FROM THE
PEA PATCH
By L. J. Martin
A series of essays, observations, and prognos-tications…some the author’s, some other writers, some taken from the Web without the ability to or benefit of attribution, although the author is appreciative for the opportunity to pass along their wisdom, pathos, and humor.
From The Pea Patch
By L. J. Martin
Published by
Wolfpack Publishing
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2011 L. J. Martin
PMB 414
1001 E. Broadway, #2
Missoula, Montana 59802
This is a free book. Thank you for downloading. You may share this book with your friends. This book may be copied and reproduced in any form, but please retain the original content. If you enjoyed this book please return to Smashwords for other works by this author.
ISBN 978-1-885339-29-4
Edition 2
PREFACE
Who The Heck Is L. J. Martin
And What’s He Believe?
I’m told that next year we’ll have a 39% Federal Income Tax, and that combined with a 10 or 11% state tax, if you live in California or Montana or many other states, will mean that the growing government will take 50% of what we make…that they’ll penalize those of us who work hard and succeed. And next year, under the present administration, you’ll be taxed 55% to die, as inheritance tax. All you’ve worked for, all you’ve saved and scrimped for, will be at the whim of the government to give away in order to buy the votes of the hand-out, palm-up set. Sorry, folks, but there’s something wrong with a system whose pat on the head for doing well is with one hand while the other hand is picking your pocket. Something wrong with a government who won’t protect our borders and will allow the unknown to rush the ramparts because they know they’ll mostly be among the hand-out, palm-up set who’ll vote to continue this outrage.
I’m L. J. Martin, and I’d like to welcome you to Wolfpack Ranch, and hopefully to my webpage and blog, fromthepeapatch.com. It’s a country boys look at what’s happening in and to this beautiful country of ours.
I’m coming to you from the shadow of Montana’s incredible Sapphire Mountains, where we enjoy a few acres of meadow grass and horses. Born in California’s great central valley, I’ve always been a country boy, but I’ve had a diverse background, having worked in the fields and sheds of my home county, in a service station, for the city, in an all night print shop, as a bartender, and at Vandenberg AFB, and as a water company manager in a small struggling town, all before becoming a farmer, real estate broker, appraiser, mortgage broker and contractor. And that was while raising four sons. And last and I hope not least, I’ve become a writer, having written 20 novels and 2 non-fiction books along the way and in that endeavor am happy to be in the shadow of my beautiful wife, who’s internationally published with over 50 novels in a dozen languages.
We’ve been in Montana, 25 miles from town, for fifteen years—not born here, but getting here as quickly as we could—and I wake up every morning, in the house my sons and I built with our own hands, with a silly grin on my face…but that grin, of late, has been shadowed with concern.
My wife and I have traveled a lot, crisscrossing the lower 48. I’ve been in the South Pacific and we’ve been up and down the Americas on the east coast from Quebec to Rio, and the west from Lima to Anchorage. During the last 25 years we’ve been in Europe several times, from Amsterdam to Rome and Costa Brava in Spain, from Dingle, Ireland, to Budapest and Prague, and, seeing ruins two thousand or more years old, I’ve come to understand why Europeans still think of the United States as an experiment, and possibly only a passing one. I want to help assure that we’re much more than that, to assure that this wonderful country and it’s perfect, but venerable, document, The Constitution, will live forever, for the benefit of my children and grandchildren and yours…and theirs.
In addition to writing, here at Wolfpack Ranch, we harvest our meadow hay, garden, and hunt and fish. We dry, can, preserve and freeze the bounty of the garden; butcher, freeze, smoke, or jerk game; cut our own firewood; and do the normal chores of a small ranch, pulling fence, fertilizing, and tending the stock. We consider ourselves self-reliant, and that friends, I think, is one of the many attributes that has made and kept America great…self-reliance. As was eloquently said in a country song, a country boy will survive.
We’re close to the land, and respect and admire others who make their living off the land, as well as those who work hard in the shops, factories, and offices and who keep this country moving. Maybe that self-reliance is what makes us so repulsed at the state of the country today, it’s burgeoning government, and the hand-out, palm-up attitude of so many.
And it’s not that either of us were born with the proverbial silver spoon in our mouths. I was raised in county housing and my wife’s family were working folks, rodeo people, and always next to the land. We worked hard for what we have and are proud of it.
That doesn’t mean that I don’t feel as if I’m my brother’s keeper, as I believe we have a responsibility to those who can’t (and I don’t mean won’t) do for themselves. So long as the hand-out, palm-up, is for need, not greed, I think we all should be there. After all, I was, as I said, raised in county housing.
As a historian, an avocation if not vocation, and even as a novelist you’ve got to be historically accurate, so you spend a lot of time in biographies and autobiographies and journals. I’ve come to admire a lot of those from America’s past, and, at fromthepeapatch.com we’ll look back at the wisdom of our forefathers. Particularly of Washington, Adams, Jefferson, and Lincoln, and those of later times, Mark Twain, Teddy Roosevelt, and Will Rogers, and even later, of John Kennedy, Dr. King, and Ronald Reagan, and many more, and try and glean and learn and benefit from some of what they believed and espoused.
Anyway, that’s some of what fromthepeapatch.com is all about and I hope you’ll join us there, no matter your politics. We want to hear everyone’s views. I will tell you I voted for Montana’s current governor, a Democrat, so I can be swayed…of course our governor runs one of two states with a balanced budget and money in the bank.
Join us, at fromthepeapatch.com.
God bless you, and God Bless America.
Table of Contents
Introduction
It’s Time To Look Inward
Welfare
Catching Wild Pigs
The Current Mess
Is Wall Street To Blame
Who’s At Fault
High Hopes
A Country Boy’s Approach
The Solution
Typical Of The Problem
Compounding The Problem
The Constitution
Can The Signers Save Us?
