I live in New Jersey. That about says it all and explains some of my bitterness. The other cause of my bitterness is the sometimes irrational belief that right makes might. Some of the top politicians have been indicted, convicted and imprisoned since the Federal Prosecutor began investigating what should have been internally investigated by the Department of Law and Public Safety, thank-you madam Attorney General and all your predecessors.

 

Aside from the criminal activities of some elected politicians we have the honor of having the highest automobile insurance rates, and our politicians make having it mandatory. We also have the some of the highest property taxes in the nation. The biggest reason for the property taxes is that schools are funded by property taxes. So if you do not own a home and have a dozen kids the village pays your way with our taxes. When the elderly, on fixed incomes, can no longer afford the taxes it makes no difference to the school board, the State or Department of Education. The amazing thing is that the funding levels are based on a flawed study done by a well meaning educator that saw low scores in urban centers and high scores in suburban areas. By the way each area has its own school board, superintendent and budget regardless of the fact that there are any schools or students in the location. The educator published his findings in a book and showed that money is the predictor of success in education. The reason, he speculated, that inner city children did not do well in testing and successfully completing high school is because the richer areas within the counties paid more per student. Since inner city property is not valued as highly as suburban areas the balance had to made up by state funding. So if a rich area raised the per capita cost of educating a student the now called Abbot District received a windfall increase in funding to match the suburbs. The cost per student is now near the $17,000.00 mark per student. So now we go into a dead mans spiral. The well meaning folks in the suburbs want the best for their children and regularly approve school budgets without even thinking about it. This automatically gives the same raise to the inner city school boards. The trick is that Abbott Districts were defined by some formula but now the surrounding municipalities have been included in the formulas and dispersing of monies. The surrounding areas are called Costello Districts. Funny, Abbott and Costello Districts, until you get your tax bill. So along with parents that think every school should have all the amenities possible we now have to educate the children of illegal immigrants at the same $17,000.00 level. This gets more and more hilarious when you find the educator conscientiously examined his findings ten years after and found the Abbott Districts have not improved. On any given day over 50% of the students are truant and almost 50% of the teachers are not in that day. He wrote another book and found that what was the better predictor of a student’s success is not money but parental concern. No one wants to look at this with the same fervor as the money spending model. Money is the easy answer, drain the tax payer. Parental behavior is unenforceable. So even though the study and reality show that money does not help we continually override the voters finally voting against school board budgets. It would seem the Hillary Clinton’s scientific paper expounding that it takes a village to raise a child does nothing more than make an excuse to continue throwing money down a rat hole with no end in site. Someone told me to be careful about my tax philosophy. They accuse me of thinking too much like a Republican and irrationally stop all taxes. This is actually far from my philosophy. I see the need for the future to filled with happy, educated adults, with two car garages and all the latest electronic gadgets, but lets face it working at McDonalds is never going to pay for these things. We will end up as a backwater country to be used as a lesson in stupidity. By trying to bring everyone up to the same level you are supposed to raise the lowest to the highest, not lower the highest to the lowest. Continuing to drain the populace will lead to losing the best and brightest.

 

Someone has got to make the decision to measure the value we are getting for the dollar. If the programs are not working then cut them lose as fast as possible and try something else. This not only goes for education, but the war on drugs is an abysmal failure, and the war on poverty is leading to total capitulation. Raise the white flag in surrender because the current crop of candidates to lead this country into the future all has the same mentality. We are marching along and the end game is being narrowed down to accepting absolute dictatorship, total anarchy, or a total revolt that puts government back into the role defined by the original constitution and out of the role of social engineering.

An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile hoping it will eat him last - Winston Churchill

Does anyone ever read or study history? Neville Chamberlain had success of the Irish Treaty of 1921 to guide him with his policy of appeasement with Nazi Germany.  Mr. Chamberlin thought he was dealing with like minded leader. Hitler was permitted to devour Czechoslovakia prior to World War II. The thinking was that Nazi Germany would be satisfied with this action. Believing that it was inevitable anyway, that it gave time to build the defenses of the British Isles, and in a practical sense that was over there and of little importance.

