Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Why 2010 Is So Important

The year 2010 may not seem too important to the average American as far as politics are concerned. After all there isn’t a Presidential election this year. But, what the average America does not realize in this case could hurt them. The currently political landscape has the Health Care Bill in center stage. With every delay and objection that is brought forth the passing of that bill gets pushed further and further back. If the democrat majority in Congress is lost this year it could signal an end to this bill (and many others that Congress has been trying to jam down America’s collective throat). And for those of you who are waiting on the important legislation that has been pushed to the side as the health care debate rages on, such as fair/flat tax, then this election should be instrumentally important to you. Overall, regardless of what piece of legislation you think should be the hot topic of today, one thing is for sure, we need to get conservative politicians back in office. Here is how it stacks up:

In the House of Representatives, the current break down is 257 Democrats and 178 Republicans this gives the democrats an overwhelming majority of 59.1%. As we have seen in the previous year, despite rhetoric of bi-partisan politics from President Obama, the democrats have used that majority to push through anything and everything they want. Depending on whose political opinion you are listening to there are anywhere from 16 to 127 seats in the House of Representatives that are truly up for grabs this election year. I like to estimate on the higher end since this has been an unusually volatile year in politics with the majority abusing their power. So assuming 127 seats are up for grabs, based on several different polls, the split looks like this:

Current Incumbent positions up for grabs:
Democrat: 98
Republican: 29

Predicted outcome according to the press:
Likely Democrats: 22
Leaning Democrat: 54
Toss up: 16
Leaning Republican: 22
Likely Republican: 13

What does all this mean? Well, according to the media, the situation is pretty much hopeless for Republicans. Anyway you look at it the Democrats will take the house, but at a minimum, the numbers will look better for the republicans. Let’s keep in mind as well that even though the press thinks that something is a sure win for one side or the other. There are inevitably upsets every time so not a single seat out of all 435 of them is completely safe.

In the Senate, the current break down is 59 Democrats and 41 Republicans, and two independents that might as well be democrats. This again gives the democrats a majority, but numbers wise that majority seems much smaller. In these elections anywhere 36 seats are up for election only 21 are up for grabs (i.e. not a safe bet for one side or the other) this election year. The split for the Senate looks like this:

Current Incumbent positions up for grabs:
Democrat: 13
Republican: 8

Predicted outcome according to the press:
Likely Democrats: 5
Leaning Democrat: 0
Toss up: 8
Leaning Republican: 4
Likely Republican: 4

What does all this mean? According to the media, this is another hopeless situation for the Republicans. The democrats will still wind up with a majority of at least 49 (plus 2 independents who seem to vote democrat more often than not). However, the margin is a lot closer than in the House of Representatives.

So do I tell you all this so you as a good conservative American can be depressed and throw up your arms and say there is no hope? Well, that is what the liberal media wants you to think. I on the other hand will be following the good old-fashioned saying “it’s not over till the fat lady sings.” (and believe you me I want to See Speaker Pelosi singing the blues) I see this as an opportunity to show Americans what we as conservatives are all about. We must get involved NOW! Do not wait! Find the good conservative in your state’s primary and support them like your future and the future of your children depend on it, because it does. Show the world that the conservative American is sick and tired of the way this country has been headed under the current administration.

To help you out a little, may I suggest the reference:

http://www.senateconservatives.com/

…and if anyone knows a good counter part for the house of representatives, please do share.

For those of you who follow me on twitter or facebook: I will over the next few days be looking for those Senators (and later Representatives) who I feel represent conservative ideals in America. I will let you know who they are and if they have a twitter/facebook page. I welcome any and all assistance and finding who is right for America.

THE TIME IS NOW! CONSERVATIVES, STAND UP AND LET YOUR VOICES BE HEARD!

A Note to the dissenters: I do realize that generalizations have been used in this post.  While it is not fair to assume that all democrats are liberals and all republicans are conservative, in general that is the way they lean. I would sooner support a conservative democrat over a liberal republican and would gladly support an independent if he were the only conservative running. I hold stronger to my ideals than to any party.

