Stimulus and Spending; Are They Really the Same?

Posted on 06/02/2009 by Grumpa Joe
My Flag Flies Everyday

My Flag Flies Everyday

I watched the speech and waited for something that would make sense to me. It didn’t happen. Last night, President Barack Obama addressed the Democratic representatives at their posh retreat in Williamsburg, Virginia. I recall many times during my working life when the company was going through a recession our leader never sent us to a resort for a retreat. Instead, he put the screws to everyone in the company to shape up. That meant working harder, smarter, and with fewer resources. I survived the stress with some long term side effects that I carry to this day. It was never a fun time to let people go, and to work the ones, who remained, harder to get more done.  

I don’t see that happening in the government sector of the economy. The government never lets staff go, they do make it bigger though. Back to the speech. I saw PBO at his finest. His suave and flawless delivery reminded me of his campaign speeches that hypnotized the masses. He did it again last night. I saw something else this time. He definitely had the sound of a black preacher man in his timing and his delivery. The audience of democratic leaders shouting “amen,” to his points of emphasis. Maybe he did listen to the Rev. Jeremiah all those years. He certainly sounded like him.

PBO made a joking reference to the cable networks calling his stimulus bill a spending bill. He railed that spending is stimulus. I like to think there is a slight difference between the two words. A stimulus is a sharp prod to get things to move again. It could be money, and spending. Spending on the other hand is an exhaustion of money, energy, or resources. Over sixty percent of the bill presented by congress was spending that is not a jolt, but rather an ongoing drain. Sure, some of it might even create a job or two, but  not in the short term. If the economy is to be rallied to head off a depression, something more drastic needs to be done. 

PBO kept ranting that he didn’t want to be presented with tired old ideas that don’t work, with the expectation that something different will happen. I agree, “if you keep on doin’ what you been doin’  you’ll keep on gettin’ what you been gettin’.  I also believe that if you want to see a big effect occur, you need to make a big change.

Here is my proposal for big change. It is an old idea, but one that will provide stimulus and long term good health for the economy and the country.

1. Cut ten percent of the employees from every department of the Federal Government. The private sector does this all the  time to cut costs. The president, his cabinet, the house of representatives, the senate, and all employees of the Federal Government take a salary cut of 50% until the economy recovers. Most of us in the private sector will be asked to take reduced wages to save our jobs, why shouldn’t the federal government employees be asked to make the same sacrifice?

2. Balance the budget. Base the budget on twenty percent  less income.

3.  Can the entire SEC. It has a budget of $904 million. They are totally remiss to all of the thieving going on in Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae, the banking system, Bernie Madoff, etc.

4. Can the entire Department of Education. It has a budget of $68.6 billion. It is money saved. As many as fifty percent of our kids don’t finish school so why continue to throw more money toward a system that is failing?

5. Can the entire Department of Health and Human Services. It’s budget is a whopping $737 billion dollars. We have a fabulous private health care system, but Medicare is going broke. Who can afford to go on as it is?

Need I go one further? I think I have given the President some bold ideas that he does not have the balls to act on. The tired old idea that does work is this: “Spend less on Government, and the consumer will regain confidence in the economy.”

The money saved by this plan will stimulate the economy because it will require less tax to run the government. The private sector will have more money to invest. “Joe the Citizen” will have more money to spend. All of the people who lose those fat government jobs can work in the private sector doing all the jobs that are currently filled by illegals. With fewer service jobs available to them the illegals will stay in their own countries: another problem solved.

Come on PBO, you can do better than “just words.”

Filed under: Election, family, Government, Lions Club, Manufacturing, Motivation, politics, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments »

Bah Humbug Blahs

Posted on 23/12/2008 by Grumpa Joe
Winter Bear

Winter Bear

As good as I felt last Sunday after our Lion Club food basket distribution, I am in a Bah Hum Bug mood today. It’s two days before Christmas, and I have the blahs. Maybe its light affective disorder, or something like that. It has to be a hormone gone wild to make a person feel so down. I can’t explain it. It couldn’t be that for the last twelve months I’ve been brainwashed by the messiah speaking about failed economic policies, and  another preacher damning America, or that the entire banking system came tumbling down by some social engineering. The weather isn’t helping me out either. It’s way too cold, it’s snowing and blowing. My joints all ache, and my muscles long for a walk, but I’m too lazy to go out .  Maybe I feel blue because I just wrote to my Senator telling him not to give himself a raise, and I expect him to give me the finger instead. Watching my 401K vanish  hasn’t added any light into my life either.

