believe it, that settles it."! Rational thought is being pushed out in favor of blind obedience or even superstition.
Our education system seems be deliberately dumbing down our kids! What possible reason can there be to do that? I don't know, do you? But I'm sure I see it happening.
Beginning in the Bush Administration we saw suppression of science. Only accepting "good" results from scientific studies. if the administration did not like the results, they were sent back to be "redone" until they matched what the administration felt was the "right" result!
Many will not remember this, but I do, because I remember being horrified by it. They actually refused to accept results that they did not like. And of course the scientists were put in an untenable position. If they did not produce the "right" results they could lose their research funds and maybe even their jobs!
And things are getting worse, science is being ridiculed or ignored or called wrong by The Religious Right, Born Again Christians, Creationists and other extreme Zealots and Fanatics. Schools are being forced to change their curriculum's by teachers and parents who want their beliefs taught. Children are being indoctrinated in these irrational, radical theories and are spouting "their own" theories about Religion, Politics etc. There is no room in these religions it seems for respecting the beliefs of others.
In case you have not already caught on, I think that the Bible, and all other religious books from other faiths, were all written by human beings. In other words they are fables, and I do not want to base my life on a fable.
For the record;:-
Peace is Good.
Ethical behaviour is Good.
God is Good.
Science is Good.
I am a Humanitarian. I believe in treating others the way that I would like to be treated.
Just some of my beliefs and opinions - and as everyone knows - Dave is ALWAYS Right (As in, correct!)
I see Science being relegated to a back seat in our classrooms at best and eliminated altogether at worst.
The Religious Right seems to be ignoring and denigrating science completely. They appear to be trying to push Creationism, and to ban Evolution teaching from our schools. I'm afraid if these radical, extreme views are allowed to continue to proliferate, the teaching of Science and Evolution and a host of other teachings that have been the basic tenets of America since its inception will be banned.
Why do they feel we have to have Science OR God? Why can we not have both?
I see statements like "God said it, I believe it, that settles it."! Rational thought is being pushed out in favor of blind obedience or even superstition.
Our education system seems be deliberately dumbing down our kids! What possible reason can there be to do that? I don't know, do you? But I'm sure I see it happening.
Beginning in the Bush Administration we saw suppression of science. Only accepting "good" results from scientific studies. if the administration did not like the results, they were sent back to be "redone" until they matched what the administration felt was the "right" result!
Many will not remember this, but I do, because I remember being horrified by it. They actually refused to accept results that they did not like. And of course the scientists were put in an untenable position. If they did not produce the "right" results they could lose their research funds and maybe even their jobs!
And things are getting worse, science is being ridiculed or ignored or called wrong by The Religious Right, Born Again Christians, Creationists and other extreme Zealots and Fanatics. Schools are being forced to change their curriculum's by teachers and parents who want their beliefs taught. Children are being indoctrinated in these irrational, radical theories and are spouting "their own" theories about Religion, Politics etc. There is no room in these religions it seems for respecting the beliefs of others.
In case you have not already caught on, I think that the Bible, and all other religious books from other faiths, were all written by human beings. In other words they are fables, and I do not want to base my life on a fable.
For the record;:-
Peace is Good.
Ethical behaviour is Good.
God is Good.
Science is Good.
I am a Humanitarian. I believe in treating others the way that I would like to be treated.
Just some of my beliefs and opinions - and as everyone knows - Dave is ALWAYS Right (As in, correct!)
Friday, December 30, 2011
The Environment.
Anyone who knows me even a little bit knows that I am a big fan of protecting the Environment.
I make no excuses. I think it is important, really important. My health and the health and well being of everyone that I love and care about depends upon our environment. That would include my lovely wife Julia, our equally beautiful daughter Sarah and maybe even more importantly, the future of our planet, our wonderful, brilliant, Grandchildren.
No, I did not forget my parents, my sister and all of my nephews, nieces, cousins etc etc. And of course all of our friends.
But to get back to our Environment, which we cannot afford to forget for even a minute.
Lets get to it. Climate change is real. The vast majority of scientists are agreed that it is happening, and it is accelerating. But the US remains the lone deny er. The Republican Presidential candidates are not just denying it they are not even mentioning it. Even President Obama, "champion of the environment" fails to refer to it.
But what is happening in the rest of the industrialized world? Rather than going into a lot of detail I will make a simple list of the % cut of emissions agreed to by each of the Developed counties by 2020 from 1990 levels as agreed in the Copenhagen meeting this year. I'll follow this with a second list of the Developing countries. The US is now the world's second biggest polluter - after China.
Developed Countries. (Cuts agreed to.)
The USA........4%
Europe........20% (Offer to go to 30% if others will)
Russia........20% to 25%
Japan.........25%
Canada.........3% (Non binding agreement to 25%)
(Ottawa said it will follow Europe)
Australia.....20% (about!)
New Zealand...10% to 20% (depending on others)
Norway........30% (willing to go to 40%)
Developing Countries. (Cuts agreed to.)
China.........40% to 50% by 2020 from 2005 levels
Brazil........38%
India..........?
Indonesia.....26% (or 41% if other countries support them)
South Korea...30%
Mexico..........8%
Germany expects to get 80% of its energy from renewable sources by 2050. Denmark plans for 100% by 2050. China has more power from windmills than any other country.
How is the US doing? You may well ask! Our reluctance to even acknowledge man made climate change is scary. We seem to be actually attacking the environment and anyone who makes any attempt to protect it. Efforts to protect are being thwarted for economic gains. We continue to give big tax breaks to coal and oil companies. Even as we say we are trying to cut our federal spending we are pumping Big money out to Big Oil and Big Coal. No mention of trying to cut that expense!
How about if we cut subsidies to oil and coal companies (I think they will do just fine, even without that) and use those billions of dollars to develop renewable energy sources? Solar, Wind, Wave, Geo Thermal. Even just reducing our use of energy. The average person in America uses more than twice as much energy per person as the average European! A country with at least our standard of living uses less than half the amount of energy per person than we do! So we could cut in half how much energy we use per person and we would still be using more than every European uses! That would cut our emissions by 50% right there - more than any other country!
Instead we deny climate change and subsidize pollution with payments to oil and coal companies.
Worse we have a line up of clowns who want to close down the EPA (I can remember their name even if Rick Perry can't!) The Chamber of Commerce wants companies to regulate themselves! (Companies that do that have been caught out by the EPA. They checked one company that reported 3 to 5 tons of dangerous cancer causing chemical emissions per year and when the EPA tested them they found 91 tons per year! So much for self regulation.) If we relax pollution standards, as most Republicans want to do, we will do so at our peril. We hear that the companies will prosper more and hire more people. Guess what, companies have plenty of money, their coffers are flush with money (Our money) but they are not hiring. I think they are waiting for the Republicans to get in next year to cut regulations so they can make even more money. They won't hire any more people. If we relax pollution standards all we will have will be dirtier air and water and more cancer, asthma and other illnesses. Which will doubtless please the Health Industry no end! So all we will have will be more pollution and nothing to show for it. No jobs, just more dirt, and more climate change.
