High school drinking

The double standard is alive and well at my house. I can drink beer, smoke cigars, roll through stops and participate in other adult activities, but if my teenagers do it, they’re busted.
The current issue is drinking alcohol. My teens think it’s okay. I don’t.
I have mixed feelings about 18 year olds, but my kids are under 18.
So now we have what I compare to a POW camp. Prisoners have an obligation to try to escape, and the guards have an obligation to shoot them if they try.
I tell my teens why the law is what it is - decreased inhibitions, 40% of alcohol-related fatal crashes are teens, general withdrawal and disregard for other laws, and that alcohol can be a gateway drug and/or lead to addiction.
Apparently other parents think it’s okay for their high schoolers to drink. Or they just turn a blind eye. They allow parties with alcohol at their house.
I’ve talked to school officials and the Sheriff’s Office. I was impressed by their concern, but discouraged by the outcomes. Sheriff’s deputies bust retailers; they even arrested parents last year. But few seem to care, and it’s tough to enforce fake IDs. Schools offer programs, but few participate.
I will keep talking and stay on guard. There will be no teen drinking at my house. I pray that no one gets hurt because of what happens at some other parents’ house.
I know this is an age-old problem. But now it’s my turn and any advice is welcome.

Person of the Year

As years go, 2009 rates as a two on a scale of ten. On the bright side, the weather was mild, gas prices behaved and warnings of a pandemic didn’t pan out. But in March, the stock market wobbled so badly that we thought the sky was falling. Those of us lucky to still have a good job lost a chunk of our savings, and America was thrust deeply into debt.
But even in a hapless year, one person must stand out.
Nobel chose Barack Obama. Time picked Ben Bernacke. AP sports picked Tiger Woods. Many wanted Michael Jackson.
(I think the Wizard of Oz had more depth than those four.)
My pick for person of the year is Susan Boyle, the frumpy woman who belted out the Les Mis tune to 100 million viewers on youTube. She had talent and nerve, but more importantly the woman under promised and over delivered. She was real, at least in that initial appearance, not some illusion shaped by the media. Her star quickly dimmed, but only after warmly enlightening us all to not judge a book by its cover.
For 2010, I’ll be looking again for substance over form and for people who lift us up collectively.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxPZh4AnWyk

And this from an admirer...

“Though the American left and right don’t agree on much, they are both now coalescing around the suspicion that Obama’s brilliant presidential campaign was as hollow as Tiger’s public image.”
Frank Rich, New York Times columnist, December 19, 2009.

Drowning in unintended consequences

People think that conservatives want to dismantle government. Not true. We’re proud of our military, parks, mints, highways, and for the most part, judicial system. We just understand that when the government attempts to fix social issues, the results are worse than the problem.
The government wanted no one to go hungry; now we have a nation of obese people. The feds wanted to upgrade education and now everyone gets a very expensive but often inflated degree. They loosened immigration and now we have millions of illegals living here like citizens. They wanted everyone to own a home and the resulting bad credits may capsize the system. They want the U.S. to pay for keeping the climate constant without addressing the much bigger problem of third-world overpopulation.
The liberal politicians and bureaucrats who run Washington mean well, they just won’t use judgment, try new approaches or ever scale back. Government rewards failure with more funding.
Free market forces may be uneven and messy, but at least they drive efficiency.
Norman Thomas, a six-time candidate for President from the Socialist Party of America said this in 1944: "The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism, but under the name of liberalism, they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program until one day America will be a socialist nation without ever knowing how it happened."

Over-reaching amateurs

A friend of mine, a professional in the health insurance industry for many years, was in Washington recently to talk to legislators about health care reform. He left depressed and embarrassed at how little the lawmakers and their staffs understand the issues.
There are accounts of federal minions telling Detroit executives how to build cars. Local power company experts are alarmed at how much the proposed cap & tax legislation will cost Georgians. And if Congress doesn’t pass cap & tax, the EPA will back door us.
Every organization – for profit or not - is spending an inordinate and rapidly rising amount of resource complying with massive new regulations, in addition to defending against frivolous litigation.
We have some serious problems in this country – high unemployment, exploding debt, un-fundable promises (Social Security and Medicare), illegal immigration, and more.
What are we getting from the Democrats? Re-engineering medicine, trying to change the climate and redistributing wealth.
Good grief.
It’s like a bunch of kids with new power in Washington, and they're very quickly killing the goose that has produced golden eggs in this country for over two centuries.

Obama could learn a lot from Governor Perdue

What a contrast we have in the leadership styles of Sonny Perdue and Barack Obama.
Sonny grew up in the country, has been an Air Force Captain, a veterinarian and a businessman. He walks the talk. He understands that government is the servant, not the master of the people - quietly, humbly running the state and letting people live their lives.
He was a Democrat in his younger days, but developed into a Republican.
Sonny gets it. Money doesn’t grow on trees. Least government is best government.
I’ll take a get ‘er done leader over a fancy talker any day.

Dealing with Dems is like Whack-A-Mole

Cap & Tax… whack. Health care reform… whack. Higher taxes… whack. Crushing regulations… whack.
Miss one and a mushroom cloud of debt appears.
The Democrat social engineering attempts just keep on coming.
Solution: lower taxes to stimulate investment and create jobs.

An independent press – key to freedom

I heard the publisher of The Telegraph, George McCanless, speak recently.
I agree with him completely that a robust press is critical to freedom in this country. I was also glad to hear him say that he wants no part of government subsidies.
But I completely disagree with his statement that The Telegraph is politically balanced. He cited that the opinion page runs the same number of left as right leaning political cartoons. In whose judgment?
My biggest beef with the Telegraph is their national news coverage. Someone at the paper decides what AP stories will run and where, and that person (or persons)is highly selective and left of center.
Have you seen appropriate coverage of Climategate? Or anything about the scandalous people Obama has appointed as czars?
The rising popularity of talk radio and Fox News proves that Americans want to hear both sides. We expect a left slant from the lamestream media (AP, network news, TV shows, movies, etc.). You’d think that The Telegraph would see the opportunity to increase readership by offering more balance, especially in this conservative part of the country.
If only the media invested a fraction of their resources in tracking government waste and corruption as they have in Tiger Woods or the crasher couple, more people might have jobs.

Has Obama learned anything during his first year?

