Vision?

Our nation was founded on vision—a vision that incorporated many different, but related visions.

It is fallacy to claim that our Founders spoke and thought as one; you need not be a dreaded elite intellectual to learn that.

Vision continues to drive our political system. Some have and give expression to great, sweeping vision while, for many of us, our vision is limited to the horizon facing us—home, jobs, bills, children, food, and health.

Others have little or no demonstrated capability for vision.

What's The Issue?

According to the Republican National Committee (RNC) and its online material, the primary issue in the mid-term elections this year is [drum roll, please]:

• President Barack Obama

The second-most important issue, according to the RNC, is:

• Rep. Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the US House of Representatives

Of course, these aren’t issues, but are personalities, instead.

According to national polls*, the voting public sees these as the issues involved with the 2010 mid-term elections:

• Economic conditions (43%)
• Health care (23%)
• Size & power of the federal government (18%)
• Afghanistan (6%)
• Illegal immigration (5%)

* “Economy Top Issue for Voters; Size of Gov't May Be More Pivotal,” Gallup, October 26, 2010

Of course the economy is on most minds. I’m very concerned with it, too—especially since I am (once again) searching for a new contract.

The Economy

According to statistics provided by the US Department of Labor, most jobs that have been lost were lost during the last quarter of 2008 and the first quarter of 2009, before the Obama administration could do a thing. Almost 4 million jobs were shed between November of 2008 and April, 2009. Many remain unemployed and many have exhausted their unemployment benefits.

Some may say: “Tough luck, shipmates.” Some Republican legislators and candidates have certainly expressed disapproval of legislation to further extend unemployment benefits, so there’s that. I don’t understand how this is a very popular move on their part, but there are plenty of mysteries to political life that I do not understand.

Disclosure: I must note here that yours truly is not, and has not been, eligible for unemployment compensation or other benefits since I’m primarily employed as an independent contractor.

I suppose that the administration in office always receives the blame for high unemployment, whether that administration caused it or not. In this case, personal and organizational greed, fed largely by the emasculation of the Glass-Steagall Act by the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act in 1999. Many of us recall how the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act ultimately permitted financial organizations, such as AIG, to package derivatives (like credit default swaps) and sell them and resell them one atop the other. Talk about a Ponzi scheme…

The Evil…and Misunderstood…Federal Deficit

But, isn’t the Obama administration responsible for tripling the US deficit? Didn’t that push our economy to the brink and destroy our jobs?

Balanced Federal Budget

The United States hasn’t had a balanced budget and no debt since the administration of Andrew Jackson in 1835, an known Democrat. Deficits began with the First Congress, which refused to mint money, borrowing it, instead. The federal government experienced surpluses for ten years in the 1920s and during four years of President Clinton’s administration.

Well, not quite. According to Reuters, the federal deficit this year has shrunk from $1.4 trillion USD to $1.29 trillion USD. In 2009, the federal deficit was at 10% of our gross domestic product (GDP) and, by the end of the federal fiscal year in 2010, the deficit sat at 8.9% of GDP. If you’re an economist, you want to see federal deficits at or below 6%; if you’re an average taxpayer, you’d probably like to see no federal deficit.

Here are two factoids we probably won’t hear from the RNC or any Republican candidates:

• The federal government spent $64 billion USD less in 2010 than in 2009
• Federal tax receipts in 2010 were higher than in 2009 by $58 billion USD

The Obama Administration Raised Taxes!

Well, didn’t the Obama administration, in its zeal to redistribute income and change us into a socialist state, raise taxes on all Americans?

Nope. A major part of the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, legislation reviled by Republicans as the evil “federal stimulus” bill, provided each taxpayer a $400 personal income tax credit known as the “Making Work Pay” credit. The major difference between this tax cut—a cut of $116 billion—and those during the previous administration is that no rebate checks were mailed to taxpayers. Instead, their withholding dropped. So, the tax cut has been invisible to many.