According to Paul Kennedy in his Strategy and Diplomacy, 1983, appeasement is “the policy of settling international quarrels by admitting and satisfying grievances through rational negotiation and compromise, thereby avoiding the resort to an armed conflict which would be, expensive, bloody and possibly dangerous.”

So what happened? 72,709,600 deaths attributed to World War II. How many deaths would there have been if the world governments took Hitler to task and isolated and attacked him? No one knows but it seems reasonable to believe that it would have been fewer and defintely would not have included the world. Wison’s League of Nation’s Covenant was the natural outcome of a man born to appeasement. He was elected on the premise that he would keep us out of war.

In the early days of World War I, Wilson was determined to maintain neutrality. He protested British as well as German acts; he offered mediation to both sides but was rebuffed.

Finally the reality of German U Boats and sovereign rights to the oceans aroused the people and him to enter the war. Doing nothing early on starts to show a pattern in the high cost of appeasement and negotiation.

Believing that Stalin was both a like minded rational world leader and someone that he, Franklin Roosevelt could manipulate, allowed Stalin to wait while Warsaw was demolished before entering it and suppressing another nation.  An elitist, President Roosevelt felt himself smarter/better/more sophisticated than a son of a cobbler, President Roosevelt allowed the devastation of the nation of Poland for the same fuzzy thinking that appeasement is better than conflict. We see how Stalin gobbled up Eastern Europe and ruled as a dictator, everything we fought against Hitler during Word War II. He must have laughed at Chuchill and Roosevelt while he took possession of all Eastern Europe and then proceeded to annihlate any opposition from his own country men.

Some would say appeasement is the rational and mature aproach to the choice of armed conflict. That presupposes that you are dealing with like minded leaders that want to resolve differences before using armed conflict. We still have that sense of smuggness that believes in negotiation and appeasement as an answer to the difficult problems facing us. Negotiation is viewed as the rational approach to a bad situation. Going to war is the barbaric response to differing viewpoints. I would like to point out that the Iraq war is not a sign of stupidity or barbarism. Saddam Hussein was the barbarian in the mass elimination of the Kurds that disagreed with his tribe. I think tribe is the key word. That area was nothing but tribes at one time until it became an industrialized by the national oil companies in an effort to appease the idigneous population so that they could grow their profits. Now the oil companies and in turn us, dance to an OPEC band, at one time little more than wondering nomads with hereditary titles to sand and sky.

So what do the current crop of candidates want to do, pull out of Iraq. Its costing us too muchin money and lives. Iraq is over there and maybe they will not bother anyone in the location. There will be no more ethnic cleansing. Israel will not be bombed. The war will not spill over to a world conflict just because of oil. this is from two candidates that are essentially hypocrites. One too young to be a part of the selective service and did not volutnteer for national service but wanted a nice life as a Harvard graduate with a law degree and a need to rule this country. Or maybe Hillary’s plan that regardless of circumstances she will pull the troops out in six months. Both of them ignored the history of appeasement and its costs. Hillary the person that treated high ranking military aides as busboys in the White House. her and her draft dodging husband that seem to despise the military. That same smug attitude of superiority that President Roosevelt showed to Stalin. As President Clinton like to describe himself “a politcal wonk” he could make things work that no one else has been able to succeed and the arrogance of Hillary that seems to want ot destroy a political party in the lust for power and control. In the end there is only one rational attitude and that is Senator McCain. We are there. We have a goal. Lets get it done and come home. Too bad that does not play well in the affluent suburbs. These yuppies that believe in throwing money at problems and for who the phrase NIMBY was coined. So lets prove to the world that we do not have the stamina for a just fight. We have not wanted to win since World War II. Vietnam and Koread showed that we should just negotiate and give them what they want so they do not bother us. Isn’t that how organized crime makes money extorting those that do not want or will not fight back. Give a little get a little.

 

“So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself — nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. ” Franklin Delano Roosevelt First Inaugral Address.

