Car Buying in the Not-So-Distant Future

Imagine this…

You are going to buy new car.  You are on a budget and you only need a commuter car to get you to work and back -- the commute is 20 miles each way.  You live in southern California where the weather is glorious nearly all of the time.  You know pretty much what you want and what you need and you know very well what you can afford.

You go into your local used car dealership only to find it empty and closed down.  Confused you drive down to your local "New Car Mall" and are stunned at what you see... A sea of cars, all roughly the same color, all the same style and only subtle differences.  You go into to talk to someone and ask what the heck is going on.

There is a very long line that snakes around the building and you take your spot in line.  People are chatting as they wait and you try to pick up bits of information.  Some seem elated to be there!  One lady comes bouncing out of the dealership holding up a set of keys to her new car!  She is telling everyone that it was FREE!  She got a free car. You think "wow, she must have won some contest."

The line moves slowly. As people come out of the building a few more are happy but many seem very angry. Some are screaming that their cars were free; others that they only cost $100 and others are seething with anger and stay silent as they storm away.  It is quite a confusing spectacle.  You finally get up to the customer service person and say you need to talk to a salesman about getting a used commuter car. 

She tells you, "Oh you can't buy a used car anymore.  It is against the law." 

You think you are dreaming so you play along and say, "Okay show me a new one". A man comes out leads you over to three cars that are slightly different shades of white, about the same size and have only subtle differences.  One is a coupe, one is a hatchback and one is a four door -- all the same model.  These ones happen to be Fords.  You glance across the street at the Toyota dealership and see the SAME three cars in their lot and they are Toyotas over there.  Next door they are called Chevys…   

Definitely a dream. 

He asks you which one you want. 

You say, NONE of them!  You say, "I want a little red, 4-speed, hatchback for around $12,000, preferably used!" 

He shakes his head and tells you that is no longer available that used cars are now against the law, they just aren't safe enough.  These are the only three that are approved by the government and these are your three choices.  

You ask him, "How much do they cost?" 

He asks, "How much do you make?" 

You say, "What difference does that make?" 

He says before he can quote you a price you must provide your personal and financial information to their dealership.  He then tells you that if you leave WITHOUT a car you will have to pay them $100! Oh and for every year that you go without one of these cars you will have to pay more and more. 

This has GOT to be a dream, right? So you continue to play along. 

You provide him your details and he plugs them in to some computer kiosk thing and it spits out a number.  He shakes his head and tells you that you make too much money and that you will have to pay full price.

You are stunned.  You are a waitress and a student.  But the tips that are reported can be pretty good. You tell him though that you can barely pay your bills and you are amazed that what you make is considered "too much". He tells you that is what the computer said and what it says is SO!

You point out that a lady just left hollering that her car was free!  What gives? He says, well she has 12 kids and she is underemployed so her car has to be free.  You HAVE to pay full price to help offset the cost of giving that lady her free car.

It's a dream. It’s just a dream…

He begins to list all the options that come on the cars… Seatbelts, back up camera, GPS navigation, On-Star, 28 airbags, ergonomic, heated, power seats, built in child seat, heated mirrors, 4-wheel drive, studded snow tires, it has the new automatic braking system that can sense a slow down ahead to avoid a crash, it can parallel park itself, it is electric, it comes with a helmet too that you must wear while driving it and it does not come with a radio of any kind .

You tell him he is nuts. All you want is a very basic commuter car to get you to and from your work and school.  I don't need all of these options and you WANT a radio.

He looks at you as though you have two heads. He says, "Haven't you been paying attention? The government mandates that you have all of these safety options -- they want you to be safe!  It is for your own good.  Oh and the radio causes people to get distracted while driving so they are no longer allowed in cars.

You say, "Why the snow tires and 4-wheel drive?"

He says, "Well it is POSSIBLE it could snow. It has before in southern California and you have to be prepared for ANYTHING that is possible."

"Why the heated, power seats with all the ergonomics?"

"You might strain your back on long drives and this will help avoid that."

You tell him your commute is 20 miles. He tells you that doesn't matter.

You tell him that you don't have a kid and you are never going to have a child -- it isn't medically possible you say sadly.

He says well every must have a built in child seat no matter what -- just in case…you might adopt!

You then tell him that you don't WANT an electric car and there isn't a charging station at school or at home.  He says that they have taken care of that and your landlord will be fined until he installs one for you. Of course your rent is going to go up to cover the installation and the higher electricity bills and your tuition is going to have to go up too to cover those costs for the school.  He looks at his list of your information and says, "Lucky you!  There is a charging station right where you work! But of course you are going to get a cut in pay so your boss can afford to pay his electric bill."

