Recovery Act? More like Spending spree

I’ve gotta put in my 2 Cents on this whole stimulus package. Dubbed the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act. The whole idea behind this is to get the economy rolling again. Create jobs and get us out of this recession. Its has a price anywhere from 800-900 billion dollars. There was a couple weeks where people were talking 1 trillion. Good lord. Thats a lot of money to be throwing around. Problem is, most of it is just spending. Just a bunch of money being thrown around to please everyones personal agendas and to please lobbyists. What? Wasn’t Obama going to be rid of that? I guess not. Just read about some of the things involved in the plan. The frickin’ thing is over 600 pages and I’m not about to read the whole thing, but I’ve heard some of the ideas from radio, internet, or newspaper. Sounds like a lot of spending. Stupid things like buying government employees hybrid cars.  Money for the filming industry to buy film(Dead serious). Modernizing government buildings and so on. Silly things like this that don’t belong in a “Recovery Act.” Everyone is lobbying to get their piece of the pie. Its not going to stimulate much of anything. Create jobs? Not really. Just more debt for future generations. There are some good things about the plan, just not enough. The cons outweigh the pros big time.  

Look what happened with all that TARP money. It was used to buy up all those bad assets and get banks lending again. Only problem is the banks are just sitting on the money. Or worse, they’ve spent it frivolously. Why? Because there basically were not rules with that money and they don’t want to start lending again. Just a hand out and good luck. Now when they are asked what they did with it, they won’t say. You mean to tell me all that taxpayer money that was given out and nobody put some clauses in that? Now there is talk of being sure to investigate into wether or not the money was used properly. On top of that we find out that they overpaid by $78 Billion dollars? What the hell? Did anyone spend some time on this? Or did they just come up with a nice round number that they thought would be enough. I can envision the conversation Paulson must have had when coming up with this? “What do you think guys? $700 Billion sound good? Lets flip a coin.” Haha, I doubt that, but I’ve heard the number they came up with from that was just thrown out there. No calculating done. What a childish way to spend our tax dollars. They didn’t even spend it all before they left office. Just handed it off to let Obama deal with it. Oh the nonsense that is our government. 

 I’d like to believe that change is coming. Granted, President Obama hasn’t even been in office a month, was voted into a hell of a mess, and years of bad policies. I do believe Obama will end up doing some good and better him than McCain. But it seems to be turing out like the old saying “politics as usual”.

 

The American Dream’s demise

   Where’s the accountability? I love how our government is throwing out the term “too big to fail” more and more these days. The next industry in line to get a slap on the wrist from Uncle Sam is the auto industry. There’s talk going around of the possible merger of Ford, GM and Chrysler. The sole purpose of this is to get bailed out. There’s no denying these guys are posting huge massive quarterly losses in the billions of dollars. All those mortgage companies that have been bailed out. Those dirty rotten greedy bastards on Wall Street too.  Small businesses fail all the time and where is their help? Small business is the heart and soul of the American economy. If there’s going to be a bailout it should be for them, not the ones making millions of dollars. Ford, GM, and Chrysler had plenty of time to adjust and change their way of thinking. How long have companies from oversees making cars more fuel efficient. My old 89′ Honda Accord got better gas mileage then most brand new cars from our Big Three auto companies. Only now do we see the American auto industry joining in. They kept trying to push those gas guzzling SUV’s and pickup trucks that kept getting bigger and bigger each year. Did the American Dream get the best of us. So much consumerism that we are now paying for it? Creating more and more jobs each year. Think of all the crap we as Americans have the option at buying at these massive super stores. So much buying and using of products, that the slightest downturn in the market and it sends everything into a downward spiral? I think we got too greedy. Too many Exec’s making millions of dollars. Too many mortgage companies allowing people to buy homes they cannot afford while they make an extra buck. Now instead of holding them accountable for their actions, we are just going to bail them out. Where is the lesson learned? I think people are going to have to lose jobs for this thing to turn around. You can’t keep throwing money at the problem. What does that solve? The bailout was bullshit, but you can argue it needed to be done. The sad reality is that it could have been avoided. Why wasn’t somebody stopping these people? You could say its borderline criminal to convince someone to buy a home they can’t afford. On the other hand, they should know better right? Either way, this whole mess we find ourselves in should never have happened, and its frightening to think how bad some experts say it is going to get before it gets better.

 

“The world needs more compassion”

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad recently was asked to speak at Columbia University. I thought it was an interesting approach. Have the leader of a nation our Government accuses daily of trying to produce nuclear weapons and supplying terrorists with weapons to come to the U.S. I thought it would be interesting to question him in an open discussion. I was not however, impressed with how Columbia University’s President introduced him. President Lee Bollinger called Ahmadinejad a “petty and cruel dictator.” He continued on with comments made by Ahmadinejad about the Holocaust. Calling him “either brazenly provocative or astonishingly uneducated.” I started thinking. You asked this man to come to your University to speak. Sure go ahead and ask him tough questions. But why would you, even before he steps up to the podium, rip into this man and make him feel unwelcome. How does that reflect on the American population. I’m sure it effected his view on the U.S. I think the whole experience was ruined from that introduction. I don’t agree with the way Ahmadinejad operates his country or his comments made towards the Holocaust, and the U.S., but I thought it was bad form on Mr. Bollinger to lay into him like he did.
I recently started reading a new book. Its called “The Secret History of the American Empire: Economic Hit Men, Jackals, and the truth about Global Corruption”. Its written by John Perkins. Its a book about how big corporations make their millions of dollars at the expense of people working in sweatshops. I’m only in the early stages of the book, but from what this guy explains is shocking. His old job, as and Economic Hit Man, is a ruthless and relentless job of making Corporations rich. He comes to grips with what he is involved with, quits doing what he does, and as years pass by decides to tell his story to the world. He has another book that precedes this one called “Confessions of an Economic Hit Man.” I suggest that anyone that has ever bought a pair of shoes made by Nike, jeans by Gap, and other big company’s with products made in Indonesia read what this man has to say. It will blow you’re mind away.
A new month means new beginning’s. I will attempt for the umpteenth time to quit smoking heaters. I went 3 months during the summer, but after my last race that went to hell. I also plan on getting a new car within the month. I really want a new Civic, and will officially start my hunt tomorrow. I heard Breckenridge has been getting snow already and can’t wait to get back out to Summit County. Well, time to get back to that book. TTFN