Barack Obama was a relatively young man when he became president. He’s bright, but his experience was limited to going to school, community organizing and public office. Surely he has met people and seen things in the past year that are completely inconsistent with the profiles and impressions he formed long ago.
• Obama must be blown away at how bright, hard working and caring business people truly are - especially small business owners. He must be equally disappointed at how self-centered and unenlightened government officials can be.
• Has he seen enough to understand that America, warts and all, is a truly exceptional nation, and that no apologies are needed?
• Does he yet comprehend that cutting taxes would have stimulated the economy, and that massive government spending has sent us into a long-term funk?
• Does he now accept that all the “excessive” corporate profits and CEO wages added together wouldn’t be a drop in the bucket of government waste and corruption?
• Can he now see that the real substance of America lies between the Northeast and California?
• Has he seen the destructiveness of political correctness and the divisiveness of partisanship?
• Does he yet realize how shallow it is to blame Bush for everything?
• Has it sunk in that attempts to share wealth simply spread misery?
Yes, the past year should have been an eye opener for Obama. Is there any hope that he can change?

Book #3 progress

Thought I’d share the progress on getting my third novel, Orange Terrace, released. Might be interesting to anyone wanting to get published.
• Writing – done 4 years ago. That’s the easy part.
• Editing – probably rewritten every word and line several times over the past 4 years.
• Feedback – 15 friends or so have provided feedback, which directs much of the editing. About ready to close this step and do one more self-edit.
• Cover – Susan Welsh is working on some revisions and should be done any day. Very exciting. Cover design is a work of art in itself.
• Publishers – sent queries in October. Two dear johns and three open to date. May be go with Indigo Publishing again. AuthorHouse (print-on-demand) is the fallback.
• Blurbs for back cover – 5 people in mind; two received to date. Hope to have quirky lines by Mayor and MCCG CEO.
• Website – Larry Najera ready to rework www.rickmaier.com. Need new photo.
• Marketing – need to work on postcard, freebie list, book signings, appearances, and promotion via the web.
Summary – May be January-February before book gets published, March-April before it’s out. Not in a big hurry because book market is in a slump. Spring is good timing for summer reading and positioning for fall (2010) selling season.
I'm halfway up the mountain.

Ginkgo is one sexy tree

The walk from my car to office at Wesleyan College every day is like a walk in the park… not the work so much as the view of the wonderful old buildings and landscape.
And in the next few days we will be treated to a particularly special annual event - the fall of the Ginkgo leaves.
All at once the leaves will turn brilliant yellow; then, all at once, they will fall to the ground. People will be staring up and taking pictures of the trees. Some folks lie on the ground and make “angels” in the golden blanket of leaves.
What makes the fall show even more special is knowing that ginkgo biloba are the oldest trees on earth, dating back 250 million years to the time of dinosaurs. The living fossil was once thought extinct, but found in China hundreds of years ago and replanted around the world. The leaves have a unique fan shape, and the leaf extract is said to have memory-enhancing and other medicinal powers. Some trees in Asia are said to be 2,500 years old.
Here’s the sexy part. The boy trees have cones and the girls have seeds. In early fall you can smell the female tree from fifty yards away when the seeds fall to the ground and give off a really foul odor as they decay. The smell is so bad that people end up cutting down the female trees. It can take twenty to fifty years for the trees to mature, so you can’t tell the boys from the girls when you plant them.
There are one female and two male ginkgo trees at Wesleyan, and you can find others scattered around Macon. If I had a few more decades to live, I’d plant a grove.

Conservation movement hijacked

I’ve been conserving all my life. I consume as little energy as possible, use things up, recycle and never litter. I love nature and support the great outdoors. Most people I know act the same way.
You’d think conservation would be the foundation of the ‘sustainability’ movement, but hijackers came aboard and forced a wacky left turn: consumers are wasteful drones of the evil business empire; Americans are most responsible for damaging the Earth; big government programs are the solution. Then the council of Hollywood bishops ordained Internet inventor and climatology expert, Al Gore, as their leader.
Like the ‘peace’ movement of the 1970s, the ‘sustainability’ and 'climate change' tags have that oxymoronic deceptiveness about them. They even hijacked green – the color of Christmas, money and envy - so the masses could follow more easily.
If man is having a negative impact on the planet, it can’t compare to the forces of sunspots, volcanoes and forest fires. Man’s biggest impact stems from an exploding worldwide population, but you don’t hear environmentalists say much about controlling births or accelerating deaths.
In nature, when a population consumes its resources, it dies or invades another territory. But environmental extremists pick and choose their laws of nature, and survival of the fittest isn’t a rule they like. They blame America for ravaging natural resources and labor overseas, but ignore that we aid the needy and maintain world order.
Instead of using up the earth’s ready supply of fossil fuels, the movement leaders want to force ‘renewable’ sources on us, decades before their time. If we want to tax and spend our way to sustaining Mother Earth, we should build nuclear plants and accelerate the exploration of space.
Maybe ‘conservation’ just sounds too similar to ‘conservative’.

Where’s the accountability?

Why are Barney Frank (D-Rep MA) and Chris Dodd (D-Sen CN) still in office? Not only are they economic idiots, they’re corrupt. If anyone is responsible for the meltdown in the financial markets we suffered last year, it’s these two clowns. But they are still officiating and the press still gives them airtime.
Oh that’s right, they’re liberals. Yes, they received huge contributions from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, Barney’s boyfriend was a Fannie executive and Dodd got a VIP loan. But they meant well.
There must be a lot of pork pouring into their two states, though both may lose reelection in 2010.
Another group that needs to man-up are moderates like Warren Buffet and Colin Powell who helped put Obama in office. They owe us an equal effort to try to unwind this disaster.
And then there’s big media, giving any lib a pass (Alan Grayson, D-Rep FL) and letting the Dems continue to blame Bush for everything.
Three years of Democratic control of Congress and a year of Obama in the White House has produced the biggest economic disaster since the 1930s. Time for heads to roll.

Earl Benson, Macon job creator

Pictured: Sandra and Earl Benson at Oct '09 reunion

Back in the 1970’s, Earl Benson decided to quit his bread truck route and open an office equipment company. Today a thousand people in Macon have good paying jobs, thanks to Earl’s initiative, hard work and tenacity.
Earl sold his highly successful copier company, Acme Business Products, to IKON Office Solutions in 1983. He continued on with IKON, expanding his responsibilities and growing jobs in Macon with corporate-level resources, until retiring just a few years ago. IKON later sold the leasing operation (Bass Rd) to GE Capital, and the sales & service operation (Preston Ct) and back office center (Arkwright Rd) to Ricoh.
On October 24th, Acme held a reunion. Seeing everyone again made me realize how great the good ol’ days in the 1980s and 1990s really were – genuine change and exciting opportunities.
You don’t hear much about Earl, mostly because he shuns the spotlight. But he’s done more for this community than people will ever know.
I moved to Macon in 1984 to work for Earl, and owe him a great deal.
Thanks, EB.

