Category Archives: Opinion

ROMNEY AND HIS TAXES

Posted on October 16, 2012 | 3 comments

The tax code is complicated; that makes it easy to spin.  The context of taxation is extensive and not in the knowledge base of most people.  Sometimes it seems to make no sense at all. For instance, if you buy a piece of improved property and it skyrockets in value, the IRS allows and expects you to report every year that it is going down in value.  It’s called “depreciation” and it reduces your tax bill.

Democrats are trying to make the case that Romney is heartless and greedy.  First by declaring that Romney paid no taxes at all, which was not only a falsehood but an insult to common sense, and now on the grounds that 14% is less than a fair share.  The math is correct but it doesn’t make the case.

A heartless man does not give extensively to charity as Romney has done.  A greedy man does not pay more taxes than necessary by intentionally omitting an allowed tax deduction, as Romney did. The bottom line is thru charity and taxes he kept 42% of his income and 58% went for the benefit of society.  This math is also correct and it disproves the case the opposition is trying to make.  Call it spin if you wish, like the 14%.  The math and the reasoning are here.

The bottom line is Romney has been more generous than either Obama or Biden who is particularly famous for his lack of charitable giving.  Romney also seems to prefer giving to society thru charity rather than thru the government.

One final thought.  Greed and envy are close companions.  Waging class warfare is an outlet for envy.  Is waging class warfare not a form of greed also?

 

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Posted in Opinion, Political polemics

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THE RYAN – BIDEN DEBATE AND SOME THOTS ABOUT LIARS WHO CALL OTHERS LIARS

Posted on October 12, 2012 | 1 comment

I want my money back.  The show wasn’t as entertaining as it was expected to be.  Biden was obnoxious but otherwise he did quite well.  Each agenda declared their candidate won.  Arguably Biden did a better job with his answers; clearly his “friend” Paul Ryan came across as more likeable.  Ryan also did a better job of establishing his honesty, not once did he lie by saying Biden was his friend.

Speaking of lies, Joe Biden said of the Libyan Consulate attack “We weren’t told they wanted more security; we did not know they wanted more security there.”  That was a bald face lie.

Biden said President Obama has “gone out and repaired our alliances so that the rest of the world follows us again.”  It’s far from the truth slo Joe may actually believe it so this one falls somewhere between a lie and oblivious ignorance.  But no benefit of the doubt can be given on the next statement that Romney and Biden, “bet against America all the time.”  Biden combined a lie with a smear with that one.

Biden said the administration passed a “middle class tax cut.”  That was another lie.  Biden said Sarah Palin spoke about “death panels” in their Vice Presidential debate in 2008.  No such statement by Palin is in the transcript.  Biden lied again.  Biden said no one is looking to do things through the UN.  But the truth is the UN plays an important role in the Obama administration’s foreign policy.

All politicians play loose with the facts at times.  We accept that within bounds.  It is up to us to intelligently separate the wheat from the chaff.   It bothers us to label anyone a liar.  But when liars lie and lie and lie, then lie again by accusing you for being the liar, at some point courtesy begins to look like guilt.  It is time to call the liars liars.  Joe Biden and Barack Obama are liars.

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Posted in News, Opinion, Political polemics

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WOW! IT’S UNANIMOUS!

Posted on October 4, 2012 | 1 comment

Headlines from the right run from “Won by two touchdowns” to “It’s Over!”  Comments from the left run from puzzlement to disappointment and to downright anger at their candidate for his poor performance.  There is universal agreement that Romney won this one – big time!

But it is not over.  Obama had a bad night but remember what he told his followers in an earlier campaign, “If they bring a knife to the fight, we will bring a gun.”  Romney skipped the knife and came in to the fight with a gun.  Expect Obama to bring a cannon to the next one.  One just wonders what he has to use for ammunition.

Because we live in an age of idiocy, I feel compelled to explain for the benefit of readers on the left that all this talk of guns and ammo is metaphorical (look it up).  I wouldn’t want to be accused of inciting violence the way Sarah Palin was when she used the word “target” to identify areas where conservatives should focus their efforts.

This election is about more than a choice, it’s a test.  There has rarely been a race where the candidates and the choices voters face are better known.  There is no complacency in this race.  This is not a pass or fail test either.  The margin of victory will be the score.  If Romney wins big there will be hope for major change.  If Romney wins but the margin is small the test will show America has a slimmer chance of returning to what it once was.  If Obama wins, it’s all over.  America will have made a clear choice and it will be all but impossible to reverse it until the country collapses in fiscal distress.  Then a strong man will come in and be accepted by the people in their distress.  That’s how Hitler and Pinochet gained power.  Hitler destroyed his country, Pinochet returned his to prosperity.  They both killed a few people in the process.

