Monthly Archives: January 2012

Who is Responsible?

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That question begs another.  For what?

My answer is: For ANYTHING.

Take BP and the Deepwater horizon debacle…  Is it BP’s fault because they put it all together?  Is it the fault of Transocean because they owned the Deepwater Horizon and rented it to BP?  How about Halliburton, who poured the concrete that failed?  How about the regulators who seemed to be more agents of BP rather than regulators?

The last reports I saw says they all were!

We have three branches of government, in the federal and state levels, that are supposed to check each other.  The Executive runs things, the Legislative makes the rules for him to use, and the Judicial is pretty much a referee.  Two of them can cancel out the actions of the third, if they all work as they should.  For the budget battle to have been won it, would take budget bill to be passed by both houses, and then signed by the President..  So, if one house passes a bill, and the president OKs the concept, then why does it not get past Harry Reid in the Senate.  So either President Obama is NOT the head of the party, or Reid just wanted to embarrass the President, or they are working together to embarrass the Republicans…    So….  are we responsible because we elected these morons?

What about big business?  We have had house flipping, that contributed to the burst bubble of the housing boom, boards of directors who seem to vote each other obscene salaries, and then have to give large payments to CEOs that they should just fire for incompetence.  A worker who does not perform gets shown the door.  A CEO who does not perform get bonuses, and then a golden parachute out the door.  If the company fails what do the CEOs and Directors lose?  The biggest question would be: who are the real losers?  There you would have to say the employees and customers.  So when a company fails, is the government responsible for letting them fail?

If I have a company that is not making money can I go the the Feds and say “bail me out”?  NO..  I would NOT be too big to fail…  So,to be succesful you have to fail in a VERY BIG way.

There sees to be a lack of people with the integrity to stand up and say “I failed”.  What we wind up with these days is a large group of people who point at each other and say, “he did it, not me”.

I have an idea…  The Japanese used to have, and still might, a rather rigid idea of Honor, and the guy who failed often ended the problem with the use of a sword….

Maybe we could adapt that code of Honor, and the next CEO who drives his bank, cooperation, or whatever, down the toilet would get a choice: use the sword, to do the honorable thing, or we take away everything you have as well as what you have given to your family.

This would, again, ask the question: Who is responsible?

The answer seems to be : the poor.

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Florida Presidential Primary : Who to Pick?

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It is Primary day here, and here I sit trying to think of whom to cast my vote for.

The first one I crossed off my list was Newt Gingrich…  I would have to say that my choice there was only partially religious…  He cheated on 2 out of 3 of his wives, and that is just what we know of….  I am not a right wing Christian wingnut, so why do I say my choice is partially religious?  Maybe Newt was married in front of a Justice of the Peace and the word “God” was never mentioned, in which case maybe he did not LIE to Jehovah.  Then again…  I believe they still say things like ”in the eyes of God”, or “before God”, so, as far as we know, Newt has lied to Jehovah God at least twice.  Then how are we supposed to trust what he says.    So he is out.

Mitt Romney : Newt has pointed to Romney’s control of the Damon Corp. and it’s large fines for ethics problems, and Newt would know about ethics problems, having be bounced from the House Speaker jobs for his problem.  One that even a Republican Majority could not ignore.  So the question about his comes down to the amount of control that Romney had over Damon.  Was he doing day to day control of the company, or was his interest just in getting it into shape to sell.  At Bain the idea was to take companies that were not making money, on the virge of failure, and turning them around.  When he was in charge of Damon, I don’t know how familiar he was with that operation or if he know that those practises, the ones that resulted in fines, were wrong, or if he was just getting rid of dead wood.  Newt makes it sound like Mitt was running thing on a day to day operation, rather then getting it ready for resale.  The whole idea that Bain could get a company, that was not performing, ready to be bought by another company and not hack off the parts that were not making money is rather strange.  After all, if you were looking to buy a company would you rather buy a healthy company or a company that was only standing up because of crutches?  Would you pay more for the healty company, or the one you would have to fix?  Me?  Not that I would ever have to make the choice, I would rather buy a company that I did NOT have to fix.

People will, it seems, look at these question through the filter of their belief: is Mitt Romney honest, or is he a greedy slug who just wanted to cheat medicare.  Mitt said he was one of the people who helped clean up the mess at Damon but, no one else seems to know about anything he did to fix anything.  Again, it is hard to decide this question.  It seems to me that either the Feds thought that he had nothing to do with it, as I don’t know of anything they have charged him with, or if they just could not prove charges and so did not level any.