Does The Constitution Have a Flaw
The Administration, etc.
A State Of Emergency
Tracking
Washington Insider
Blackwater
The Tea Party
Obvious And Obscene
Talking Heads
According To Karl
Democracies Heinous Crime
Don’t Expect Repentance
Idiocy and the Federal Government
Economy For Imbeciles
The Muslim Threat
The Test
Profiling
An Open Letter
Shiria Law
The Border
Humor, Even The Border
The Courts & Immigration
Education
Is The System Working?
The Cupcake Caper
Created Equal – From Jim Walker
Copulating In The Classroom
Political Correctness
Capital Punishment
Gay Blades
The Media – Including The Internet
Internet Humor
Letter To The Editor
Unions
Uncouth, Nasty, and Often Drunk
Conclusion
Introduction
It’s Time To Look Inward
For decades America has been trying to buy love, friendship, loyalty. There’s a reality of the human experience, and that’s the fact you can’t buy love, friendship, loyalty. Trying to do so is to defy common sense, and historical reality. It’s living in la la land.
We send a billion dollars to Haiti, and nine hundred eighty million of it ends up in the Swiss bank accounts of the government officials entrusted with dispersing it to a people in need…and that’s been the pattern of our world give-aways since the end of WWII. America, making millionaires and billionaires out of despots. And sadly, too many times, the United Nations has been the bus hauling the money away to the dirty hands of despots, usually the cohorts of U.N. officials.
When are we going to learn? The prosperity of the United States in the same post WWII period allowed us to let our visceral liberals shame us into excesses and reckless giving. Guilt driven by our own success, by our own predominance in the world. We foisted our well gotten, hard earned, gains upon those who enjoy ill gotten ones, upon evil doers, criminals, and thieves. Yes, there are starving children in Ethiopia and over half or more of the rest of the world, and yes, after we invest billions in those countries there are still starving children, and the only thing that really changes is the bank balance of those in power. And I’m not saying don’t give, to give is Christian: I’m saying don’t give money. Give only directly to those in need, and give goods and services that pass from the hand of the giver to the needy. A water well drilled in a village cannot be shipped to a Swiss account.
The era of prosperity in the United States is ending, threatened by the same visceral, bleeding heart, hypocrisy of liberals in this country. The concept of “give-away other peoples money” runs rampant through the sad thinking of liberals. The concept of entitlement when there is no actual “entitlement,” only want and greed. When did the concept “do unto others as you would have them do unto you” become “give unto others until you’re broke and can no longer take care of yourself?” The belief that government will take care of all is a sickness, and it’s over, fini, finished. And if not, it soon will be for lack of supply. And if it’s not, we are. At least our prosperous lifestyle will end, and maybe our very existence. The folly of waiting until the national debt surpasses the gross national product in order to declare us an economic failure is just that, folly. We are broke. In the eyes of any budgeting housewife, we’re broke. We don’t have to have a degree in economics from Harvard to understand the fact that we are broke. As the debt clock:
reports as I write this, each and every “taxpayer” in the United States owes over $127,000.00 as his/her share of the national debt. Each man, woman, and child owes over $47,000. Can you please pay yours now? Most can’t. Most don’t have that much net worth. And even if many are able, they won’t soon be as inevitable inflation eats away at savings and retirement. And as debt grows with interest and ability to pay diminishes as the mere sustenance cost for the debtor goes up with inflation and rising costs.
We’re engaging in the ultimate folly of printing phony money, backed by only the good faith and credit of the country, in order to keep our economy afloat. And the economists and rulers of the other nations of the world don’t have to be Harvard grads to understand the folly of that recourse. And they’ve lost faith, and will soon not extend credit. Money, not worth the paper and ink used to manufacture it. Particularly after the liberal politicians in this country, under the guise of being progressive, have ruined all belief in the good faith and credit of the country by buying votes with home loans for everyone and anyone who wanted four bedrooms and two and a half baths, rather than to everyone or anyone who could afford same. That folly (or purposeful deception by our politicians) collapsed our economy, and cost us those foreign friends who were truly friends and certainly those whose friendship we’d only been buying over the last few decades.
Now comes a reckoning. The Muslim world is awash with revolt, and sadly, it’s not a movement toward democracy. It’s a movement to throw out the “friends” we’ve been buying for decades. It’s amusing, but not surprising, that oil producing countries attract the wealth of the United States, billions flow to them every year, and they continue to express their hatred for us. And it’s the same with dope producing countries, like Afghanistan. Would it be a fair question to ask why we support a country whose primary export is opium? Why do we support a country whose president has a brother who’s known to be the biggest dope dealer in the region? Now those friends, even if purchased, will be replaced with Iman’s who preach our destruction.
It seems to me that our whole basket of foreign policy has been a folly, is a folly, and will continue to be a folly unless we begin to employ common sense and accept the human experience: you can’t buy love. You can buy a screwing, but you can’t buy love, and we’ve bought plenty of the former.
I shudder with the death of every American boy or girl who dies in undeclared wars, from Korea to the present. I mourn the death and maiming of every young American boy and girl who fights in a country that would turn on us in a proverbial heartbeat should there monetary interests lie elsewhere. It’s time we turned inward. We need our gallant young men and women here, to rebuild this junk heap that’s the result of the great give-away. Drive on any California interstate highway and you’ll know what I mean about a junk heap. Our interstates have more holes than even the heads of those who plan our foreign policy.