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Posted in News, Opinion, Political polemics

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MY SOUL FOR A MESS OF POTTAGE, MY VOTE FOR A FREE TELEPHONE

Posted on September 29, 2012 | Leave a comment

It’s an old Socialist trick.  Take mightily from the masses in complex ways they don’t understand and give back a pittance in something tangible and you will gain their trust even as you are depriving them of their prosperity.  Eva Peron was a master, or should we say mistress of the technique.  She would hand out actual peso notes at times when she mingled with the public.  Eva and her husband devastated their once prosperous nation yet the people referred to her affectionately as Evita when she reined and today she is honored with her image on the currency.  Fidel Castro, as I remember it, gave a rice cooker to every household.  Apparently today’s pittance du jour is a telephone.

Republicans don’t get totally off the hook this time.  While the Democrats are spending our tax money buying votes with free telephones, Republicans in Florida were playing ACORN with voter registrations.  The RNC in Florida hired an outside firm to canvas neighborhoods and register voters.  It must have been piece work because they registered some dead people and perhaps a dog or two.  At least the Republicans had the decency not to do it with some of the Democrats money and they promptly fired the firm and ended the program.

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KRUGMAN ARGUES THAT GREECE AND SPAIN ARE VICTIMS

Posted on September 28, 2012 | 2 comments

Paul Krugman, ever the liberal, is less vituperative than usual in today’s column in the New York Times.  It is entitled Europe’s Austerity Madness and is well worth reading.  Not for the column’s correctness but for its clarity.  He outlines with rare accuracy the predominant views of the cause of Europe’s financial woes and the solution for them.

First we must note that what passes for the Right in most of Europe would be called Liberal in the U.S.  This places Krugman’s argument more in the Socialist camp than Liberal.  He says of the European Right,

Talk to German officials and they will portray the euro crisis as a morality play, a tale of countries that lived high and now face the inevitable reckoning.

And fear of a backlash from voters who believe, wrongly, that they’re being put on the hook for the consequences of southern European irresponsibility leaves German politicians unwilling to approve essential emergency lending to Spain and other troubled nations unless the borrowers are punished first.

Despite the insertion of the word “wrongly”, Krugman has done a good job of stating the argument coming from Europe’s Right.  One other fault to find, it’s not punishment that’s sought; it’s bearing the consequences of one’s own decisions.  If you choose to live beyond your means don’t ask someone else to pay for it.

In Krugman’s view,

More austerity serves no useful purpose; the truly irrational players here are the allegedly serious politicians and officials demanding ever more pain.

Consider Spain’s woes. What is the real economic problem? Basically, Spain is suffering the hangover from a huge housing bubble, which caused both an economic boom and a period of inflation that left Spanish industry uncompetitive with the rest of Europe.

Spending was not the problem and austerity is not the solution.  Greece and Spain are victims of a housing boom and collapse that occurred in the private sector.  The fault is with other nations in the Eurozone that are failing in their moral obligation to redistribute some of their relative wealth to where it is needed.  Inferred in that view is the notion that the greed of capitalism was the source of the problem and socialism is the solution.  Get the cause wrong and so it will be with the solution.

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Posted in Economy, Opinion, Political philosophy

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WHERE IS THE PROMISED HEALING?

Posted on September 28, 2012 | Leave a comment

First it was a spontaneous eruption by a few members of a group of demonstrators and it was mere coincidence that the raid happened to occur on the 11th day of September.  The Libyan people were horrified and even helped carry Ambassador Chris Stevens to the hospital, so said Hillary Clinton in the Secretary’s first public statement about the attack.  Then the details morphed a few times until now we are at “Al Qaeda did it”  and the ambassador’s body was paraded through the streets in triumph.  What was so difficult about saying this was an operation planned for September 11th and carried out by a brand of Islamic extremists whose work is all too familiar to us?

It would not reflect well on Islam, of course.  It would place full responsibility for the atrocity on certain elements from the Muslim world and not hold the United States in any way accountable for the overrunning of its Libyan embassy and the murder of its own ambassador.  Any other administration would have said something like that.  But not this one.

The bombing of trains in Madrid, subways in London, a night club in Bali and the World Trade Center in New York are atrocities in plain sight.  They cannot be denied.  And these may be the least of it if you add up all the local killings by Islamists that have occurred over the years in schools, airports, markets and even on military bases.  If such inhumanities are not acknowledged as an element of the Muslim world, then the only alternative is they must be the Muslim world.  That of course is not the case.