No, not a dream. This is a freakin' nightmare!

In frustration you tell him to just show you the damned hatchback.  He opens the door and you slide in to the driver's seat.  You look around and it isn't bad to look at. You ask for the keys -- he gives them to you. As you reach for the ignition you notice a credit card swipe machine mounted in the dash. You ask him what the heck it is for.

"Oh that?" he says, "It is for when you start the car. You need to swipe you credit card until you have paid your deductible."

"What?"

"Yes" He says, "Until you have reached your deductible you have to swipe your card each time you start it."

"Deductible for what?" you stammer.

He goes on to explain that any time you use your car you must pay.  Although there are some trips that are free.  If you are going to the post office, if you are going to a volunteer job with a federally licensed organization, if you are dropping your child off at a public school or if you are going to a rally those trips are all free!

"But I don't have kids! Can I get another free trip instead?" you ask.

Nope that's all the car will allow.

"I pay all my bills online and I use FedEx. I never go to the post office."

He just looks at you blankly and says that these are the ONLY free trips and there aren't any substitutions. Period.

"How does the car know where I am going? You ask sarcastically.

He very seriously says, "Oh it KNOWS."

Wake up, wake up, wake up you think to yourself.

Well how much will it cost every year?  He looks as his tablet and swipes a few times and says, "For this car only $12,000."

You shriek, "TWELVE THOUSAND DOLLARS?" You only take home $3000 a month. That is one-third of your take home pay!

You ask him how it all works. He tells you that each time you make a trip the car totals up the mileage and then charges your card whatever the government rate is for mileage.  Right now that is 48.5 cents a mile. 

But wait he says, excitedly, "You get 80% of your miles paid for after you meet your deductible! Isn't that great?"

You tell him that you only drive about 10,000 miles a year - you would have to drive nearly 25,000 miles a year to meet your deductible. You will never reach your deductible. And what the heck does the 80% mean?

He goes on to explain that when you swipe your card it knows how many miles you have driven and once you have drive enough miles to pay off your deductible then you only pay 80% of the 48.5 cents or 10 cents!  Oh and you still get those FREE trips!

You stop, collect your thoughts and summarize to him all you have been told.

 

1. I can't buy a used car; I must buy a new one.

2. I only have three to choose from all slightly different shades of white.

3. They come with options I don't want or need.

4. It doesn’t come with options I DO want.

5. I have to pay full price for the car because I work hard and earn a living -- the price is non-negotiable yet other people who don't work hard are getting the same car for free. I have to pay more so they can pay less.

6. The car charges me 48.5 cents a mile each time I use it until I have driven 25K miles, even though I will never drive that much and then it only charges me 10 cents a mile after that.  

7. IF I had kids dropping them off at school would be free ONLY if they attended public school.

8. Even if I go across the street to the Toyota dealership my choices are pretty much the same.

9. My tuition is going up, my rent is going up and my wage is going to go down to offset the mandatory electric charging system that is being required to be provided for MY car.

10. AND you are going to charge me $100 if I leave her without a car.

He says, "YES, you got it! Welcome to the Affordable CAR Act!"

And you realize it isn't a dream…

 

 

 

 

The UN-Affordable Care Act or ObamaDoesn'tCare

In 2008, when George W. Bush was president, according to Gallup, 14.9 percent of adult residents of the United States lacked health insurance coverage. That increased to 16.2 percent in 2009, the year that Obama was inaugurated, and to 16.4 percent in 2010, the year that Obama signed his law requiring that all Americans have health insurance.

In the first half of 2011, according to data released by Gallup in 2001, the percentage of adults in the United States lacking health insurance ticked up to 16.8 percent - that is 55,440,000 people based on a population of 330 million.

That conclusion is based on Gallup’s interviews with 177,237 American adults from January through June of this year. The interviews were part of the ongoing Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index survey.

Today it is being estimated that an additional 37 MILLION people will be dropped by their insurance. Add the 55.5 mil to the 37 mil and we now have 92 million people uninsured or 28% of the population.  In addition 75% of all new job growth is part time and specifically does NOT offer benefits. 

Florida Blue, for example, is terminating about 300,000 policies, about 80 percent of its individual policies in the state. Kaiser Permanente in California has sent notices to 160,000 people – about half of its individual business in the state. Insurer Highmark in Pittsburgh is dropping about 20 percent of its individual market customers, while Independence Blue Cross, the major insurer in Philadelphia, is dropping about 45 percent.