It’s time we pulled out of not only those countries where we fight, but pulled our money out of every country that’s not a democracy, and even then money sent abroad should only be in the form of actual credit worthy loans and/or investment. And if loans are not repaid or investments nationalized or stolen, or don’t ear a return or have a really good verifiable excuse not to, then no more. NO MORE.
Where the hell are these countries going to sell their oil, their dope, and in fact, their cotton, if not to the largest consuming country in the world? WISE UP AMERICA. Do you think we’ll not get oil or dope—what a heartbreak that would be—if we pull out…they still want our dollars, no matter how much they’ve depreciated, and will so for a long while.
It’s time we turned inward. It’s time we took care of or own economy, it’s time we allowed self-reliance to have the opportunity to rise to the top of the American experience as was so prevalent after WWII, and replaced the hand out with a hand up. It’s time we stopped trying to buy love. There’s a word for that and America has been the JOHN of the world, the customer of international nation prostitutes. And brother, we didn’t get the kiss to go along with the screw.
And this doesn’t mean transfer the “buy your friends” concept to merely “buy the votes” of the American people with the money we don’t send overseas. Part of the “turn inward” approach is to pay off the national debt and regain the respect of the rest of the world…not that respect of those outside our borders is truly important. Self-respect, along with self-reliance, is what’s truly important. Self-respect and self-reliance, and military power, will again gain the respect of the rest of the world, if a grudging respect as it’s always been. It’s time we went back to setting the example, and being the world’s whipping boy—let them berate us for being rich and self-reliant, they’ll still want to be our friend, at least in a trading-partner sense. Young men and women rebuilding the infrastructure of the U.S. is what we need, the re-invention of the WPA would be a good start. Pay young Americans who are now being paid to risk their lives, to rebuild the country. It’s the same dollars, only put to a far greater purpose.
Egypt, Yemen, Turkey, Jordan, Lebanon, and other Muslim countries around the world are rising up against despots whom we’ve supported for decades, and it’s my belief these revolts will not result in democracies, but rather in Muslim Sharia Law governments who will be dead set to destroy the United States and all Christianity, as they have Christians in their own countries. That’s the result of attempts to buy friendship. It’s estimated there are only 17 million of hundreds of millions of Christians left in Muslim countries, the rest killed our driven out. And I pray I’m wrong.
STOP giving money to any country outside our borders. PERIOD. Credit worthy loans and investments only.
It’s time to turn inward. My wife and I, in a small way, support charities such as Doctors Without Borders, the Heifer Project, and others who don’t give money, but rather goods and services, and then only where truly needed. And the goods they give go directly to the people, without being processed (read stolen) by corrupt governments and their despot rulers. When you buy a gift heifer, a hive of bees, a goat, a pig, or yes, even a camel, or other opportunity building critter from the Heifer Project you know it, and training, are going directly to a family who will put it to work to better their lot, not merely eat it or sell it. Don’t give a man a fish, teach him to fish.
We’re at a turning point in this country, in this world, and it’s time for human experience, for common sense, to rule our actions.
It’s time to use common sense to get this country back to where it belongs, to where our parents and grandparents fought long and hard to bring it. It’s time to turn inward, and to heal ourselves before we continue to try to be all things to all people the world over.
While there’s still time, and I pray there is.
When I look at our country and see what’s happening I can’t help but be concerned for all of us.
It seems now that 41% of all births in the U.S.A. are to unwed mothers. How many of those are living in some kind of relationship with a man I have no way of knowing…but I hope it’s a good many of them. I also see that 85% of all births in the country are to minorities. On the face of it that would not seem upsetting, but at the risk of being called a racist, it is upsetting to me. Why? Because of the following statistics, and this was as of 2006, the last statistics I have:
WELFARE
Of the 2006 TOTAL population of each respective race in the United States, it is:
5.27% white (5.27% of the white population is on welfare)
27.78% black (27.78% of the black population is on welfare)
11.47% Hispanic (11.47% of the Hispanic population is on welfare)
Another way to look at this data is based on the total number of people who receive welfare. It is:
39% white 11,661,000 of 29,900,000 recipients
38% black 11,362,000 of 29,900,000
17% Hispanic 5,083,000 of 29,900,000
So, already 27.78% of ALL blacks are on welfare. And 11.47% of all Hispanics are on welfare. While only 5.27% of Whites are on welfare. I imagine all of those percentages are up in the current state of the economy, but none-the-less: If 85% of all births in the country are to minorities, then the trend is a geometric curve upward in terms of welfare recipients, regardless of particular race. The birth rate of those receiving welfare is much, much greater than those not.
That leaves damn few of us, white, black, red, yellow, and brown, to pay the taxes necessary to maintain the rest of the populace. And daily, percentage wise in a geometric growth, it’s fewer and fewer of us.
I can’t help but wonder how many would be unemployed, and off welfare, were it much more difficult to obtain, were it’s necessity proven, rather than merely applied for. We need to change the availability quotient.
In addition to that sad picture: I was raised by my mother, a latch-key kid with an older brother, thank God, to set some kind of a male example for me. With 41% of all births to unwed mothers, how many young boys are being raised without any male example in the home?
Why does that matter?
Normalcy, is why it matters. I hate to suggest this, at the risk now of not only being called a racist, but being called homophobic, but the good Lord, or nature, or Darwin, or whomever/whatever you believe in, obviously designed the human progeny to begin with a father and a mother. No matter how same sex couples try to obscure and camouflage the fact, it still requires a sperm and an egg to create a human being. I’m sure the mad scientists will overcome this small obstacle in the future, and maybe even design a system wherein a child can be conceived and born anally, or via cullinigus, but I don’t think they’ve sunk that low yet.