Nanny villages go kaput

When you’re under stress, go back to basics. And a basic way to consider public policy is to think of our country as a village.
Say that you’re the leader of a village of 100 people. The villagers hunt, farm, care for their families, build huts and trade goods. Everyone agrees to chip in and hire a few peace officers and teachers, plus they gladly give to the church to help take care of the less fortunate. The village prospers.
If the US were a village of 100, we’d have 5 teachers, 5 police officers, 10 attorneys, 5 social workers doing the work the church once did, 5 assistants to the leader, 5 vagrants, 5 guys scamming the system and 10 bureaucrats keeping tabs on the other public workers. We’d be in big time debt to the village next door, the one with the wisdom and discipline to maintain about a seven to one private-to-public ratio.
Soon, the 50 villagers who carry the load will slow down; some will move to a better village. The once prosperous village soon collapses.
The private economy in the US has done so well that it could sustain most of the increase we’ve seen in public works over the past 80 years. But Obama and his statist friends have stomped on the accelerator so hard that the engine can’t take any more.
Don’t like the village analogy? Just look at history. Countries with big central governments always fail. Low-tax, low-regulation countries thrive. But even successful nations run the risk of thinking that money grows on trees, get apathetic and slowly fade.

‘99 Blazer, Rescue Truck

I’ve never won anything significant, so it was pretty exciting to receive a call from the Georgia Industrial Children’s Home that I had won a car with my $10 raffle ticket. I was thinking new Camaro. Not even close. A 1999 Chevy Blazer with 143,000 miles.
The truck was in fairly good condition, but my theory is that a SUV with over 100,000 miles is like 100 in human years. I only accepted the prize because my son was close to getting his license, and this would be a good first vehicle.
A year and a half later, it’s still on the road, but has had some issues.
First the radiator blew. My son (let’s call him Matthew to protect his identity) thought it was on fire. A good cooling system lesson for $400. Then the A/C didn’t work in the middle of the summer; $500 for a new climate control panel.
The first $400 the prep-turned-thug earned at his new job at Kroger, he spent on speakers. The subwoofer is loud enough to make your head explode.
Then ol’ Matthew had a mental lapse and took the 2WD truck, with one wheel in the grave, out to an area the kids call Brandywine. I had no idea such a vast no-man’s-land existed in Bibb County… right behind Wesleyan no less. Steep, rugged trails with deep ruts wind through acres of marsh and woods. The various trails lead to mud holes – big, red clay craters filled with slimy mud and nasty water. Catnip for a 16-year-old.
Of course the boy got stuck. His buddies pulled him out of the bog, but his truck wouldn’t run. No tow truck or repair service would venture the half-mile from a paved road.
In the days the truck sat abandoned, some idiot threw a rock through one of the windows and stole the speaker system. Then the property owner locked the gate Matthew had entered. It poured rain every night. After letting Matthew exhaust his connections, I got retired off-road experts Walt and Eddie to drag the crippled SUV out of the wasteland and to the shop. They wouldn’t accept any pay for their incredible talents and equipment, but the shop bill was $900.
This week, the driver side electric window won’t work. Another hit to the boy’s savings account.
Despite all of the breakdowns and downtime, I must say that both Matthew and I have developed a very special bond with the little rescue truck. But a few more big cha chings and we’ll have to put her down.

At least the right hears both sides

I sit at the gate at the airport and watch CNN. The rabbit-eared TV in the kitchen only gets CBS News. The news reports between Neal, Sean and Rush segments on talk radio are from ABC News. I must sift through AP stories in the Telegraph to get local news. I sit through incredibly stupid anti-business propaganda to see otherwise entertaining movies. I sometimes can’t get my finger on the FFWD button fast enough to cut the juvenile political jabs of Leno, Conan and Letterman to get to their occasional good guest.
I can’t help but get the left-leaning media’s version of the news, but at least I get both sides.
I feel sorry for the left who miss half of the news and perspective in the world. Even sadder is that the left gets deceptive reports from the left of what the right is saying.

Libs don’t know the difference between profit and covering costs

Listen closely when liberals use the word profit. The tone is negative, the contempt compounded further by a snarl. Those wicked corporations and their money-grubbing CEOs care about profit more than people or the environment.
Clearly not everyone was paying attention in economics class, or they wouldn’t be using the p- word so loosely or as if it was something evil.
Here’s a question we used to ask middle school students in a Junior Achievement course I was involved in years ago: What percent of profit do you think the average corporation makes on sales? The replies were usually in the 50% range; the reality is more like 5%. And after running their own ‘company’ for a few weeks, the Junior Achievers understood how hard it was to eke out even 5%.
Stockholders deserve a 5% return on sales, just a little more than what the IRS demands. Anytime there’s a lot of profit, competitors flood in. And if you think oil, pharma and insurance companies make too much money, go buy their stock and get rich along with them!
Libs don’t understand that profit is essential to growing jobs, paying taxes and providing a little cushion for hard times. They have no idea how bright, hard-working and caring most CEOs are - at least the ones I've met.
Every organization must cover costs – except government. The Feds just print money while most state and local governments borrow far more than you or I would consider prudent.
So don’t let the libs use the profit word in a negative way. Unlike government, companies that don’t cover their costs, plus a little return for investors, go out of existence.

Hail the Class of '69

1969 was a landmark year – moon landing, angry Vietnam protests, drugs gone wild, Helter Skelter, Woodstock, and the graduation of about 400 kids, including yours truly, from Mt. Pleasant High School in Wilmington Delaware.
On October 10th we got back together for our 40th reunion. I figured four decades was a good time to catch up, and I’m glad I did.
By age 58, we’re past all the bravado. Some of my fellow Green Knights have retired in luxury, some are bankrupt, and it was hard to tell the difference over a few drinks. Most of the guys had added a few pounds, lost some hair, have trouble seeing and hearing, and struggle with the ol’ short-term memory. The women are fabulous, all even more bedazzling than they were in high school.
Only about 100 classmates made it, but many of us flew great distances (CA, TX, WI, AZ) to be together. A few of our classmates (maybe twenty) have died; most have lost one or both parents.
The lesson I would want my kids to hear is that high school is just the beginning of the journey. Looking back, kids that had success in high school – however you want to measure it - were often, but not always successful over the next forty years. And some classmates who barely got noticed in ’69 have gone on to great things. High school is a base, an important one, but there is plenty of time to recover if you make some bad choices or get off to a slow start.
Salutes to people at the reunion – to those who are taking good care of themselves, to those still happy in their marriages, to those who organized the event, to those on Facebook and to the spouses that endured the reunion (you have to really love someone to attend a reunion that isn’t yours).
The event was awkward, fantastic and surreal, all in one. Nothing like a reunion to ground you in your past. I hope to stay in touch with several new old friends. Go Green Knights!

