I'm A City Girl

But I can't really deny where I'm from. Let's be honest, Idaho is about as country as it gets. Particularly Southeast Idaho. I do love living in a bigger city, though, and the fact that I was not born in ID probably saves me the Wranglers, plaid and a baseball cap gene. Country music is not really my favorite either, though I do love me some hot country men like Timmy and Keith Urban and the guys from Rascall Flatts. I've recently developed an appreciation for the classic outlaws too. Who doesn't love Cash and Willy? Seriously. And if you ever want to tell me that country music is less offensive than rap music, you should listen to some of David Allen Coe's non-publicized songs and get back to me (er...that one is nsfw. This one is funny and only slightly inappropriate tho! ;->).

Anyway. One of the country musicians I've always appreciated is Cletus T. Judd. If you don't know, he's the Weird Al of country (and I bet he hates that comparison). When I was first exposed, I heard his silly songs like Did I Shave My Back for This?, which is mild compared to some of the things that I've heard from him recently. Cletus is still silly, but he's apparently taken up politics as well. And you know, I've gotta give it to him for not mincing words about it either. Exhibit A:




And you know what? He's right. Look, I voted for Obama, and despite everything I haven't lost complete faith in him. He really did inherit a HUGE mess. And he's been looking older and older because I'm sure the stress is more than any of the rest of us could handle. But we're going on two full years of his reign and things have not and are not changing. Well, they are changing, because change is always inevitable, but if anything the economic situation has worsened. Unemployment is at 9.6 percent? That's insane, particularly considering what he had to say about unemployment while he was campaigning for the stimulus package.

There is some good news, though. Retail sales are up, and one can never complain about that. It doesn't surprise me, though. I know I'm not having any problem spending the money I do have,. but I have also had to spend some of the money I don't have, which is bad, but it's better than being charged out the wazoo for late payments and overdrafts, right? Right. The GDP is up too, and there are 27,000 new jobs available in UT this month, which means that all of the new, prominent, flashy advertising I see from local businesses is not just a coincidence.

So at least my state's economy is recovering a bit, but that's probably mostly because it wasn't hit as hard as the rest of the country. I guess I have to count that as a bonus of living in this sheltered place. UT aside, the national economic situation is still out of control. Granted, it did take us a good eight years to get into this mess, so perhaps it's too much to expect any one man to get us out of it in two. But after this year President Obama will only have two left, and he'll have to spend those ones actually making things happen if he even has a shot at re-election. And honestly, if he doesn't stop trying to please everyone in congress (and all of their various corporate supporters) and start making good on everything he promised the voters in the first place, he deserves to be voted out.

And yet, eternal optimist that I am, I can't help but be hopeful. Here's to 2011 being kinder to my 401(k).

I Read it on Wiki....

From Wikipedia: "Wikipedia's 15 million articles (3.2 million in English) have been written collaboratively by volunteers around the world, and almost all of its articles can be edited by anyone with access to the site."

Translation: anyone can write/edit for Wiki. In my mind, that means that anyone can make up whatever they want and throw it into Wikipedia as fact. And yet, Wikipedia is toted as the end-all of the online resources. It is used and allowed as legitimate source material for writing a research paper (which, while I think that is a huge detriment to the advance of information in a digital age, I can't really complain because all of the research papers I've written in the last three years were helped along by Wikipedia). I bring this all up because during a conversation about cars last night I was told point blank, "It's true! I read it on Wiki." To me, that sounds an awful lot like "It's true! I saw it on Fox News." Click on that link to read the insanity. Not recommended for conservatives that love the channel, but pretty dang useful to those of us rational people who expect our "news" to be relevant AND true... Okay, the "rational people" comment is probably uncalled for, but seriously? Suing for and winning the right to lie to your viewers and yet people still watch it...? I'm so confused.

At least Wikipedia takes some precautions against full on lies being published. Of course, I'm sure plenty still get through. Not surprisingly, Wikipedia and Fox News fit pretty perfectly into Baudrillard's theory of Simulacra and Simulation. Maybe one day (perhaps not to long from now), the only information we know will have come from Wikipedia, and the absolute truth about reality will be distorted to the point that we don't even suspect that it is.

Then again, "absolute truth" is nothing more than a concept at this point. Information, regardless of source, is never delivered unhindered or unaltered by some sort of bias to the general public. Sometimes the alterations are unintentional, of course, because people can't help but relate things in their own view and with their own words, but sometimes (cough cough the Bush administration) information is altered on purpose to serve certain interest.

This is more or less why I am so cautious about any "fact" on the internet. A new term should be invented to describe this wave of half truths and biased fact, and then everyone should agree to use it so that people can tell the difference!