I could probably go on for hours, but will let you go. You get the idea. We`are all in dire danger - especially our children. All in the name of Greed. When it comes to money we count for nothing.
I make no excuses. I think it is important, really important. My health and the health and well being of everyone that I love and care about depends upon our environment. That would include my lovely wife Julia, our equally beautiful daughter Sarah and maybe even more importantly, the future of our planet, our wonderful, brilliant, Grandchildren.
No, I did not forget my parents, my sister and all of my nephews, nieces, cousins etc etc. And of course all of our friends.
But to get back to our Environment, which we cannot afford to forget for even a minute.
Lets get to it. Climate change is real. The vast majority of scientists are agreed that it is happening, and it is accelerating. But the US remains the lone deny er. The Republican Presidential candidates are not just denying it they are not even mentioning it. Even President Obama, "champion of the environment" fails to refer to it.
But what is happening in the rest of the industrialized world? Rather than going into a lot of detail I will make a simple list of the % cut of emissions agreed to by each of the Developed counties by 2020 from 1990 levels as agreed in the Copenhagen meeting this year. I'll follow this with a second list of the Developing countries. The US is now the world's second biggest polluter - after China.
Developed Countries. (Cuts agreed to.)
The USA........4%
Europe........20% (Offer to go to 30% if others will)
Russia........20% to 25%
Japan.........25%
Canada.........3% (Non binding agreement to 25%)
(Ottawa said it will follow Europe)
Australia.....20% (about!)
New Zealand...10% to 20% (depending on others)
Norway........30% (willing to go to 40%)
Developing Countries. (Cuts agreed to.)
China.........40% to 50% by 2020 from 2005 levels
Brazil........38%
India..........?
Indonesia.....26% (or 41% if other countries support them)
South Korea...30%
Mexico..........8%
Germany expects to get 80% of its energy from renewable sources by 2050. Denmark plans for 100% by 2050. China has more power from windmills than any other country.
How is the US doing? You may well ask! Our reluctance to even acknowledge man made climate change is scary. We seem to be actually attacking the environment and anyone who makes any attempt to protect it. Efforts to protect are being thwarted for economic gains. We continue to give big tax breaks to coal and oil companies. Even as we say we are trying to cut our federal spending we are pumping Big money out to Big Oil and Big Coal. No mention of trying to cut that expense!
How about if we cut subsidies to oil and coal companies (I think they will do just fine, even without that) and use those billions of dollars to develop renewable energy sources? Solar, Wind, Wave, Geo Thermal. Even just reducing our use of energy. The average person in America uses more than twice as much energy per person as the average European! A country with at least our standard of living uses less than half the amount of energy per person than we do! So we could cut in half how much energy we use per person and we would still be using more than every European uses! That would cut our emissions by 50% right there - more than any other country!
Instead we deny climate change and subsidize pollution with payments to oil and coal companies.
Worse we have a line up of clowns who want to close down the EPA (I can remember their name even if Rick Perry can't!) The Chamber of Commerce wants companies to regulate themselves! (Companies that do that have been caught out by the EPA. They checked one company that reported 3 to 5 tons of dangerous cancer causing chemical emissions per year and when the EPA tested them they found 91 tons per year! So much for self regulation.) If we relax pollution standards, as most Republicans want to do, we will do so at our peril. We hear that the companies will prosper more and hire more people. Guess what, companies have plenty of money, their coffers are flush with money (Our money) but they are not hiring. I think they are waiting for the Republicans to get in next year to cut regulations so they can make even more money. They won't hire any more people. If we relax pollution standards all we will have will be dirtier air and water and more cancer, asthma and other illnesses. Which will doubtless please the Health Industry no end! So all we will have will be more pollution and nothing to show for it. No jobs, just more dirt, and more climate change.
I could probably go on for hours, but will let you go. You get the idea. We`are all in dire danger - especially our children. All in the name of Greed. When it comes to money we count for nothing.
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Dumb ideas.
Has there EVER been a dumber idea than flat roofs? HELLO! Even blondes can see that a flat roof WON"T WORK! Dumb, Dumb, Dumb.
Let me explain, in case the highly retarded inventor of The Flat Roof is reading. If you put a slope on a roof, even a slight slope, it allows water - rain for example -to run off. This means the roof is not exposed to water (rain) laying on the roof 24/7/365 which deteriorates the roof. DUH!
Eventually, sooner or later, the roof WILL leak. Maybe that is the answer - it was invented by a roof repair company. Silly me. That must be the answer.
If you can think of dumber ideas I would be happy to hear them.
(War is out, that doesn't count.) (Ooh another one, US politicians, Congress people and such like, definitely out of the running .)
Let me explain, in case the highly retarded inventor of The Flat Roof is reading. If you put a slope on a roof, even a slight slope, it allows water - rain for example -to run off. This means the roof is not exposed to water (rain) laying on the roof 24/7/365 which deteriorates the roof. DUH!
Eventually, sooner or later, the roof WILL leak. Maybe that is the answer - it was invented by a roof repair company. Silly me. That must be the answer.
If you can think of dumber ideas I would be happy to hear them.
(War is out, that doesn't count.) (Ooh another one, US politicians, Congress people and such like, definitely out of the running .)
Saturday, December 24, 2011
Continuation of my comments on Congress from a few days ago.
As Mark Twain once said, "America is a nation without a distinct criminal class - with the possible exception of Congress."
And it is worse now than it was then!
"All men are created equal." - unless they are Congressmen.
"Do as I say, not as I do." was probably first said by a Congressman.
For example : -
The IRS reports the non-payment of taxes by 7.5% of Senators and 8.4% of Representatives.
39 Senators and 178 Representatives have criminal records.
We have in Congress a disturbing group of elected officials who routinely avoid paying their debts, write bad checks, abuse their spouses, assault people, and openly violate the law.
Recently; -
29 Members of Congress accused of spousal abuse.
3 arrested for fraud.
19 wrote bad checks.
117 bankrupted at least 2 businesses.
3 arrested for fraud.
71 have credit so bad they don't qualify for credit cards.
14 arrested on drug charges.
8 arrested for shoplifting.
21 are defendants in lawsuits.
84 stopped for drunk driving.
In a typical year 3,000 parking tickets are issued to Members of Congress. None are paid. Also as many as a hundred are stopped for drunk diving. "Some are so drunk they can't remember their names." said one police officer. But they cannot be charged. Why? because by law they cannot be charged.
These are the same people that make our laws. Notice that they have different laws for themselves.
And it is worse now than it was then!
"All men are created equal." - unless they are Congressmen.
"Do as I say, not as I do." was probably first said by a Congressman.
For example : -
The IRS reports the non-payment of taxes by 7.5% of Senators and 8.4% of Representatives.
39 Senators and 178 Representatives have criminal records.
We have in Congress a disturbing group of elected officials who routinely avoid paying their debts, write bad checks, abuse their spouses, assault people, and openly violate the law.
Recently; -
29 Members of Congress accused of spousal abuse.
3 arrested for fraud.
19 wrote bad checks.
117 bankrupted at least 2 businesses.