Before Obamacare, a lot more people had jobs; those jobs provided their insurance. Millions of people have LOST their insurance due to Obamacare. McDonalds hired 62,000 people AFTER getting a waiver from having to change their insurance coverage for their employees. They can't afford it and we won't pay $10 for a Big Mac.

Executives at several staffing firms told Reuters that the law, which requires employers with 50 or more full-time workers to provide healthcare coverage or incur penalties, was a frequently cited factor in requests for part-time workers. A decision to delay the mandate until 2015 has not made much of a difference in hiring decisions, they added.

"Us and other people are hiring part-time because we don't know what the costs are going to be to hire full-time," said Steven Raz, founder of Cornerstone Search Group, a staffing firm in Parsippany, New Jersey (he needs a grammar lesson). "We are being cautious."

Raz said his company started seeing a rise in part-time positions in late 2012 and the trend gathered steam early this year. He estimates his firm has seen an increase of between 10 percent and 15 percent compared with last year.

Other staffing firms have also noted a shift.

"They have put some of the full-time positions on hold and are hiring part-time employees so they won't have to pay out the benefits," said Client Staffing Solutions' Darin Hovendick. "There is so much uncertainty. It's really tough to design a budget when you don't know the final cost involved."

Part time jobs also don't show up on the unemployment numbers. Ironically, if enough businesses hire, say, two 20-hour workers instead of one 40-hour worker, there could be an apparent improvement in the unemployment figures. The unemployment data counts a person as “employed” if they worked at least ONE hour in the reporting period. By switching from full-time workers to a larger number of part-time workers, it would make it appear that unemployment dropped — even though the total amount paid to workers remained unchanged.

Citing from a New Jersey example the cheapest plan Horizon offers on the exchange that covers two 55-year-olds would cost $1,217 per month, a 63 percent increase from what the one New Jersey couple was paying. That plan, another New Jersey man, Mark Butler said, only offers 50 percent coinsurance and 50 percent prescription drug coverage, and has a $5,000 family deductible. They could also choose a plan with a $1,546 per month premium that offers a 20 percent coinsurance and $2,000 family deductible. None of this is affordable.  Take into consideration also that at this age, statistically speaking our income level has peaked.  It trends downward as we get older.

Butler goes on to say, "If my small business makes $100,000 in a given year — not a lot of money in Morris County — I will have to pay between 15 percent and 19 percent of my pretax income on health insurance," Butler said. "That is not affordable."

So in conclusion the "Affordable" Care Act is not affordable.  Fewer not more citizens are covered by health insurance.  The young, who are already saddled with paying of the national debt, are being gouged and are being forced to subsidize higher risk individuals in the pool.  In what universe does this make sense?

I don't often quote Bill Clinton but he gave us a pearl of wisdom where Barak Hussein Obama is concerned:

Obama, Bill Clinton said, “doesn’t know how to be president” and is “incompetent.” For once I agree with Bill!

 

 

Peace Through Strength

There is a sad irony going on in the world today…  America, once a great and powerful nation was both loved and feared.  We had one "equal" and that was the Soviet Union. When the USSR fell apart it left us…the U.S.  We only needed to rattle a saber and bad guys often just stopped whatever nefarious deeds they were doing and scattered.  Things were good.  Good not just for us but really for the rest of the world.  We, while we sure could have been, were not bullies.  Just because we COULD be if we chose -- we often got labeled as such.  We weren't. They were jealous.

This power brought peace…not just here but all over.  It isn't because you USE your might that brings about good behavior -- it is because you COULD.  The military was a fighting force -- not a humanitarian force.  But because it was so mighty it brought the world more humanity.  

As this nation creeps closer and closer to mediocrity and to being just one of many like us, our ability to feed the starving, to help the oppressed and to be the do-gooders that we have always been, is slipping away. In our power and benevolence we have fed more people, aided more nations and done more good than any nation on earth in our short 230+ year lifetime. We are mere children on the planet. There are nations that have existed for twice, three, four times our life that have done nary a fraction of what we have done. We were able to do all this good because we were powerful.

As our strength wanes we continue to TRY to be the leader and the feeder of the world…and in doing so we are neglecting our own.  We are sending billions of dollars in aid abroad and we can't pay our own bills. If a parent allows herself to starve to death by giving all of the food to her child, who will feed the child when she is dead?