Anyway. Be skeptical is all I'm saying.

So here's some awesomeness for you.
I heart P!ink, and I particularly like that her ex is in this video with her. You go girl!

Dear Mr. President

(It's been a while since I've ranted about anything political. This came to be last night while I was cleaning my house. I figured I'd share, just for funsies :) Enjoy!)

You know, I'd like to have a conversation with the President. As a voting member of society I see it as my right to do so. I have some things to say to him, and since I voted for him he should listen, right? Right. I really just want to look him in the eye and say, All due respect, Sir, but what the fuck? You make us all these promises during the campaign, and so far you have been nothing but one epic fail! To be fair, Sir...(he'll probably try to interrupt me at this point, but I will not allow him to do so), if you please, Sir, I voted to put you in this office because you asked me to. Well, I did, and so far you have not carried through with your part of the bargain. So, Sir, if you please, I have some words to say as a concerned citizen of this United States. So, yes, to be fair I know that you came into some really shitty circumstances. You are assaulted on all fronts every day. Well guess what! This is the job you signed on for. You can't have been so naive as to think that you would never have to muscle your way through the opposition. Hello?! Have you met your predecessor? He's basically retarded, and he still managed to get shit done. Why? Because he was an arrogant motherfucker who did not take no for an answer!

So, Mr. President, I would like to give you this message, from all of us that did and did not vote for you (because, let's be honest, no one is happy with you right now) to you: Man up. Seriously. Grow a pair. Fire some people if you have to (and you should, because you've surrounded yourself with people who are only holding you back). Whatever it takes to get it done, do it! I know that congress is a big fat thorn in your side (trust me, we all feel that way), but we will not accept your excuses any more! We voted for you because you promised change. You promised that you were different than the politicians that we already know, but so far you have done nothing but prove yourself a liar. I hope that you realize that, and I really hope that it affects the way you sleep at night, because things only seem to be getting worse.

The economy is recovering, as it does, but what's being done about the warS we are STILL fighting? Nada. And guess what. We're never getting into Afghanistan, my friend. That nation has turned out every other nation that has tried to invade it from the beginning of time. Just because we helped them turn away the Soviets doesn't give us the right to turn around and expect them to welcome us in. They want to be LEFT ALONE to live the way they want to live. The pursuit of happiness is a basic human right, and they want to pursue their own happiness just as much as we want to pursue oil in their country, and since they were there first, logic learned by any child before kindergarten dictates that it is theirs, and we have no right to tell them what to do or how to live their lives. Bush started this war under the pretext of saving the Muslims from themselves. They don't want or need to be saved, and you do not need to be carrying on this holy war just so that the fat Republicans that own the companies which are profiting from it can continue to do so. You and I and all of us common folk (you know, the ones that voted you into office) are most decidedly NOT benefiting from it.

I know what you're thinking: that I think that I could do it better. Well that's not the case. I don't think I could run the country. That's why I did not (nor do I ever intend to) go out for the job. You did, though, and you got it, so you must have had some sort of plan for dealing with the giant mess of a situation, right? You must have, because you said that you did, and that's why people like me did or did not vote for you. Well you won the popularity contest, and now it's high time to be getting down to business. We thought you were better than them. We thought that you were the genuine person you claimed to be. So why don't you just answer me this one question that has been burning in my brain since your 100th day in office: how do you sleep at night knowing that you have failed so miserably at what you were supposed to do? You don't have to answer right away. I'll wait. I am already accustomed to waiting for you, so it's not big thing. Just think about it for a while. But not too long. You still have a job to do.

Sounding Off and Speaking Up

Iowa and Vermont both legalized gay marriage within the last week, and the United States as a whole has moved a little bit closer to the ideal of "equality" that we pride ourselves on but have yet to reach as a result. I've been keeping an eye on the news articles that are coming out about the issue, and I came across this one today. I really do believe that it (the legalization of gay marriage at the Federal level) is inevitable because it is, inevitably, the right thing to do in a country that prides itself on democratic principals like freedom of choice and equality for all.

Of course, as the article points out, it is going to take a long time, and it won't come without continued struggle, but two states coming to the decision independently and within four days of one another is a big advance in the right direction.

I found this quote particularly interesting:

"It's really clear," asserts Maggie Gallagher, of the National Organization for Marriage, "that, if you leave it up to the American people, they would say, to make a marriage, you need a husband and a wife, and we don't want politicians messing with it."