3 arrested for fraud.
71 have credit so bad they don't qualify for credit cards.
14 arrested on drug charges.
8 arrested for shoplifting.
21 are defendants in lawsuits.
84 stopped for drunk driving.
In a typical year 3,000 parking tickets are issued to Members of Congress. None are paid. Also as many as a hundred are stopped for drunk diving. "Some are so drunk they can't remember their names." said one police officer. But they cannot be charged. Why? because by law they cannot be charged.
These are the same people that make our laws. Notice that they have different laws for themselves.
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
What is important in politics?
Apparently to many it is not The Economy - how to turn it around, how to Balance the Budget, whether to Cut or Increase Taxes, how to reduce Unemployment, fix our failing roads, bridges and airports, make College and University affordable for our best and brightest, or even the Pledge of Allegiance. No it is none of things, not one of them gets even a mention in the list of 14 things that the Evangelical group Family Leader wants the Republican candidates to sign.
Instead our politicians are told to sign a list of things that include denouncing same sex marriage, Sharia law and adultery. If they don't sign they will not be endorsed.
Other parts of the pledge include "Robust Reproduction", forswearing adultery, defining marriage as between a man and a woman, men and women in the military must not sleep under the same roof, candidates must agree to uphold the First Amendment (the right of free speech) - apparently the rest of the Bill of Rights doesn't count?
So there is nothing in there asking the candidates to pledge help to any citizens suffering in today's economy. No mention of forgiveness. Nothing at all to help the economy recover. Apparently all that matters in the USA today is a bunch of stuff about gays and marriage.
Sign, or else.
I seem to remember something about a lot of people coming here to escape religious persecution! Where are those people going to have to go now? The Moon? Mars? Certainly Religious Persecution is raising its ugly head now here in the United States of America.
Instead our politicians are told to sign a list of things that include denouncing same sex marriage, Sharia law and adultery. If they don't sign they will not be endorsed.
Other parts of the pledge include "Robust Reproduction", forswearing adultery, defining marriage as between a man and a woman, men and women in the military must not sleep under the same roof, candidates must agree to uphold the First Amendment (the right of free speech) - apparently the rest of the Bill of Rights doesn't count?
So there is nothing in there asking the candidates to pledge help to any citizens suffering in today's economy. No mention of forgiveness. Nothing at all to help the economy recover. Apparently all that matters in the USA today is a bunch of stuff about gays and marriage.
Sign, or else.
I seem to remember something about a lot of people coming here to escape religious persecution! Where are those people going to have to go now? The Moon? Mars? Certainly Religious Persecution is raising its ugly head now here in the United States of America.
Sunday, December 18, 2011
Corruption.
When most of us think of corruption we almost certainly think of the leaders of countries in Africa, like Zimbabwe, or the Middle East, like Iran, or even such diverse countries as Venezuela or Uzbeckistan or Pakistan or Haiti. Plenty of corrution there and elsewhere. In fact on a scale of 1 to 10 half of the countries in the world rate a 5 or less. Well they would wouldn't they!
Of 180 countries the USA rates a surprising 24th (#1 is the least corrupt, and # 180 the most corrupt.) Surprising to me anyway, as I would rate the USA as MUCH more corrupt. Even as one of the most corrupt contries in the world!
I can imagine the indignation! How could I possibly rate the USA as corrupt, compared to countries where, "under the table" bribes are "normal".
Well here is my reasoning: -
Congress, that is the Senate and The House of Representatives, don't just take bribes like politicians do in many, if not most, countries of the world. They actually voted to make it legal! Yes they drafted and voted in laws that make it legal for them to take bribes. It is called Lobbying. Lobbyists bribe members of Congress, give them money or goods, to do their bidding.
How corrupt is that?
At least in most countries that take bribes, they do it "Honestly", by taking cash "Under the Table." In the USA they do it "Honestly" by making it legal! That to me is MORE corrupt.
The Health Industry for example spends One Million Dollars a DAY to bribe Congress to do what they - the Health Industry want. And it is not just the Health Industry. There is Big Oil, Big Business, Big Agriculture, Big Banks, Wall Street and countless others that spend millions of dollars to bribe Congress to do their bidding.
These Mega Crooks in Congress are so blatant in their criminality that they didn't even stop there. They also voted to give themselves a 100% pension every year for the rest of their lives after just one term in office. (Wouldn't you like to get a 100% pension for life after working at your job for just a couple of years? I'm sure you would!) And they receive free Health Insurance for life too. Not just the pitiful Insurance that we, the rabble, get. Oh no, they get a real good one. And they don't even pay for it! We do. Yep, they gave us that privilege too - to pay for not only our own Health Insurance but theirs too.
That is why I say that the USA is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. But maybe I should have just said that the Congress of the USA is.
Of 180 countries the USA rates a surprising 24th (#1 is the least corrupt, and # 180 the most corrupt.) Surprising to me anyway, as I would rate the USA as MUCH more corrupt. Even as one of the most corrupt contries in the world!
I can imagine the indignation! How could I possibly rate the USA as corrupt, compared to countries where, "under the table" bribes are "normal".
Well here is my reasoning: -
Congress, that is the Senate and The House of Representatives, don't just take bribes like politicians do in many, if not most, countries of the world. They actually voted to make it legal! Yes they drafted and voted in laws that make it legal for them to take bribes. It is called Lobbying. Lobbyists bribe members of Congress, give them money or goods, to do their bidding.
How corrupt is that?
At least in most countries that take bribes, they do it "Honestly", by taking cash "Under the Table." In the USA they do it "Honestly" by making it legal! That to me is MORE corrupt.
The Health Industry for example spends One Million Dollars a DAY to bribe Congress to do what they - the Health Industry want. And it is not just the Health Industry. There is Big Oil, Big Business, Big Agriculture, Big Banks, Wall Street and countless others that spend millions of dollars to bribe Congress to do their bidding.
These Mega Crooks in Congress are so blatant in their criminality that they didn't even stop there. They also voted to give themselves a 100% pension every year for the rest of their lives after just one term in office. (Wouldn't you like to get a 100% pension for life after working at your job for just a couple of years? I'm sure you would!) And they receive free Health Insurance for life too. Not just the pitiful Insurance that we, the rabble, get. Oh no, they get a real good one. And they don't even pay for it! We do. Yep, they gave us that privilege too - to pay for not only our own Health Insurance but theirs too.
That is why I say that the USA is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. But maybe I should have just said that the Congress of the USA is.
Sobriety, wisdom and judgement - really?
A recent article in a newspaper credited Mitt Romney with Sobriety, Wisdom and Judgement.
Using MY good judgement I have considered each one of these verdicts and come to my own opinions. These are : -
Sobriety - I give him a 'good' on this as I have not heard otherwise from any authorities, and I am sure that if he committed any improprieties while "Under the influence" we would have heard about them.
Wisdom - a sound 'F' on all counts here. His failure on ANY showing of Wisdom is awesomely apparent every day! Just watch any news program (except Fox "news") or read almost any newspaper to learn of his latest inconsistency, extravagance or non-sensical half baked idea.