Some of my best friends are liberals

One of the mysteries of life is how people who are bright and industrious can have such different approaches to public policy.
I’m not talking about the tens of millions of people who suffer from class envy or are led by the media like sheep. I’m talking about well-adjusted, thinking people.
Part of it is rivalry, similar to rooting for a college or pro football team. We start out following the same team as our parents, and build our position over time with more pride than logic.
Positions are then reinforced by how we filter information and everyday experiences. A liberal sees the guy in the picture above as a lucky Michelle fan. I find it disturbing that a guy in a food line has a $500 Blackberry.
Liberals look out over a world with a few greedy ‘haves’ and a sea of helpless ‘have-not’s’. It’s not fair (by their definition), so they feel compelled to do something. They demand that the government use their arresting power to tax and regulate the ‘rich’. The law of unintended consequences kicks in and the situation worsens, so they keep ratcheting up big government control.
It’s like taking a walk in the woods and seeing a fox attack a rabbit or a hawk swoop down and grab a chipmunk. The well intended liberal wants to help the little guy by hampering the big guy, and screws everything up. If you ignore the occasional unpleasantness and mess, nature does just fine. And like nature, the free market takes care of itself.
I don’t like greed any more than the next person, but I also hate to see people get a pass for making stupid decisions over and over – not taking school seriously, goofing off, drugs, etc. Liberals let slackers slide.
I say live and let live. Quit judging and trying to rig outcomes. Each of us has enough to do making the best with what we got. The greedy and the slackers will suffer the consequences and it won’t be at the hand of social engineering administered by a big central government.

No joy in watching Prompterpotamus get a beatdown

October has not been a good month for President Obama – higher unemployment, a public scrap with General McChrystal and failing to get the Olympics in Chicago. SNL even lambasted Obama in a skit (search hulu.com).
You might think that someone like me who fundamentally disagrees with Obama’s central government approach would be delighted in this beatdown. But the failure of wrongheadedness is no cause for celebration. We are going through a tough economic correction and the chronic mistakes by the Democrats have made matters worse.
Not only are we not getting what we need, but the crazy talk in Washington (sky-high debt, higher taxes and takeover of our medical and energy industries) is undermining everyone’s confidence. Duplicity and false promises are tearing the country in two.
The private sector needs stimulus – tax cuts, tort reform, relief from regulation. We need strong leadership in a troubled Middle East.
Washington has two jobs to do – stimulate private job creation (the tax base) and keep us safe. Quit the power grabbing and get busy.

Walk away, Dave

Letterman used to be fresh and funny; in recent years he’s become dim and sarcastic. The only thing that keeps him out of the political-hack pool with other two-bit comics like Al Franken or Bill Maher is self deprecation, and even that’s become insincere.
Dave’s behavior is so typical of the media and entertainment’s ridicule of traditional values. He even tried to get laughs as he made his sketchy confession on the show the other night. Letterman talks about his young son all the time – I’ll bet Harry will be real proud to know that his dad has been diddling the staff, dipping his pen in company ink, fishing off the company pier.
Letterman now joins the ranks of Clinton, Edwards and other remorseless libs with no character – egomaniacs leading America deeper down the sewer pipe.
This week’s uproar may help ratings for a while. Letterman fills his theater with sycophantic audiences, but the sponsors won’t put up with his crap for long.
And surely there’s another side to the story.
The late night format is great; it’s time to give someone else a chance.
You’ve made your hundreds of millions, Dave. Time to walk away into the Connecticut sunset.

Medical and tuition cost shifts

The good intentions of liberals to make higher education and health care available to all has had a major impact on costs for the middle class.
Why have tuition costs risen so much faster than the CPI for decades? One major reason is that the expensive, highly selective schools decided to give financial aid to bright, poor students. If you charge $40,000/year for tuition, why not increase it to $44,400 and let 10% of students come for free? It’s the same total revenue and now you’re politically correct. The egalitarian strategy soon spread to all colleges.
The same has happened to medical costs. Medicare and Medicaid pay doctors and hospitals a lot less than private insurers, so the providers shift costs. All you’re doing is squeezing a balloon at one end.
The rapid increase in government programs (now nearly 50%) has caused medical costs to rise dramatically for everyone else.
And what is Washington’s solution for rising costs? More government! (You got to talk real smooth to pull that argument off – but so far half the people are buying it.)
The system can absorb some scholarships for poor kids and some discounts for government-paid medical benefits. It’s the right thing to do in, say, 10% of cases.
But when government dominates the system, and the expectation is ‘free’, nothing good can happen. The balloon goes pop.

Democrats speak with forked tongue

President Obama has said time and again that, if you like your private health insurance, the new reforms being proposed will allow you to keep it.
But wait a minute. That’s not his decision and it’s not yours. Your employer will decide.
Employers have been plagued for years by steep increases in health care benefits, causing most to shift about 25% of the cost to employees in the form of payroll deductions.
The new regs would require employers to insure their employees or pay a tax of 8% of payroll. Employees would then receive Medicare-like government coverage.
My guess is that most employers now pay 6% to 14% of payroll for Blue Cross-like coverage, plus the costs of administering the program and complying with the rising heap of regulations. Given the opportunity to lower costs, they will pay the tax. And employees would - initially - welcome not having $50 to $350 deducted from their monthly pay for health insurance.
Obama may be technically correct that the government won’t mandate the public option, but most employers would eventually elect the government plan. Unless you work for a very profitable company, it will only be a matter of time before you join the estimated 100 million employees who will be moving to government insurance.

Eddie Haskell is in the (White) House

Smooth talk, good looks, wrongheaded

Give President Obama credit for talking; he’s everywhere and his platitudinous comments play well. He carries himself well. And he’s completely off base in thinking that big central government is the solution for everything.
Talks good, looks good and up to no good… who does that remind you of? Eddie Haskell!
You got to have some years on you to remember Eddie in the old Leave it to Beaver shows. He was Wally Cleaver’s best friend, a wise guy who would suck up to adults only to pick on other kids such as Beaver and Clarence “Lumpy” Rutherford.
President Obama doesn’t play pranks, but he’ll do some major damage if he gets his way.
If Eddie isn't Obama in disguise, he must be one of his many czars.

The Myth Myth

I recently canceled my membership to AARP, but they still send that monthly Bulletin that reads like a DNC rag. Their feature story this month is about clearing up all the hype and lies about health care reform - myths such as private insurance disappearing, euthanasia and rationing. It’s bad enough that they miss many key issues, but their responses are all based on what lawmakers say today.
All this spin by the media and special interest groups is getting old, isn’t it?
The basic facts that AARP and other supporters of Obama-style health reform miss is that we can’t trust anything the government says when it comes to social programs. Go back and look at the promises made about Social Security back in the 1930s. Look at today’s catastrophe-waiting-to-happen level of unfunded liabilities for Medicare and Social Security. And the only Democrat plan for illegal immigration (and ensuring that more illegal’s don’t get free health care) is keeping unemployment high.
My biggest complaint about the health care debate is that proponents of reform talk about problems and not solutions. Of course there are issues needing attention, but the Pelosi-Reid-Obama plan just increases the government’s interference in our lives… at the expense of our freedoms.
If you want to bust some myths, ask your doctor what reforms we need. Or ask your employer’s HR department how many people don’t enroll in your company plan because they have other “priorities”.
I sure hope we wake up and stop rushing to a government solution for health care.