Ron Paul :  He is a libertarian, which means he is not a big government liberal, and he is not a big bussiness syncaphant.  People would either love him, or hate him.  Ron Paul would probably get rid of a number of government agencies that DON”T carry their weight…..  One of these would be the Department of Education…  how maany schools do they run… and how many teachers do they have?

I would take aim at the guys in charge of the Federal Highway Administration.  What do they really do?  You think of these guys as the ones who build the Interstates but, the closest they get to this is telling the states where to build the Interstates.  If the Feds want to put in a new Interstate they tell the State DOT where to put the road, and the the STATE goes out to get the property, the right of way, and then gets the road built.  The USDOT/FHA does not even get it’s feet dirty.  They just hand out the money, which they often threaten to withhold if the stated does not pass laws that the USDOT want, but does not have the authority to pass.  Take the speed limits.  Feds have said that if a state does not have and enforce  a speed limit that the FHA likes then the feds will withhold highway funds, so the state can’t build the highways that the FHA wants.  This money comes from, at least one source, gasoline taxes.  Each state get back a certain about of money, as determined by what the Feds feel is needed.  That means that some states will see a less than a $1 comeback for every $1 they send in, while other states will get more than $1 for ever one they send in….

There are any number of ways that we can slime down the government, and do away with departments that just take up space…..  Did the Army Corp. of Engineers so such a good job around New Orleans?  How about the Securities Exchange Commision investigating Bernie Madoff?  How about the guys who were in charge of keeping an eye on the Deepwater Horrizen?  The did a BANK UP job.

Ron Paul might just make the world appreciate us more, when he pulls us back into our own borders.  Once the worlds whipping boy takes our marble and come home, maybe they will realize just how much they need us.  Maybe then they will understand that WE are not the source of THEIR problems…

In the mean time….  I am going for RON PAUL..  I think he will do the least damage.

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Rick Scott : Keeping his head down?

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Official photo of Florida Governor Rick Scott

Image via Wikipedia

I was watching one of those anti-Romney adds….  You know the one: they are talking about Mitt Romney and how, they say, the Damon Corp.  cheated medicare out of millions of dollars while he was in charge.  They show his face on the left side, and as they talk it slowly morphs into Skeletor, uh, no, that’s not right.  Yes, its Florida Gov. Rick Scott who face finally emerges..

I read in the paper that our dear Gov. has a %30 approval rating…  I wondered, as soon as I had seen the ad just what Rick Scott thought of the idea that his face can be used to scare voters, and small children.

I have always thought that you should give the Devil his due, or in this case the Governor.  Somewhere around %20 of FLorida voters put him in office.  So when you look around at 100 Floridians in a room think that something like 60 of them did NOT vote for anyone, a little over half of the ones who did voted picked Scott.  So a little more than 20 of those people put him into office.

He got into office with the promise of 700,000 jobs being created over, what, 7 years?  Where are they?

He has tried to get the legislature to slash laws that govern business, and has found that even some of thosebusiness leaders said those laws were needed.  Think about business you deal with where a license is required, and then think of the license requirment,  and background checks, being eliminanted.

To give you an example.  It was just a few years ago that we heard how Doctors did not want to be subjected to Fingerpring checks like common criminals.  Why would we need to know who they were?  Why would we need to know he had a license?  Maybe because they write prescriptions for drugs, and we don’t want a drug pedler to just move into the state and hide the fact that he lost his license, in the other state, for selling drugs, or presciptions, like a common criminal.

Does your child’s bus driver have a license?  Did they lose it in another state?  Were they child abusers in that other state?   Yes we need those laws that set out what kind of people can hold jobs, and how much they have to know to do that job.

We need those laws  just like we need to have local control of zoning requirments, which is one of those thing our Govener would like to do away with.

Now for some of that “the devil his due”.  Yes, he has accepted federal funds from program he did not agree with, like the stimulus pack, but, even if the money should not have been spent, it came from our taxes so why should we turn it down just because those people in Washington were just throwing it around like confetti?.

Some people condemed him for not snapping up the funds for the speed rails, at least not right a way.  Rick Scott pointed out that he wanted to know that the money promised would really be there.  Sure they promised millions of dollars for high speed rail but, promises and acts are two different things.  What if we had gone ahead and started on it, and suddenly found that no one had raised the money.  Would those organization who were ready to take the money, and build high speed rail, get stuck for a the bill?