Judgement - here I must question the judgement of anyone who would say that he has judgement! I can't think of a single instance when he has shown any sign of good judgement. Can you?
I await your answer with bated breath.
Using MY good judgement I have considered each one of these verdicts and come to my own opinions. These are : -
Sobriety - I give him a 'good' on this as I have not heard otherwise from any authorities, and I am sure that if he committed any improprieties while "Under the influence" we would have heard about them.
Wisdom - a sound 'F' on all counts here. His failure on ANY showing of Wisdom is awesomely apparent every day! Just watch any news program (except Fox "news") or read almost any newspaper to learn of his latest inconsistency, extravagance or non-sensical half baked idea.
Judgement - here I must question the judgement of anyone who would say that he has judgement! I can't think of a single instance when he has shown any sign of good judgement. Can you?
I await your answer with bated breath.
Saturday, December 17, 2011
Just a bit of fun.
Thinking back over the last few weeks I am struck by the "mistakes" made by the Republican line up for President.
Lets hope that if one of them gets elected to that post (Horror of horrors!) they don't make even more mistakes. Mistakes made when you have the kind of power that the President of the United States has, could end in the demise of us all!
I will begin my list with those gaffs of Michelle Bachman - ladies first.
"If elected I will close the Iranian Embassy in Tehran." It was closed, by President Carter, in 1980.
"Hurricane Irene was a divine message from God because we are not balancing our budget." No comment from me here!
"The HPV vaccine (to prevent sexually transmitted diseases) causes mental retardation." Here I wonder if she had the vaccine! (It does not cause mental retardation - in case you are wondering.)
To continue, let's move on to Rick Perry.
He got the date of the election in 2012 wrong - it is on November 6th 2012 not November 12th 2012. (To be fair to him, it has only been since 1845 that the date has been set as the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November.)
He is apparently also ignorant about when our youth is first allowed to vote - it is at age 18, not age 21 as he seems to think! Age 21 is when they are first legally allowed to drink alcohol. To set the record straight, they can drive at 16 (Too young in my opinion.) Serve in the armed forces at 18 (Way too young for anyone - I would make it 65 years of age for that privilege. Better yet make it MANDATORY for ANY politician of ANY age to serve in the front line if we get into a war!. That ought to drastically cut down on the number of wars we get into!)
He forgot the name of one of the three agencies that he wants to close down.
Here I must give him credit for saying that he is not good at debates! After all those blunders perhaps he should avoid speeches too? Certainly I would be EXTREMELY NERVOUS about letting him loose in The White House!
Lets move on to Mr Cain, although as he is out of the race it seems pointless to poke fun at him too. But I just can't resist!
He mistakenly thought that China was "developing" nuclear weapons! Hey don't laugh, who can keep up with all those countries that have nuclear weapons nowadays?
He thinks the US recognises the government of Taiwan. (We stopped recognising it 32 years ago!) I don't suppose China minds if the US President thinks we still recognise them. A minor mistake? Whats a little mistake between friends?
He asked some reporters interviewing him what Obama's policy was on Libya! I mean there was hardly anything about Libya on the news. Was there?
But he made up for all his errors with his strong character!
I'd start on Newt now, but I might run out of space.
And I have to pause to have a good laugh. Or perhaps I should have a nervous breakdown?
Lets hope that if one of them gets elected to that post (Horror of horrors!) they don't make even more mistakes. Mistakes made when you have the kind of power that the President of the United States has, could end in the demise of us all!
I will begin my list with those gaffs of Michelle Bachman - ladies first.
"If elected I will close the Iranian Embassy in Tehran." It was closed, by President Carter, in 1980.
"Hurricane Irene was a divine message from God because we are not balancing our budget." No comment from me here!
"The HPV vaccine (to prevent sexually transmitted diseases) causes mental retardation." Here I wonder if she had the vaccine! (It does not cause mental retardation - in case you are wondering.)
To continue, let's move on to Rick Perry.
He got the date of the election in 2012 wrong - it is on November 6th 2012 not November 12th 2012. (To be fair to him, it has only been since 1845 that the date has been set as the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November.)
He is apparently also ignorant about when our youth is first allowed to vote - it is at age 18, not age 21 as he seems to think! Age 21 is when they are first legally allowed to drink alcohol. To set the record straight, they can drive at 16 (Too young in my opinion.) Serve in the armed forces at 18 (Way too young for anyone - I would make it 65 years of age for that privilege. Better yet make it MANDATORY for ANY politician of ANY age to serve in the front line if we get into a war!. That ought to drastically cut down on the number of wars we get into!)
He forgot the name of one of the three agencies that he wants to close down.
Here I must give him credit for saying that he is not good at debates! After all those blunders perhaps he should avoid speeches too? Certainly I would be EXTREMELY NERVOUS about letting him loose in The White House!
Lets move on to Mr Cain, although as he is out of the race it seems pointless to poke fun at him too. But I just can't resist!
He mistakenly thought that China was "developing" nuclear weapons! Hey don't laugh, who can keep up with all those countries that have nuclear weapons nowadays?
He thinks the US recognises the government of Taiwan. (We stopped recognising it 32 years ago!) I don't suppose China minds if the US President thinks we still recognise them. A minor mistake? Whats a little mistake between friends?
He asked some reporters interviewing him what Obama's policy was on Libya! I mean there was hardly anything about Libya on the news. Was there?
But he made up for all his errors with his strong character!
I'd start on Newt now, but I might run out of space.
And I have to pause to have a good laugh. Or perhaps I should have a nervous breakdown?
Friday, December 16, 2011
Once upon a time . . .
. . . . there were millions of Bison, Passenger Pigeons, Ducks, small furry animals, fish and other animals - and just a few people. "Harvesting" some of these creatures was not a problem, you went out and got a duck for dinner and fed the family, or a deer and fed the community and your family for several days. A fishing trip brought about a change of diet, fish, crabs and shellfish. No problem. The population of "Food animals", was large, seemingly inexhaustible.
But now we are no longer few, we number in the millions, indeed the hundreds of millions. We know now that the "Wild food", is not inexhaustible and in fact many have become extinct - like the Passenger Pigeon that once numbered in the billions - or almost extinct like the Bison, and many fish and birds.
But do we change our habits? Of course not, we continue to hunt our "Inexhaustible" wild food to the point of extinction. And as we are many, inexorably growing in numbers and becoming increasingly clever in ways of catching our wild heritage, the pressure on them increases daily.
Also we now not only use these creatures for our food we use them for pet food, fertilizer, animal feed, any use that will bring in a profit, with no thought to what it is doing to us and our environment.
Some of the worst slaughter happens to animals we cannot even see, such as Oysters and Menhaden. Clean water is necessary for the survival not just of the country's animal, bird and fish populations but also for us. We too need clean water and air. Our greed for more money blinds us to this need. Oysters and Menhaden spend their whole lives, 24 hours a day, cleaning the waters of the Chesapeake Bay for example. So what do we do? We remove them. We eat the Oysters, and as we cannot eat all that are caught we ship the rest to other parts of the world. We can't eat the Menhaden, so we feed them to our animals, and to our pets, and to fish that we can eat, and for fertilizer.