So, no matter how much some aspects of society and the preponderance of gays therein would like it to be different, vaginal birth is still normal, i.e., and man and a woman as parents, is normalcy.
For a male, being raised by your mother poses some problems, particularly if the mother is particularly feminine, as my mother was. In fact, she was a beauty. Had I not had an older brother who was a man’s man, raised until he was age twelve with a male influence in the house, as I was only seven when my father fled the scene, I’m sure it would have been even harder to adjust to the male half of the world for this latch-key kid.
I smiled too much, not considered manly. Conse-quently I was thought to be soft by my peers, and testing that theory cost them many a black eye. I was thrown out of high school every year for fist-fighting, and twice my senior year…and by far the most of my battles went undetected by the school administration.
I also had, what I considered, inordinate attention by older gays. At least a half dozen times, in high school, and in junior college, I was cajoled and approached by older men…I guess I still smiled too much and was much to friendly. Those approaches ended in various states of catastrophe for those older gays. One went out a window, a half-story above a thorn bush, in Berkeley, another suffered a broken nose on the bar car of a train, and yet a third was booted out of my car several miles from town. Needless to say, I was offended by their misunderstanding of my ready smile and friendly manner: I’m sure I’d be more empathetic now, and handle those instances in a different manner. And I’m not suggesting gays aren’t tough, or that they don’t belong in the military. No matter how special gays like to think themselves, I think they should be able to give their lives for their country just like the straights.
And, yes, I have gay friends, who are made aware that I don’t expect to be groped unless they expect to have their eye dotted. I don’t give a damn about your sexual preferences, so long as it’s not in my face, or the faces of my children and grandchildren. Que sara.
Do you suppose this growing cadre of children raised by a single mother are why so many men seem to feel the need to wear five days of beard growth…maybe only to prove to themselves their manhood, to be reinforced of their proof-of-gender when they look in a mirror? It seems most of those in Hollywood need to add some additional identity to themselves., or convince themselves of their own.
Do you suppose a good number of those in this country who only think they have a sexual preference to their own sex might have been unduly influenced by being raised in a single parent household? And I’m not suggesting that there’s not a physical cross over of gender, of genes, of sexual orientation, or that, in fact, that’s abnormal just because it’s a small percentage of the human race that is “special” in that way, i.e. physically different.
All that said, I wish it was a perfect world and each child had a happy, normal (as I consider it), home life; and that each child was born wholly male or female; but we know that’s not to be. I don’t begrudge a gay couple who want to raise a child, I do have a lot of empathy for the child. However, I have a great respect for the resiliency of children, and judge them much smarter and far more perceptive than do most adults. I can’t help but believe that children of a gay marriage will watch, and learn, and strive for a normal relationship themselves.
It’s not a perfect world.
This seems as good time as any to include this story, I received via the internet and have no way to attribute it to the writer…whom I admire greatly.
Catching Wild Pigs
A chemistry professor in a large college had some exchange students in the class. One day while the class was in the lab the Professor noticed one young man (exchange student) who kept rubbing his back, and stretching as if his back hurt.
The professor asked the young man what was the matter. The student told him he had a bullet lodged in his back. He had been shot while fighting communists in his native country who were trying to overthrow his country's government and install a new communist government.
In the midst of his story he looked at the professor and asked a strange question. He asked, 'Do you know how to catch wild pigs?'
The professor thought it was a joke and asked for the punch line. The young man said this was no joke. 'You catch wild pigs by finding a suitable place in the woods and putting corn on the ground. The pigs find it and begin to come everyday to eat the free corn. When they are used to coming every day, you put a fence down one side of the place where they are used to coming. When they get used to the fence, they begin to eat the corn again and you put up another side of the fence. They get used to that and start to eat again. You continue until you have all four sides of the fence up with a gate in the last side. The pigs, who are used to the free corn, start to come through the gate to eat, you slam the gate on them and catch the whole herd.
Suddenly the wild pigs have lost their freedom. They run around and around inside the fence, but they are caught. Soon they go back to eating the free corn. They are so used to it that they have forgotten how to forage in the woods for themselves, so they accept their captivity.
The young man then told the professor that is exactly what he sees happening to America . The government keeps pushing us toward socialism and keeps spreading the free corn out in the form of programs such as supplemental income, tax credit for unearned income, tobacco subsidies, dairy subsidies, payments not to plant crops (CRP), welfare, medicine, drugs, etc.. While we continually lose our freedoms—just a little at a time.
One should always remember: There is no such thing as a free lunch! Also, a politician will never provide a service for you cheaper than you can do it yourself. All of this wonderful government 'help' is a problem confronting the future of democracy in America…God help you when the gate slams shut.
"A government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take away everything you have" Thomas Jefferson
And to add even greater insult to this metaphor, the government is taking our money (from those of us who still pay taxes) to use to buy the corn and fence!
The Current Mess
Is Wall Street to blame?
Having been in the real estate business for the early part of my life and having designed lots of tax shelter deals when that was in vogue, I dealt some with Wall Street which raised the money for same. More than once I wandered the concrete canyons of New York City in my cowboy boots and dealt with the boys in the three piece suits, yellow power ties, and Italian loafers. I’ve also, as a historian by avocation, studied the history of money, credit, and the real estate market in this wonderful free enterprise system of ours at some depth. I am not an economist, but have been a real estate broker, appraiser, contractor, and mortgage broker.
I can tell you that the raising of capital and trading of stocks, bonds, and commodities is as pure an enterprise as there is in a free enterprise system. Note, I didn’t say honest, aboveboard, and ethical, and there’s a great difference. Like most industries and specialties in this country, they self regulate, and like most, they do a damn poor job of it, and therein is the reason for government, a supposedly neutral party, to oversee and regulate..from the outside.