There is no such thing as global peace through agreement -- stop even imagining it.  We are animals and we all have self interested motivations.  There will always, I mean ALWAYS be a nation or faction fighting to be on top -- the ONLY way to keep that in check is to be on top and to gently kick them off the ladder they are scrambling up.  We will never be able to call them down from the bottom by negotiating. 

Europe has been a negotiator for a good long time and Europe is weak.  They look good and it looks appealing that they all sort of get along -- but in a sense they have to.  They share borders; they are geographically vulnerable to one another.  We are not.  Even when Europe is lamenting that the US has too much power we need to let them vent and go about our business.  The only reason they have the freedom to lament is because we had the power to let them. It is because we were mighty that they are not all speaking German.  How quickly we forget.

The United States of America needs to get back to the basics of lifting weights, eating right and getting enough sleep.  We need to let the world have their skirmishes because they will.  We need to regain a single mindedness that we are #1!  Notre Dame doesn't go into a bowl game saying "we are number #1 but let's all just decide we can all be #1".  Being #1 allows us to be both the mighty force we must be and the benevolent care giver we want to be.

On this anniversary of the attacks on the United States let's all get together for a single cause.  Let's all decide that we want a strong coach, a powerful leader who puts our nation first.  Let's all step back and look at the formula that will produce the results we want.  Whether you are a global peace person or you simply like the idea that we can kick ass.  It is ONLY through power that we will get either… This is the only way that we can all get what we want… Think about it.

 

Syria: The Rest of the Story

The official Western narrative against Syria goes something like this:

"The Syrian government has abused basic human rights, maintains deep ties with rogue regimes like Iran and North Korea, and just recently launched a chemical weapons strike on hundreds of its own people. In addition to killing its own people, the Assad regime is serving to destabilize an already unstable Middle East. Assad must go…"

Now for the rest of the story…

Syria is none of our business in the context of the above statement.  Neither side is a "good guy" and for our president to even THINK of going in there borders on utter insanity.  He and is loose lipped cronies who demanded swift action to the gassing of a group of people need to save face and not look like the buffoons they really are. The spouted off in a knee jerk way to news…"We must DO something!" they clamored. The sad fact is that an overthrow of Syrian President Assad has long been in the works.  This is a deadly and dangerous performance -- all the chess pieces began to move when the U.S. backed each of the Middle East uprisings… To date, rulers have been forced from power in Tunisia, Egypt (twice), Libya, and Yemen; civil uprisings have erupted in Bahrain and Syria; major protests have broken out in Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, and Sudan; and minor protests have occurred in Mauritania, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Djibouti and Western Sahara.

The real aim of the US, it is being said, is to remove all the independent governments in the Middle East, to destroy the popular movements in order to secure the domination of this key strategic and oil rich region. Pretty sinister and frighteningly believable.

This is about natural resources and energy my friends…this time it is not oil but liquefied natural gas or LNG. The US has plenty of it and we don't need it -- and if we are smart we will keep it that way. Europe however is thirsty.  This has NOTHING to do with any children who were or were not gassed.

Have you not wondered why Russia is so concerned? Russia has the world’s largest reserves of natural gas. Which country has the second largest reserves? Iran.

Iran, however, is isolated with no current ability to export its vast energy supplies to Europe. Russia has its eye on the potential profits of bringing Iranian oil and gas online for Europe. For this reason, (among myriad others) it has sought to solidify its relations with Iran. Of course, the most direct route for moving Iran’s energy supplies to Europe is right through the heart of Iraq and into Syria. So, it appears that Russia’s alliance with Syria has less to do with Syria and much more to do with the Iranian gas that may soon flow into Syria. As we already said, Europe is thirsty.

Assad wants to cut a deal with Russia and will not work with the U.S. or Israel.  So of course we want him out. Russia has stepped up its diplomatic and trade activities in the Middle East and North Africa in a bid to enhance its geopolitical clout and gain access to, and at least partial control over, the region's oil and gas reserves. Among the former global superpower's tactics: linking arms deals and debt-forgiveness to energy deals. The strategy has been most apparent in former client states of the ­Soviet Union including Libya, Iraq and Syria, although by no means limited to such countries. Moreover, Moscow has not shied away from courting the authoritarian regimes of countries such as Iran, Syria and Libya that are or have been shunned by the US and other western governments. So Russia is shopping for partners and picking all the ones we are not friendly with.  Reagan would be outraged.