So a miracle of efficiency is removed from the Bay and the Bay dies. Now we have to spend Billions of dollars to clean the Bay!! We had the worlds most efficient cleaners working at doing just that 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, for free! Now we have removed them and will have to spend, probably more money than they brought in in the form of taxes to the State treasury, to clean the Bay.
Of course I should not ignore the fact that the removal of almost all of the Menhaden and Oysters has made a few people very rich and the attempts to clean the Bay will make more people rich. (This will never happen because more rich people will bribe the politicians to remove the teeth from any attempts to clean the Bay.) They want to continue to dump chicken manure into the Bay - because that is a cheaper way to dispose of it. And to pour billions of gallons of fertilizer, weedkiller and insecticide into the Bay - in pursuit of the "perfect" lawn - as millions of homeowners continue to do, because it is their "Right" to have a better lawn than their neighbors, even though they can see the dead fish floating off of their beaches, killed by their poisons washed into the water, and by the poisoned insects that the fish ate. Even though they can see the lack of Bay grasses that used to be there to nurture fish, crabs and other creatures essential to the Bays health, killed by their weedkillers. None of this seems to matter - as long as they can have that "Perfect" weed and insect free lawn.
My lawn is my idea of a perfect lawn. It has had no fertilizer on it, and yet it grows. (Perhaps because I let the grass clippings lay there) No insecticides are sprayed - there are still a few natural "Insecticides" around - called birds. No weedkillers - because I don't have any "weeds". I bet that surprises you! No, I don't have any "weeds", I have violets, I have, red, white and pink clover, I have a profusion of tiny yellow flowers, small red flowers, and countless other flowers that I can't begin to name. When I walk out onto my lawn and see the flowers, with the bees and other insects working them, I see a beautiful lawn. I look next door and see a boring green lawn, just one color. (The raft of dead fish float just off of his lawn) Look back at mine and it is lush with color, generous in its variety. So much so that I am reluctant to mow it!
We are killing not just our wonderful variety of animals, fish and birds as fast as we can, we are killing ourselves, and even more scary our children and grandchildren. How many children suffer from allergies and asthma now? A lot. Many times the numbers that suffered from those insidious ailments and afflictions just a few years ago. Of my parents, my friends, relatives and neighbors, I honestly can't recall any. But most of my grandchildren and their friends suffer from asthma and allergies. This has happened in two or three generations. What is to come if we continue to poison our home (The Earth) in the name of profit and greed?
Already we can see that it costs more to put back what we destroyed, but still we refuse to do the right thing. Corruption is so rampant in all walks of business, government and politics that we stand almost no chance of correcting our misdeeds.
But now we are no longer few, we number in the millions, indeed the hundreds of millions. We know now that the "Wild food", is not inexhaustible and in fact many have become extinct - like the Passenger Pigeon that once numbered in the billions - or almost extinct like the Bison, and many fish and birds.
But do we change our habits? Of course not, we continue to hunt our "Inexhaustible" wild food to the point of extinction. And as we are many, inexorably growing in numbers and becoming increasingly clever in ways of catching our wild heritage, the pressure on them increases daily.
Also we now not only use these creatures for our food we use them for pet food, fertilizer, animal feed, any use that will bring in a profit, with no thought to what it is doing to us and our environment.
Some of the worst slaughter happens to animals we cannot even see, such as Oysters and Menhaden. Clean water is necessary for the survival not just of the country's animal, bird and fish populations but also for us. We too need clean water and air. Our greed for more money blinds us to this need. Oysters and Menhaden spend their whole lives, 24 hours a day, cleaning the waters of the Chesapeake Bay for example. So what do we do? We remove them. We eat the Oysters, and as we cannot eat all that are caught we ship the rest to other parts of the world. We can't eat the Menhaden, so we feed them to our animals, and to our pets, and to fish that we can eat, and for fertilizer.
So a miracle of efficiency is removed from the Bay and the Bay dies. Now we have to spend Billions of dollars to clean the Bay!! We had the worlds most efficient cleaners working at doing just that 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, for free! Now we have removed them and will have to spend, probably more money than they brought in in the form of taxes to the State treasury, to clean the Bay.
Of course I should not ignore the fact that the removal of almost all of the Menhaden and Oysters has made a few people very rich and the attempts to clean the Bay will make more people rich. (This will never happen because more rich people will bribe the politicians to remove the teeth from any attempts to clean the Bay.) They want to continue to dump chicken manure into the Bay - because that is a cheaper way to dispose of it. And to pour billions of gallons of fertilizer, weedkiller and insecticide into the Bay - in pursuit of the "perfect" lawn - as millions of homeowners continue to do, because it is their "Right" to have a better lawn than their neighbors, even though they can see the dead fish floating off of their beaches, killed by their poisons washed into the water, and by the poisoned insects that the fish ate. Even though they can see the lack of Bay grasses that used to be there to nurture fish, crabs and other creatures essential to the Bays health, killed by their weedkillers. None of this seems to matter - as long as they can have that "Perfect" weed and insect free lawn.
My lawn is my idea of a perfect lawn. It has had no fertilizer on it, and yet it grows. (Perhaps because I let the grass clippings lay there) No insecticides are sprayed - there are still a few natural "Insecticides" around - called birds. No weedkillers - because I don't have any "weeds". I bet that surprises you! No, I don't have any "weeds", I have violets, I have, red, white and pink clover, I have a profusion of tiny yellow flowers, small red flowers, and countless other flowers that I can't begin to name. When I walk out onto my lawn and see the flowers, with the bees and other insects working them, I see a beautiful lawn. I look next door and see a boring green lawn, just one color. (The raft of dead fish float just off of his lawn) Look back at mine and it is lush with color, generous in its variety. So much so that I am reluctant to mow it!
We are killing not just our wonderful variety of animals, fish and birds as fast as we can, we are killing ourselves, and even more scary our children and grandchildren. How many children suffer from allergies and asthma now? A lot. Many times the numbers that suffered from those insidious ailments and afflictions just a few years ago. Of my parents, my friends, relatives and neighbors, I honestly can't recall any. But most of my grandchildren and their friends suffer from asthma and allergies. This has happened in two or three generations. What is to come if we continue to poison our home (The Earth) in the name of profit and greed?
Already we can see that it costs more to put back what we destroyed, but still we refuse to do the right thing. Corruption is so rampant in all walks of business, government and politics that we stand almost no chance of correcting our misdeeds.
Sunday, December 11, 2011
Is it time for a political comment? More of an economic comment really.
I was watching Fareed Zacharia on CNN this morning. For those of you who don't know him, he is an Economist who was born in India. He is also very intelligent and has a grasp on economic issues that keep on surprising me. He seems to cut to the meat of the situation or problem every time.
One of his guests this morning was John Huntsman - one of the Republican contenders for the Presidential nomination. If I were Obama I would more worried about John Huntsman than I would be about most of the other candidates. He made a lot of sense. There were still some problems, in my mind anyway. For one thing he supports cutting taxes, which I think is a mistake. It seems to me that we are way under taxed. Pretty obvious really when you consider that we borrow 40% of all that we spend! You couldn't keep that up at home for long, could you. But of course it is an easy vote getter to say "I want to cut your taxes".
