Freeze America!

President Obama recently delivered his State of the Union address and touched on a lot of topics.  I will admit that he has both short term and long term goals that he wants to accomplish but the one that I was asked to blog on was his proposal of a 5 year spending freeze.  Now, before I start talking about this idea, I have to establish a base as to the purpose of the budget before I start talking about his plan.

In previous blogs, I talked about the federal budget and what it was (For a recap, please read previous blogs on New World Order).  Now, the federal budget is devised by the Executive Branch of the federal government.  It is then “tweaked” by the Legislative Branch of the government.  So ultimately, even though it’s a joint effort, Congress will set the budget.  So, let’s talk about the plan:

Obama wants to put a spending freeze on non security, discretionary spending.  To understand what this is you have to understand that there are two types of spending in the federal budget.  That is mandatory spending and discretionary spending.  Mandatory spending goes towards programs that are required by law to provide certain benefits.  The majority of mandatory spending goes to social security, medicare, and Medicaid.  Discretionary spending is money that the Executive and Legislative branches negotiate over as part of the budgeting process.  You see technically, there is laws in place that state that social security, medicare, and Medicaid should provide certain services.  They could possibly adjust how much is paid out for those services but those services have to be covered by law.  On the other hand, things like education, defense, and transportation aren’t covered by such laws.  These are programs that the federal government gives money to at their “discretion”. Get it? Now Obama wants to put a spending freeze on those programs.  You can get a list of those programs easily by googling “2010 federal budget”.  I would do it but it’s just too long for this blog.  I do have a couple of points that I want to make about 2010 before I continue with his proposal (yes I know this is long and boring but you have to understand the base before you can understand the plan so I’ll just throw in a joke here to keep you interested)

What do you call a defective boomerang?

A stick.

OK let’s continue: in 2010, discretionary spending was estimated to cost about $1.4 trillion with over $700 billion going to defense and homeland security.  So, a few programs get half while the other 20+ get the other half and that’s the half that Obama wants to put a freeze on.  Departments like Education, Transportation, Housing and Urban development, Health and Human Services, Veteran Affairs, Labor, Treasury, etc…..  Now this proposal has some snags in it when I do my research.

First, he really touched on education during his speech so I will be watching to see if he really cuts spending with Education or does something to promote hiring more teachers in the coming years.  Next, I will also be watching Housing and Urban Development to see if anything changes with the dream of Americans becoming home owners.  Also, as a PA, I will definitely be checking on Health and Human Services budget with the passing of this healthcare law.  I believe since it is a law that spending will somehow be mandatory spending now as opposed to discretionary spending but I am not sure about that one.  I’m not saying he can’t do it; I just want to know where this estimated $200 billion dollars we will be saving over 10 years is coming from.

One more point, The Republicans have already thrown the gauntlet down for this plan.  As I discussed before, we always spend more than we bring in so maybe this whole budget and spending freeze is pointless right?  Well, our House majority leader Jim Boehner has already hinted to having a “spending cap” placed on certain programs to make sure we don’t go over budget.  The republicans want to reduce spending and it looks like they are taking Obama’s plan and saying “we want more cut before we vote with you”.  This will get interesting because initial cuts are being aimed at everything from the FBI to Head Start programs.  Ladies and gentlemen, this blog is long but if there ever was a time to start looking at what will and will not be funded this fiscal year, NOW is that time!

New World Order Part 2

I have a confession to make: I was wrong.  When I wrote the last blog about the republicans taking over the House and winning seats in the Senate, I had the blog set up to discuss how the Republicans were going to restrict spending(For review, read New World Order Part 1).  I just knew that was going to be their first order of business.  It was my way of leading you to believe that was going to be their primary focus but one thing that I have learned this past weekend is that I am still a rookie in understanding politics.  Politicians have a way to think 2, 4, and 6 years ahead and see how decisions made today will reflect decisions the American people will make during election years.  And their recent vote may have helped.

The Republican Party started the year off with voting to repeal the healthcare laws that were just signed into law last year.  Now of course it would seem like they decided to do this to cut government spending as I am sure that they will use this vote as a platform for re-election but if you look closely to this vote, you will see that this vote was more of a political move and not a move for the American people.

The first thing you have to understand is that before they even brought this bill before the House, a few things were already known:

1.       The Senate said they would not pass it

2.       President Obama said that IF the bill passed the Senate, He would veto it.

3.       Congress does not have the 2/3 vote it would need to override the veto IF it even gets this far.

So, why pass a bill that will go nowhere?  Well, to establish the fact that they voted against the healthcare bill come election time.  I can see the commercials already: Some congressman sitting at a desk pretending to be working while facts about him supporting the people and voting against government spending scroll across the screen and at the end seeing that same Congressman approves this message because the American people need a voice.  Oh it’s going to be so heartwarming.  So, of course this puts the Republican Party in a bad light.  I mean, they are just looking out for their best interest and not ours right?  Well, before you run over to the Democrat side, let me share something with you.

Last year right before the republicans took control of the House, the democrats passed a bill extending the Bush tax cuts for anyone making 250k or less.  They ALSO passed another bill for families making 1 million or less after the 250k bill failed.  Now before they passed this bill, they knew that the Senate was going to block the bill as well.  So why did they pass a bill they knew was going to fail?  The same reason the republicans did it this year.  If extending the tax cuts for everyone hurts the economy (which I think it will), it will be their platform come election time to keep their seats.  I can see their commercials too: Some guy sitting on a desk looking right into the camera talking about how he wanted the bills to pass but the Republicans wanted to block it.  Vote for me, and I’ll make the change needed for America.