Obama’s father was a Muslim.  Obama spent some his early formative years in a Muslim country attending Muslim schools.  It is understandable that he would be sympathetic to the plights and beliefs of Muslim believers.  There is nothing wrong with that.  In fact he is in a unique position to bring some understanding between people of the Muslim and Western worlds.  But it has to start with acknowledgement and unqualified severe condemnation of Islamic militant Jihad and terrorism.  Only then can understanding begin.  Sadly, Obama won’t do that.

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SHOULD NINCOMPOOPS BE ALLOWED TO VOTE?

Posted on September 25, 2012 | 1 comment

The following is taken from an item in Real Clear Politics.  The post is accompanied by a video that must be seen to be believed.

Howard Stern contributors Sal and Richard traveled to Harlem to interview Obama supporters and ask them why they are voting for Obama.

Stern and his crew ask denizens of Harlem various outrageous questions, including if they believe Obama will find and kill Osama bin Laden; if Romney is a Muslim and if Obama is a Mormon; if Obama made the right choice by picking Paul Ryan as his running mate and if he did it because he is black.

One interviewee was under the impression that 2008 Republican nominee John McCain is also running this time.

“Just trust me, not one person knew that Osama bin Laden was dead,” Stern said during the segment.

“Well, we’re obviously dealing with a whole population that doesn’t listen to the newscasts or read a newspaper,” co-host Robin Quivers said.

People who are this clueless are pawns for manipulation by the most unsavory of politicians.  It gives rise to the question of whether citizenship alone should be enough qualification to vote.

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Posted in Humor, Opinion

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ACCOMPLISHMENTS OF BARACK OBAMA AS PRESIDENT

Posted on September 21, 2012 | Leave a comment

Once in blue moon a post bears repeating in its entirety.  Back in May, Random Thots published a list written by an Obama supporter of the President’s accomplishments since taking office.  It was a well written and impressive list.  I did a little research to see how accurate the writer was in his claims.  The Rebuttals are the result of the research.

One thing I would point out is how the truth can be used to convey a lie.  In the first example the author’s claim was absolutely true as he wrote it.  But it conveyed the idea that a higher level of standards relating to the lobby industry had been established and followed by Obama and his administration.  That was a lie.  The signing of the law turned Obama’s previous legal use of lobbyists (use that he continued) into an illegal one.  All others including his opponents were now subject to new restrictions while the President de facto set himself above the law by not complying with it even though he was the one who signed it..

Here is the original post.

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A LIST OF BARACK OBAMA’S ACCOMPLISHMENTS AS PRESIDENT

Posted on May 31, 2012

There is a list going around the Internet outlining an extensive number of things the President has accomplished since coming into office.  The author seems to be addressing Obama supporters who are disappointed in the President’s performance.  It’s an impressive list, well documented and straight forward in it’s presentation.  I thought I would check it out.

Here is an example from the middle of the list.

He signed an order banning anyone from working in an agency they had lobbied in previous years. He also put strict limits on lobbyists’ access to the White House.   http://nyti.ms/gOrznV

REBUTTAL. He did sign the ban, but continued to hire former lobbyists to serve the White House. Mega lobbyists Steve Ricchetti, Broderick Johnson, James Heimbach just to mention three.

Not to cherry pick, I started from the top.  Here are the first seven.  They are enough to tell the storey.  Here’s a link to the full list.

Legislative Prowess
Despite the characterizations of some, Obama’s success rate in winning congressional votes on issues was an unprecedented 96.7% for his first year in office.  Though he is often cited as superior to Obama, President Lyndon Johnson’s success rate in 1965 was only 93%.   http://n.pr/i3d7cY

REBUTTAL. True. With Democratic control of the House and the Senate, Pelosi, Reid and Obama had a radical’s field day.

Fiscal Responsibility
Within days after taking office, he signed an Executive Order ordering an audit of government contracts, and combating waste and abuse.   http://1.usa.gov/dUvbu5

REBUTTAL. True. The Order added the requirement for contractors to disclose their political party affiliations when applying for government contracts making it easier to reward those who had done political favors for the President and his party. 

Created the post of Chief Performance Officer, whose job it is to make operations more efficient to save the federal government money.   http://n.pr/hcgBn1

REBUTTAL. True. But his appointee to initiate the post never served due to her personal income tax problems.

On his first full day, he froze White House salaries.  http://on.msnbc.com/ewJUIx

REBUTTAL. Not really. On his first full day it was a proposal and not a freeze.  And it didn’t stop federal employees from getting increases in their income.  It only stopped raises within grade. Increases could still be given as bonuses or the raising of pay grades without the need for promotions.  The proposal was more fanfare than substance.