Monday, March 8, 2010

Fair, Flat, and Current Tax

Over the entire weekend and during most of my free moments at work today, I spent time reviewing the proposed bills for Fair and Flat taxes. I had a general understanding beforehand, but now feel overwhelmed and stupefied by the amount of information that I took in. One thing that I am certain of after reading these documents is that the current tax system is a joke. Take for instance the now well know picture of Rep John Linder (R-GA) shown below:

In this picture, Rep Linder is posing with a code of the current tax code (the bound books lying down) and a copy of his bill (Fair Tax) held in his hands. Obviously, no one in their right mind has read through every page of the current tax code (and why would you) but the fair tax bill (current version is only 131 pages) I just finished reading through. Now I wouldn’t exactly recommend anyone directly read the Fair tax bill, but after finishing reading it, I found a much simpler (i.e. non-lawyer jargon) version that looks accurate enough at http://www.fairtax.org/PDF/PlainEnglishSummary_TheFairTaxAct2007.pdf

This version (only 36 pages long) will give your average person a good understand of the bill and only take a small portion of your time to do so. The Flat tax bill by comparison is 17 pages long and infinitely easier to read, but does not do away completely with the stack of books shown in the picture above.

Here is a little bit about the two contenders for your new tax code broken down to the simplest explanation.

Flat Tax:

Flat Tax is actually somewhat similar to our current tax system in the fact that it is still an income tax, but it is very different in the fact that those pesky Form 1040s that you have been filling out since you made your first real dollar will be a thing of the past. There will be a new, simple way to figure out your tax. Take the amount of money you made, multiple it by 19% (for the first 2 years and 17% after that) and that is the amount of money you will pay in taxes. The beauty of this is that everyone will pay the same percentage regardless of the amount of money they make. The wealthy pay the most but they still only pay 19% like everyone else. That seems pretty simple and very fair to me, but like most good bills, there is a down side to this idea. Most people may not realize it but at one time flat tax existed. The very first income tax was a flat tax. The problem is that liberals (or maybe more properly, socialists) believed in the “distribution of wealth” (much like our current President) consequently you started to get a tiered system of taxes so that the wealthy had to pay a larger percentage and you got deductions for everything you could possibly imagine as a way to encourage growth in one sector of the economy or the other. This eventually led to the stack of books you see in the picture. So the down side to Flat Tax is that while we are rewinding the system to an earlier period when things were more fair, but in the end, it will likely just wind up right back where we are today.

If you decide to read it like I did you can find a pdf version of the bill at:

http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=109_cong_bills&docid=f:h1040ih.txt.pdf

Fair Tax:

Fair Tax is a completely new angle on how to bring in revenue to the Federal government. It builds on a form of taxation that is already present and working in most states. You guessed it, sales tax. This contender gets rid of income taxes, gets rid of the IRS, and gets rid of most tax filing (all of it for your average person). Now I know what you are thinking. You are probably celebrating thinking about all the money you will be able to keep that the government now takes from you but don’t celebrate too soon. Now instead of that income tax, everything that you purchase at the store and ever service rendered to you will include a 23% sale tax on it. The good part is that there are no more loopholes (or at least none that you would want to use). It also encourages saving your money (since you won’t pay taxes on the interest you earn). On a grander scheme, it encourages growth in our country by getting rid of all those pesky taxes that companies have to pay just to do business. This will encourage them to set up shop here (or at least discourage them from moving their company to a foreign country). This means more work and lower unemployment ect. Now for the bad side. This tax while meaning well does have some hints of socialism in it. This is in the form of a rebate. This rebate basically pays everyone a refund (in advance) of the amount of taxes someone right at the poverty line would pay. While I do believe that this tax has its heart in the right place (i.e. taking care of the poor), it is a little socialist in nature in that it seeks to equalize the poor with everyone else by giving them more then they are deserving of. It in effect gives this same money to people who do not add to the GDP (i.e we are paying them not to work). However, the worst part of this bill is the feasibility of it. It is an uphill battle because it requires that the 16th amendment be repealed. For those of you who have forgotten what you learned in your American Government class you took in high school (or earlier) I will give you a quick run down of that process. In order for an amendment to pass you first have to have a two-thirds vote in both houses of Congress (good luck with that). If the proposed amendment actually makes it through that process, it still has to be approved by three-fourths of the states (again good luck with that). There is a reason we only had 27 amendments. Therefore if you really want to see this passed, you better get to work and get the word out because I can tell you right now (based on an informal polling of my co-workers) that word is not out yet.