Yeah, they don't want politicians to mess with it. They want the politicians to agree and protect it, though. One of my biggest issues with the conservatives' argument against gay marriage is that it will undermine the "institution" of marriage (which, by their definition, is classified as such because it is between members of the opposite sex). I'm sorry, but how does something that goes on between two people that you don't even know have any effect on your own marriage? Does it undermine the meaning of your marriage? If someone else's choices and decisions and freedoms have an effect on your marriage, then maybe you need to take a good long look at your life and figure out why you're letting others define things for you.

When it comes right down to it, marriage is a legal agreement between two people who have agreed to spend their lives together. It comes with tax, medical, inheritance and other legal benefits. The cultural definition, of course, is complicated by social and religious tradition. Perhaps it is just the rebel in me, but I think that there are many a social/religious tradition without which we would be better off as a society. Besides, this is supposed to be a free country. Free. As in our decisions are not made for us. In reality, unfortunately, our decisions are being made for us all the damn time, but that doesn't mean that we should just accept that that reality will never change.

In my mind, tradition should not dictate the future. Just because it has always been one way does not mean that it is right. Denying a group of citizens basic rights based on superficial things like sexual preference is discrimination. How can it not be? How is it any different than denying citizens basic rights based on gender or skin color? The answer is that it is no different, and it goes against the fundamental freedoms and rights guaranteed to all citizens by our Constitution.

Question:

Bush approved a $700 Billion bailout package to save the banks and get them lending again. What happened to that money?

Answer: Any questions?

Are You KIDDING Me?

This is just WRONG!

We're in the midst of a recession and Exxon is reporting a $42+ BILLION PROFIT??? Does anyone else see how messed up that is? And here the oil companies are trying to tell congress and the world that their profits are within reason. Reason? HA! How is $42+ Billion reasonable when hundreds of thousands of people have been laid off so far? And, no doubt, hundreds of thousands of more people will be laid off in the weeks and months to come.

It makes me sick. SICK I tell you.

Messed Up

I just read this story on my local news Web site, and read this post on my cousin Karene's blog, and I just have to say: It makes me sick that such stupid and ignorant racial prejudices still exist (though seeing as I live in Utah, I guess I shouldn't be surprised). I love Salt Lake City, don't get me wrong. The margin of difference in SLC between support for McCain and support for Obama was about 2,000 votes. The rest of the state, though...it makes me sad to live here.

Where are we Going and Why am I in this Hand Basket? (Part 2)

Hear ye! Hear ye! The latest in national economic news: PANIC!

That’s right folks. It’s true. It’s pandemonium out there. I probably aught to be afraid (isn’t everyone?), but I’m actually pretty fascinated by the stock market decline. I wasn’t old enough to know or care about the Tech Bubble fiasco, and I didn’t know anything about the stock market after 9/11 (which was not a bubble so much as it was pure panic), so I’m counting this as my very first major economic downturn. Isn’t it just so exciting? We’re making history here folks. I can totally see myself in 20 years from now saying: I was a broker during the economic crisis of 2008. I got to see the decline from the inside! And people will say “Oooh.”

But in all honesty. It’s fascinating, but I’m also a bit boggled. Here’s the thing: a lot of the people I deal with on a daily basis have been investing in the stock market for longer than I have been alive. That’s long enough to have lived through at least two other extreme market downturns (in the 80s and the afore-mentioned Tech Bubble). Now, I don’t know about you, but loosing $10K, $50K, $100Million overnight would be a rather traumatic experience for me—not something I’m likely to forget. So why (oh why!?) do people forget those previous traumatic experiences every time the market dips even by the least substantial bit, freak out (just like last time) and sell everything they have to cash only to have the market increase enough to make up for the loss the next day?

Seriously folks. Someone please explain it to me. It’s like the most random form of amnesia there is, and yet it seems to affect a lot of people.

Disclaimer: If you are retired, or are close to retiring, I don’t blame you for panicking. No. I blame you for investing your money in highly aggressive stocks and/or holding all of your money in one or two different securities. Sure, that 120% unrealized capital gain and $5 monthly dividend was fantastic! But guess what, you didn’t capitalize soon enough and now your shares are worthless. Perhaps you’d be better suited taking your retirement money to a casino and playing the penny slots. At least slot machines play music and have flashing lights and sparkly stuff.

One of the very first things I ever learned about fashion and the economy is that they go in cycles (I personally am all for the return of leg warmers and slap bracelets!). One of the very next things I learned about the economy is that what goes down must come back up, and up, and up…you get the point. Yes! It’s true—verifiable even—the worst market declines are always followed by a rebound that exceeds the high points of the happy era before. That is why it makes all of the sense in the world to invest for “the long haul.”