For many years, people referred to me as Scrooge. I created that personae in order to survive my job. We always had ‘performance appraisals’ right before Christmas. Often,  the news I gave my staff was not what they wanted to hear, therefore, the “Scrooge,” moniker. A negativity overtook me like the devil. I became negative the year around. Then one day, I heard a motivational speaker, and he changed my life. His name is Bernie,  he’s a medical doctor, and he changed my life with his speech. I learned that “positive” works much more effectively than “negative.”

It took me several years to break out of the negativity habit, but I did it. I  became a positive person. That is why these blahs are affecting me so. My mind wants to revert to negative, yet I know its the wrong way to go.  I see myself  being tempted by Darth Vader.  I hear him calling me to the “dark side.”

Several times today, I had to stop what I was doing to  find a positive moment to reflect upon. It has kept me going. I have to make alist of everything positive happening in my life today. It will help me bury the blahs.

Filed under: Election, family, Funk, grief, Lions Club, Motivation, Uncategorized, Writer | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

How Much Is A Trillion?

Posted on 27/09/2008 by Grumpa Joe

The last few days I have heard the words “trillion dollars” bandied about like it meant a dollar. Just what is a trillion? How many of us have tried to fathom what a trillion dollars is? I like to break things down into terminology that I can understand. I worked for over fifty years, and my lifetime salary approached something like three million dollars. Sounds like alot doesn’t it? Well I earned that much over a fifty six year period.  A very significant portion (about $800,000.00)of that salary went to pay taxes to the state and federal governments. At this moment the federal government is considering spending seven hundred and fifty billion dollars to correct a mistake they created.

 

A trillion is the number “one” followed by twelve zeros ($1,000,000,000,000.00). Lets break that down to something more basic. Lets say that you turned twenty-one years old today, and because of new technology we know you will live to one hundred. That translates into seventy nine years or 28,835 days of life. How lucky you are. Now lets divide a trillion dollars by twenty eight thousand eight hundred and thirty five days. The answer is thirty four million six hundred eighty thousand and seventy six ($34,680,076.00) per day, or one million four hundred forty five thousand and three ($1,445,003.00) per hour 24/7. Do you really think you could spend that much? Think about it. It took me fifty six years to earn three million dollars, and I had a very nice life. Sure I could have used more money, but I can’t imagine spending thirty four million in my lifetime much less spending it every day for seventy nine years.

Here is another way to put the number one trillion. Lets say that we wanted to buy a nice double wide manufactured home for some of the poor people in this country. How many could we buy if they cost one hundred thousand dollars a piece? Are you ready for the answer, ten million.

The whole reason for the sub prime mortgage fiasco was to lower the lending rules so poor people could buy homes. Well the program exceeded our expectations. It is costing us nearly a trillion dollars. I think the government would have been smarter to give each poor family a manufactured home. Think of the jobs that would have created. Making that many houses takes alot of effort. With four people living in each of these homes we could have housed forty million people, over ten percent of the population. Instead, we have people losing their homes, banks going out of business, and our country is at risk of a “great” depression. The politicians are pointing at the greed of Wall Street as the root cause. The Feds created two organizations for the purpose of creating investment vehicles for investors. They really got iinto the “greed” thing and decided it was great scam so they hid thousands of known bad loans into packages that were sold to banks and to investors. Sure the investors were greedy, I am too when it comes to my pension. What I nor anyone else knew is that our glorious leaders were pirates. Many politicians profited from this effort also. The “Wonder Man”  BO was among them. By the way, BO is also connected to the invention of the entire scheme.

This great program to become socialist is going to cost each one in the population twenty eight hundred and fifty seven dollars($2857.00). That means me, you, your wife, and each of your kids, etc. for every single member of the 350,000,000 population.

I happen to think I can do better with my money than to give it to Uncle Sam to pay for his mistakes. I sure don’t want to give the responsibility of spending trillions to a socialist leaning BO.

