Jobs

We are now having to deal with the fact that our government has given away alot of American jobs. Please no rants about the last administration it started well before them. Our government seems to put the needs of foreign countries and their citizens before Americans, this needs to change. Another issue facing us is job snobbery (for want of a better term). TV, the media, films all make fun or look down on people who work with their hands. Because of this we (America) are running out of skilled and unskilled craftsman, plumbers, electricians, carpenters and the like. Face it, not everyone is college or higher education material, also many who are may not want to go there but because of family and peer pressure they do. What does this have to do with the situation? Simple if we do not start encouraging people to enter these jobs by 1) removing the loser or low class stigma that goes with them, 2) raising the pay in some cases so they are attractive, this country is going to grind to a halt. How many of you can replace your own faucet or toilet, clean your furnace, change the oil in your car or the spark plugs to name a few? Who's going to do it for you if we keep knocking those professions and no one enters them. Americans seem to have little or no problem paying hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars to people who do nothing more then gamble with the economy and other people's money,they look up to them also. Yet the people who keep us warm, dry, keep our vehicles moving and all the things that actually keep our society moving are scorned and looked down on and in many case not even paid decently. But don't worry our government is making sure this doesn't happen in other countries only here. We need to take a new look at what jobs we have and what jobs we can create then move forward putting America and Americans first.

Competition & choices

It’s time Americans take a long hard look at the “financial experts” guiding our economy. In my mind they are experts in protecting their finances, and guiding the economy into their pockets.
I always understood competition to be the cornerstone of capitalism. If that is correct why has our government, under the guidance of these “experts” pretty much done away with competition all under the guise of better prices and service for the consumer?
In the oil industry for example Mobil, Exxon, Chevron, Phillips are now Exxon-Mobil and Chevron-Phillips, four companies that competed now down to two. Any competition here? The same holds true for consumer goods. Small stores, mom & pop shops covered the country each offering something different. Local flavor, a different shade of paint color, different prices since the products came from different manufacturers. They actually offered consumers choices. Now the majority of these stores and with them the choices we had are gone. We now can only buy what the big stores say we need and should buy at their prices. Is this competition and choice?
We have only a handful of large financial institutions because the “experts” said that’s the best way. What just happened without competition and accountability? It’s going on in the auto industry. Greed runs amuck with no concerns for the consumer.When constructing a bridge you normally use many support columns, and cables so that you can lose a portion of them without losing the structure and safety of the bridge at once. Shouldn’t our financial, auto and consumer businesses operate on the same theory? One or two come down there goes America; if we had 100 we could weather the financial storms with less damage. It’s time to dissolve the conglomerates, and bring back competition and choices.

Freeze all taxes

Time to freeze all taxes local, state and federal. It's about time the government learned what it is like to live on a budget without out being able to rob people. How many of you out there when your costs or bills go up can go to your employer and demand more pay? So why should the government continue to be allowed to lower our standard of living by raising taxes? It's time they learn to live within their means as the rest of us are forced to do. I don't want to hear the usual spiel "Oh if we cut taxes it means less police and fire protection" that's garbage it's just away to scare people. Plenty of other places to cut unnecessary expenses if you think about it don't fall for scare tactics. It's time taxpaying Americans take back their wallets. Politicians were elected to make our lives better not to rob us and ruin us financially. Make them totally justify every expenditure. One last comment we should spend some money and take a survey of the pay and benefits of all companies in the state with 150 or more employees. Whatever that averages out to, number of hours worked per year, sick time, vacation time, how much medical insurance is paid and so on, should be the limit of what government employees can make including the unions. It's time to level the playing field.