Every now and then I come across someone who is smart. It’s not often, let me assure you, but it happens. Every now and then, amongst all the “OH MY GOD! GET ME OUT OF THE MARKET NOW! I’M GOING TO LOSE EVERYTHING!!” type of questions I get, a “I want to go ahead and get in the market now. I like how low the prices are at this point” crops up. Smart. The term “Low Prices” is the key point here. Every one loves low prices. That’s why Wal-Mart continues to spread through the entire world like the virus that it is. Low prices; who doesn’t love them? I can buy this for $1 less here than I can anywhere else? I’m sold. Price decreases are generally a good thing for the consumer in any industry—except for the stock market. Which, once again, makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. If you bought a stock at $85 and the stock drops to $75, you should buy more! (Granted, the company is still reliable—do your research, folks!) Think of it as a $10 discount on the awesome product that you just have to have.

Now here’s the trickier part: if the stock goes to $95, sell some of it. Cement in at least some of your gain, while keeping enough to profit from any additional gain. And take it from me: learn about trailing stop loss orders and how to place one. You’ll thank me later (I happily accept gratitude in the form of cash).

Investing in the stock market is not for the faint of heart (or the weak of stomach). But it’s not rocket science, people. Don’t want or have the time to research a sufficient number individual companies that will allow you to be properly diversified? Buy a mutual fund. Don’t have enough to buy a mutual fund? Buy an ETF. Don’t have enough to buy an ETF? You need to rebalance your budget. And hey, if hiding money under the mattress is more your style, I won’t hold it against you. Though, you may want to consider putting it in a savings account (at least!) to earn some interest—might as well keep up with inflation, right? Your cash sure as hell isn’t going to do that if it’s stuffed under the mattress.

Where are We Going, and Why am I in this Hand Basket? (Part 1)

As you might be able to tell, I'm not being terribly productive at work. It's Friday, and my mental capacity had fallen to dangerously low levels. I blame it on Lehman Brothers, and AIG, and Washington Mutual, and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and Washington's love affair with Big Oil and Corporations in general...it's all their fault that I'm mentally exhausted and becoming poorer and poorer with every passing day. Damn them! Damn them all to the depths of hell!

So, that's a little melodramatic, but it's the best I can come up with at the moment...

Why are these things exhausting me? Because I'm trying to figure out why (oh why!) I should let the Government issue me a $30K tax bill so that they can buy bad assets off of these failing companies. I understand (believe me, I do) that if the Government doesn't do something, the economy is going to go from bad to worst ("The Greatest Depression Ever" as we were joking at work last night). I understand that. But let me hit you with a scenario (and this is 100% true):

A man is hired as the CEO of a major banking institution in 2002. At that time, he is given a $7.5 Million signing bonus. In a matter if six years the bank in question has completely collapsed--in fact, it is being called the largest bank failure in U.S. history. So, what does this CEO get? He got fired, of course, but don't feel bad for him. He gets to keep the signing bonus, and he gets $11.5 Million in a severance package....

This scenario begs many questions in my mind. The first of which is WTF?! This guy ran an established bank, that has been in operation for 120 years no less, into the ground in six short years. He should be getting nothing! Just like the thousands of employees that have been and will be laid off because the company cannot afford to pay them. He should be standing in line at the unemployment office with the rest of them, waiting for his $400 unemployment check. He should not be getting any sort of severance, much less one worth multi-millions of dollars.

Secondly, and more importantly I think, if the company has to lay off thousands of employees because there is not enough liquid assets to pay them, AND the company is failing because it doesn't have enough cash to back up its bad assets, where exactly are the severance package dollars coming from?

Unfortunately, I don't have an answer to that question. I do know, however, where the $700 Billion that the Government wants to use to bail these failing companies out with will come from. Me. And you. And every one you know. And everyone you don't know.

Now, don't freak out, but I have to say that I agree with the House Republicans at this point (gasp!). They're pushing for a program that would benefit us as tax payers, not just the corporate giants responsible for this mess. Thank you, House Republicans, for looking out for me in this situation. I truly appreciate it. I really hope that you get your way here. I rather like the idea of putting the responsibility of funding this bailout back on Wall Street, as the individual investor and tax payers are hurting enough as it is. Shame on you, Democrats, for thinking that tax payers should foot yet another bill we can't afford. Have you seen gas prices recently? Or how about food prices? Shame on you.

Something needs to be done. That's an absolutely indisputable fact. If the Government allows all of these major corporations to fail, we're all screwed. If the Government buys all of their bad assets for $700B using tax payer money, we're still screwed.

I'm glad that I won't be the next president.

Propaganda if I've Ever Seen It...

So, it's been a while since I've posted a political commentary. I guess that's probably because I've been focusing on other things lately, or it might be because there's not much else to say other than "our economy sucks" and "I really hope that Obama wins the election."