Wall Street, a label for the financial industry in the United States, is a voracious animal. It’s not concerned with much else other than profit…and to your surprise, I’m telling you that’s not a bad thing. It’s in fact, one of the critical elements that have made this the great go-to country she is. Capital, generated on Wall Street, is thrown at new opportunities, and credit worthy opportunity, with a zeal. And a few of those new opportunities become viable businesses that create jobs, generate profits, and yes pay taxes so someone in government can make the full circle and regulate how capital is raised.
What happened in the great real estate, mortgage, debacle of the last few years? Is Wall Street the culprit? No, no more than a firearm is to blame for a crime in which it was used. Wall Street was the vehicle which took blocks of those mortgages to the marketplace, raising more and more money so more and more homes could be financed. And government wanted them to do exactly that.
So what happened? Credit, and credit worthiness for mortgage lending (or any lending) is, or should be, overseen by those taking the risk, i.e. the banks, mortgage companies, and various other lenders. Government, who controls much of the rules and regulations of those institutions, sets the guidelines for lending…when in fact those taking the risk should determine who qualifies for a loan.
When government interferes with that process, when they decide that they know better than those taking the risk, then things become artificial. In the case of mortgage lending, the credit worthiness of borrowers became a falsehood motivated and created by government. When they allowed the old tried and true process of verification by those taking the risk to become only the truthfulness of the borrower, then the process fell in a pile of rubble. Prior to changes, instituted by Clinton, a lender would, as standard operating procedure, obtain a verification of deposit (how much money does the borrower have) from the borrowers bank, a verification of employment and income (who does he/she work for and how much does he/she make) from the borrowers employer, and a credit report (what is the borrowers credit history). And, of course, an appraisal on the property which acts as collateral for the loan from an independent appraiser.
But government, wanting the economy to roll on, and home sales being a large part of that process, decided to change the process. And I wish I could believe that wanting the economy to improve was governments only motivation. Buying votes was, in my opinion, the primary motivation to destroying an industry and almost a country. Some, in congress, decided everyman was entitled to three bedrooms and two baths, no matter their credit worthiness or income. Verifications became a mortgage broker or banker merely asking the borrower, “how much do you make?” without an verification coming from the employer, making prevarication by the borrower a simple part of the process…otherwise, with verifications, it did a borrower no good to lie, as he wasn’t asked the question. Now, it was simple. The new loans were known as stated income in the industry, and as liar’s loans to those of us who had common sense and a small understanding of human nature. Now, the process, oft times went something like this, and you must remember the mortgage broker was making thousands of dollars off the average loan:
Mortgage Broker: “Okay, Mr. Borrower, how much do you make at the Jone’s Meat Market?”
Borrower: “I make thirty five thousand a year.”
Mortgage Broker: “Uh…you have to make sixty thousand to get this loan.”
Borrower: “Oh, let me see, I told my wife and in-laws we were buying this house. I forgot my bonuses. I get another twenty five thousand a year in bonuses.”
Mortgage Broker: “Great. You know this house will go up in value, so you’ll be okay. Sign here.”
And everybody lived happily ever after, until the great collapse, and Mr. and Mrs. Borrower and the kids, having lost their three bedrooms and two baths are now living with the in laws and Mr. Mortgage Broker, having lost his five bedrooms and three baths is selling shoes, a job which he’s under qualified to perform.
Now, let’s see, will people lie to get what they want? Duh.
So lots of homes were sold, lots of folks who couldn’t afford the payments occupied lots of houses across the country, and, as lots of enthusiastic real estate sales people had guaranteed, prices rose. These same real estate people are back to selling shoes, if they can now find even that job. Of course prices rose, as homes couldn’t be built as fast as borrowers could lie about their income, and as government could dictate to lenders, “you must loan to all those wonderful borrowers who will vote for us.” And as Wall Street, as they always have, raised the capital by selling blocks of those loans to investors. And those blocks were looked upon by investors as being prime investments…after all, they were first mortgages on peoples homes, and people protect their homes almost before all else, and the government of the most powerful country in the world set and dictated the standards by which those loans were made. Prices rose, because of demand (economics 1A), but demand was artificial because credit was easy, and it was all based on a lie and the greed, not of Wall Street (Wall Street has always been greedy and that’s their place in the workings of the economy of the U.S.), but of government.
The economy was destroyed by Harry Reid and Barney Frank and their ilk and their greed in wanting to “buy” votes. And let’s see, whom can we blame it on…of course, Wall Street, those greedy folks who we depended upon to continue to sell the artificial loans we dictated that lenders must make.
And now, the hell of it is, those of us who did not lie about our credit, who looked at the artificial real estate market and said, “I think I’ll set this one out,” are now being taxed to keep people (liars in many instances), in those homes they couldn’t afford in the first instance.
And more of the hell of it is, when somebody is around to bail you out, time and time again, do you learn the error of your ways? Of course you don’t.
By the way, one of my first jobs was selling shoes, so no disparagement intended.
Who’s At Fault
We all are, every citizen and every Republican in Congress, but ours was a sin of omission whereas the Democrats are guilty of commission, of direct cause. The Republicans in Congress had a share of commission as well, as they, too, tried to buy votes and assure their place at the trough with excess spending not a whit of budget sense.
See Bloomberg BusinessWeek, Feb. 27, 2008
“Add President Clinton to the long list of people who deserve a share of the blame for the housing bubble and bust. A recently re-exposed document shows that his administration went to ridiculous lengths to increase the national homeownership rate. It promoted paper-thin down payments and pushed for ways to get lenders to give mortgage loans to first-time buyers with shaky financing and incomes. It’s clear now that the erosion of lending standards pushed prices up by increasing demand, and later led to waves of defaults by people who never should have bought a home in the first place.