Filed under: Election, family, Government, Lions Club, Motivation, politics, Writer | Tagged: , , , , , , | 4 Comments »

Conserve or Die

Posted on 04/07/2008 by Grumpa Joe

WOW! Our country is two hundred and thirty two years old today. WIll we make it to two hundred and thirty three? Will this country, which was built by people who sought religious freedom, and freedom from the oppression of fuedal systems last another year? I often wonder if we will, but that is negative thinking. It is pessimistic, and I hate pessimism even though I am the master of it. Our country will survive. We will even survive the upcoming election. I figure we can last four years of the next president no matter how uncapable he might be. We, the general population will pay for his incompetancy with a devalued dollar, super high gasoline prices, and a lack of jobs. Most likely he will lead us into a “depression.” 

 I was born at the end of the last depression, and I remember the effects it had on my parents. They did everything they could to conserve and preserve what they had in order to survive another depression. Mom saved everything, Dad worked two jobs, and collected scrap. He sold the spare wheels off his car. If something wasn’t necessary, they lived without.

I’m not sure I could live up to that kind of lifestyle. I am positive that, 98% of the population of the U.S.A. would not. The only ones who could are the illegal aliens who came here with the shirts on their backs. The rest of us would take to starving, or stealing to survive.

Conservation is what it will take to get ready for a  “depression.” A mindset that focuses on those things that are necessary to survive. Grow food, sew clothes, repair shoes, preserve food, and walk or ride a bike to get places.

If the next president begins to tax us as I suspect he will, business is going to take a dive. More business will leave the country to avoid taxation. That means our jobs leave too. Of course we could leave to live in Mexico, or China, or Zimbabwe, or wherever the hell the jobs go. Or, we will rise up and challenge the government to provide more, by taxing the rich. Impeach the man who suggests that the American people should be industrious and work for themselves. Perish the htought. 

It’ll be a fun time, I’m sure. In the meantime, I’m looking for every volume of Foxfire I can find. I want to learn the ways of survival from the mountain people of Appalachia. If the rest of you are wise, you will do the same, or you might just pick a president who believes in a system of incentives that motivate business and businessmen.

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The Funk Rules Negative People

Posted on 11/06/2008 by Grumpa Joe

Grumpa Joe Looks at FlowerWow! It seems like forever since I last posted. So much has transpired. The baby steps have been ticking off faster and faster. In spite of all the positive activity toward my goals I have been stricken with a slight case of depression. My self-esteem is low, and that always is the result of depression. Some little thing triggered me into a funk. The funk is over, I’ve survived and now it’s time to BLOG again. How did I get myself out of the funk? Well first there is work. Good hard physical work. Thank God, I can still do physical work. That meant taking many baby steps in the garden. In the past week I planted about forty perennials around the pond. I added annuals, and planted seed too. All of it is doing fine except for the few plants that the rabbits are bothering. Two of my most expensive perennials being native hibiscus are being munched on by the rabbits. They gave up on the rose of sharon, and are now on tastier plants. If you are old enough to remember Elmer Fudd, and his ongoing battle with Bugs Bunny, you will understand how I must proceed with the critters. Unfortunately, my dear Peggy is an animal lover, and she will prevent me from openly taking a shot at the furry creatures. I’m a poor shot anyway.

A friend stopped by last week and deposited ten good size goldfish into the pond. We can now see fish from our kitchen window, whereas before, the little guys were invisible. Everyday, Peggy and I throw a handful of fish pellets into the water to feed them. I want to train the fish to come to us when we approach the edge of the water.

Another powerful tool for getting ot of the funk is to pray. I pray every night before retiring. I coax my sub-conscious into bringing me only good health, great stories, and abundance. Included is a request to help a bunch of people who need it. In the morning, when I walk, it is  another opportunity to pray and speak to God. I can’t walk without praying. It’s a habit I developed over the last seven years.

Slowly, ever so slowly, the endorphins begin to kick in and the funk begins to disappear.

Today, I wrote a letter of introduction to my new writing instructor. Yes, I signed up for writing school. Hopefully, my style will improve and I will get as good as the really fluid writers on the blogs I visit. Man are they good. I admire people who can write their thoughts clearly, concisely, and in a completely understandable way . They amaze me. How can some writers be so descriptive with their words and others like me are complete klutzes. Do you believe this, I’m writing myself into a funk just by giving someone unknown to anyone an “atta boy.”

I am not a klutzy writer, I do well. Even though others can write rings around me, I must concentrate on the positive in my life and not dwell on the negative. The negative, “or dark side,” can quickly envelop the id and predominate. We have to learn and practice being positive every moment of our lives. Being positive is much more fun than being negative. Funk rules the negative person.

Filed under: Funk, Garden, Motivation, Writer | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

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