Month: February 2013

Sequestration or just a nibble off the block of Govment Cheese?

February 28, 2013

I just wanted to add my thoughts on the current Sequestration turmoil that has engrossed the FEDGOV and our media friends. Everyone is screaming about how bad it will be to cut all of the services and programs out there that are helping people. Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA) said it could cost 179 million jobs! Holy large fecal number Batman! (BTW, there are about 180 million in the total workforce in the US) Now, I pray that Rep Waters just made a gaffe! Otherwise, sequestration means we are closing the plant and firing everybody.

Shove this thought into your pipe. All of those services and programs are ensuring that millions are enslaved by a FEDGOV that is only ENABLING them to be perpetually helpless.

Go ahead. Quote the numbers of people who have used assistance and then gotten away from it with good jobs and higher education. That’s great. Really, it is. That is what is was supposed to be for and I am ALL FOR HELPING PEOPLE!!!!

However, I would like for you to think of FEDGOV programs in terms of real solutions to real problems. Pretend you had a bullet wound and the bullet was still lodged in your body. Being shot is bad enough. The doctor comes along and does surgery. The doctor promises to fix the problem. It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to say that we got shot in the collapse of the markets in 1929 and the couple of decades after that included the depression and a world war. The FEDGOV’s surgery included lots of money (pain killers) thrown at the “problem” over the years.

Just take ONE set of numbers that describes DIRECT PAYMENTS to INDIVIDUALS by the FEDGOV from the period of time between 1940 and 2011. The chart I am getting my information from what was published by the OMB. http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/Historicals/

If you will notice the “whitehouse.gov” portion of the website. That is the FEDGOV folks!!! These aren’t my numbers or some conservative hack!

(The chart numbers are in millions of dollars (e.g. 1.00 is actually 1,000,000.00))

So, in 1940 the direct payments to individuals was $1,360,000.00

By 1946 it jumped to $5,222,000.00

1950 — $12,407,000.00

1961 — $24,907,000.00

1970 — $56,079,000.00

1974 — $105,557,000.00

1979 — $206,276,000.00

1987 — $413,541,000.00

1998 — $817,749,000.00

2009 — $1,732,245,000.00

Now, those are a bunch of numbers.

You might wonder about an increase in population to explain the increase in spending. Smart!

1940 US Population — 132,164,569

2010 US Population — 308,745,538

Gee, it took 70 years for the population to increase by 100%, while in the same 70 years direct payments by our FEDGOV to individuals increased by 139,113%!!! That is a COMMA between the 9 and 1!!!

Now, back to the bullet you got shot with that your FEDGOV doctors are working on taking out of you.

Originally, in 1940, the size and weight of the bullet that you got shot with was akin to the size and weight of a Tylenol pill. Now, after the FEDGOV doctors have worked on you for 70 years, the bullet has grown to about 11 pounds is about the size of a football. Does anyone really think they are solving the problem? Really? Anyone think that???

Today, the politicians are SCREAMING about how much this sequestration will hurt. Well, if the FEDGOV doctors had done their job to begin with, we wouldn’t be trying to hack out such a large bullet from the patient using such crude tools as sequestration. Wait, how much are we cutting out???

Just how much money are we talking about anyway with sequestration? What unfathomably large dollar amount is going to cause so much pain when cut out??? 85 billion dollars. Yeah, that will hurt. It represents a little over 2% of the entire FEDGOV “budget” in 2010. It is just over 4% of the FEDGOV payments to individuals in 2010. Ouch, you pulled some hair out when you yanked that FEDGOV Band-Aid off! Wahhhhhhhhhh!!!!!

I freely admit that numbers ARE NOT MY THING! Look them up for yourself and please tell me if I am wrong.

— R. A. Grier

February 18, 2013

Held Hostage

To believe that the current (seemingly perpetual) political environment is about anything other than power and control to get and keep something for a select few would be asinine. In America today, leadership at the FEDGOV level is not of a country, but of an ideology that carries and supports only the top members. The masses are pawns on both sides. As long as the President (any President) can keep the invading armies off our shores and reasonable access to tennis shoes and ham; the masses will be content enough not to cause any real trouble.

The masses are an inconvenient necessity for the leadership. They make the world go around through the daily toiling in their lives, jobs and efforts. I have said it before and will re-emphasize it now. Given the resources, talent and brains afforded to our FEDGOV, it is inconceivable that problems have not been solved. If you listen to the mouthpieces (AKA, talking suits) of the FEDGOV, they will tell you that they are working very hard for us. They just need your patience, more time and of course more money.

A few days ago and only a few miles away, there was a standoff that made the national spotlight for several days. A man shot and killed a bus driver, kidnapped a child and held the child hostage in a bunker for six days. It is my collective opinion that Jimmy Lee Dykes wanted to make a political statement about how badly he disliked the FEDGOV and its practices.