“President Bush continued the practices because they dovetailed with his Ownership Society goals, and of course Congress was strongly behind the push. But Clinton and his administration must shoulder some of the blame.”
End of Quote
In this one Clinton dodges personal blame, but does lay the blame for Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae’s blatant disregard for good credit practices at the feet of Democrats. See the video:
and here, in this rather long clip Barney denies his participation (but it seems to me that you can tell when he’s lying because he has his mouth open) but blames the Clinton administration, exacerbated by the Bush administration, for poor credit practices (if you can jump, go 2/3 rds of the way through to get to his admission). See the video:
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1499367446&play=1
Now, the real scoop on Barney, this from writer Bruce Feinstein, Vanity Fair:
“To hear Barney Frank tell it, he bears no responsibility for the housing bubble or for the failure of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. But his record as a member of the House Financial Services Committee tells a different story. As far back as 1991, Frank was pushing Fannie Mae to break its rules, lower its standards, and buy risky loans. As The Boston Globe reported in November 1992, he helped to convince Fannie Mae to make “substantial concessions” on its rules regarding multiple-family-home mortgages, despite data from Fannie itself showing that the “default rate on mortgages on two-family homes is twice that of single-family homes, and the rate for three-deckers is five times the rate for single-family dwellings.” During the Clinton years, the time when the foundation was being poured for the financial meltdown, Fannie and Freddie were growing by leaps and bounds.” Bruce Feinstein, Vanity Fair
End of Quote
To see the whole article, well worth reading, from this very liberal magazine, go here:
http://www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2009/09/100-to-blame-41.html
The long and short of it is none of this fiasco can be blamed on those evil folks making more than $250,000 a year, but it seems that, and of course the Bush administration is where President Obama wants to hang all the current financial problems of the country. Is anyone else tired of hearing it?
It’s hogwash.
High Hopes…
After the election I had such high hopes that congress got the message, that they heard loud and clear that the American people wanted change, wanted congress to get off their high horse and understand that they are not America’s aristocracy. The vote against banning earmarks was a terrible disappointment to me and an indicator that the old adage “power corrupts” is so basic to human nature as to be almost impossible to change.
Still, there is a so-called lame duck congress and a number who are being forced into retirement. As I’ve mentioned before, I think this “lame duck” time to be very dangerous. The DREAM Act, the Police and Firefighters Bargaining Act, the Start Treaty, and “don’t ask, don’t tell” were likely to all come up prior to those congressmen and women voted out actually packing their bags. And there was a fervor to make it happen, and happen quickly.
Among the proposals that were scheduled to up were a one time payment of $250.00 for social security recipients, a so called “cost of living adjustment.” I find that to be a laugh. And, by the way, I’m sure it was be the same as the last one, if you’re still working, if you’ve found that social security is not beginning to pay your cost of living, you won’t get the adjustment. It’s nothing but a cheap attempt to placate, to buy votes, another bait and switch scam.
This came over the internet from resistnet.com:
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Saturday announced that he would file cloture Monday to force votes on a series of bills Democrats have sought to push through, including the DREAM Act immigration reform measure and 911 firefighters health bill.
The move would set up votes on the measures Wednesday, which would give the Senate enough time to conduct a rare impeachment trial of Judge Thomas Porteous beginning Tuesday morning.
None of the bills, which also include a collective-bargaining measure for firefighters and a one-time $250 cost-of-living adjustment payment to seniors, are expected to muster the 60 votes needed to break a GOP filibuster, although agreement could be reached on the $250 COLA payment measure.
But Reid has insisted he would try to force votes on all of them, and by doing so on Wednesday he could clear the way for progress on big-ticket items such as tax cuts, an omnibus spending bill, the START Treaty and possibly even "don't ask, don't tell."
Indeed, Reid did not include the DADT repeal, and the underlying defense authorization measure, in the list of cloture votes, saying he is still hoping to work out a deal on "the question of amendments" to the bill.
End of Quote.
This kind of hogwash was typical of the Barney Frank/Harry Reid mentality. It had no relation to what was good for the country, only what would buy votes for the Barney Harry B.S. team.
A Country Boy’s Approach to Curing The National Budget woes…
Let me tell you, you folks in Congress… Democrats and Republicans alike…a lousy $100 billion cut in the budget is pissin’ in the wind (it turned out to only be $60 billion). Of course, you haven’t demonstrated enough good sense not to wet yourself in the past, so maybe it’s an unreal expectation.
During fiscal year 2009, the federal government collected approximately $2.1 trillion in tax revenue. Primary receipt categories included individual income taxes (43%), Social Security/Social Insurance taxes (42%), and corporate taxes (7%).[6] Other types included excise, estate and gift taxes. Tax revenues have averaged approximately 18.3% of gross domestic product (GDP) over the past 40 years, generally ranging plus or minus 2% from that level.[7]
Tax revenues are significantly affected by the economy. Recessions typically reduce government tax collections as economic activity slows. For example, during FY2009, the U.S. government collected about $400 billion less than FY2008. Individual income taxes declined 20%, while corporate taxes declined 50%. At 15% of GDP, the 2009 collections were the lowest level of the past 50 years.
Social Security was responsible for $701 billion of the national spending in 2010, but was offset by 40% of the federal tax income, or $865 billion. What’s the problem here? Social Security is paying for itself, unless the overhead is just way to high? Social Security is not the problem.