Might as well bail out Detroit

I think that the fact the taxpayers once again have to bail out corporations is sickening. However if we don't the trickle down could be worse then Wall Street. With Detroit and the big 3 we are dealing with all the mom and pop shops that go along with it, you know the people in the neighborhoods who have business that are supported by the workers, the independent truckers, the dealerships and their neighborhoods, the people who assemble components across the country and countless more people whose welfare depend on the big 3.
In bailing out the big 3 I think the American taxpayer has the right and duty to demand concessions from them. Something that should have been done with Wall Street and the insurance companies yet wasn't.
The major concessions I see are;The current executive officers resign or are let go and any golden parachutes or just plain retirement does not apply. They are one cause of the collapse and should not be paid let alone rewarded for their part in it. Let the lawyers scream foul who cares there isn't any money in the corporations to pay the golden parachutes so we don't bail them and they don't get paid in any case. Or is there and we are just not being told there is money for it?
Any new contracts for the new executives needs to be approved by congress and does not include golden parachutes but rather a pre-nuptial of sorts that if the company doesn't make a profit they get nothing but their salaries.
Unions have to get real. They have killed the golden goose with their demands. The pay and benefit scale is so out of touch with reality it needs to be cut in 1/2 at a minimum. If they don't like too bad. We don't bail them out. A job and a paycheck in the day and age is something to be treasured even if it isn't what their egos tell them they're worth. How many other Americans lost jobs because of the greed of the auto union by forcing companies to find lower priced labor out of America. The unions didn't care about that as long as they kept their jobs. Remember in bailing them out and letting them keep their jobs all of us taxpayers are going to take a pay cut. So why should we take one and not them?
Congress better stand up for America and do away with these free trade treaties with other countries. In very simple terms duties, tariffs and taxes placed on goods coming into a country are put there to bring the cost of the import up to what the cost is for the same product made in the country doing the importing, making for a level playing field. Certain countries use these duties to increase the price of the imported product to protect their home economies. Free trade does not protect the country whose standard of living is high and costs associated with it's products are higher. It just means that a country that produces something for $5 that costs $8 to make in the US will put the US workers who make that product out of jobs. Maybe in good times they may work that out somehow, right now America itself is on the line and that's what I care about. I don't care about China, Brazil, Germany, Spain, anywhere else I'm an American and I care about America. When we are back on our feet then we can help again until then sorry the piggy bank is broke.
So we need to contact our legislators and tell them America comes first and if they don't want to listen and put other countries first then their jobs will go to someone else next election no matter what party they belong to, America is more important then the Republicans or Democrats. So get those letters and emails going.

We can do it

Let's have a moratorium on financial news for 1 month. No news, no Dow Jones no S&P no comments on how 401ks are doing absolutely nothing then see what happens. People look out the window see people working, shopping doing things they feel more secure they go spend some money, not the wanton waste of money that brought us here but sensible without going into deep debt or debt at all. All of a sudden people have to be hired because people are buying That's pretty much how it works. What we've had to put up with was a media frenzy that built everything into such a hysteria just to sell their shows it became a self fulfilling prophecy. All they sell is bad news to sensationalize their shows for ratings, and people panic OMG my 401K is in ruins cries a 30 something wake up you've got 30 + years for it to come back stop and think before you panic People who have just retired or are getting ready to have an issue but they can still survive. Panic will destroy you stop and think hard and long and I'd really think hard before I listened to any of the experts didn't their advice and way of doing things cause this?Can anyone explain to me why people get paid to gamble with other peoples money? My business teacher told us that stocks were nothing more then a gamble and back then when Vegas was the only gambling mecca in the US he said "The business of gambling takes a dim view of the business known as gambling", I think the reason for that is when you engage in the business of gambling you risk your own money you don't have to pay anyone to play let alone pay them to lose it for you, or pay anyone when you win. Slow down stop and think. If we can start buying again in small ways we will generate new jobs or help keep old ones. It's going to take Americans not the government to get us out of this. Good old Yankee ingenuity and down home Southern Pride that made this country great can do it again and if the problems in DC get in our way vote them out of office. Time to take back America.

Republican loss, on purpose?

Did the Republicans realizing the shape the economy is in and the fact that the American public demands instant satisfaction run a campaign that had little to no chance to win on purpose? I can just hear the Republican strategists, the economy is in terrible shape, even though it's a Democratic congress with a lower approval rating then Bush that did its share to cause it the public won't remember that. The other problem is the American public demands instant everything from coffee to marriage, divorce, enlightenment, anything and everything must happen when they want it forget the fact that it can't. Let's let the Democrats win. This will work out great as another fact about American voters is they have the memory span of 1 news broadcast to the next It's announced Nov. 5 that the Democrats have won, within a week they are putting out their recovery plan, by Christmas they've pretty much taken over the problem. Come the inauguration they own it lock stock and barrel. If it isn't resolved by summer they are going to take full heat for it, not because they should but rather all the public heard during the campaign was "we will fix it" and with a Democratic congress and President it better be done. Throw into the mix a black President and what this will do to race relations in this country if the economy doesn't straighten out right away I shudder to think. Race relations have not improved or changed in years all that's happened is they've been shoved under the rug by putting in place hate/bias crimes law, outlawing racial and ethnic slurs but never dealing with the actual issue of how to achieve true integration and equality.So maybe the Republicans made a smart decision lose this one, let the Democrats try or maybe start to fix the problem, however it won't happen quick enough to satisfy the American public so the Republicans will start winning back seats in the mid term elections and have a good chance to regain the White House in 2012.It's just a thought.