If you decide to read it like I did you can find a pdf version of the bill at:

http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=111_cong_bills&docid=f:h25ih.txt.pdf

I also highly recommend the website:

http://www.fairtax.org/

and

http://www.pafairtax.org/resrcs/FlatTaxFairTaxComparison.pdf

(thank you FairTaxNancy)
Okay, now for the moment you have all been waiting for, which one did I like best… Yeah right like it is that easy. As I have stated to many people recently there are benefits and drawbacks to both the fair and flat taxes but what I do know is that both are better than the current tax code. If I was forced to choose I guess I would go with fair tax, but don’t let me influence your decision, read the bill yourself and make an informed decision. If either of these bills has a chance they have my support.

Friday, March 5, 2010

Support for a Liberal who is Supporting a Conservative Ideal

Dear America,

Far be it for me to rush to the support of a liberal, but in this case I think I will. The reason is this one particular liberal has a conservative side to him in at least one issue. That issue is the issue of abortion. You guessed it. I am putting my support behind Representative Bart Stupak’s (D-MI) push to remove abortion funding from the health care bill.

Now, for those of you out there who actually listen to the lies that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) spews on this topic, let me say this. Read the bill yourself and do a little research and you will see what the truth is. According to her, the bill is “abortion neutral”. Now to be fully honest with you and fair to her, if you listen to the whole statement you will see that this is only a white lie. Basically, in her mind and what she would have you believe, since abortion is not directly mentioned within the bill, it therefore is neutral. But if you do your research as I have mentioned you will find that the bill in fact does support taxpayer funded abortion.

The truth of the matter is found in a not so well known piece of legislation (unless you are a politician) first called the Hyde Amendment. If you do your research you will read the history of this amendment and find that at one time Medicaid was paying for nearly 300,000 abortions a year. The Hyde Amendment (named for Congressman Henry Hyde (R-IL)) barred the government from paying for abortions with funds allocated from the appropriation bill for Health and Human Services. Since that time (1976) the Hyde Amendment has been in every piece of Health Care legislation in one form or another.

Now fast forward to today’s current version of the health care bill and you will see that this wording is not present. It was proposed as part of a Stupak-Pitts Amendment which was in the original House Bill (and consequently why it passed). However, when the Senate voted on the bill, no such language existed. So, now you can see why, in Nancy Pelosi’s mind, she believes that the bill is neutral when in fact, if the amendment is not placed into the text of the final bill, it will open up the flood gates to allow taxpayer funded abortions again.

Thankfully, Representative Stupak and 11 other democrats have vowed to vote against any legislation that does not have this important language in it. I for one applaud them for doing so. The fight against abortion has long been a conservative ideal. No matter how you look at it, in the end you are taking the lives of young humans that are too small and too weak to defend themselves. My hope is that at a minimum the Stupak-Pitts Amendment will be added to the bill, but if America is lucky the bill will die completely.

Thursday, March 4, 2010

Well done Senator Bunning

Dear America,

Why is it that when you stand up for what is right, there is never a shortage of people to tell you, you are wrong for doing so? Of course you have guessed that I am talking about Senator Bunning. I am not sure how this whole situation got this out of hand, but I do know that a man doing what is right was vilified by both by the democrats and his own party.

Let rewind a little shall we. We only need to go back a little less than three weeks (to the 12th of February to be exact). On this day in American history, Congress put into effect a “pay-as-you-go” law. What does this mean? Well in the words of our President it means:
“Congress, you have to pay as you go. You can’t spend a dollar unless you cut a dollar elsewhere. This is how a responsible family or business manages a budget. And this is how a responsible government manages a budget, as well. “
And the naïve people in America rejoiced…No longer would Congress spend our tax dollars liberally. No longer will congress increase our national debt. Finally Congress would have to be (at least in part) fiscally conservative…and as the old saying goes “if you believed that, I have a nice bridge in Brooklyn to sell you”
Now come back in time to just a few days ago and you will see a good Conservative Senator from Kentucky by the name of Senator Jim Bunning. Congress is trying to pass a law that would extend money to among other things unemployment and Medicare (two of the largest Black Holes in America as far as our tax dollars are concerned). This man dared to stand up in Congress and tell them to follow their own rules. He actually told Congress to find out where the money would come from. I will tell you that I for one was shocked. Did Senator actually propose that Congress live by what they preach? Of course what did not shock me was the treatment that he received. Democrats and even a handful of Republicans verbally attacked him viscously for the next few days for daring to hold this bill up. And where was the support of President Obama then? Let’s just say it was with all the other support that the Senator received. Senator Bunning stood along against the masses.