Defense Department spending is 20% of the 2010 budget, or $668 billion. Why not offset some of that by charging those to whose aid we continually come. Afghanistan and Iraq to name a couple. How about Japan? How about South Korea? Hell, if China is going to steal our military secrets none-the-less, why not sell them a few even if only to offset a good chunk of our debt? Interest along on the 2010 national debt was $197 billion. Should we institute a true “free enterprise” approach to our Department of Defense, I’ll be we could knock about a half trillion off that expenditure in a hurry. And we could actually pay a living wage to our military, if we charged for their services as any other business entity might do. And it’s about time we got rid of the $600 dollar hammers and the $300 dollar screwdrivers. Insane.
Medicare & Medicaid represented $793 billion of the 2010 budget. One FBI sting operation this year shut down cheats who’d stolen over $100 million…and that’s one sting. If we went after the doctors and clinics who over bill Medicare we’d save more than 25% of that bill in a big rush. Now if we went after the cheats on the lowest level, those from the guy who hangs a disabled sticker in his car (a pet peeve of mine as he jumps out of his Cad and heads into the gym at a run) and who went to the doc and then billed Medicare for the office visit, to the guy who gets a powered wheel chair because he’s too damn fat and lazy to walk, to the gal who gains weight in order to qualify for a stomach stapling to…well, the list goes on and on, and I guarantee it represents another 10% of the problem.
Now, a goodly portion of the rest is liability actions …attorneys who advertise for claimants and the advertising itself, and visceral juries who give away somebody else’s money to convince themselves how kind THEY are. And no, insurance companies don’t PAY those ridiculous judgments…they pass the cost on to you and me and the dumb s—t on the jury.
How many times do those of you with a nervous twitch (because you’re cheating on your wife, or on your income tax) have to be told during the endless T.V. ads that you have nervous leg syndrome before you actually begin to believe it, and then to convince some doctor who only wants to get you out of his office that you need a prescription. And the prescription is $200 and you pass it along to Medicare. And odds are its sugar pills which will make you fat and give you diabetes.
Stop drug advertising on T.V. PERIOD. You don’t need to advise your doctor about the nature of your perceived problem, or what to prescribe for your problem, particularly when your education consists of a 30 second advertisement. He went to school for a long time to learn that skill. Limit liability lawsuits to actual damages, and you’ve knocked out another 25% (mayber far more) of the Medicare Medicaid shortfall.
And we haven’t even begun to speak of so-called discretionary spending, $660 billion of the 2010 budget. Discretionary spending is used to fund the Cabinet Departments (e.g., the Department of Education) and Agencies (e.g., the Environmental Protection Agency). Discretionary budget authority is established annually by Congress, as opposed to mandatory spending that is required by laws that span multiple years, such as Social Security or Medicare. What we hear of so often as entitlements, as if it were a bad word and not the only part of the government budget that was actually paid in for a specific purpose.
The Federal government spent approximately $660 billion during 2010 on the Cabinet Departments and Agencies, excluding the Department of Defense, representing 19% of budgeted expenditures[47] or about 4.5% of GDP. The 2011 budget included estimated spending for 2010 for selected Departments and Agencies with over $10 billion in budget authority.
I could write reams about the waste in the self-serving federal agencies. I say self-serving because public sector wages have gone up 38% in the last ten years while private sector wages have only gone up 10%. If that’s not self-serving, I don’t know what is. And the hell of it is, we don’t need even half of the tit-sucking, trough crowding, public employees we’re burdened with. Without the conscripts of “profit” as a result, government agencies grow like amoebas, with no rhyme or reason. Were they in the private sector, they’d suddenly shed 75% of their employees.
Do we need a department of commerce (141,000 employees) to help those in the free enterprise private sector do what they do best…make money. It’s a segment of the Department of Labor (2,000,000, yes that’s two million employees) whose need I question as well. No, all they do is get in the way and suck up tax dollars. GET RID OF THEM. I’m an environmentalist, I love the outdoors, but the Environmental Protection Agency is over the top. Merge them with the Department of Interior and cut both by more than half in budget and particularly in employees, the EPA has a mere 18,000 employees currently.
By the way, McDonald’s and WalMart, who are America’s largest private employers, each have about 1,500,000 employees, so the Department of Labor has 33% MORE employees than America’s largest private employers. Do you really think we need any government agency, other than the military, that ponderous.
Do you really think we need farm subsidies? The largest farmers in the nation, both corporate and private, laugh all the way to the bank while collecting your money and mine for NOT PLANTING. Ludicrous.
Other so-called Mandatory spending represents a measly $416 billion of the 2010 budget. Other Mandatory spending is separate from SS and Medicare/Medicaid. Hell, no one seems to know where that goes. I’ll bet if WE THE PEOPLE said NO, we’re not spending that, in about two heartbeats the squeal of whomever is getting it would be heard echoing from the trough, and we’d know who and where and if we investigated we’d determine that more than half of that is wasted.
The Solution…At Least A Beginning
Now, all that said, we can’t summarily throw half of the government workers in this country out on their ears. Hell, they’d just go on unemployment anyhow, which seems to be America’s largest and most worthless industry these days. No, we have to plan what to do with displaced government employees.
I’ve proposed before, and still believe, that tax incentives are the best motivation for hiring…in fact for investment of any kind. If we gave a tax incentive to a private company who hired a discharged government employee, say 100% tax credit for the first year of that new hire (effectively the government would be paying for that employee with lost revenue, of course they’d be saving an equal amount as well as he was no longer a government employee), 50% tax credit for the second year (now the government is making money, a savings of 50% over what he had cost them), and 25% for the third (again making money), then that labor force would be quickly absorbed. It would have to be done with the stipulation that no regular employees were discharged in order to take advantage of the program, but it would work well. We could reduce federal employment by 5% a year for at least ten years and never feel the impact, and not notice missing services, unless you also lost your crop payments and actually had to farm that land you’re being paid to leave idle. That, and other tax incentives, and productivity would grow, along with private sector employment.