Sadly, when it comes to the US (and of course Israel), it does have a very hidden agenda: one that involves lying to its people about what any future intervention is all about, and the fabrication of narrative about chemical weapons and a bloody regime hell bent on massacring every man, woman and child from the "brave resistance." What they all fail to mention is that all such "rebels" are merely paid for mercenaries of the Qatari emir, whose sole interest is to accrue even more wealth even if it means the deaths of thousands of Syrians in the process.

A bigger read through of the events in Syria reveals an even more complicated web: one that has Qatar facing off against Syria, with both using Syria as a pawn in a great natural resource chess game, and with Israel and the US both on the side of the petrodollars, while Russia and to a lesser extent China, form the counterbalancing axis and refuse to permit a wholesale overthrow of the local government which would unlock even more geopolitical leverage for the gulf states.

Up until today, we would have thought that when push comes to shove, Russia would relent. However, with the arrival of a whole lot of submarines in Cyprus, the games just got very serious. After all the vital interests of Gazprom, the largest extractor of natural gas and one of the largest companies in the world and perhaps the most important "company" in the world - are suddenly at stake.

I see two take aways here.  One is that the Syrian outrage is a big lie.  I am not saying that Obama is the FIRST president to lie to us about this but he is the CURRENT president and there are a lot of very powerful and very dangerous characters at play now.  This has got to stop.  The second is that we MUST recognize and EMBRACE that we may have the largest oil reserves on the planet. It is estimated that this area dubbed the Green River formation, contains a massive three trillion barrels of oil, half of which is currently recoverable. To give you an idea for how significant that number actually is, three trillion is approximately equivalent to the rest of the world’s proven reserves combined.

We can and must rely on ourselves…if we do, we can stay out of this nasty and never ending turmoil.

 

Obamacare, Drugs and My Future

I have an autoimmune disease.  I had NOTHING to do with getting it.  It just happened one day.  I do my best to take care of myself.  I am eligible to be 100% disabled and could, tomorrow, live off the dime of the taxpayer.  I could depend on all of you for my income and my healthcare.  I choose NOT to do that.  I want to work and I work hard.  I also have worked very hard at bettering myself professionally and making myself more valuable.  One would assume doing that would also lead to a betterment of my income and standard of living.  We should reward those who work hard and are willing to solve problems.  Ah, alas 'tis not so… 

I have a new job that pays nearly 50% more than my former job.  I have a new insurance provider.  Anthem.  I have to pay a portion of my monthly premium as my employer does not pay 100% of the option I chose. I accept that because I DID chose that more expensive option.  So that comes off the top of my paycheck.  I am on a certain medication that I take once a month.  It is called Simponi and it is a single injection that suppresses my immune system. My disease causes my immune system to be in overdrive.  I have had this disease now for 18 years.  I have been through the gamut of medications.  Some work. Some don't. Some make me very, very sick. This one -- Simponi -- works.  It isn't a medication I WANT to have to take.  It makes me susceptible to nasty infections (deadly ones) and it opens me up to certain cancers.  If I do not take it though I am in agony and life really sucks.  It is that game you play when you pick the lesser of the evils.

Anthem for me is a joke.  With any injectible medication they are only willing to cover 60% of the cost.  That is okay when the cost is $100, you or I would pay $40.  It is not okay when the cost of ONE injection is $2500.  Yes, I said $2500 per dose.  My monthly out of pocket expense for ONE DOSE is $1000.  That doesn't take into account ANY of the other accompanying medications -- there are several.  This disease is not fun in any way folks - it is not fun to have and it is no fun to treat.  Simponi is a newer medication so I decided to price Enbrel instead.  I have been on it in the past; my results are not as good with Enbrel as they are with Simponi but I realized that I might have to be willing to suffer some in order to be able to treat my disease, able to AFFORD to treat my disease.  Enbrel is a WEEKLY injection but it has been on the market for a decade and half and one might assume the price had come down.  Um, no.  My co-pay on Embrel is $938 per dose.  Multiply that by 4 and we are looking at $3752 a MONTH! That is $48,776 a YEAR for ONE medication and that is WITH insurance!  Yes there are "support programs" from the drug companies…  Enbrel will help you with your co-pay for a maximum of $4000 per 6 months.  That is nearly consumed in the first month…  LOVELY, eh?