And when Senator Bunning himself came up with a plan to pay for it all, what happened? Where is the support of those who voted for this rule in the first place? I am sorry to say, it was not there. Senator Bunning eventually compromised after fighting a hard uphill battle after agreements were made that funding would be provided in the near future. Let me just warn you now: don’t hold your breath.
Senator Bunning, I for one applaud you for your efforts. Please keep up the good fight for the short time that you remain in office.

BTW, in a final bit of irony, President Obama had a party of sorts yesterday for 31 of his favorite Democrats. Why did he have the party you ask? To thank them for their support in passing “pay-as-you-go”.

Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Reading Through the Health Care Bill

Dear America,

It struck me yesterday, that there is a good reason that a good majority of elected officials have law degrees. Last night I sat down again and tried to read a little further into the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (otherwise known as HR 3590, or the new Health Care Program, or Obama Care). My head was hurting from reading the legalistic terminology. You had to be a lawyer to turn understand/appreciate how this was written. Your average person would not have a clue what they were reading. A prime example of this was when I first started reading this a while back. In the opening pages of the Act, they said (in lawyer terminology) that heath insurance companies would not be allowed to set “unreasonable annual limits” on the payout of benefits. They then went on to say that “unreasonable annual limits” was defined in the Internal Revenue Code of 1986. Now I am sure none of you have read the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, but I will say that I took a look at it. Needless to say, I spent a good half hour to an hour trying to figure out exactly what “unreasonable annual limits” were. In the end, I still do not know. I gave up and decided that if I was ever going to read this thing completely, I would have to just assume that the person who wrote this knew what they were talking about and move on. Since then I have had to make that assumption dozens of times, and I am still not fished reading this thing (because I do have a job after all).

So after reading for bit yesterday, it occurred to me that it is very unlikely that any of our elected officials have read and truly understand what is in this bill. After all, the current bill is 2409 pages long. And this scares me beyond compare. If our elected officials do not know what they are voting on, why are they trying to pass this? From what I have ready there are many flaws in this program. And as I thought about that, while listening to a clip of Ronald Regan www.bit.ly/9txVgR speaking about the evils of socialized medicine, it occurred to me that this all boils down to a quote from Norman Thomas, a man who ran for President several times on the Socialist ticket. He said,
“The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism. But under the name of 'liberalism' they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program, until one day America will be a Socialist nation, without knowing how it happened.”

Ronald Regan warned us back in 1961 of this. True he was referring to Medicare at the time, but if you listen to the recording www.bit.ly/9txVgR you will be shocked at how similar it is to today’s fight.

I think the efforts of former Governor and Presidential Candidate Mike Huckabee are to be commended in this fight. He has started a petition to “Scrap the Bill” http://tinyurl.com/y8q542v . I am not sure what real effect it will have (I have signed it) but the sentiment is correct. THIS BILL IS WRONG FOR AMERICA. The bi-partisan support is not there for a reason. We need to start over and all sit down and try to rework a health care fix that does what the American people want, not what some Washington Liberals want.

As the recording of Ronald Regan finished up he quoted Former Representative Halleck of Indiana as saying
“When the American people want something from Congress, regardless of its political complexion, if they make their wants known, Congress does what the people want.”
Though there are several clips of our elected officials (all liberal democrats) saying they will force this bill through regardless of what the people they represent want, I can only hope that in the end, they will listen to you America. Stand up. Tell them that this bill is wrong. Tell them to start over and if they do not, tell them by way of your vote, that you do not represent me anymore.

Tuesday, March 2, 2010

I am a Right Wing Conservative American

Dear America,

As you read this blog, many of you will no doubt ask yourself, who is this person anyway? So to save you some time I will paint you a picture of this right wing conservative.

1) I am a proud American. I love my country and will not apologize for my belief that it is the best country in the world. That is not to say that there are not other good countries out there, but rather to say that I think mine is the best. If I did not believe that, I would have left this country and I think that anyone who does not agree with that statement should either be working to make America better or leaving it.

2) I am a Christian. Some would say that this is the wrong way to lead off introducing myself, but I would disagree. This country was built on Judeo-Christian Values and those values are the same values of conservatives in America today. This is not to say that my religion controls my political beliefs, but rather to point out a very important facet of my life. Since I am a Christian, you will rarely if ever see me support something that is in conflict with those beliefs. Though there are liberals out there who will use and twist religion to try and garner support for their policies, you will find that Christian beliefs by far support Conservative Values.