With all that done (and common sense applied to other areas, like foreign aid), the federal expenditures would be reduced by half. So we’d be spending 1.75 trillion rather than 3.5 trillion and we still be taking in 2.1 trillion, if not more due to increased taxes paid by GROWING BUISINESS, while not penalizing them with new taxes, in fact the tax burden should be less in respect to GNP. So, that’s 26 billion a year we can apply to the National Debt. Let’s see, at that rate, we can pay it off in 52 years. I wonder, did the current thinking in Washington D.C. bury us?
How can we forget that the budget deficit we hear congress whine about is the budget deficit created by…by congress. Duh!
But all that’s just one ol’ country boys approach.
Typical Of The Problem
Wow, spend more money to spend more money to spend more money to….
It seems my chest is getting bruised from my jaw dropping. As I’ve often said, truth is stranger than fiction.
In my local paper not long ago: “To boost the number of Ventura County residents receiving food stamps, the Board of Supervisors has OK’d spending almost $770,000 to recruit and enroll recipients over the next 12 months.” And the article goes on.
Soooo, now we’re paying people to “recruit” food stamp and welfare recipients. We need to pay folks to cave in, to destroy their own self-confidence, their own self-reliance, their own willingness and desire to pursue a job. Isn’t that really what the county is doing?
And yes, times are tough, and no, I don’t begrudge anyone who doesn’t have enough to eat or to feed their children the fact they need help. I do begrudge our government spending, wasting, even more money to “sell” them on the fact they’re in need. To say that’s ludicrous is one of the great understatements of all time.
Their rational, again a quote: “The federal food stamp program has told California we have to get our participation rate up.” Otherwise, “California, you don’t have enough people on food stamps, so go out there and sell them on welfare.” Insanity.
So it’s a coalition of imbeciles, federal, state, county and city.
If you have an ounce of pride, of self-reliance, of gumption left…get rid of it and get on food stamps, because the federal government, who’s broke, needs to get rid of more of the taxpayers money so they’ve be even more broke. And it’s dangerous to the creeping socialism we’re trying to force down your throat. I wonder if anyone gets the fact that this kind of idiocy will climax in no more food stamps, in fact, no more food.
It continues: “Only about half of eligible residents in California were enrolled in the program in 2008, compared with a national average of 66 percent…”
So, California, Ventura County, you’re falling down on the job. The country is yet to be completely broke. Charge forward, you federal blind leading the state and county blind…and I mean mentally, not physically. The physically blind deserve food stamps, if they truly need them.
Compounding The Problem
Disdain For The Dollar
The following story got very little notice in the American liberal press, but I think it was a turning point in the respect of the world for the U.S.A., a respect destroyed by Barney Frank, Harry Reid, and xxxx Raines, among many others who participated in the vote buying by bribery, by making available 4 bedrooms and 21/2 baths to those who merely had to lie in order to obtain loans. Loans that were sold to friends around the world, and who cost them their investment and us our respect. The long and short of it…the dollar, longtime the currency of the world…is now refused in foreign countries. See below:
St. Petersburg, Russia - China and Russia have decided to renounce the US dollar and resort to using their own currencies for bilateral trade, Premier Wen Jiabao and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin announced late on Tuesday.
Chinese experts said the move reflected closer relations between Beijing and
Moscow and is not aimed at challenging the dollar, but to protect their domestic economies.
"About trade settlement, we have decided to use our own currencies," Putin said at a joint news conference with Wen in St. Petersburg.
The two countries were accustomed to using other currencies, especially the dollar, for bilateral trade. Since the financial crisis, however, high-ranking officials on both sides began to explore other possibilities.
The yuan has now started trading against the Russian rouble in the Chinese interbank market, while the renminbi will soon be allowed to trade against the rouble in Russia, Putin said.
"That has forged an important step in bilateral trade and it is a result of the consolidated financial systems of world countries," he said.
Putin made his remarks after a meeting with Wen. They also officiated at a signing ceremony for 12 documents, including energy cooperation.
The documents covered cooperation on aviation, railroad construction, customs, protecting intellectual property, culture and a joint communiqu. Details of the documents have yet to be released.
Putin said one of the pacts between the two countries is about the purchase of two nuclear reactors from Russia by China's Tianwan nuclear power plant, the most advanced nuclear power complex in China.
Putin has called for boosting sales of natural resources - Russia's main export - to China, but price has proven to be a sticking point.
Russian Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin, who holds sway over Russia's energy sector, said following a meeting with Chinese representatives that Moscow and Beijing are unlikely to agree on the price of Russian gas supplies to China before the middle of next year.
Russia is looking for China to pay prices similar to those Russian gas giant Gazprom charges its European customers, but Beijing wants a discount. The two sides were about $100 per 1,000 cubic meters apart, according to Chinese officials last week.
Wen's trip follows Russian President Dmitry Medvedev's three-day visit to China in September, during which he and President Hu Jintao launched a cross-border pipeline linking the world's biggest energy producer with the largest energy consumer.
Wen said at the press conference that the partnership between Beijing and Moscow has "reached an unprecedented level" and pledged the two countries will "never become each other's enemy".
Over the past year, "our strategic cooperative partnership endured strenuous tests and reached an unprecedented level," Wen said, adding the two nations are now more confident and determined to defend their mutual interests.
"China will firmly follow the path of peaceful development and support the renaissance of Russia as a great power," he said.
"The modernization of China will not affect other countries' interests, while a solid and strong Sino-Russian relationship is in line with the fundamental interests of both countries."
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