And, let’s not forget that in September Republicans in Congress saved all of us from the socialism of those damned Democrats and Obama—the President and his henchpeople tried to extend the Bush tax cuts for middle- and low-income citizens while letting the cuts for the wealthy expire!

Now, come January, all those tax cuts will go away and taxes on all of us will rise.

Thanks, Congressional Republicans!

But, the Stimulus Didn’t Work…

It Went To Unions & Cronies!

Nope. Not according to a report by the independent Congressional Budget Office in August 2010. According to Reuters, the Recovery Act resulted in an increase in the US GDP of between 1.7% – 4.5% and helped increase jobs by between 1.4 – 3.3 million in the second quarter of this year.

Did all of this go to union members or “cronies” of President Obama? That hardly seems likely.

In the case of unions, do we mean that union members shouldn’t have jobs?

What About Obamacare?

Aren’t insurance companies pulling their health insurance policies or drastically raising rates because of Obamacare? Aren’t seniors being cut off from Medicare because providers are pulling out of the program?

There are many stories making the rounds concerning the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010:

• Obamacare is a massive federal takeover of US health insurance companies
• Obamacare results in massive rate increases by US health insurance companies
• Obamacare is a bailout of US health insurance companies
• Obamacare will take away our freedoms
• Obamacare will drive insurance companies out of the field
• Obamacare is a guise to redistribute wealth

In March, 2010, the CBO estimated that the new legislation will ultimately lower the federal deficit by $138 billion USD. Of course that’s just an estimate. As for the rest of the accusations above—“ripped from the tag lines of the blogs”—it just doesn’t seem likely to me that the Act can be a federal takeover of US health insurance while also being a bailout of US health insurance companies.

Insurance companies have raised health insurance rates dramatically each year for at least the past ten years. I know of one senior whose health insurance company ended her Medicare Gap policy and encouraged her to buy another “product”—at a significantly higher cost—before the 2008 election of Barack Obama. (Mom went running into the waiting arms of TRICARE for Life, instead.)

As for me, the new law means that, at present, I’m eligible to purchase a plan in the high-risk pool in my state for $616 a month. This seems a lot of money, but, when I compare it with the cost of buying health insurance before the law was passed—at least $1,200 per month—it seems to be a good deal. Plus, the plans available before the new law required me to pay for my insurance for twelve months before I could use it. Hmmm…

What a rip-off! I am soooo offended.

Federal Government—Size & Power

Fact: In 1789, the federal government was considerably smaller than today. The nation had no:

• Standing army or navy
• Bureau of Federal Investigation
• Office of Management and Budget
• National Aeronautics and Space Administration
• National Institute of Standards and Technology
• Department of Agriculture
• Department of Energy
• Department of Health and Human Services
• Department of Transportation
• Department of Housing and Urban Development
• Department of Homeland Security
• Department of the Interior
• Department of Labor
• Department of Veterans Affairs
• Central Intelligence Agency
• Environmental Protection Agency
• National Security Council
• Securities and Exchange Commission
• Commodity Futures Trading Commission
• Consumer Product Safety Commission
• Federal Aviation Administration
• Federal Communications Commission
• Federal Deposit Insurance Commission
• Farm Credit Administration
• Federal Mine Safety and Health Review Commission
• General Services Administration

…and a host of others…

So, which agencies would we remove? For that matter, which agencies have Republicans shut down, ever?

We look to those whom we elect as leaders to lead; to make concrete proposals. Besides another complaint about the Department of Education, I cannot find a Republican proposal to close any federal agency or department. Unless, of course, some wish to end federal regulation of the financial industry.

That has certainly worked in our favor, eh?

There are many charges and counter-charges out there in Lunacy Land—a region inhabited by bloggers (such as me), Fox News, Facebook, Twitter, and almost any other public shouting medium available. Let’s take a look and ask ourselves, “Would we be better off if…

• The banks and auto companies had collapsed?
• The Stimulus made unemployment worse?
• Healthcare insurance was not reformed?
• We unburdened the wealthy from taxes?
• We unburdened companies of regulation?