Be careful boycotting media sponsors

You don’t have to agree with everything Rush Limbaugh says – he probably doesn’t. He has the biggest audiences because he does his homework, keeps an incredible library of past statements made by officials, and invents/popularizes phrases that capsulize the issues – drive-by media, Breck Girl, environmentalist wacko, chickafication.
Is Rush partisan and acrimonious? Absolutely. But no more so than Couric, Letterman or Matthews are to the ears of conservatives.
Glenn Beck apparently said some things on Fox News that really angered the left. Now they’re organizing boycotts of his sponsors. While this is nothing new, and we are certainly free to shop wherever we want, these boycotts are the slipperiest of slopes.
Can you imagine if the left shopped at Publix and the right at Kroger? Or the left was AT&T and the right Verizon? Or the left drove Toyotas and the right Chevys?
You put an Eveready battery on your shoulder and I’ll put a Duracell on mine, and we’ll dare each other to see who knocks whose off first.
Wide-scale public boycotts of sponsors will destroy what little independence of the press we enjoy today.

Break from the folly

Thanks to vacations and funerals, the reckless pace of hard-left social engineering has slowed to a crawl in the past few weeks.
But something very significant occurred over the summer. Raised voices from the third of Americans who worship Obama and the third who can’t stand his politics have awoken the middle third. The herd has picked up the scent. No longer is Obama the post-partisan, post-racial, cool guy who represents hope and change. He’s been exposed as just another platitudinous power grabber.
The left has overreached. They have shown their hand. Government health care and manmade global warming never were about lowering costs and fixing things that need attention; they have always been about central government control. And the vast majority of Americans hate the notion of Washington judging them, overtaxing them and interfering in their lives.
And maybe the best part of the summer break has been that the mainstream media no longer directs what we see and hear. Radio, Internet and ordinary people speaking up in public have worked around the filters.
Enjoy the break, because the folly will restart soon enough.

Friedman and Donahue

Milton was brilliant and more relevant than ever today

Watch this so you won't experience it

When you think about it, the greatest risk we take everyday is not Al-Qaida or Obama's latest policy, but getting behind the wheel.
Watch this and share it with those you love.

Warning: very graphic and disturbing!

Pull my finger for the public option

Pictured: writer of the House health care bill

Obama and company are trying to pull off the scam of the century on health care.

Does your employer pay more than 8% of payroll for health insurance (8% is the proposed employer tax for not providing health insurance)? My bet is they do; a lot more.

Would your employer drop BlueCross or whatever plan you now have, and use the savings to either lower the price of their product/service or give employees a raise? My bet is they would.

Do you think a Medicare-like system will be better for your family than the private plan you now enjoy?

Estimates are that Obamacare will cause a hundred million employees and their families to transfer from private insurance to government insurance.

The Dems like to rail on insurance company profits and executive comp, yet those amounts would be a drop in the bucket compared to the cost of government waste, corruption and rationing costs. All Medicare and Medicaid have done is cost-shift by paying a fraction of what private insurers pay doctors and hospitals.

Choice? More competition? Lower cost? Yeah, pull my finger.

The key to improving health care is HSAs that put control and responsibility on individuals.

Reagan had it right

Citizen Ronald Reagan, 1961.

Dems have become the establishment they once scorned

Pictured standing: Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Bill Clinton, Barney Frank.
Seated: Barbara Boxer, Al Franken, Al Gore



Back in the seventies, young people did anything they could to rail against what they called the ‘establishment’ – from drugs, riots, and desertion to bad hygiene. They yelled, disrupted, mocked and scorned any and all authority.
Now those youth are the establishment – at least in government, media, entertainment, and academia. We have gone full circle and memories are short.
Today, if you speak out against Obamacare and a government spinning out of control – in a much more mild and sincere fashion than the 70’s – you’re an un-American mob.
Yeah, all we are saying is that it took a village to end up in this mess.

Favorite recipe – the perfect summer treat

I spend little time in the kitchen , so if I offer a recipe, you know it’s going to be delicious, nutritious and easy.

Recipe for frozen grapes

Ingredients: red seedless grapes
Preparation: place in sandwich bags for individual servings; freeze.


Warning: Grapes can pose a choking hazard for children ages 3 and under. Eating more than 75 grapes at one sitting may cause nausea, diarrhea, constipation and swelling of the thighs and buttocks. Do not insert grapes in your nose as this can cause sudden drop in blood pressure, runny nose, shortness of breath and decrease in semen. Placing more than 10 grapes in your mouth at once may cause you to talk like Barney Frank. Not following these directions can cause thoughts of suicide, hearing voices, projectile vomiting, stomach bleeding and an erection lasting more than 4 hours. Eating grapes alone can cause paranoia, infections of the nervous system and skin reactions. Avoid driving or operating heavy equipment while eating frozen grapes. See your doctor if you get a brain freeze or dryness of mouth. Grapes do not provide protection from STDs or homicidal tendencies.

Porked, spent and spun to death

Here's what I understand to be the layers of this year’s federal budget:
1) Basic government services – national defense, welfare for the needy, and infrastructure programs that have been around for decades
2) Entitlement programs – Social Security, Medicare (including prescription) and interest on federal debt - none of which can be sustained at current levels
3) Recent reactive actions – bailout of financial institutions following mortgage crisis, higher unemployment benefits
4) Stimulus – Democrats' special interests and share-the-wealth initiatives passed last spring.
5) In Obama’s pipeline – government health insurance

Government will spend $34,000 per household in 2009. Median income is about $50,000. That’s madness.
I’m okay with 1) and could live with 2) if the bureaucrats would resize benefits. Some of 3) might be needed temporarily to fix past government missteps. Items 4) and 5) are irresponsible.
Do you personally spend money on what you want or what you can afford?
I balance my personal finances, and I’m sick and tired of Washington spending money they don’t have for programs we don’t need.
This economy will not recover until consumers and industry regain their confidence. On a scale of ten, my confidence in Washington is zero.