However (as is the case with most of my political commentaries), I happened to stumble across this article on CNNMoney.com today, and I feel compelled to express just how much I hate the Oil Industry. Basically this article says that the recent drop in oil prices, and the subsequent drop in gasoline prices is actually BAD for the economy. Why? Because the oil prices are dropping due to the fact that Americans are driving less (duh!), which means that Americans are spending less, which means that the economy is just getting worse.

"But falling oil prices also suggest that the recession the U.S. has so far avoided is well on its way, as consumers pull back from the spending spree that drove economic growth earlier this decade." First of all, can I just point out that we have NOT BEEN AVOIDING A RECESSION!! We are in a recession folks (no matter how much George W. wants to deny it). We're there. We were there a good long time ago. And guess what! CNN even reported that we were, in fact, in a recession way back in FEBRUARY (I remember because I predicted it and was subsequently vindicated).

Second of all--DUH! Of course people are spending less. Know why? Because people can't afford to spend! Discretionary income is no longer a luxury that most Americans have, seeing as food and energy prices are through the roof. I've taken a couple of economics classes in my day--and trust me, economics is certainly not my strongest subject--and while I didn't learn any of the intricacies, I did learn a couple of key things. First of all, there is an inverse relationship between price and demand. If price goes up, demand goes down, and if price goes down, demand goes up. Hence, gas/oil prices go up, the demand will inevitably drop. Surprise, surprise.

Secondly, of course, there is supply and demand. However! As oil futures trade openly on an international exchange, prices are subject to a little thing called PERCEIVED demand, aka SPECULATION. Speculation is what drives oil prices up. Today, oil dropped almost $4 per barrel because the weather forecast for the next a few days looks better than it did. Seriously? Listen, I understand that the oil supply WOULD most definitely be affected if a hurricane went blazing through the Gulf of Mexico. But let's be honest here folks. The cost of producing a barrel of oil has not increased significantly in the last 50 years. And production has, if anything, increased significantly.

The fact that oil has been over $120 per barrel for the last three months is due to a) the situation in the middle east, b) hurricane season and c) political and social tensions in other major oil producing parts of the world (Africa and Latin America) all making investors jumpy. And that's without even mentioning the fact that the oil companies are doing ZERO to help (they're making billions and billions of dollars, so why would they?), and our current government isn't going to do anything about it because the major players all have ties to the oil industry and are benefiting from the high prices.

Conflict of interest much? Maybe just a little. Or a lot...

So, here's what I think. I think that if oil prices continue to fall, gas prices will continue to fall, and people will start driving again because they can afford to do so. This, in turn, will probably drive the prices back up eventually. It is common knowledge that the market--any market--is cyclical. We just so happen to be on the down turn at the moment. It happens, people, and it sucks, but that's just how it works.

So, CNNMoney, stop printing your bull crap propaganda about how lower oil prices are actually bad for the economy. The economy is bad partly because of oil prices. It only makes sense that if prices drop, people are going to be able to afford to buy more, which, in turn, will increase consumer spending, which is always a good thing. I also think that falling oil prices will inspire consumer confidence (which, apparently, is also a good thing). Confidence leads to more spending, which leads to more confidence, which leads to more spending...etc. etc. so on and so forth. You get the point, right?

Right. So! This is what I think: I think that falling gas prices can only be good for our economy, and I think that I'm not the only person who thinks so. Most of the consumers I know are only concerned about how much it costs to fill up their tank or their pantry and/or refridgerator. It's only logical, I think, that a fall in oil prices can only be beneficial for the average consumer in ever way because the price of oil doesn't just affect pump prices. It affects PRICES in general. Oil drops, prices drop, spending increases.

It just makes sense.



(But of course, just because it makes sense doesn't automatically make it a sure thing.)

BY FAR the stupidest thing I have seen in a long time...

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/sfgate/detail?blogid=7&entry_id=26848

Let me start by saying that Fox News is flat out ridiculous. I can't stand to watch it for more than like 10 minutes at a time because of the blatant bias of their "reporting." Second of all, is anyone else annoyed by the fact that everything has to be so freaking PC all the time? Or is it just me?

A scarf, that bears a very slight resemblance to a headdress worn by terrorists, is cause enough to pull an ad off the air? Because it might, possibly, maybe offend someone somewhere. My guess is that no one else would have made that connection. Leave it to Fox News to make an overly big deal about something so incredibly asinine. The fact that Fox News even took the time to point it out just goes to show that Fox News has nothing better to do with their time than report on stupid, frivolous issues that have no bearing on anything.