So I am now simply working to treat my disease.  With this new "raise" and new insurance company and Obama's taxes on the "rich", I am taking home less than I was with my old job.  Why should a person like me NOT go on disability?  I am working MY ass off so someone else can sit on theirs and collect welfare, food stamps, medicaid…this is an f-ing joke.  I am a department head of a County Government with a ton of responsibility and a staff to manage.  I carry a weapon at times when I do code enforcement calls.  I am giving a lot of myself to my job and my community and this is what my nation gives me back.  Where is the assistance for the people who want to stay healthy enough to be IN the workforce?  For the people who have invested in themselves enough to be valuable citizens and valuable employees?  I WANT to be a contributor but I don't get any help until I am not one.

The drug companies are a bad guy in this too.  They discount the drug 50% to the insurance company.  THEN they offer, in the case of Enbrel, $8000 a year in discounts to the consumer.  How many products do you know that could withstand that level of "discount" and still turn a profit?

I found the following on a medical advice website and wanted to laugh. One-fifty? I would LOVE that co-pay! 

"You have insurance and, supposedly, it covers your medicines. However, you still get stuck with a portion of the bill that the insurance company calls a “copay.” In some cases these copays can run more than $150/ month per medication (e.g. Enbrel). If you are on more than one of these expensive, branded medications the copays can really add up. What are your options?"

Frankly I have no options.  I have to spend over 25% of my take home pay on ONE dose of one medication.  The intent of the Affordable Care Act (AKA Obamacare) is to make sure that all Americans have access to quality, affordable health care," said Brian Rosen, a senior vice president of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. He adds that there is a danger that the insurance marketplaces "will discriminate against the patients with the highest medical need. That would completely undermine the spirit of the ACA."

The group has been joined by Rep. Doris Matsui, D-Calif., in urging state officials to reconsider the policy. The high copays "could prevent many patients from receiving the lifesaving treatments they need because of prohibitively high cost," Matsui wrote to the state.  Cancer drugs and autoimmune drugs fall into the same category of costs and how they are treated in the marketplace.

Leukemia patient Lisa Lusk worries about what will happen to her. A nursing assistant who lives near Fresno, Lusk is hoping to return to work in the next few months. When that happens, she expects to lose emergency coverage she's now getting through the state. And the medication Lusk takes to manage her chronic form of the disease costs more than $5,000 a month.  

I sure can identify with Lisa and her fears. "I'm scared that when I get a job my co-pay may be more than $1,500 a month," said Lusk. "I'll just be working to pay for my medications." 

The crux is that I am already there and Obamacare has not even fully kicked in yet.  If this is the future for people who are NOT yet there, where will that put me?

Sinister Despotism

Watergate, 1972. The affair began with the arrest of five men for breaking and entering into the Democratic National Committee (DNC) headquarters at the Watergate complex on June 17, 1972. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) connected cash found on the burglars to a slush fund used by the Committee for the Re-Election of the President, the official organization of Nixon's campaign. In July 1973, as evidence mounted against the president's staff, including testimony provided by former staff members in an investigation conducted by the Senate Watergate Committee, it was revealed that President Nixon had a tape-recording system in his offices and he had recorded many conversations. Recordings from these tapes implicated the president, revealing he had attempted to cover up the questionable (and illegal) goings-on that had taken place after the break-in. After a protracted series of bitter court battles, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the president had to hand over the tapes to government investigators; he ultimately complied. (Wikipedia)

Nixon was trying to win an election and he lied about having done or been a part of any of this.

So now we are in 2013. That sort of thing doesn't happen anymore now does it?  Read the conversation between Senator Mark Kirk and our Attorney General, Eric Holder only four days ago.

"Mr. Attorney General, I want to take you to the Verizon scandal and -- which I understand takes us to possibly monitoring up to 120 million calls. You know, when government bureaucrats are sloppy, they're usually really sloppy. Want to just ask, could you assure to us that no phone inside the Capitol were monitored of members of Congress that would give a future executive branch, if they started pulling this kind of thing off, would give them unique leverage over the legislature?

Holder replied, "With all due respect, Senator, I don't think this is an appropriate setting for me to discuss that issue. I'd be more than glad to come back in a -- in an appropriate setting to discuss the issues that you have raised," noting they were speaking in public.
Kirk, a Naval intelligence officer, was not satisfied with Holder's answer.