The facts, as Zacharia pointed out, are that our tax rate at present is the LOWEST that it has been in more than 60 years! It is also the lowest of the top 28 world economies. In other words our tax rate is the lowest of the top 28 economies in the world. And it doesn't seem to be helping does it? He then pointed out that growth in all areas has historically been better when taxes were higher! Under Reagan and under Clinton for example.
Our infrastructure - roads, airports etc - standing in the world has dropped dramatically as had a long list of standings, not least of which was from number 1 in University graduations to number 14. Our output of graduates in the scientific areas was even worse.
Seems to me that we need an increase in taxes. And we should use the money to pay down our debt, to rebuild our roads, airports etc, and to help our young people to go into the maths and sciences at university. We should also encourage saving - remember when we used to be encouraged to save? I do. Those savings were used to loan money to businesses.
And while I'm at it, when you go to war you need to ask everyone to help and to sacrifice. That has always been the way. Now we just sit in front of the TV and watch the wars happening, like it was some sort of "Reality Show". I'm sure people would respond if we were told "Hey we are at war, we need everyone to pitch in. Cut your use of electricity, gasoline, or whatever is necessary. Oh and by the way, there will be a 'war tax', an across the board tax of 5% of every ones income to pay for the war (or whatever amount is deemed necessary)" That would bring home to everyone that we are at war. And it might bring it to an end earlier.
Just a few common sense thoughts.
One of his guests this morning was John Huntsman - one of the Republican contenders for the Presidential nomination. If I were Obama I would more worried about John Huntsman than I would be about most of the other candidates. He made a lot of sense. There were still some problems, in my mind anyway. For one thing he supports cutting taxes, which I think is a mistake. It seems to me that we are way under taxed. Pretty obvious really when you consider that we borrow 40% of all that we spend! You couldn't keep that up at home for long, could you. But of course it is an easy vote getter to say "I want to cut your taxes".
The facts, as Zacharia pointed out, are that our tax rate at present is the LOWEST that it has been in more than 60 years! It is also the lowest of the top 28 world economies. In other words our tax rate is the lowest of the top 28 economies in the world. And it doesn't seem to be helping does it? He then pointed out that growth in all areas has historically been better when taxes were higher! Under Reagan and under Clinton for example.
Our infrastructure - roads, airports etc - standing in the world has dropped dramatically as had a long list of standings, not least of which was from number 1 in University graduations to number 14. Our output of graduates in the scientific areas was even worse.
Seems to me that we need an increase in taxes. And we should use the money to pay down our debt, to rebuild our roads, airports etc, and to help our young people to go into the maths and sciences at university. We should also encourage saving - remember when we used to be encouraged to save? I do. Those savings were used to loan money to businesses.
And while I'm at it, when you go to war you need to ask everyone to help and to sacrifice. That has always been the way. Now we just sit in front of the TV and watch the wars happening, like it was some sort of "Reality Show". I'm sure people would respond if we were told "Hey we are at war, we need everyone to pitch in. Cut your use of electricity, gasoline, or whatever is necessary. Oh and by the way, there will be a 'war tax', an across the board tax of 5% of every ones income to pay for the war (or whatever amount is deemed necessary)" That would bring home to everyone that we are at war. And it might bring it to an end earlier.
Just a few common sense thoughts.
Thursday, December 8, 2011
Why do we NEVER learn?
Yesterday my Blog mentioned World War Two. Wouldn't you think a War that killed an estimated at least 40 million people would have said "never war no more more" even more than the "Ban the Bomb" movement of my day. But no, war continues to be our favorite pastime.
On another note, the Depression of 1929 followed a time of no restrictions, regulations or controls on Big Banks and Wall Street. And what are Republicans calling for now? Removing all controls and regulations on Big Banks and Wall Street. They refuse to vote for the new regulator, even though a new law that they voted in just last year requires a regulator. Every day that the Republicans delay means thousands of people are vulnerable to unrestricted banks and loan agencies that are charging as much as 25% a MONTH in interest! That's 300% a year! And with no regulator in place there is no one to stop it.
Talk about not learning from past mistakes, here we are struggling to come out of a financial disaster caused by unregulated banks that were allowed to gamble with OUR money and the Republicans are trying to get even the weak regulations that are in place now, removed. What are they thinking? Do they think that banks will regulate themselves? Or are they so much in the pockets of the Big Banks and Wall Street that they think they have no choice but to do their bidding?
I give up - which doubtless is what the greed mongers want.
On another note, the Depression of 1929 followed a time of no restrictions, regulations or controls on Big Banks and Wall Street. And what are Republicans calling for now? Removing all controls and regulations on Big Banks and Wall Street. They refuse to vote for the new regulator, even though a new law that they voted in just last year requires a regulator. Every day that the Republicans delay means thousands of people are vulnerable to unrestricted banks and loan agencies that are charging as much as 25% a MONTH in interest! That's 300% a year! And with no regulator in place there is no one to stop it.
Talk about not learning from past mistakes, here we are struggling to come out of a financial disaster caused by unregulated banks that were allowed to gamble with OUR money and the Republicans are trying to get even the weak regulations that are in place now, removed. What are they thinking? Do they think that banks will regulate themselves? Or are they so much in the pockets of the Big Banks and Wall Street that they think they have no choice but to do their bidding?
I give up - which doubtless is what the greed mongers want.
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
December 7 th, a day that will live in infamy.
NPR - National Public Radio did a wonderful program today on the attack on Pearl Harbor, the events leading up to and following it. They also discussed Winston Churchill and President Roosevelt and it included a lot of things that I had not known before - I am 70 years old and consider myself well read - as I like to say, "You learn something new every day."
I urge all Americans, and indeed all non-Americans to read about World War Two, as well as any other things that might interest them. In fact I even suggest reading books and stories that may not seem of interest to you - you might be surprised at what you learn. You can never learn too much. Knowledge is its own reward and its own escape from, and into, the World at large.
I have never regretted reading or learning anything. You just cannot know too much, but you can definitely know too little. Many, many people know too little - it is known as ignorance and ignorance is a blight suffered by far too many of us. To be Ignorant is to be Unaware and Incompetent.
Ben Franklin said "If you think Education is expensive, try Ignorance." and Mark Twain said, "If you have Ignorance and Confidence, success is sure." (Don't quote me here but doesn't that seem to describe several of the Republican candidates today?)
I urge all Americans, and indeed all non-Americans to read about World War Two, as well as any other things that might interest them. In fact I even suggest reading books and stories that may not seem of interest to you - you might be surprised at what you learn. You can never learn too much. Knowledge is its own reward and its own escape from, and into, the World at large.
I have never regretted reading or learning anything. You just cannot know too much, but you can definitely know too little. Many, many people know too little - it is known as ignorance and ignorance is a blight suffered by far too many of us. To be Ignorant is to be Unaware and Incompetent.