Thank you, Fox News, for keeping us safe from the terrorism that is Rachel Ray and Dunkin Donuts...

UPDATE (June 4, 2008): http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24972847/ The scarf in question is a symbol of Pakistani nationalism, not terrorism as Fox News and other conservative media would have us all believe. An Arab-American in this article likens the scarf to a baseball cap. All the more proving my suspicion that this was the stupidest pseudo-controversy ever cooked up.

Because I love Political Cartoons:

Basically....I'm going to have to concur.

Another Cartoon

The caption, by the by, says "Recession? What recession?"

And in other I'm-so-glad-that-our-President-is-on-top-of-things news, President Bush finally came out and said that the economy is going through "challenging times."

People, this is the 21st century. The kind of data that economists need to determine the current state of affairs is READILY AVAILABLE. And, seeing as this is the US Government, I'm willing to bet that they have access to this information BEFORE ANYONE ELSE DOES. Yet, for some reason, they are still always two steps behind.

Why? I'll tell you (you knew I was going to, didn't you?). Because the big companies that are REALLY running the Government are the ones making money here. The oil companies (that the Bushes have a direct interest in, of course), to start with, are making money hand over fist. Vinnie told me yesterday that ExonMobile holds the record for 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th largest profit gain in a quarter. Why? BECAUSE OIL IS OVER $100 A BARREL!

And there is argument within the Government as to whether or not the interest rate should be lowered again because the Dollar is losing value faster than you can even blink. But what's being done about it? Nothing really. I don't know what can be done about it, I'm not an economist, but I do know that there has got to be something that we can do about it! For one, stop producing money. Less money in circulation means more demand, yes? Supply and demand. Not just for products. The law holds true for money too. If there is less money circulating, then there will be more demand for it and the value will increase.

That's exactly what they are doing for gold and diamonds. Raise of hands. Who actually thinks that gold and diamonds are as rare as they are perceived to be. Perceived demand is what makes these "rare" commodities so expensive. It's the exact same scenario with oil. OPEC is "slowing down" production in a "transition from winter production to summer production." Blah blah blah. It's a cover up for "we can raise the prices, so we will. AND! As we have been meticulously raising the gas prices every summer for the last 50 years, we're going to make you all believe that the extra increase in prices is normal."

Gas prices are being manipulated from all sides. The methods of productions have not change significantly since the beginning. Subsequently, production costs have perhaps increased due to inflation, but the method and the production costs are essentially the same as they were 20, 30, 40 years ago. Yet we're paying twice as much for gas today as I paid for gas merely 3 or 4 years ago. It's ridiculous. We are supposed to have the brightest minds in the world working on a solution for our addiction to oil, but nothing has been done yet? That just doesn't add up.

Something should be done. Something drastic. Something really, really drastic.

Elliot Spitzer = Distraction

I have recently begun to realize some things about the current administration that have seriously made me consider leaving the country for good. Not the least of these things concerns the issue in this article:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/03/08/national/main3919474.shtml

So. The President of the United States of America has basically said that torturing people is okay as long as it keeps the country safe. First of all, why isn't this being more widely covered? Why did I have to Google "President Bush vetoes torture bill" in order to find information on this? IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN FRONT PAGE NEWS! It happened on March 8, 2008.

Guess what happened on March 10, 2008. News broke that stupid Elliot Spitzer was involved in a prostitution ring. As I have stated in a previous blog, I've been wondering if there is, in fact, people working behind the scenes to manipulate whats really going on in this country. Turns out that I might just be onto something. The Bush Administration needed a distraction to keep too many people from hearing about the bill he just vetoed that would have done away with torture interrogation techniques like waterboarding. So, Elliot Spitzer had to be exposed as practically the same time. Coincidence? Something tells me that there's no way....

How anyone believes in the Bush Administration's credibility anymore is beyond me. Intelligent people, at least, should recognize the gaping holes in the reasoning behind the "war on terror." Every single citizen of the United States should be aware that we are in the Middle East for OIL. OIL. Not to keep the country safe from the imminent threat of terrorism. Oil.

Wouldn't you think that, in a country where we now have prescriptions for EVERYTHING and anything, and in which so much research is being done to find cures for what ails us, we would have come up with an alternative energy source that could reduce our addiction to oil? I mean, there has got to be someone out there who has developed or discovered and energy source that is both ecologically and economically sound. But, sadly and surely, the big oil companies do not want such things to become widely known. If the world's dependence on oil begins to slacken, then the people who run the oil industry will start losing money. And heaven forbid that something so utterly terrible like that happen.