For the record, I do not and cannot support him (or anyone else) hurting uninvolved “innocents” to get a point across. Jimmy Lee Dykes killed a bus driver and held a child hostage. They had nothing to do with his fight. It should have never happened and those hurt should have never had their lives interrupted or ended.

I believe that Jimmy Lee Dykes felt like no one was listening and he felt powerless. After it was over, the FBI Special Agent in Charge, Steve Richardson was quoted in the local paper saying, “Unfortunately, we will have to deal with another one of these some day,” Yes, I agree. We don’t have to, but we will see more of these… a lot more.

It didn’t take too long before the media starting throwing around the term, “mentally ill”. The convenience of labeling someone “mentally ill” made the ordeal even more disturbing to me. Lately, it is the term de jour for describing the acts of people with guns. A man, with little regard for others’ health and well-being took actions that were dangerous, depriving some of life and liberty. Those actions were seemingly only in his self-interest.  Again, go a few paragraphs up with the sentence that starts with, “To believe that the current…”

What is the difference in what Jimmy Lee Dykes did and what the FEDGOV does and has done for decades upon decades?? Lives are ruined and people die every day for the ideologies of the powerful in this country. Those in the inner-circle get ahead. The tertiary supporters get to ride along and feed on the cognitive and substantive scraps and are supposed to feel proud and happy about being able to struggle to obtain the American Dream. Jimmy Lee Dykes had it right; he just got wrong trying to get right.

For years I have counseled kids in an attempt to make their lives better and hopefully our world a little better too. One of the many phrases that one develops in my line of work that I used quite often was, “Don’t get wrong trying to get right.” It meant (among other things) that you shouldn’t just create an end with no regard to how you got there. (E.g. goal is to get better grades; poor choice to achieve the goal would be to cheat. Goal is achieved, but not really). The follow on reason for not doing wrong to get right is because you will perpetuate the label of being wrong.

Jimmy Lee Dykes cheated and paid a price. In the process, he also created another poor argument that armed citizens are mentally ill and dangerous, especially if they disagree with the FEDGOV. What a convenient occurrence for the other mentally ill in this country to steal more liberty! A stretch? No, I think it is a fact and I believe that it has been happening for a very long time.

Laws do not make “right and wrong”. In fear of sounding like another burned-out (and dead) “crazy” who was also eliminated by the FEDGOV; I believe that God has the only law that matters. MOST of the other tripe in the law books was created to perpetuate the myth of our leadership fighting the good fight for the citizens. It also stacks the deck for some. How many of our leaders are struggling? How many of them are in the poorhouse during or after their terms in office? Does anyone out there think that they are on our side? Really??? If you do, please don’t bother yourself by further interrupting your comfortable, mythical existence any longer by reading more of my stuff. Go back to your glowy box. Listen while the nice man tells you that everything is going to be alright as he sends you back to Honey Boo Boo. I love the movie Idiocracy by the way.

America is and has been held hostage by our own dreams. We toil and struggle only so long as it suits the powers that be. Another counseling example of this would be the process of enabling. It isn’t too much of a stretch to see that welfare and other social programs are simple satiation of the electorate and a means to quell the masses from rioting, thus interrupting the comfortable carrying out of diabolical schemes by the leadership. Enabling is an act or acts that are well-intentioned, but do nothing more than perpetuate the behavior that is “undesirable”. Here is another example for you to chew on. You want to help Johnny. He has a serious drinking problem. Last month, he “lost” another job. He is struggling and you believe that he only needs to be out from under some of that struggle, so you pay his electric bill for him. He is grateful and tells you how difficult things are and mentions that he could use a sandwich. Awww, the poor boy needs a sandwich, so you get him one. Meanwhile, Johnny buys more booze… You find out and get mad. Why on earth would you be mad? Go back to that paragraph that starts with “To believe that the current…”

The simple fact that we have perpetual, heritage welfare should be a damned clue that it is enabling, not helping. It is also more dubious in that it keeps the power in power and the powerless (unbeknownst to them), happily held hostage. Above, I wrote about counseling kids and an example of how to approach problem solving a more-healthy way. I now wonder if I lied to all those kids. America really doesn’t work that way, does it? Everybody is doing it and that must be respected. That is right in line while practicing good cultural awareness, which is another short-sighted hallmark of my misguided profession. So what if a few people are inconvenienced by losing their rights like bearing arms or losing their liberty by being taxed into slavery? It is for the greater good, right? Besides, the FEDGOV knows what is best for us. They are working hard to solve our problems. They just need more time and of course, more money. Oh, by the way, here is a succinct definition for Antisocial Personality Disorder found on page 706 in the DSM-IV-TR (that book that defines what is crazy), “a pervasive pattern of disregard for and violation of the rights of others”. Attributed to Albert Einstein, is the other definition of crazy; doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results. Again, FBI Special Agent in Charge, Steve Richardson was right. We will see more of these hostage situations. As a matter of fact, we live them every day. BUT, we don’t want them. Who is crazy now?

— R. A. Grier