Obama is America’s ‘puppy purchase’

My house is full of all kinds of electronic gizmos and wheeled contraptions that the kids and I just had to buy - we couldn’t live without them. After using them like crazy for a few weeks, many now sit idle. The tire needs air, the fishing line got tangled, the batteries need a charge.
We call these impulse buys ‘puppy purchases’ because, just like a cute little puppy that grows into a big needy dog, the fun turns to work.
The election of Barack Obama reminds me of the nation's ‘puppy purchase’. The guy was cool… a different kind of candidate. It wasn’t what he said as much as how he said it, and the voters bought in. He was supposed to be bipartisan, transparent, post-racial and able to talk down dictators. Instead, he’s been inflexible, inexperienced, divisive, soft on defense and a real Chicago-land politician.
My family has learned its lesson. We think long and hard before we commit to anything on an urge. I hope the country is learning the same lesson.

The Minimum Wage is stupid

Note: I always taught my kids not to use the word stupid. But it’s in the news a lot these days, and there may be no better adjective to describe the minimum wage.

My 16-year-old son just started working part-time in an entry level position. I’m very proud of him for taking the initiative. Low and behold, after only three weeks on the job, he got an 11% raise. The boy must be good, a real chip off the old block!
But wait. The raise wasn’t based on performance, it was Washington interfering in the markets again. And it may cost my son his job.
The minimum wage increased to $7.25 on Friday. Of all the misguided government programs, this may have the most damaging unintended consequences of all.
I shop at the place he works; you probably do, too. I’m just waiting to see the impact of the minimum wage increase. Will my son lose his job or suffer a cutback in hours? Will the store raise prices or cut back on quality or service? Will lower earnings cause the company’s stock to decline and lower our retirement savings another notch?
You can squeeze a balloon all you want. Either the pressure goes somewhere else, or it bursts.
If raising the minimum wage to $7.25 is so smart, why not raise it to $17.25 or $117.25?

Obama speaks without facts… again

The Gates-Crowley episode in Cambridge, MA reminds me of the movie, Bonfire of the Vanities. Instead of Manhattan, the setting is Harvard.
Professor H. L. Gates, Jr. is about as privileged as they come – big salary, friend of the President, tenure at America’s richest school, living in a university house, returning home from a trip to China with his chauffeur. Sergeant Crowley was simply responding to a neighbor’s call to 911 at a house that had previously been burglarized.
In the movie, an alcoholic journalist shines a spotlight on an otherwise unfortunate accident. In Gates-Crowley, the President of the United States drew national attention to an unfortunate event with his casual, off-the-teleprompter comments.
Saying the police acted stupidly may have been a rookie mistake, but Obama's unguarded observation gave us a glimpse into his way of thinking. Based on his own frantic backpedaling, Obama acted stupidly in judging without all the facts. A simple ‘no comment’ would have been wiser.
Don’t worry Obama supporters, the mainstream press will make sure that the damage to your man is minimized.

Global warming update

Katie Couric: I feel bad not reporting the news of record low temperatures in Macon.
Nancy Pelosi: You did good. That would’ve hurt our chances of passing the cap and trade bill in the Senate. Right, Barbara?
Barbara Boxer: If you are talking to me, please call me senator.
Couric: Did you ever wonder if we could be wrong about global warming?
Boxer: Quiet! We’ve worked too hard to get people to buy curly light bulbs and take their own bags shopping. Do you think this outfit makes me look taller?
Couric: I can’t just ignore the truth. What would Walter do?
Pelosi: Let’s come up with a diversion. We need more greenhouse gas villains.
Boxer: What is greenhouse gas, anyway? I heard it’s just water vapor. That doesn’t sound very harmful. Actually, it’s good for my complexion.
Couric: Maybe I could do a two-hour documentary on The China Syndrome. I thought the acting was much better in that than The Inconvenient Truth.
Pelosi: I got it! We need to go after methane gas. Something stinky and flammable.
Boxer: Doesn’t methane come from pig farts?
Couric: Does methane make a lot of noise, because one time I heard Walter cut the cheese and it was quite a blast.
Pelosi: I saw this PBS special that showed methane gas just naturally bubbling out of oceans and lakes. They even showed where snow can burn in Alaska.
Boxer: Some of my best friends are Eskimos.
Couric: I’m confused about all this global warming stuff. It sure was easier when we were negative about everything and didn’t have to defend things.
Pelosi: I got it! Let’s call Joe Biden. He’ll find a way to blame Bush for all this.
Boxer: Joey is up in Hyannis Port helping Teddy protest the installation of windmills that block the ocean view at his beachfront compound.
Pelosi: What about Al Gore? He invented the Prius.
Couric: Al is still at the Michael Jackson tribute eating leftovers.
Boxer: Just forget it, Katie. It will get warmer in Georgia. Those people just cling to their guns and religion, anyway.

Asia is beating us like we beat Europe

In the movie Outsourced, an American company has moved its production to China and call center to India. In one scene, an American caller complains about dealing with a bunch of foreigners. The pretty young Indian empathizes with the guy and gives him the number of a company that manufactures and sells in the U.S. The customer asks if the price is the same. When she replies that the item costs $200 more, the customer sheepishly stays on the line to place his order.

The same people that complain about outsourcing are those who are unwilling to pay more for American goods and services. They support unions, but buy imports. They love jobs, but hate employers. They demonize corporate executives when they as consumers are driving businesses to outsource.

Every time our government raises taxes – e.g. cap and trade, national health - jobs go overseas. The more regulations passed by our government – e.g. minimum wage - the better other countries look.

You can’t stop people from doing what’s in their family’s best interest. And history proves that protectionism cannot stop an expanding global economy.

Years ago, the U.S. was strong enough to absorb all of these hits. Unfortunately, due to decades of high taxes, heaping regulation, lawsuit abuse and wasteful spending, our reserves are stripped.

Wake up, Democrats. It’s time to stop all the emotional, anecdotal liberal speak and grip the realities.

Landing on the moon. We came, we saw, we…

On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong stepped onto the moon. I’ll never forget the fascination and pride I felt that night. I still marvel at NASA’s inspiration, courage, creativity, teamwork and persistence. That was the greatest leap man has taken in my lifetime and brought the people of earth together like never before or since.
Much of the technology we enjoy today came from the R&D that went into the space program – areas such as communications, miracle materials, medical breakthroughs and advances in safety.
But soon after the landing, the social engineers began arguing that we should direct our resources on poverty and education, not exploration. Their short vision won, and now, forty years later, we have more poverty and ignorance than ever… and little progress in space exploration. People also said we should explore the oceans instead of space. We needed to do both; we did neither.
As Charles Krauthammer said in his recent column about the moon landing: we came, we saw, we retreated.
Too bad. Quitting was a big mistake.
But who knows... maybe I’ll live to see man land on Mars.

How did Mary Jo die?

