I am disgusted this week with what’s happening in Washington so I decided to take refuge in my room with the latest edition of The Weekly Standard and a package of chocolate covered cakes. So as I settled in to read, I broke out a package of the 100 calorie cakes. Obviously the cakes are enlarged on the package because they are teeny tiny. They are bite sized. Three bites and I am done. I don’t normally watch my calories, but instead of eating 100 calories I ate 200. I would much rather eat two regular sized cakes and be done. I had to exert more energy by going and getting another package of these 100 calorie cakes. I guess I should be glad that I only ate two packages, I could have continued to eat all six packages while I was reading about the new Treasury Secretary’s failed attempt at explaining the bailout situation or Obama’s newest addition to the Faith Based Initiative Board who has very close ties to the infamous Rev. Wright. By the way, the cakes were delicious and could only be enhanced by a Dr. Pepper.
Monthly Archives: February 2009
WWJD
Okay so in this context it’s What would Jana do, but it works. The Pioneer asked in my last post what I would do if I could build a stimulus package that would work. So this is my challenge. I have been thinking about this and doing some research. I have looked at many different points of view on both sides. I think the one thing that will best help our economy is putting money back into the pockets of hard working Americans. Instead of one lump sum payment, the payroll tax should be cut. This will put money back into paychecks. It will help stimulate the economy by getting the public to spend. A lump sum payment especially now will probably go toward paying down debt or putting it into a savings account. I am sure there will be some that will spend it on something new, but not much. We saw this happen with the last round of Bush tax cuts. The object was to stimuate the economy by putting money in people’s pockets, that didn’t happen. Not only will a cut in payroll tax help out the worker, it will help the employer. It would reduce the cost of labor for employers and make it easier to hire new employees or avoid layoffs. I would cut all pork projects. However, I would like to see an increase in spending for education. We have to make sure our kids our getting the best education available. We owe it to our children to give them as many resources as possible so they will be prepared when they take over. We lag behind countries such as South Korea in secondary education. We need more emphasis on the basics –reading, math and science. Any ideas on how to get our economy moving? What would you do?
Seriously Folks…
What the heck is going on? Do the people that have been elected or in some cases appointed to Congress even know what they are doing? According to Nancy Pelosi, every month that a stimulus bill is not passed 500 million Americans (yes, 500,000,000) will lose their jobs. The last time I checked there are only 140 million workers so we will now have minus 360 million workers. How could that be? According to the Census Bureau’s PopClock as I write this there are 305,758,335 Americans. Is Nancy Pelosi insane? I want to say yes. The stimulus bill that is currently in the Senate is not a stimulus bill. It is a spending bill with every thing that the Democrats wanted to do over the last eight years, but didn’t get to do. There are doorbells for $100,000 in Laurel, Mississippi, there is a proposed shelter for prostitutes in Ohio for $1.5 million along with a dog park in Chula Vista, California for $600,000. These projects are just some of the pork that is going into the bill. How about $400,000 for prevention and treatment of STDs. Isn’t that already happening? Aren’t there already programs that address this? What about money for a no smoking campaign? Wait, didn’t the tobacco companies get sued and the money paid out was to be used to help people stop smoking? The majority of restaurants, malls, etc… are non smoking areas. Many states, cities, counties have a no smoking ban. I don’t think we need to give, I think it’s $7 million, for this. Plus in this bill many of the government buildings like the Department of Commerce need some renovating so let’s do that too. What kind of stimulus is this? None of these projects and there are a lot more like them are going to do anything to help the person that just got laid off or may be facing foreclosure. A wise Pioneer told me that this is a stimulus bill because it has stimulated me to write to my elected officials and say What the ….? Please, please let your voice be heard and write, email or call your elected officials. Let them know how you feel. We don’t answer to the government. They answer to us — the American people.