Even Scott deserves some credit, though I hope, in the next state election, that the people of Florida would show a little, a let, more interest in who runs the state.  In the meantime he keeps his head down, and maybe he won’t do too much damage to our soiled reputation.

Thank you.

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Family Values? Newt Gingrinch?

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Family Values

Image by 37 °C via Flickr

Figuring which Republican would be the best President is rather hard.  In this day and age it seems to be expected that they will lie. You might have the political ad that ”mostly” tells the truth, with the main thrust of which is said to be a falsehood.  The there are the ads put out by these groups who hide behind Action committees which are totally false.

The paper today tells about how it is estimated that Newt Gingrich will win Florida with the support of the Evangelicals and their support of Family Values….  So what are Family Values?

The first thing I would think of would be marriage, and raising a family.  That would be a man and a woman raising their family according to their values.  Parents teaching their offspring about RIGHT and WRONG.  Like why it is WRONG to lie, steal, or hurt other people.  These are not just Family Values but, they are the kind of values that are needed to keep a society on the path to growth.  At one time Marriage was seen to be an institution that was for life, and divorce was frowned upon, and was seen as a liability to public office as the divorced politician considered to be someone who could not keep his family together.  Somewhere along the path to where we are divorce has gotten to be accepted, and a divorced politician is just looked upon as another person who failed at love.  Marriage, and the marriage oath, have lost some of the meaning they once had.

I look at New Gingrich, who is appealing to the Religious Conservative, and wonder what this all says about him.  He is in his THIRD marriage, the first two of which he cheated on with women he subsequently married.  So he had TWO wedding where he lied to God.  Is that something that we would want to teach our children?

Sure he says he as repented, and will be forgiven by God, or Jehovah, but, in the meantime, and thing about this, if he has lied to Jehovah twice what makes us believe he is NOT lying to US now.

For those of you who do NOT believe marriage is sacred he might be a great candidate for President, though you might not be able to tell when he is telling the truth but, for the rest, these little slips might just indicate that he is a poor example of Integrity.

For the chief executive of our country I would expect a certain amount of Integrity, and I don’t think we will find it in New Gingrich.

That Joe Guy.

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Tebowing

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Tebowing

Image by Jeffrey Beall via Flickr

Before I start on this I will have to say:  I am not a great fan of Sports in general.

I learned about Tim Tebow, and Tebowing, from seeing it on the New channels, the Letterman show, and Jay Leno.

Today I got one of those email that seem to be going around.  It was about Tebowing.  There were two pictures in it.  One picture showed a bunch of Muslim praying on Wall Street, with the question under it “Why is this OK?”  The other picture was of Tim Tebow doing his thing, with the question “and this is NOT?”.

There are a number of questions that this brings to mind…  Is it the context of the actions?  The Muslims are in the middle of the street, while Tebow seems to be on the sideline..

Is the one, where they are praying to Allah better than the one where he is parying to God, or Jehovah?  That might depend on your religion.

In one story I saw about it he says he is thanking God for letting him play, in another he is asking God for a win.  Does this mean that God, or Jehovah, is a Bronco fan?  Or does it just mean that he likes people who pay homage to him, or just someone who ask him for help.

Think of all the coaches who have asked for help on the field, and have won.  If only one team offers up a prayer, and they win, does that mean God gave them help and the win had nothing to do with their ability?  If both team had prayed, does it mean that God gave the win to the team he liked, or does it just mean that team won on its own?

Does Tebowing trump the coaches prayer?

Does Jehovah even care about the teams?  Is he a Broncos fan?  Does he like the NFL better than the other leagues?

I will have to be fair and say that I don’t know the answer to these question, and the only reason that I have thought about it is for this article.  Though I have always been taught that religion is a personal thing, does if make the belief less real by doing it in public?  Take the Muslim, they make it into an event.  Tim Tebow does it with people watching, or a public display.  Does this mean he has turned prayer into a gimmick?

The question would be:  Does it really matter?  Does Jehovah pick sides?

Its like the old question:  If two armies meet in the field, and they both pray, does Jehovah pick on to win?  If a Islamic army meets a Christian, or Jewish army, is it a question of which god in stronger?

Or is the question really this: Are we just making too much of the question?

You decide, I don’t know.  I can only ask.

That Joe Guy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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