Said Kirk, "I would interrupt you and say the correct answer would be say no, we stayed within our lane, and I'm assuring you we did not spy on members of Congress." (Suntimes.com)

The top leadership in this administration must go. Feinstein, Holder, Obama and Biden -- they are defending all of their actions.  Eric Holder has more arrows in him than Custer did but HE is still alive (metaphorically speaking).  When is enough ENOUGH?  The Obama administration is so outrageously overreaching its authority that it is downright frightening…terrifying and infuriating.  Sure the Patriot Act followed 9/11 under the watch of George W. Bush.  It SEEMED appropriate then -- hindsight is 20/20.  We now have over a decade of hindsight.  In Obama's re-election speech he said that Al Qaida was on the run and dwindling.  Were that true why the massive expansion of the Patriot Act? Why so many things?  Hopefully you all knew when he was pandering for your vote that Al Qaida and all its spin offs were alive and well…  So that was a lie, one of so many. 

This is sinister and I am now willing to go into the dark thoughts and wonder what the big picture is.  They have taken away your privacy -- you might as well be micro chipped.  They want to take away our/your guns.  They control all your water with the EPA clean water act -- it ain't just about clean water folks, read the fine print and the EPA answers to NO ONE.  And they now control your food sources -- Monsanto owns you and what you eat.  Your meat is being process by Somalis and the Chinese's…it really and truly is. There are nations out there filled with people who don't like you or me.  Two of which are Somalia and China? You though the guy licking your taco shells at Taco Bell was bad?! I am NOT at ALL a conspiracy person -- but this is sick and treacherous…  It is very simple and very bad. It is an equation that adds up to really terrible outcomes.

Today folks your liberty is gone…GONE.  You have no privacy you have few rights against this sort of autocratic leadership.  How is it that he is able to still be the President of the formerly freest nation on the planet?  Was the Kool-Aid that good?  Why aren't you who voted for him outraged?  You should be more angry than I am.  He didn't fool me.  Don't you feel duped?  Do you feel a little regret? A lot?  You should feel partly responsible. Do you?  This is a dangerous man you handed the reins to.  He is dangerous, calculated and sinister. 

Angry. Really Angry About Healthcare "Reform"

First I want to apologize for my tone…I will come across as being angry.  I am angry. I am mad as hell.

May 13, 2013 on the AP wire…

"WASHINGTON (AP) — Cancer patients could face high costs for medications under President Barack Obama's health care law, industry analysts and advocates warn.

Where you live could make a huge difference in what you'll pay.

To try to keep premiums low, some states are allowing insurers to charge patients a hefty share of the cost for expensive medications used to treat cancer, multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis and other life-altering chronic diseases."

Thank you so much Mr. F-ing Obama... I am already facing a HUGE co-pay for my med EVERY MONTH for my rheumatoid arthritis... and now with your dumb-ass healthcare "reform" you might be ending my working career...  I cannot work my ass off just to pay for a medication...and that is exactly what you are doing to people like me. If this comes to pass I too will be "on the dole" and I will become one of the statistics I so loathe...a net taker. I will not be able to afford the "reform". You Barak will have forced me and people like me to become dependants when we have worked all our lives to be INDEPENDENT.   I am ALREADY giving the government 40% of my paycheck. I am now giving a drug company 25% of my take home pay for ONE medication and that is likely to go up now?  That is insanity.

So who did Obamacare actually help?  NO ONE.  We already had Medicare and Medicaid for the uninsured and the uninsurable.  For those who choose not to work -- you are on your own.  There IS work out there -- make no mistake.  It just is harder than many people want to work…or it pays less than they think they are worth or it is "beneath them".  Nothing is beneath any of us for honest work.  Finding a job is hard work -- but it isn't impossible.  As an insurable person (meaning I can't just buy it from anyone) I was faced with three choices. (Also note that my chronic disease is through no fault of my own -- I did not choose my parents or their genes). My three choices are:

1) Go on government assistance and not work so I would "qualify" for aid.  That was a no. 

2) The second choice was to pay for my own through the Cover Colorado -- not great coverage but sure was better than none. 

3) Or I could pursue a job and fight for a job that provided coverage. 

I was on Cover Colorado for a while and kept healthy enough to work as a contractor -- it was work I could find so I did it. I still had to pay for my own healthcare premiums -- it is NOT free. I was not feeling great but I was healthy enough to work and that is what I did. My "window of wellness" was just enough to get through a work week with maybe a little left over for a horseback ride -- often not anything left over. Running and riding my bike was OUT!  Then I looked for jobs that would provide me coverage and I took a job that was far less pay than I wanted and not at all the "dream job" I wanted and still I made it work.  In fact at times it was a miserable  place to work -- but it was my job and it provided me with things that I could not provide for myself.  It is called a COMPROMISE.  I don't have the RIGHT to have a great job -- I have the RIGHT TO THE FREEDOM to pursue it.