Ben Franklin said "If you think Education is expensive, try Ignorance." and Mark Twain said, "If you have Ignorance and Confidence, success is sure." (Don't quote me here but doesn't that seem to describe several of the Republican candidates today?)
Monday, December 5, 2011
Why I don't take sugar in my tea or coffee.
Isn't that a strange title? I am sure that it really grabs your attention! Not! Anyway, if anyone has read this far possibly they are interested enough to read the "rest of the story", as someone famous once said.
When I was about 17 years old and an apprentice in the British Admiralty we drank tea at the two tea breaks each day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon.
We`all contributed a very small amount of money each week to cover the cost of the tea, sugar and milk. One day I was there to pick up my mug of tea, and the "Tea Waller" as we called him, asked if I took sugar. I did, and said I so, whereupon he put the spoon into the bowl to get some sugar for me. I glanced into the bowl and seeing some black spots asked what they were. looking in, Ted the Tea Waller said matter of factly, "Mouse droppings". He then took the spoon, removed most of them and dumped them unceremoniously onto the floor.
I have not taken sugar in my tea or coffee ever since - over 50 years! I was going to take my own sugar in to use, but never did get around to it and found that I quite liked my tea without sugar.
A teaspoon of sugar is about 25 calories. I think I probably took 2 teaspoons, so 50 calories. I drink between four and six cups of tea or coffee a day, lets say five. Five times 50 equals 250 calories a day saved. Times 365 days equals 91,250 calories a year. Times 50 years equals 45,625,000 calories.
Aren't figures fun? So, it is generally considered that a pound of fat is 3500 calories. If I divide my 45,625,000 calories by 3500 I come up with one thousand three hundred and three and a half pounds! Now, I weigh 160 pounds, so if I had taken sugar in my tea and coffee for the last 50 years I would now weigh 1463 pounds! (I took off the extra half a pound - for that time I was sick and would have had less cups of tea.) A sobering thought!
Talking about sobering, how many calories are in a beer or a glass of Scotch . . . . .
When I was about 17 years old and an apprentice in the British Admiralty we drank tea at the two tea breaks each day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon.
We`all contributed a very small amount of money each week to cover the cost of the tea, sugar and milk. One day I was there to pick up my mug of tea, and the "Tea Waller" as we called him, asked if I took sugar. I did, and said I so, whereupon he put the spoon into the bowl to get some sugar for me. I glanced into the bowl and seeing some black spots asked what they were. looking in, Ted the Tea Waller said matter of factly, "Mouse droppings". He then took the spoon, removed most of them and dumped them unceremoniously onto the floor.
I have not taken sugar in my tea or coffee ever since - over 50 years! I was going to take my own sugar in to use, but never did get around to it and found that I quite liked my tea without sugar.
A teaspoon of sugar is about 25 calories. I think I probably took 2 teaspoons, so 50 calories. I drink between four and six cups of tea or coffee a day, lets say five. Five times 50 equals 250 calories a day saved. Times 365 days equals 91,250 calories a year. Times 50 years equals 45,625,000 calories.
Aren't figures fun? So, it is generally considered that a pound of fat is 3500 calories. If I divide my 45,625,000 calories by 3500 I come up with one thousand three hundred and three and a half pounds! Now, I weigh 160 pounds, so if I had taken sugar in my tea and coffee for the last 50 years I would now weigh 1463 pounds! (I took off the extra half a pound - for that time I was sick and would have had less cups of tea.) A sobering thought!
Talking about sobering, how many calories are in a beer or a glass of Scotch . . . . .
Monday, November 7, 2011
Fog.
As many of my faithful readers know, I have often said that The Lake is different every time that I look at it. This can mean day to day, hour to hour and even minute to minute. I suppose if you wanted to be a real stickler you could even say second to second or nano-second to nano-second - whatever they are - because of course it is never EXACTLY the same. The waves are different, the leaves and the birds are in different positions and so on.
But of course I am not referring to the ever changing nano-seconds, or even seconds and minutes. Although I must say that a few minutes can indeed make a big difference, when the sun comes up in the morning the colors on The Lake and the trees do indeed change by the minute, as it does at sunset, or when the sun goes behind a cloud.
But today I am reporting on a major difference to "The Norm", at 6.00 am today as I struggled out of bed to head for my morning coffee my gaze was met by a blank view of white through the window! Had Julia put up white curtains in the night and pulled them across? Of course she hadn't, Mother Nature not Julia, had changed my view of the world and more specifically of The Lake, it was enshrouded in thick fog.
My view of the world was all white. I could not even see the pier a mere 100 feet away and even the trees right in front of the windows were mere shadows.
It is now 8am and the light of my life, known by others as the Delightful Julia, has emerged from her coma and drowsily commented that it is foggy out. I, of course report that it was indeed very foggy a couple of hours ago, but that now it is just a little foggy, almost a mist in fact. The Lake looks almost like something with the edges taken off, sort of rounded, like a pastel painting or one of those Chinese Artists renditions, that they do so well.
I can hear the fog horns on the Bay and the sun is doing its work of burning off the fog. Soon it will be gone and I will be able to view The Lake in all its Glorious Fall Colors.
Gotta get some more coffee and settle down to watch.
But of course I am not referring to the ever changing nano-seconds, or even seconds and minutes. Although I must say that a few minutes can indeed make a big difference, when the sun comes up in the morning the colors on The Lake and the trees do indeed change by the minute, as it does at sunset, or when the sun goes behind a cloud.
But today I am reporting on a major difference to "The Norm", at 6.00 am today as I struggled out of bed to head for my morning coffee my gaze was met by a blank view of white through the window! Had Julia put up white curtains in the night and pulled them across? Of course she hadn't, Mother Nature not Julia, had changed my view of the world and more specifically of The Lake, it was enshrouded in thick fog.
My view of the world was all white. I could not even see the pier a mere 100 feet away and even the trees right in front of the windows were mere shadows.
It is now 8am and the light of my life, known by others as the Delightful Julia, has emerged from her coma and drowsily commented that it is foggy out. I, of course report that it was indeed very foggy a couple of hours ago, but that now it is just a little foggy, almost a mist in fact. The Lake looks almost like something with the edges taken off, sort of rounded, like a pastel painting or one of those Chinese Artists renditions, that they do so well.
I can hear the fog horns on the Bay and the sun is doing its work of burning off the fog. Soon it will be gone and I will be able to view The Lake in all its Glorious Fall Colors.
Gotta get some more coffee and settle down to watch.
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
Peace.
Peace, Silence, Stillness, that is what I am seeing outside of my window today. A scene of perfection if I ever saw one. The only movements are of clouds of birds as they glide by and the occasional leaf as it flaps it's way down to join the others on the growing mat of colors on my lawn.
I have stuff to do today, how wonderful it would be instead to stay here and watch, as Seinfeld would say - nothing.
But I have to do stuff. Get the Pick Up Truck after it's major repair, pick up straw and chicken food, visit the bank, call customers, clean out the chicken house, dump my compost tumbler and refill it, spread the compost onto the garden. Pull old plants and weeds and consign them to the compost tumbler along with the chicken sh*t. Light the fire, get wood in, feed the cats, and that is just this morning! There is more for the afternoon, but I won't bore you with that, you have your own stuff to do I'm sure.