Over the weekend I read on Twitter that we can not be frightend of the Republicans. That we need to stand up against them. Where do these people live? Are there armed blackshirted groups standing on corners watching your every movement, listening to every utterance. If the people in this country truly fear that deeply their neighbors, sons and daughters then I might have to ask, What are you ashamed of them finding out about you? Pretty much everyone believed that the Republicans would not win the Whitehouse this November, so is there fear that the Democrats might lose? They have the poster children for the ideal candidate in Hillary Clinton and Barrack Obamma, so pick one and get on with it. But maybe they are seeing thier saints have clay feet. Everyone thought Senator Clinton would walk away with the nomination, and then came Senator Obamma. We all started to see a side of the Clintons that no one wanted to admit had always been there. There is something sleazy about an 18 year old worried about his viability to run for President if he avoided the draft. Senator Clinton appears like a deer in the headlights. There seems to be some deep seated desparation within her that does not want to admit defeat. They both appear to be a husband and wife wrestling tag team when the one on the outside of the ring obviously pretends not to notice the out stretched hand for the switch. Well both Clintons come with a complete book of misspeaks, lies, nitpicking legal wording of an answer instead of a clear resounding yes or no. Now along comes Senator Obamma, who no one took seriously because of his lack of experience until they remembered that William Clinton was elected as a former governor of the State of Arkansas, not a glowing recommendation. Senator Obamma comes with his own baggage in the form of his minister for all intents and purposes appears to be a Black Racist. There is also the lingering shadow of his and his wifes friend Jesse Jackson. Where are the rest of the Congressional leaders? Everyone seems to be hiding in the shadows. Opra Winfrey supports him what about Bill Cosby? Barrack Obamma seems to be saying that he will provide the tools but he cannot work them as well. John McCain or George Bush III as they lable him. Here is someone that did his duty during Vietnam, survived as a prisoner of war, is admantly independent, yet he knows the president and tells a probable outcome that once we committed to the war we will be there in some form or another for many years to come. A reluctant but pragmatic statement.

So here we are, only a few months away from picking someone with an inordinate and unreasonable need to be president, a possible black supremacist, and a war monger. What are we to do? Ignore our real external enemies for the made up terrors we paint our opponents to be. Possibly ignore the propoganda  and chose the candidate that best fits our ideals. This country is too large and powerful to make a mistake that would destroy our futures forever.

The carpenter grabbed his hammer and with each strike missed or bent the nail he was trying to pound into the roof. Shouting damn stupid hammer he continued in his fuitless task. Pretty stupid isn’t it? What’s the difference between our presidential candidates and the carpenter? Nothing. The military didn’t up and decide to invade a country. They are under control of the Commander in Chief and ultimately all of us and our elected representatives. So don’t blame the hammer for the failure of all of us. Let the hammer do what a hammer does best, put nails into roofs and walls. And please do not sit there talking about a failed policy. Since when is the policy of the military branch to hold still for the status quo. They are there to win. Otherwise do not send them. They are not supposed to enforce a policing policy. They are there to pound that nail down flat.

This whole debacle started when no nothing politicians started trying to run the wars, instead of telling the military what they want and sending them out with a mandate to bring home the win just short of not complying with the Geneva Convention and the general rules of war. We had that unholy trio of Lyndon Johnson, Robert MacNamara, and General William Westmoreland. Each with there own agenda, something to do with self aggrandizement. They didn’t seem to understand the concept of cannon fodder or maybe they understood it all too well. I will not argue the validity of that war or anyother, just the fact that the military should be left to do their job. Their ownly self interest is to come home alive. MacNamara knew of the lies, of inflated body counts, dropping ordinance in empty jungle, not bombing Haiphong harbor the one target that would have ended the war quickly.

Teddy Roosevelt had a saying, Walk Softly and Carry a Big Stick. I would like to add an addendum, Use the Stick if necessary. All debate of the rightness and necessity of war should be done prior to firing a shot not now in the middle of it. I cannot help but feel the sorrow for those that listen to the prattle of the no nothings and do nothings expounding on when they were against the war or for it. That date is immaterial. The date that matters is the day it started with a clear no holds barred win at the end. these are the dates that matter.