He appointed the first Federal Chief Information Officer to oversee federal IT spending. http://www.cio.gov

REBUTTAL. True. Each government agency already had a Chief Investment Officer. The creation of this new layer of oversight provided the means to control all of the agency career CIOs by one czar appointed by and beholden to the President.  It also added and an unnecessary expense

He committed to phasing out unnecessary and outdated weapons systems, and also signed the Weapons Systems Acquisition Reform Act to stop waste, fraud and abuse in the defense procurement and contracting system.  http://bit.
ly/hOw1t1     http://bit.ly/fz8GAd

REBUTTAL. Defense Secretary Gates called this a controversial move.  I am not qualified to judge the advisability of it. However one thing is clear; it dismissed one third of private contractors, replacing them with civilian government workers.

Through an executive order, he created the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform.  http://bit.ly/hwKhKa

REBUTTAL. This is better known as the Erskine-Bowles commission.  The Commission made many recommendations for the President and the Senate to include in the Federal Budget.  None were adopted.  Harry Reid’s Democratically controlled Senate hasn’t presented a budget in 3 years, contrary to law.

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LIBYA – PRE-MEDITATED OR SPONTANEOUS ?

Posted on September 17, 2012 | Leave a comment

Susan Rice, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations told ABC News the attack on our embassy was a spontaneous eruption by demonstrators; it was not a pre-planned event.  Her statement is in direct contrast to that made by Libyan President Mohammed el-Megarif who not only said the event was pre-planned but added that the Libyan government warned us about it three days in advance.

These statements are in direct conflict with each other so there can be no question but that one of the two nations is not telling the truth.

A pre-planned attack on the United States by a Muslim faction in Libya does not bode well for Obama who has Muslim roots and has trumpeted his ability reduce hostilities and bring understanding between the modern day Barbary Pirates and the United States.  The administration is trying to characterize the killing of Ambassador Stevens, the parading of his body through the streets, the burning of American flags around the world and the storming of our embassies as something other than hostility against the United States.  This is absurd enough on its face, but pre-planned attacks make the claim even less credible.  The role of an ambassador is to convey the position and policy of the leader of the nation they serve.  Ambassadors are given little discretion to make critical pronouncements of their own.  Susan Rice was appointed by Barack Obama.

To be a spontaneous reaction we must believe that demonstrators routinely carry enough weapons to breach our security of the Libyan embassy, capture and kill the ambassador and destroy two buildings within the compound.  Susan Rice’s statement defies common sense.

Truth is becoming ever more difficult to discern.  There was a time when in a case of conflicting claims between Libya and the U.S. we felt comfortable with the judgment that our spokesperson was the one far more likely to be telling the truth.  We no longer have the luxury of making such assumptions.

UPDATE:  One thing admirable about Susan Rice is she is uncomfortable when she is lying.  It shows in the video of her statement.

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WHY ARE OBAMA’S VOTER POLLS SO STRONG WHEN HIS RECORD IS SO BAD?

Posted on September 13, 2012 | 2 comments

It’s the media, stupid!  If you are a Conservative, how much time do you spend watching MSNBC?  And when you do, do you believe anything they say?  But what if it were all true?  And you believed it.  It would be a whole different world.  You would detest FOX News and be disgusted by Republicans.  Welcome to that world, you may not be of it but you are in it.

Fast and Furious never happened, Solyndra was a vast right wing conspiracy to spread dirt on Obama, and the President is a friend of Israel because he said so.  Tea Party demonstrators spat on Black Caucus members and screamed anti-gay epithets at them as they strolled from their offices to the State House.  Christianity is a threat to our freedoms and Republican obstructionism is the reason the economy is anemic and unemployment is so high.  If you are unable to see how hard Obama is trying to improve the world, if you can’t see that his steps are the correct ones, there can be but one reason and one alone for your blindness – racism.

If you are a modern Democrat, these are your beliefs.  Your media reinforces them.  You spend little or no time with media that doesn’t.  There is no neutral objective media any longer, none.  There is no comfortable place you can go to hear the other side of an issue.

Obama is a very charismatic man.  Women fainted at his 2008 campaign speeches; men get tingles up their legs.  Delegates cried listening to his 2012 acceptance speech.  His blackness satisfies a longing in the Liberal heart for release from guilt.  He is a force for good.  Therefore, any opposition to Obama is a force against all that is fair and right.  Put this all together and you see the man can do no wrong.  The Right dubbed him Messiah for a reason and the left has never denied it.

President Obama says the financial crisis that brought the economy down was created by the policies of his predecessors and was so devastating it was impossible to clean it up in four years.  And the word of a Messiah is truth.  The worse the economy is now, the more important it is not to put the people  back in office that caused it.

For the “True Believer” the joblessness, soaring debt and the poor economy only reinforces the need to re-elect the President.  But there is another much more alarming reason for the strength of the President’s polls.  The United States may have reached “Tocqueville Time.”  But that’s for another post.

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Posted in Economy, Opinion

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