Meanwhile I think I will have another cup of coffee and enjoy that peaceful world outside my window for a few more minutes before I have to join the fray of "The Real World."
I have stuff to do today, how wonderful it would be instead to stay here and watch, as Seinfeld would say - nothing.
But I have to do stuff. Get the Pick Up Truck after it's major repair, pick up straw and chicken food, visit the bank, call customers, clean out the chicken house, dump my compost tumbler and refill it, spread the compost onto the garden. Pull old plants and weeds and consign them to the compost tumbler along with the chicken sh*t. Light the fire, get wood in, feed the cats, and that is just this morning! There is more for the afternoon, but I won't bore you with that, you have your own stuff to do I'm sure.
Meanwhile I think I will have another cup of coffee and enjoy that peaceful world outside my window for a few more minutes before I have to join the fray of "The Real World."
Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill said that America will always do the right thing - after they have first exhausted all other possibilities.
I guess the question is, have we exhausted all other possibilities yet? It would certainly seem that we must be getting close, how many other things are there left for us to do before we 'do the right thing' - whatever that may be.
The alternative may be collapse. That is what seems to happen to things when they build up too much.
Take The Mighty Roman Empire, few know that it collapsed, not over centuries, but over one or two decades. The Ming Dynasty in China, built up over centuries fell in a single decade. The Incas were masters of all they surveyed in 1520, by 1530 they were all gone, destroyed by Spaniards, gunpowder and disease.
Closer to home and our time, in case you think those things happened a long time ago and can't happen now, how about the Soviet Union - was that sudden enough for you? What about the dictatorships of North Africa? Ali, Mubarick, Ghadaffi, here today with their fortunes and palaces, gone tomorrow.
Is the European economy about to collapse? And if it does, can ours be far behind? The history of collapses shows them to be sudden, not slow declines as you might think. Sudden and complete.
Oh, did I forget to mention that ALL of those collapses that I mentioned, as well as all the others over the centuries, were all the result of GREED. (You can check in with Wall Street, Bankers, Goldman Sachs et al on the meaning of GREED.)
Beware. And be ready. If you can!
I guess the question is, have we exhausted all other possibilities yet? It would certainly seem that we must be getting close, how many other things are there left for us to do before we 'do the right thing' - whatever that may be.
The alternative may be collapse. That is what seems to happen to things when they build up too much.
Take The Mighty Roman Empire, few know that it collapsed, not over centuries, but over one or two decades. The Ming Dynasty in China, built up over centuries fell in a single decade. The Incas were masters of all they surveyed in 1520, by 1530 they were all gone, destroyed by Spaniards, gunpowder and disease.
Closer to home and our time, in case you think those things happened a long time ago and can't happen now, how about the Soviet Union - was that sudden enough for you? What about the dictatorships of North Africa? Ali, Mubarick, Ghadaffi, here today with their fortunes and palaces, gone tomorrow.
Is the European economy about to collapse? And if it does, can ours be far behind? The history of collapses shows them to be sudden, not slow declines as you might think. Sudden and complete.
Oh, did I forget to mention that ALL of those collapses that I mentioned, as well as all the others over the centuries, were all the result of GREED. (You can check in with Wall Street, Bankers, Goldman Sachs et al on the meaning of GREED.)
Beware. And be ready. If you can!
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Seven Billion . . .
. . .Dollars or People? Both actually, the world now officially has seven billion people to support. Coincidentally, Goldman Sachs, a name synonamous with the word Greed, has set aside $7 Billion dollars for Bonuses for it's already Super Overpaid employees. Its associates alone are set to receive an average of $3 million each in bonuses, and there are around 500 associates!
Unbelievably, that money could give one dollar to every single person in the entire world!! Or looking at it another way, if the average family consists of five persons, each family would receive $5.
It may be of interest to you to know that Goldman Sachs received $6 Billion dollars in bailout money from US - YOU AND ME!!! Now they are going to take that $6 Billion dollars of OUR hard earned money, add another Billion to it, and share it out among themselves!!
$6 Billion dollars works out at around $20 for every person in the USA. Or using my earlier figure of 5 people per family it is about $100 per family, that is how much we gave Goldman Sachs to "Bail them out". I don't know about you, but I could put $100 to a lot better use than giving bonuses to the very people that caused the problems that I, and the entire country, is suffering from.
Can anyone tell me why they deserved to receive $6 Billion of our money? Is it for doing such a great job? At what? At robbing us? At destroying our economy? At setting a new standard for greed?
Just in case you didn't already know, I am pretty upset. I can certainly understand why the 99% are upset with the 1%.
Unbelievably, that money could give one dollar to every single person in the entire world!! Or looking at it another way, if the average family consists of five persons, each family would receive $5.
It may be of interest to you to know that Goldman Sachs received $6 Billion dollars in bailout money from US - YOU AND ME!!! Now they are going to take that $6 Billion dollars of OUR hard earned money, add another Billion to it, and share it out among themselves!!
$6 Billion dollars works out at around $20 for every person in the USA. Or using my earlier figure of 5 people per family it is about $100 per family, that is how much we gave Goldman Sachs to "Bail them out". I don't know about you, but I could put $100 to a lot better use than giving bonuses to the very people that caused the problems that I, and the entire country, is suffering from.
Can anyone tell me why they deserved to receive $6 Billion of our money? Is it for doing such a great job? At what? At robbing us? At destroying our economy? At setting a new standard for greed?
Just in case you didn't already know, I am pretty upset. I can certainly understand why the 99% are upset with the 1%.
Monday, October 31, 2011
Nature Paints a Picture.
The view from here today is breathtaking - no I am not referring to my view of Julia, which of course is always thrilling and exciting - instead I allude to the view from our Window on The Lake, which is now at it's most amazing. The colors are as bright as any in nature, surely it would be impossible for even a Michelangelo to capture and do justice to this scene? And here it is, laid out before me to enjoy for free.
Wait, let's not get too carried away now, Anne Arundel County does of course impose a heavy penalty for living in the Land of the FREE and the Brave, a penalty known as Property Taxes which they are glad to collect from us at the rate of about $150 a week, or about three times as much as we spend for food, four times as much as we spend on road tax, insurance and gas for our car, but less than one quarter of what we spend on our mortgage. I'm not sure if it is a bargain or not, but I certainly can no more imagine living without my view of The Lake than I could of not enjoying my daily dose of inhaling the beauty of Julia.
Wait, let's not get too carried away now, Anne Arundel County does of course impose a heavy penalty for living in the Land of the FREE and the Brave, a penalty known as Property Taxes which they are glad to collect from us at the rate of about $150 a week, or about three times as much as we spend for food, four times as much as we spend on road tax, insurance and gas for our car, but less than one quarter of what we spend on our mortgage. I'm not sure if it is a bargain or not, but I certainly can no more imagine living without my view of The Lake than I could of not enjoying my daily dose of inhaling the beauty of Julia.
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