3) I am a happily married man with children. My children and their future are extremely important to me. I want to see them have a life that is as good as or better than the life I have lived. As such, I see it as my duty to take a stand for what is good in America and ensure that the liberals of this country do not destroy the things that have made this country so great.

4) I am the great-grandson of immigrants, I am proud of my heritage and I am proud of my great-grandfather who came to America seeking a better life for himself and his family. He came to America through Ellis Island. He learned English. He worked hard and raised wonderful children who he taught to love and respect their heritage, but to love and respect their Country (America) more. As such his son would later proudly serve in the Army during WWII. My great-grandfather lived as an example to me in my youth of what a real man should be. He taught me to love my country, work hard for my family, and to always live as God would have us live. His life also heavily influences my stance on immigration.

5) I have spent time in the Army and have deployed in support of this great nation. I believe that those who serve/have served in the Army, Air Force, Navy, Marines and Coast Guard are the sons and daughters of America and should be honored as such. It is hard to find a person who serves today who has not been deployed at least once, if not multiple times. These Service members/Veterans have put their lives on the line for this great country and for our freedom time and time again we should remember their sacrifices and give them utmost respect for what they have done and are continuing to do.

6) I am not old enough to claim social security and young enough to worry/know it will not be there for me unless something drastic is done. Other than that my age is not important to this blog.

7) My political affiliation is not as important to me as my political beliefs. I will vote for the candidate that best espouses these beliefs. Unfortunately, that sometimes means choosing between the lesser of the two evils. However, it may also mean voting for a third party candidate (a controversial topic to say the least). I believe that the political line between parties has blurred and good men and women need to take a stand for what they believe rather than trying to appease the most people.
Finally, I will end answering a question I am sure many of you are thinking. Why do you not specifically say who you are? The long answer is complicated. The short answer though is that in the end, it is not important. All that truly matter is that I am an American…I am a Right Wing Conservative American.

Monday, March 1, 2010

The Begining

Dear America,

First off, you are probably wondering why this blog is even being written in the first place. Well that is pretty simple. America is in dire need of some infusion of conservative thought and conservative values. It something we are in drastic short supply of given our current times. Here is just a short list of some of the reasons…


1) Our economy is in shambles due to liberal policies of spending.

a. Specifically, stimulus after stimulus which equates to billions of our hard earned tax dollars being wasted.

b. Social Security (a program that possibly should never have started) will be bankrupt before we know it and no one seems to be doing anything about it.

c. Our national debt is currently at $12.4 Trillion dollars and is far outpacing the revenue pulled in to the federal government.

d. It is more and more common to see state governments operating at a deficit.

e. Hundreds if not thousands of pork belly programs are funded by the National Government and our hard earn tax dollars.

2) The moral fabric of America is being torn.

a. We are currently in a fight in American over whether or not “homosexual marriage” or some other version thereof should be allowed. While liberal judges legislate from the bench and over ride the will of the people in some few areas where the conservatives have had success. Homosexual indoctrination has taken it’s stand in our schools, teaching that this deviant behavior is not a choice but and natural characteristic like skin color or sex…and the list goes on.

b. The perversion of society is allowed on the streets in many cities and BDSM and other perverted acts are celebrated in front of our children’s eyes while organizations like the ACLU fight to remove Judeo-Christian values and practices from our schools, work places and if they have their way our very lives.

c. The idea of teaching abstinence in schools alone is almost non-existent in America. More and more schools are starting to not teach abstinence at all. Our children are being forced to learn the perverted ways of the world as if they are normal and accepted by all. This directly leads to the spread of horrible STDs and decays the moral values and the self worth of all individuals in America.

d. Use of illegal drugs is so wide spread and accepted in American society that even a former President has admitted to having used drugs and that had little to no effect on the outcome of the election.

3) Government is overstepping their bounds.

a. Federal Government regularly imposes laws on America that should be left for the states to decide.

b. Liberal judges legislate from the bench.

c. Government agency after government agency is being created to limit or even destroy the free market principles which have made this country the economic power it is.

d. Laws are slowly being imposed upon America that challenge, limit and even directly oppose those rights set forth in the Bill of Rights.

I could go on as there are many more issues and this is just the tip of the iceberg, but that is what this blog is for. I welcome your thoughts as I continue to spread my own conservative thought through this blog. Welcome to The Thoughts of a Right Wing Conservative.