daily quote – “Don’t become a Buddhist. The world doesn’t need more Buddhists. Do practice compassion. The world needs more compassion.” The Dalai Lama

:With cycling season winding down the daily bike term will take a little hibernation until next spring:

 

WHERE’S THE RUM???????

A snifter of rum, and then if I can find the dugout……………….ok we’re ready to rock. Hello again…Long time no reading? Geezalaweeezzz why not? Oh right, my bad. Its been awhile since my last post. Apologies for that. I’ve been slacking. So yesterday was voted the “most depressing day of the year”. Whatever that means. Not much has changed since my last post. Christmas has come, then gone. Not much to speak of on that one. New years at the crib was a hoot. Lots of good photo’s and stories from that one. Just ask. I went out to Breckenridge, CO the second week of Jan. with some friends to ski, drink, ski, drink, and then maybe a little bit of drinking. Good times, and pics of that too!!!! Other then that not much has changed in this world we occupy. The last time a president’s approval rating was this low, my parents hadn’t really met yet, Pink Floyd was kicking ass, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas was being written, and the whole coutnry was stoned. Iraq is still a mess,. Canada still rules, I’m still single, and the Gophers hockey team is still # 1. So what the hell is there to talk about? Well, having snow is finally nice. Apparently recent studes have shown that the old saying “not two snowflakes are alike” is false. Honestly, who the hell spends time finding useless and pointless factoids like these? And who the hell is paying these crazy bastards? I’d like to meet them. President Bush made his State of the Union address tonight. I actually lisented to it, its the first one I’ve ever had interest in. All in all, I’d say it was well said. He made some good points. I like that he finally recognizes a global climate change, finding new ways of fuel that are enviormentally safe. His health care goals seem reasonable. I would suggest finding it on youtube, or reading it on abcnew or cnn, or whatever. You just might like it. Those of you that still appose global warming, i urge you to watch “An Inconvenient Truth”. Don’t think of it as a global warming documentary, think of it as a save the enviornmment, and a cleaner world. Seriously. Do it. With that I think I might go watch that flick. Then its some Bloc Party and then off to bed. Word.

weekly quote – “Is a Vegetarian allowed to eat animal crackers?” – George Carlin

 

Quick, somebody send my to Iraq. I didn’t go to college!!!

Tsk, tsk, tsk Mr. John Kerry. Ya know, all ya had to do was make your speech about the upcoming election, who you support , and be done with it. Nope, you had to take it one step further. Those of you who have no idea what I am talking about here ya go. John Kerry while speaking at Pasadena City College on Monday. “You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework, and you make an effor to be smart, you can do well. If you don’t you get stuck in Iraq.” Of course the wonderful and oviously bored journalists we have in this country blow this up into a firestorm. Being that it is, I would like to shed my 2 cents on this subject. Myself, being of the “uneducated”(otherwise known as a non-college attendee) ILK take offense to this quote. Yesterday, Mr. Kerry said “I apologize to no-one” and went on a 5 minute tangent of pointless and worthless dribble said that the statement was a “botched joke” and was more directed at the Bush administration. He even starts condradicting himself. He said his comments couldn’t have been directed at the military because you have to be smart to be in the military. Wait a minute? Is this making sense? I think not. So if I’m hearing this right, first he said if you aren’t good in school you get stuck in the military, then he says you have to be smart to be in the military.  I call shenanigans RIGHT now. I do not believe that in any way that it was “botched”. He said what he said, and this subject should not have even come up. Why even joke about what our current situation in Iraq is? How about giving a helping hand with the administration. Ya know, Mr. Kerry was in favor of our situation in Iraq at first. Since then, he has gone back and forth many times. Another tid-bit of info I heard. President Bush got better grades in college and on his SAT then Mr. Kerry did. Cripes, my head hurts. I hope he does apologize, although I’m convinced he won’t. Its a damn shame. Thats that. I will leave it at that and nothing more.

On another not, I know I just started up with the weekly quote and hope to have a weekly log, this week is a little different. Its the one and only Top 10 list myself, Matt, and a few wonderful guests came up with after a night of consumption and hilarity I would like to share. Enjoy.

Top 10 Reasons not to leave a Wounded Soldier(i.e. a beer)

10. You paid for it
9. Its only cold once
8. There’s not as much swill as you think
7. Show of Masculinity
6. You don’t remember it anyways
5. Satisfaction of a job well done
4. You want it all for yourself
3. ITS THE LAW!!!
2. Show that person of leaving one behing
1. Hey!!! Its alcohol, quit complaining.

Good night, I’m out. Word.