It is terrible when you have over seven hundred channels on cable and you get hooked into a panel discussion. State politicians going on about hospital care. The one politician stood up to declare that “the costs are outrageous and this is where government has to step in and help those in need.” On face value it sounded right and moral, until I thought long and hard about the words,” government must step in.” Aren’t we the government? Did anyone ask me, when I had to have the bone shards in my elbow removed from an armed mugging that shattered it, if I wanted to have my insurance company pay the surcharge for someone else who does not have insurance? It would seem to me that between the surcharge and state grants for hospitals we have created a state that Nikita Krushev would be proud to call his own. He did not need to bury us we dug our own hole. We lost the revolution our founding fathers fought and died for. We no longer have the the kings but we have our own dynasties of Rockefellers, Kennedy’s, Bush’s and now the Clinton’s. We have gained one thing at least. We now have taxation with representation. The cheap politician of the Tammany Hall days, with their nickel cigars and a drink to get a vote has been replaced by cheap politicians that use our money to get reelected repeatedly while they drink single malt scotch and smoke Cuban Cohibas. I did not get a shot of whisky or a puff on a cheap cigar. I just got the bill.

I reviewed the New Jersey state constitution. No where in there talks about the ludicrous amount of property taxes we pay to educate the children. We have educators without certification making over $80,000 a year. No where in the constitution states that my insurance premium is there for someone that is not a relative to tap into and I cannot even claim a deduction. There is not a mention that someone that does not save a nickel is given a house without a downpayment because housing is too costly in this state. The governor must get a lot of laughs in his million dollar condo overlooking the Hudson river while having happy hour for the residents. The constitution clearly states the role of government. Our state laws do not resemble the original intent of the constitution. Volumes of laws have been tacked on as responses instead of well considered judgements. No wonder the politicians got rid of Judge Bork whose only sin was to state that he believed in the literal words of the constitution not the reinterpreted words that gave us the mess we have today. Imagine allowing the rabble to vote on constitutional amendments to define our country instead of back room meetings and long lunches of our elected officials. I think the Ten Commandments are the real inconvenient truth and need total reinterpretation to fit our lifestyles today. We can probably get rid of nine of them, maybe just keep thou shall not kill unless it is a war.

People what are we doing to ourselves? Is our collective guilt destroying our country? In a country that supposedly accomplishes its agenda on the basis that majority rules we certainly twisted that up to suit some politicians election ambitions. When does the majority become the minority? What happens when the majority decides to join the minority? Do we get Canada to pay for everything?

This so reminds me when I took a tour of Admiral Nelson’s flag ship, the winner of the battle between England and the Spanish armada. On the tour below decks our tour guide pointed out the punishment area. Someone that had broken a rule would be have his legs strapped between two cannons. It was there that the prisoner would be forced to weave his own cat o’ nine tails and present it to the bosun’s mate. If the bosun accepted the whip then the prisoner would be beat with it, if not he had to go and reweave it again. Somehow I am beginning to feel like that prisoner with the bosun refusing my efforts. “Give us more, mate.”  How did we become trapped in a country that is partially communist and partially capitalist with the politicians as the biased referees? Too many questions and not enough answers, but here is a thought. Everyone should have the necessary amount of shelter, clothing, education, medical treatment but if you would like more go to school for your education, get a skill or a trade, work and pay for the extras yourself. One day they will unshackle my legs and I’ll take the whip and flog the bosun.

Does a lazy nudist wear clothes? Do fish ever get thirsty? Did I pique your interest? If you never find out the answers will it haunt your every waking moment? Probably not. Then why do we care whether Barrack Obamma, Hilary Clinton, Mitt Romney or John McCain win the primary election? Do you know how many people were injured or killed in Afghanistan today? Has anyone come close to finding a cure for cancer? How about the unsung heroes in our hospitals that have brought someone back to life by their skills. Do you know any of the teachers in your local school system? What are their credentials?  Where are your children right now? Will the bridge you drive over collapse? Is the person across the street in need of a smile and a wave? Aren’t these questions more important than the petty bickering of politicians? The real question is why aren’t we considered for political office? Why are we always stuck with all these insiders? Originally the founding fathers saw property owners serving a fixed amount of time in office because they had a vested interest in doing the right thing to keep the nation prosperous and safe. A real news story would be that someone not anointed by the party got elected by a massive write in vote.