I am not a silver spoon kid.  I don't want to hear any "Yeah but you had this advantage or that advantage". I was a WAITRESS for much of my 20s.  I didn't go to college until my late 20s and that was because I wanted to BE more and EARN more than a waitress did.  I paid for EVERY DIME of my own education and at the beginning cobbled together classes in between part time work at a construction company, waitressing, teaching preschool and cleaning houses.  I left the house at 6AM and didn't get home until 10-10:30PM almost every night. It was quite a juggling act but we were in a recession at the time and it was all I could do to make ends meet.

I face not one but two chronic diseases and I still took care of what was in front of me.  If I told you my life story you would nominate me for an Oprah award - and yet I don't want your pity and I don't want the government's handouts.  I want the freedom to pursue a career and be a useful part of society.  It was not all f-ing joy and roses.  But I knew it was up to me to get anywhere if I didn't want to stay where I was.  I have been through the wringer more than once.  The best thing one can do is stand up, dust yourself off and put one foot in front of the other and keep moving.

The young and healthy -- those who don't want to buy healthcare insurance have the RIGHT to not buy it -- now all of you with kids who thought this was a good idea…your kids are going to be paying MUCH higher rates for their health insurance to offset all of those who are costly to insure. You don't think your rates are going to go up if you keep your kid on your plan until he or she is 26? Think again. Your kids and their kids will be soaked to pay off the national debt and your kids will be soaked to pay for people who don't want to pay for themselves. The well-off and wealthy who choose to self-insure and can afford it, have the right to self insure. 

The sick and hilarious irony in all this "healthcare reform" is that nothing is working the way we were told it would work.  Face it -- all he wanted to do is 1) have his name on something big and 2) win an election. He told us this would be a saving grace for people like me -- people who were faced with pre-existing conditions.  We would now be insured like everyone else.  That no one could turn us away.  Well that is all hunky-dory Barak -- but SOMEONE has got to pay for it!  For someone who is willing to work and can be kept healthy enough to work -- some support is a good investment.  Allow someone like me to produce more than I consume.  That is the whole idea of an HMO -- spread out the risk.  They actually work.  But the federal government is so busy trying to win the hearts and minds of a class of people who will continue to vote for them as long as the support doesn't run out.  Give them a freebie and you have got their vote.  It is sickening.

Do you realize that only 44% of the US population over the age of 18 is actually IN THE WORKFORCE?  That means that over HALF the US population of people over the age of 18 are NOT WORKING!! This includes those who are retired. A record 5.4 million workers and their dependents have signed up to collect federal disability checks since President Obama took office. These people are no longer counted as "unemployed" so they make the unemployment rate look good.  Why are they now suddenly "disabled" when they were not before Obama took office?

"We see a lot of people applying for disability once their unemployment insurance expires," said Matthew Rutledge, a research economist at Boston College's Center for Retirement Research.

The number of applications last year was up 24% compared with 2008, Social Security Administration data show.

As the Congressional Budget Office explained : "When opportunities for employment are plentiful, some people who could quality for (disability insurance) benefits find working more attractive ... when employment opportunities are scarce, some of these people participate in the DI program instead."  That means folks that they ARE healthy enough to WORK!  I am all for support for those who are truly disabled but for those who "find it more attractive" -- please, that means you CAN WORK and you should work.  And again there is work out there if you are willing.

The explosive growth in disability enrollment also "helps explain some of the drop in the labor force participation rate," noted economist Ed Yardeni on his blog.

In fact, the participation rate — the share of working-age people who have or are looking for a job — has fallen to 63.8% compared with 65.7% at the start of Obama's term.

Ironically, this drives down the unemployment rate, which simply measures how many people are looking for work but haven't been able to find it. When people quit looking or sign up for disability benefits, they no longer count as unemployed.

The problem is that few people who get on disability will ever participate in the labor force again. Think about that for a moment they will NEVER WORK AGAIN and they have no incentive to ever work again -- every one of us needs the next generation to pay into social security for our own benefits.  Sadly, that is the way the program was set up. In fact, the vast bulk of those who exit Social Security Disability Insurance do so either because they hit retirement age or died -- not because they have now decided to work again.

So in closing this sucks! I will be penalized if I want to work and produce and I will be rewarded if I become a dependant.  Isn't that just a little screwed up?  I ask everyone out there -- is this right? Is this good? Can you really, really still support this?

I could go on and on -- but I have to get in the shower and get myself ready for WORK!