At about the same time Neil Armstrong stepped on the moon, Ted Kennedy left Mary Jo Kopechne dead in his overturned car in a stream on Chappaquiddick Island in Massachusetts.
Ted and Mary Jo were at a party of six single women and six married guys sans wives. Kennedy was supposedly giving her a lift to the ferry landing when he made an unbelievably irrational turn from a paved road onto a dirt lane and drove off a narrow bridge.
Was he drunk? He says no. Were they fooling around? He testified no. Why did he swim the strong current of the channel between Chappaquiddick and the mainland, return to his hotel, sleep, and act so casual the next morning – all before contacting the authorities? He never gave rational answers.
There was no autopsy. The Kopechne family went silent. Kennedy was treated like royalty by officials, and got off with a two-month suspended sentence.
Mary Jo would have been 69 years-old on July 26th. I guess we’ll never know how or why she died.

Barbara Boxer and the Grizzly Bears

I recently watched a nature program showing how grizzly bears snag spawning salmon out of an Alaskan stream, take a big bite, and throw the carcasses on the rocks.
My first thought was that the grizzlies must be doing well and there must be plenty of salmon. Global warming must be very good for the wildlife in Alaska.
Then I wondered what people like Barbara Boxer and Barack Obama would think if they ever paused from pontificating to pay attention to the world around them.
Boxer: “Oh my, those grizzlies are so greedy and wasteful! It’s not fair! We must stop them from killing those poor little fishes!”
Obama: “Ma'am, we must tax and regulate them! We will ration the fish by muzzling the bears and putting cages around the fish. We know better and this must be stopped!”
Boxer: “Oh, Barack. What would the world do without us?”

Conservatives and libertarians accept the ugly as well as the majestic side of nature. Live and let live. We view free enterprise the same way. Too bad the powers in Washington think they have all the answers, yet don’t have a clue about unintended consequences.
Turns out, the fish carcasses on the rocks support an entire ecosystem of smaller animals, insects and plants.

Secession – will the South rise again?

I never thought I’d seriously consider the idea of states seceding from the union. I’m not sure if it’s the highest form of patriotism or treason, if I’m even in favor of the idea, or that I understand how it would work. But the talk is rising; the momentum is building.

I do know that I can't stand the changes that the Democrats have brought to my country.

Any society or organization needs administration. Probably about 25% of resources should go toward infrastructure – security, finance, education and other administrative functions.

The U.S. is approaching 45%, and that’s way too high. Half the people will soon be supporting the other half. Some of that is military and police, teachers and other clearly necessary functions, but entitlements and unnecessary bureaucracy are rising fast. Environmental fanaticism and political correctness rule.

The people in Texas are openly talking secession. Georgia, Tennessee and South Carolina should be right behind them. Throw in Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama and a few other solidly red states, and we have a viable country. (Florida should remain with the California-Illinois-New York crowd.)

Thomas Jefferson said: “Whenever any form of government becomes destructive, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government.”

However it works, I hope people have a year or so to immigrate to the country of their choice. If we lead the charge, maybe Atlanta can become the new nation’s capital.

Obama’s fatal flaw – talks fancy, but full of crap

Even the most loyal Obama fans have to be alarmed at the length and depth of this recession. Unemployment continues to rise, investments are still down. Those who bought into the campaign slogans are losing hope, and the rest of us are deeply concerned that the statist in Washington are doing permanent damage to this country.

Obama policies have not created a single job in the private sector… the sector that produces real wealth. He’s loading up future generations with debt, promising entitlements that can’t be delivered and weakening our security.

The world is full of people who don’t express themselves particularly well, but that's okay, because they don’t have anything unique to contribute anyway. Once in a while we get an inspiring talker who is also a brilliant walker… Reagan comes to mind. Great leaders who aren’t great speakers are the salt of the earth… Cheney and most corporate execs come to mind.

The most dangerous people are great speechmakers who are either evil or misinformed… Hitler and Obama come to mind.

Stimulus not working... VP offers excuses

Joe Biden said recently that the Obama administration "misread how bad the economy was.”
Good grief, Joe. A fifth grader could have seen the two lines tracking in opposite directions for the past year – the likelihood of an Obama agenda and the economy.
Instead of authorizing $787 BILLION for a bunch of pork and social programs, the Democrats should have given us a two-month tax holiday.
Can you imagine how rapidly a tax cut would have stimulated the economy, versus making delusional promises back in March and waiting until the House elections in 2010 to spend the money?
Tell me, Joe, which Obama program do you think encourages business to hire and expand? Is it higher taxes, more debt, nationalizing companies, crippling environmental rules, smothering regulations or the prospect of government health care?
The people who make this country work have no confidence in Washington.

Tapeworms, Al Franken, barnacles and other parasites

The comparison of liberals to parasites and conservatives to hosts has never been more appropriate than with Al Franken’s arrival in the Senate.
What were the good people of Minnesota thinking? Do they miss the national attention of Governor Jesse Ventura?
Parasites can play a useful role, like an egret picking off ticks on the back of a bull. And a certain amount of parasitic activity is harmless. Like barnacles, they may be a nuisance, but do little damage.
Franken is over the top in a Senate that is over the top. He’s made a lot of money being negative, in a low, mean style. He’s the kind of parasites that, left untreated, will slowly kill the host.

Sports celebrities say some stupid stuff

Lakers’ coach Phil Jackson recently told Conan O’Brien that he had a conversation with the president after winning the NBA championship. He told Obama that the reason the Iranians were protesting in the streets was the tone that President Obama has set in the world.
Not only is that about the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard, but why is Jackson commenting on foreign affairs, anyway? He’s a basketball coach, for heaven’s sake.
What is it about celebrities that they feel a need to use their platform to say such stupid stuff?
Is it some kind of god complex? Are they trying to find some greater relevance for their lives?
I think celebrities have an overwhelming need to feel that they’re part of the herd. Conan’s LA audience loved Jackson’s comment, so we can expect more dim-witted observations.

“I can't really remember the names of the clubs that we went to." - Shaquille O'Neal, basketball player, on whether he had visited the Parthenon during his visit to Greece.
"I want all the kids to do what I do, to look up to me. I want all the kids to copulate me." - Andre Dawson, former professional baseball player, on being a role model.
"Strangely, in slow motion replay, the ball seemed to hang in the air for even longer." - David Acfield, sports commentator.
"We all get heavier as we get older because there's a lot more information in our heads." - Vlade Divac, Basketball player.
"He's a guy who gets up at six o'clock in the morning regardless of what time it is." - Lou Duva, veteran boxing trainer.
"If only faces could talk..." - Pat Summerall, sportscaster, during the Super Bowl.

Testy testy little ma'am

Can afford a Blackberry... but not food

This is crazy. A guy shows up for free soup served by volunteer Michelle Obama with a very expensive Blackberry. Priorities?? Choices??