What do these two things have in common: They do nothing to help us, but everything to help the Party.  Right now, the primary focus is 2012!  It isn’t the economy, the deficit, or the budget.  Think about it, if they REALLY cared about those things, they would have started out with a way to pass something that at least had a shot of making it through the Senate but neither the Democrats nor the Republicans did that.  The only person that tried to do it was Barack Obama when he passed the compromised tax bill during the lame duck session and who was upset that he did that?  The Democrats.  That should tell you that compromise wasn’t on anyone’s mind. 

This is getting scary but I am more intrigued.  More blogs about this to come………………

DEAL WITH THE ISSUE!!!!!!!

I am sure by now you have heard about the shooting that has taken place in Arizona.  On January 8, 2011, Jared Lee Loughner shot 20 people, killing six, in Tucson. Ever since that day, I have noticed that the major issue in the media is who to blame for this?  There has been finger pointing at the family, gun laws, Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, and others.  Politicians are beefing up security for fear of the tea party movement.  Even a prominent African American GOP official has resigned because of threats he has received.  Now, he has received these threats in the past but because of the shooting now there is an issue.  Everybody is looking at all of these issues and no one is looking at the REAL reason these shootings occurred.  Let me break it down for you:

Have you seen the youtube videos he made?  I have. Now when I see those videos, do I see a tea partier? No.  Do I see a person protecting his rights to bear arms?  No.  What I see is a man with a severe mental illness.  He spoke of mind control and starting a “new currency”.  His videos are kind of hard to follow but with him being an avid reader of political books and having an affinity for conspiracy theories, why would you pick this guy as the reason the tea party is reckless?  He didn’t hate liberals or conservatives, he hated America.  I mean, America is brainwashing us with grammar.  That’s what he thought.  And this guy is the reason why we need gun control?  No. He is the reason why we need better funding for mental health issues.

 It is estimated that up to 16% of homeless people suffer from some kind of mental illness.  We are so focused on trying to find a reason to attack the tea party or attack gun control we will use anything.  We are so reactive and quick to point fingers and release statements without getting all of the information.  You honestly think that a psychotic atheist who believes grammar is controlling Americans is the reason the tea party needs to control their supporter’s rhetoric?  Be serious.  Do I think that democrats have a legitimate complaint about the tea party?  Maybe.  Do I think they should have used Jared as their spokesperson? Absolutely Not!  But what is more disheartening is that once it comes out that he wasn’t a tea partier but rather a mentally disturbed human being, who do you think it would benefit more?  The tea party cries slander and grows stronger.  Democrats should hope that nothing comes out about Jared stating he wasn’t affiliated with the tea party because I see a political windstorm coming that will totally cripple them in 2012. 

I chose to wait until I got more information before I decided to comment as I wish more people in high offices would do.  I challenge anyone to look up some information about Jared Lee Loughner.  I am sure by now, he probably has a Wikipedia page.  You will be just as surprised as I was as to what I read. 

If you know someone who is suffering from mental illness, please contact the National Institute of Mental Health at

6001 Executive Boulevard

, Room 8184, MSC 9663
Bethesda , MD20892-9663
Phone: 1- 301 - 443-4513
Phone: 1- 866 - 615-6464
Web Address: http://www.nimh.nih.gov/

NEW WORLD ORDER PART 1

Well, the New Year is here and the new Congress and Senate will soon begin to discuss the plans for the New Year.  There are a lot of promises that the Republicans made during the mid term elections and they may have some issues keeping them.  I will be addressing these issues in my next series of blogs.

The republicans ran their campaign on fiscal responsibility.  Their strategy made sense.  I mean, if you have a huge debt and the media is reporting how big it is; then you add to that the American people are not happy with it, the best thing you can do is run a campaign stating you will do the opposite.  That’s what they did and they won big capturing the House and gaining seats in the Senate. 

So what now?

Well, now comes the part where they have to come through with their promises.  Now here is the problem with that.  The republicans want to restrict government spending, but all of the major spending bills Obama wanted to pass have already passed (stimulus bill, healthcare reform, etc…), so it seems to me the first place they will try to restrict spending is with the federal budget.  In fact, some Republicans made promises to reduce the federal budget by 100billion dollars.  Now, Understand that the federal budget is very confusing so I will try to simplify it the best way I know how.

The federal budget is the amount of money that the federal government is ESTIMATED to pay out every year to different programs (social security, defense, medicare, etc…..). A budget year runs from October 1^st to September 30^th.  Normally, the amount actually paid out is greater than that but it should still be close to the budgeted number.  The government then looks at how much money came in (taxes) and figures the difference.  If the amount the feds make is more than they spent, there is a surplus.  If the amount spent is more than made, we have a deficit.  I have noticed through research of the last few years that two things always happen every year.

1. We always underestimate our budget
2. We never collect more than we spend, meaning we add to our deficit every year

So how do you reverse this? Well if you want to tackle point 1, you restrict spending.  Restricting spending will bring us closer to our budget.  If you want to tackle point 2, you raise taxes.  The more money the federal government makes, the more it can pay out or save (HA).  And THOSE TWO POINTS were the subject of debate since Obama became president.  The Democrats wants to raise taxes, the Republicans want to reduce spending.  Well, in 2010 the American people decided that it was time to restrict spending.  So, now all of those promises made will have to be kept.  Can they? My next blog will address that………