Market takes a dive

It's interesting, 2 days after the election you would have expected the market to stabilize, hold steady something like that and it's not it's in the toilet. The bail out is going through gas prices are down Bush is leaving and there's a new president. The president has the approval of what 52% percent of American voters. So how come the market is doing an imitation of a submarine? I know people are going to say it's been fluctuating for awhile and yes that's true. However I would have thought that with the election decided, the uncertainty gone the market would have at least leveled off for awhile. Guess I thought wrong. Maybe that is why the market is doing what it is doing, because the uncertainty is gone. Obama won. He wants to tax businesses and rich people. So businesses and rich people normally being intelligent, (and I'll save all you Obama fans from having to add the following) greedy, self centered, not at all concerned with America or its poor, (got most of them) are bailing on America. Why? The great unwashed masses out there voted him in with a 4% popular vote and a coastal and IL electoral vote so that he could tax these businesses and people how dare they leave? Because they're smart, they realize that true economic growth does not occur by a redistribution of the wealth. It occurs when people are willing to work. When businesses are willing to grow and employ more people. It grows when the American dream my grandparents came here to find is realized. It does not grow when businesses and people are taxed just to redistribute the wealth. They will leave, they will not work or build something just to have it taken from them for no other reason then to give it to someone else. Have there been financial abuses by the large multinational corporations? Yes. Do we need to institute safeguards to hopefully prevent them from happening again? Yes. However if we do not allow corporations and people who invest in them to retain the lions share of the profits, keeping in mind they are risking their assets to fund and keep these businesses going what reason will they have to stay in America when other countries are clamoring for work for their people and will let them keep most of the profit? It sound very good and idealogical to spread the wealth however if you're old enough to remember sandlot games that were played when the kid who had the ball got there and ended when he left, that's what you have here. These businesses and rich folk have the ball and if Obama and America does not make it worth their while to stay here, game over.So I feel it would be in America's best interest if Obama and his people sat down with these businesses and people and work out a workable deal before he and congress are wondering where their retirement is coming from since there maybe no one working in America.

I'm tired of pressing #1 for English

My grandparents and the parents and grandparents of many of my friends immigrated here from other countries and learned English. They learned it to become a citizen, to get a job to grow in their new country but more then that to show respect for a country that was giving them the chance for a better life then the country they came from. It appears that today's immigrants have no respect for a country that is better then the one they came from because they just want everything handed to them as if they earned it. Guess what just immigrating here doesn't earn you anything. You have to work for what you get. Yes I am saying the United States of America is better then whatever country you came from. The USA gives you the chance for a better life, a chance to be yourself a chance for freedom in thought ,word, religion and more. If your home country gave you all that you wouldn't be here so the USA is the best.I don't like all what I consider useless laws that the government keeps instituting or writing just to satisfy or shut up squeaky wheels without even considering who it benefits. This is suppose to be a country of majority rule so if a law doesn't benefit directly a minimum of 40% of the population our tax dollars shouldn't even be used to consider it. The one law I think that should be instituted because it benefits probably 90+% of the taxpaying legal US citizens is all phones, ATM's, self checkouts anything that is public must be in English without having to push any buttons or ask for it. It is in English from the start, you have to push buttons or ask or whatever they may require for any other language that company may wish to offer. With a very hefty fine for non compliance. It's time Americans took back our country from the multinational corporations who want to blur national boundaries in their unbridled greed which was proven by them and the Unamerican Americans who caused this massive financial crisis.Bring back America.

America’s Chance

America's Chance

We should export or at least not vote into office our politicians who support socialism, communism, and fascism, anything but good old capitalism.

Why, very simple, look at history. What fascist, socialist or communist country has survived for any length of time without aid from another country? Or total subjugation of its people except the ruling class?

I don't see any of those who praise these other forms of government moving to those countries, if that form of government was such a good way to live why don't they immigrate?

If living under those forms of government is so good and fair why are the majority of the immigrants that come to this country (legal or otherwise) from countries with those forms of government? Is it because they want a better life? Is it because they want what use to be the American dream, the ability to have your own business? The ability to have a better life style then one that is degreed by the government? The ability to give their children a better education and the chance to make a good life for themselves and their families when they have them?

Do the people who support these politicians actually think that these same politicians would live under the same financial constraints, the same living conditions, have the same health care as the general population? If they do they are wrong. Look at any of those countries, they have 2 distinct classes those that rule and those that serve. Our politicians who support these forms of government for the US are already in the ruling class, they can retire after 1 term with pay and health benefits for the rest of their lives for them and their families. We taxpayers (those who serve) are lucky if we can retire. They have staffs and offices, everything the aristocracy and monarchy we broke with in 1776 had and everything the ruling class in socialist, communist, and fascist countries have.

The way that the capitalism that formed the American dream has been warped by the unbridled greed of more than a few CEOs, boards and stock traders along with multinational corporations cannot nor should it be denied. However when you have a large plumbing leak in your house you don't tear your house down, you repair the problem. That's what America needs to do. Repair the problem. Prevent companies from getting so large that they destroy competition, do not let greed and illegal activities be rewarded by golden parachutes. If CEOs or board members have been proven to have broken the laws take their money and assets the same thing the government does to drug dealers. There are many ways to fix what is broken without destroying the house.

I feel that we do need to change a few things to prevent what just happened from happening again soon, and yes it will happen again history does repeat itself.

However turning the greatest country history has ever known into a 3^rd world country is not an option I feel we should exercise.