If you read one magazine

The only magazine I read faithfully is Forbes. They get it. Smart, insightful and easy to read. Here are a few lines from the latest edition:
Steve Forbes on the new financial regulations – the blunt truth is that even if we had Obama’s regulatory reforms in place 4 years ago, we would still have experienced an economic disaster… regulations turned a serious flood into a tsunami... the thing about government is that the more it fails, the more power it accrues.
Steve Forbes on the new vehicle regulations - changes in efficiency standards will mean greater carnage on our highways… smaller cars will mean people will keep their clunkers longer… sky-high fuel prices, not innate environmental rules, is why Europeans drive small, high-mileage vehicles... but raising gas taxes in the US would be deeply unpopular, so Washington gave us CAFE.
David Malpass on the markets – the markets have rebounded from March lows… Washington will claim victory… but they shouldn’t…unemployment will climb to well over 10%... industrial production has fallen 13.5%... Washington’s plan is to hire workers to take the census, sign union construction contracts in compliant states and tax the shrinking private sector to pay unemployment benefits… economic problems are fixable, but not under current policies.
Rich Kilgaard on energy – Obama supports Iranian nuclear power, but not ours… France gets 80% of its electricity from nuclear power… the US gets 20%... there were no deaths or effect on cancer rates from the Three Mile Island accident in 1979… but after Hollywood’s The China Syndrome , logic didn’t matter.

Barack Obama is Tommy Flanagan

Every time I hear Barack Obama I think of the Jon Lovitz routine on SNL.

Obama dodges central health care question

Obama hems and haws, and gets long winded to avoid the key issues. The health care system is messed up, but government involvement will just make things worse. National health care is a huge power grab which we can't afford and don't need. Any solution must include individual responsibility for good lifestyle choices.

Impressions of Washington DC

On our annual trek north to see family, the kids and I stopped overnight in Washington to visit the monuments. Here are some impressions.
1. Washington is teeming with activity, especially overcrowded highways and subways. You can almost hear the giant sucking sound as money from all around the country pours into DC.
2. Virginia is booming as the bedroom community for DC. One of the reddest states in the country is steadily turning blue as federal payroll and special interest money oozes southward into the Commonwealth. Thomas Jefferson is crying in his grave at how the statists have ruined his vision for this country.
3. The morning traffic jam northbound on I-95 into DC from Virginia was several miles long, many lanes wide and lasts for hours. DC must have a size 17EEE carbon footprint.
4. The further north you drive from Georgia, the more self-centered people drive. Around Washington, the odds are good that the car cruising in the passing lane and not passing anyone has an Obama-Biden ‘08 bumper sticker.
5. Toll taxes are rising fast. The best stretches of I-95 are in the South and all free. As soon as you enter Baltimore the tolls begin – Baltimore tunnel $2, Maryland $4, Delaware $4… and that’s all within 40 minutes. The tolls get even worse as you continue north (see http://www.i95exitguide.com/tolls/index.php). Not only are these tolls a regional rip-off, but the waste of gas and time waiting in line is sinful. If that’s how they want to play it, Georgia needs to put a $10 toll on I-95 north of Savannah and on I-75 north of Macon and give all Southerners a free speed-pass.
6. DC’s weather in June has been unseasonably cool. Al Gore may not have been truthful about the weather, but his climate campaign has been quite convenient for his fame and fortune.
Washington is full of hope and change - for the Democrats who are seizing power and lining their pockets just as fast as you can say yes-we-can.

Cap compensation? Start with Oprah

Forbes just reported that Oprah Winfrey made $275 million last year.

I admire people that can command big bucks; I understand supply and demand. But the Democrats in Washington want to cap compensation. They want to cherry pick their targets and stand in judgment of how much they’re worth.

If they decide to go down this slipperiest of slopes, they ought to begin at the top. Cap Oprah at $2 million. But they won’t go after entertainers or media moguls - they’re Democrats. They’ll go after the evil titans of industry who the media has painted as greedy and whose jobs the politicians could not do or even understand.

I can just see some bureaucrat deciding that Steven Spielberg is worth $150 million/year, but the CEO of some business isn’t worth $1.5 million. It’s all bound to blowup in their faces because the politicians think win-lose: if you get a bigger slice of the pie, my piece will be smaller. They slept through ECON 101 when the professor explained the win-win of creating wealth – making a new pie or an existing pie bigger.

I personally don’t think Angelina Jolie is worth $27 million/year just because she was born pretty. Madonna ($110 million) is washed up, as is David Letterman ($45 million). Bruce Springsteen ($70 million) has always had more nerve than talent.

But they are worth what they get. Let the market judge what someone is worth, not some pinhead with a grudge in Washington.

Letterman is an idiot

I couldn’t wait to get DVR so I could watch Letterman shows. Now I’m down to watching his hour long show in about five minutes.
I used to like his monologues, but then they got political, in a stupid, mean way. Fast forward, at four arrow speed. No show has more commercials. Fast forward. Many of his guests are lame. FFWD. The musical acts at the end of the show are sometimes good, but more often not. Stop and erase.
His Sarah Palin cracks prove he’s the typical negative, elitist, two-faced Hollywood lib, so I’ll probably deprogram the show. But first I’ll watch the commercials to see who I should stop supporting.
Letterman is like the Telegraph. Used to be good, but now bias, thin and deformed. Hardly worth a look.

To the Germans: I'm ashamed

I’ve been asked to speak in July before the German Society of CPAs in Munich about accounting practices in the U.S. I’m a little nervous because it’s a big crowd and my words might lose something in translation. And they want me to use a teleprompter, which I’ve never used before.

I plan to tell them how Americans used to enjoy freedom and trust before the statists brought us Sarbanes Oxley and the steamy pile of other regulations that waste our time, cost us a fortune and no one understands. So far I’ve got: “We didn’t want these regulations, they’re silly and unnecessary, and we’re ashamed that Obama is the President of the United States.”

I know this has nothing to do with why they asked me to speak; I just thought I’d use this platform to try to influence people who don't think on their own. The media will make me an accounting rock star. They’ll say: Rick is a talented debit/credit guy and he’s easy on the eyes, so he must be right!

Okay, I haven’t been asked to speak in Munich. Just thought it would feel good to put the shoe on the other foot.

Kayaking down the Ocmulgee

Daughter Morgan and I took a kayak tour in the salt marshes in St. Simons during spring break. We enjoyed the experience so much that we bought a couple inexpensive kayaks for home. We’ve been getting comfortable with paddling our mighty vessels on a nearby lake.
Last Saturday we put in at the new canoe launch at Amerson Water Works Park and took out at Spring Street. What a terrific adventure! Fun, easy and good for the soul.
Next time, we’ll probably put in further north to catch some white water.
For more information and references to guided tours, see Jessica Walden’s blog at Up the River. For the new tour company in town, visit Ocmulgee Expeditions

Get out on the river and see why people have lived in Macon for 12,000 years!