I don't really expect anything to happen about oil in my lifetime. I do not expect much in general to happen during my lifetime, really. I have very low expectations of my country, which I find really sad. People should know about this stuff. People should be aware, for example, that nowhere is it written than we must pay Federal taxes as citizens of the United States. This is not a law, people. Go look for it. You won't find it. The only kind of tax that is technically legal in the United States is one that is proportionate for everyone. Our current tax law is anything but proportionate.

Why aren't more people aware? People should know, and people should talk about these kinds of things.

Headphones without Music

One of the girls on the team behind me is being extremely loud. She's trying to verify a client over the phone, and the client either doesn't get it, or is hard of hearing. It is situations like that that make me very glad I don't have to take phone calls any more. I can hear, even from a good 20 yards away, that she's getting really frustrated, but is trying not to let that frustration filter into her voice. It's a tricky game, over the phone, really. It's easy in writing, because you can voice your frustration without the client having to hear it.

Anyhow. I wish my iPod was charged so that I wouldn't have to listen to all of that nonsense. It makes me sympathetically frustrated for her, because I've been there and it sucks. Unfortunately, however, I did not have the forethought to plug my iPod in to charge when I got here this morning, because I didn't have the forethought to see what the battery power was before I turned it off last night. I really should pay more attention to these things so as to make my life easier.

So, I was thinking about the whole Elliot Sptizer thing today. Not that I really had a choice in the matter, considering that he has been the headline on every single news web site out there for the last four days. So it's not really that I WAS thinking about the situation on my own, it was more like I was being force fed the situation, and have furthermore decided to contemplate it more fully.

First of all. WHAT THE HELL? Seriously. What is wrong with people? I will never understand WHY in the WORLD someone would do something so stupid in the first place, especially when the person is a PUBLIC FIGURE!! Did Bill Clinton's debacle teach anyone anything? Maybe I'm just an overly rational person, or maybe Elliot Spitzer is just a complete idiot, but why wouldn't someone who is in a public office (even someone who isn't in public office) say to themselves "Maybe it's not such a good idea to hire a prostitute because it would be the end of my career and devastating to my family if the news were to get out." That, to me, just seems like common sense. But apparently, common sense is scarce in the political world.

This man had been planning to run for President, which makes me wonder what country he thought he was in. He must be new here, because any conscious citizen of the United States could tell you that it is not a good idea to hire a damn prostitute if you plan to run for President. Even if no one finds out about it right away. News flash: Your opponents have people dedicated to digging stuff like this up!

I honestly do not get it. I really don't. I probably never will. I just cannot even begin to fathom what would drive a person to make such an idiotic decision. Not only did Elliot Spitzer ruin his own life (he will forever be the disgraced ex-Governor of New York), but he ruined his family's lives as well. Sometimes I wonder if it is all just a big fat ruse (and by "wonder" I really mean desperately hope). I wonder if maybe there is some bigger force working behind all of these politicians. A force that decides whose turn it is to mess up and how, in order to keep things interesting. The Media, perhaps? I think that the Media is really just a direct benefactor of the plan. No, I wonder if there is something or someone bigger than that whom all of the Politicians know about (but naturally keep their mouths shut), who gets to say who is going to have the next big scandal, and what the scandal is going to be.

Sounds a lot like selling your soul to the Devil to become a politician. Sometimes I truly hope that is the case. Of course, I know that it is not, but somehow it would make it easier to contemplate such things. Unfortunately the simple truth of the matter is that these stupid men in power become morally bankrupt. Or, in some cases I'm sure, they are morally bankrupt to begin with. Either way, it's not cool. I don't want those kinds of people running my country. And you know me, I'm no conservative by any means. I believe that people should be free to do whatever they want. Who am I to tell someone how to live their life? But there has to be some sort of consciousness to it. People should ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS be aware that their actions are going to affect the people around them. No man is an island...

To illustrate my point...

I love that the cat is wearing a barrel too. Notice that the barrels are actually oil barrels instead of the regular wooden ones. Symbolic, much?

AH HA!

Guess what! I was right. Check it out:

http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/05/news/economy/recession/index.htm?section=money_topstories

I love it when I'm right.

Okay, on with your lives now.

2008 State of the Union

I know, I know. I'm a total slacker and the speech was made a week ago. Hey, better late than never, right? Right. First of all, the links:

State of the Union 2008
Bush's Proposed Budget

The first link is a transcript of Bush's seventh and FINAL (hooray!) SOTU address. I actually watched it this year (well, most of it anyway. He lost me when he started talking about Iraq--I tried to stay engaged, but I just couldn't. So I switched to Scrubs). The second link is an article about the budget he proposed today. More on that later. First and foremost, the speech.