Frustration has set in. The “experts” are now voicing their opinions on the failures of President Bush. I have to announce up front that I am a registered Republican but I would not vote for Bush again. Lets face it though would anyone else have done better? The Democratic candidates all voted to fund the war and repeated it over and over. I do not want to see anyone on our side die in a war no matter how just the war. The problem today is that we do not enter into conflict to win, we enter them to stalemate the countries. The power this country has could obliterate the whole of the near east but we would be castigated for the rest of our existence. So win the war but do it within reason and do it quickly the American public gets bored watching the same old war on television when Paris Hilton may or may not be wearing panties that day. Yuck!

They All Did

The next big issue are illegal immigrants. What happened? Naturally President Bush was holding the barbed wire fence up for them to crawl under. It had nothing to do with the Democrats, Republicans and Independents that wanted a cheap baby sitter, someone to clean the house, cut the grass and wash the dishes. We were constantly fed the same line by the press, “it doesn’t cost anything for them to be here” “They are doing the jobs that no one else will do” Both total lies. In New Jersey it costs the tax payers $15000 per child just for the education, and like the Wizard of Oz do not look behind the curtain of additional costs like medical, transportation, insurance costs and all this to parrot a script at McDonald’s to give us our fast food. The Princeton Packet is bewailing the tactics of the INS in rounding up identified illegal immigrants. The Princetonians are bewailing the INS arrests others they find in violation of the immigration laws. If this is distressing to them, why don’t they look at themselves for providing a safe haven in direct opposition to the law. I guess they never thought of changing the law that would make them pay a fair wage for the work that these immigrants do for them. They would have to contribute to the general fund by paying their share of taxes and fees. Ever wonder why there are so many landscaping trucks running around the streets performing work that was traditionally accomplished by eager high school kids trying to make a few dollars. So don’t cry for me Argentina cry for the Princeton mothers that have to actually take care of their children, grass will have to be cut, after school jobs may blossom. All these horrors but on the other hand taxes may not be reduced but reallocated to other quality of life issues, uninsured motorists fees may be reduced, new school construction could be halted for years. Oh the horror!

Cost of Illegal Immigrants

How do you like the cost of a gallon of gas? Not too happy? Check the taxes you pay the state for them to occasionally send someone out to measure that the meters on the gas tanks give you full measure for the money. How many tanks of gas does it take to pay for the inspectors? Don’t forget they are using gas driving their trucks around the state. In my experience every-time gas goes down the state raises taxes because they are losing money. As gas goes up when is the last time the state lowered their tax rates to keep it balanced. Does the state actually find the crude oil, buy the ships that transport it, refine it, distribute it, pump it in your car? No then why should they get anything? Fix the roads? How many potholes per mile is there in your state? What happens to the Federal money that the states receive to fix the roads? The Federal government has not raised their taxes and continues to give the money to the states.

Gas Prices

So what do we get? We get exactly what we deserve. The press, politicians, and advocates all play their fiddles and we dance and dance until we collapse. How close are we to collapsing? Reading the blogs and Twitters we still have a long way to go, we dance in circles instead of stopping and researching the issues and come up with our own sense of what is going on in our lives. We are not hamsters running on the wheel of earth. The earth won’t stop turning if we stop running in circles, we will not fly out into space.Good luck and Good night.

The US Post Office played Scrooge this year by denying a recovering wounded veteran a Christmas card. The image tells the story. Correctly addressed after notifying Post Office but returned anyway.

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You would think that facing a war would put a sour face on anyone, but after leaving McGuire Air Force base I felt energized. All these bright and happy faces surrounded me. When I looked at the civilian workers that I work with I saw nothing but misery. All we are facing are arrogant political hacks, not harm and death. I realize that we are so beat down that no one is happy anymore until you get out of work. What a sorry way to live, yet we elect these idiots and we fear these idiots. Everyday these young Army and Air Force heroes face an uncertain future. All we face are blank faces and supreme stupidity. How do thousands of unionized workers hide under rocks when a political appointee with a limited intelligence and a limited time span to exist stares at you? I think it is truly time to use Gandhi’s passive resistance and smile and do whatever you want. They die if we don’t help. We take away the souls they have been feeding on like oily succubi and they will shrivel up and blow away in the wind.