I'm not all that sure why I had the intense urge to watch the SOTU address this year. I certainly have never had the inclination before. I think that I was so inclined because it was his last SOTU address, so I was interested to see what exactly he would say to wrap up his presidency. Some of the things he said I agreed with, some of them I flat out disagreed with, and others made me wonder if he's living in denial (sometimes I wonder if we even live in the same country). Mostly, though, I was skeptical.

One of the other reasons that I wanted to watch the speech was because of the current state of our economy. Days before, the major market indicators had all dropped to 10-month lows. The Federal Reserve had decided to drop the rate 0.75% in between normal sessions (which hasn't happened since 1990, apparently). And, an "Economic Stimulus" plan had been proposed. This is what interested me the most. I wanted to know how the $150 Billion stimulus was going to be funded.

President Bush got to the economy pretty quickly, thankfully. He urged the Congress to keep his previous tax breaks effective, saying that raising taxes would be even harder on American families. While I completely agree that rebuking the tax breaks would probably be hard on many people (the middle class like me would be hit the worst, no doubt), how else is he going to pay for everything? When Bush came into the Presidency seven years ago there was a budget surplus that was supposed to have lasted for years. Now, a relatively short time later, we have a deficit of several hundreds of billions of dollars.

This debt is seriously hurting our economy. The dollar is as weak as it’s ever been (which is really bad news for those of us who are going to Europe this year) because the US has all but lost its financial credibility. All we do is borrow money from other countries like Japan and China, which in turn makes their economies stronger while making ours all the weaker. Not cool, Bush. Not cool.

To add to that, the credit crisis is far from over. These banks, these unbelievably stupid banks, are now reaping what they've been sowing for the last three years. There is a reason we have credit scores, people. There is a reason why you should not make big loans to people who have bad credit. Isn't that the point? Of course, don't get me wrong, there are plenty of people out there that have bad credit due to divorce and identity theft and what not. Those people are not the problem. The problem lies with people who have bad credit and know they have bad credit, and the banks who knowingly loaned thousands upon thousands of dollars to these high-risk people. And, not only did they make the loans in the first place, but they all but tricked these people in to adjustable rate mortgages--the dreaded ARM.

So these things, among others, are leading the country into (or have led us into, in my opinion) an economic recession. There. I said it. I think we are already in a recession, kids. We're there. Of course, the actual data proving this hypothesis won't come out for several months, but I'm going to say it anyway. So, an "Economic Stimulus" package was proposed by Nancy Pelosi and other members of Congress, and Bush urged the rest of Congress to pass it as soon as possible. This package includes rebates of $600 per person, or $1,200 per married couple and up to $300 per dependent child, if you made under a certain income level in 2007.

Now, don't get me wrong, I love it when the Government gives me free money. Who doesn't? But in all honesty, I think the economy would benefit much more if Bush and Congress made more of an effort to get Government spending in check. Bush said in the SOTU that he'd be proposing a budget that cut over 150 "wasteful or bloated programs" that should come up with $18 million dollars. He also verbally backhanded Congress for not cutting down on their sneaky little earmarks. I 100% agree with him there. Earmarks are stupid and unnecessary, and I think that the people in the committees that come up with these proposals should be individually fined each time an earmark comes up.

Which brings us to Bush's proposed budget for fiscal year 2009, which starts in October 2008. The Yahoo! article gives a pretty general overview of what he's trying to accomplish. In the SOTU address, Bush mentioned that his budget would produce a surplus by 2012, and he's sticking with that argument in this proposal. Personally, I think it's crap. First of all, he's asking for a total spending allowance of $3.1 TRILLION dollars. Not billion, TRILLION. And not just one single trillion. Three trillions. But, he's cutting costs by not printing out the plan and distributing it to Congress the old fashioned way. He's being "innovative" by doing it digitally (honestly? Is anything still done on paper?).

WHERE IS THIS MONEY COMING FROM??? Seriously. He's not raising taxes, and we're already in debt up to our eyeballs, so there is no available cash to pay for all of this. Am I the only one who sees the problem with that? No wonder the US has a negative rate of savings. Someone recently told me that Government is essentially a reflection of its people. I think it works both ways. The Government spends money without thought of the consequence, and the people spend without thought of the consequence, and it's a vicious cycle of debt on both the personal and the national levels. I don't like it. I don't like where its heading. I don't like where its taking us as a nation.

Hopefully, and I say this with all the sincerity I posses, the next President is able to fix the CF of a financial situation that the country is in. I won't even care if it's a Republican, as long as the problem gets fixed for reals (though I don't think that a Republican will be inclined to cut down on the war spending, which is the bulk of the problem).