Are you pulling the wagon, or are you in the wagon?

You can't be both. Either you, as an American citizen or other human who is breathing American air and treading on American soil, are a net positive to the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP), or you are a negative to GDP. That math is easy. (Yes, to quibble, you can net out at zero, but that category of folk are statistically insignificant, and accordingly irrelevant to the discussion).

The private sector is where all wealth in the U.S. is generated. All of it. The money that the public sector takes for its unending public 'needs' must come from the private sector through taxes. That's just how it works. Lately, our public sector spending has risen to the top of the kitchen table topics in America, as it has burgeoned to levels beyond anyone's wildest imagination. This spending has got to stop, and to remain a viable world power, this crazy spending has got to be rolled back. And rolled back by a whole lot.

Of course, this involves pain; pain suffered by those who depend on public money. This public money (call it entitlements, welfare, pensions, Medicare, Social Security, unemployment benefits, ad infinitem...) was promised to the recipients. And all of these promises were made by politicians at all levels to their short term political gain, but to our long term damage as a nation.

So, where do we cut?

In other words, whose ox shall we gore first?

In my last post, I was accused of being insulting and inflammatory because one of those 'in the wagon' wanted an exemption for being in the wagon. He was entitled to be taking money out of the private sector because he was a veteran. He took part in defending and securing our nation as an active duty military guy a decade, or perhaps two decades or more ago. But my only argument is that regardless of what any American did in the past, when we cash a government check today, and provide nothing for it today, this individual is a net negative on GDP. Or, in other 'inflammatory and insulting' words, this individual is 'in the wagon.'

'But Fredd, but Fredd, these military veterans deserve their pensions, they made it possible for you to type away on your blog with the freedom they provided decades ago.' OK, okay, fine. Military veteran pensions are off the table.

Then I had a retired policeman get all hot and bothered when I wrote that he, too, was 'in the wagon,' while the rest of us pulled the wagon he was in. He protested, saying 'I chased thugs, criminals and ne-er-do-wells during my prime, I still have the injuries incurred from that career, I protected your life and property, I deserve to sit in this wagon, Fredd, you are a jerk for calling me a parasite.' (I paraphrase here). OK, okay, fine. Retired policemen are off the table, and they can remain in the wagon that I am pulling.

But where does this thinking stop? We in the private sector are now pulling a wagon that is just too damn heavy, and we will, like John Galt in Ayn Rand's 'Atlas Shrugged,' just eventually disappear, leaving the wagon to sit there motionless. Then where will all of those entitled, righteous wagon sitters be? The gravy train is ending, everyone can see this is true, but nobody wants the finger pointed at them, because they have a righteous claim on private sector money in the here and now, many of them for services provided decades prior.

Where does it end? The retired fireman will layment that he, too, can lay sideways in that wagon because he, years ago, prevented whole neighborhoods from burning to the ground, back in his younger days. He is now entitled to a big hefty retirement check for the remainder of his ever extended life. Ok, okay, firemen are exempt from pulling the wagon.

But the librarian pipes up, hey, without my past services, the public would be ignorant and illiterate, I deserve an exemption. Ok, fine. Librarians are exempt. But what about retired city hall administrators? Without them, nobody would have gotten their tax levies in the mail, nobody would have known when they should show up for jury duty, society would have collapsed. OK, fine. These guys are exempt, too.

Doesn't anyone out there get dumb ol' Fredd's point? When we pay people not to work, we slowly go broke. We are now broke. The public (and some private) pension systems (that defer wages onto future generations that should have been paid when the services were consumed) that were the rage 100 years ago clearly and demonstrably don't work for the benefit of society now. They patently and obviously do not work. Eventually the chickens come home to roost, and the checks start to bounce. Nobody will be exempt when that day comes. And that day is indeed coming. Hell, that day is almost here.

And once that day comes, there will be blood in the streets. The people riding in the wagon will jump out and grab pitch forks, demanding that the checks start flowing again (just look at the riots in Greece and those U.K. students, to list just a few examples). And the private sector folks who stopped pulling the wagon will grab their pitch forks, telling the wagon riders to take a hike.

These retired pensioners, while they ostensibly agree with my conservative take on things for the most part, have taken their first step towards grabbing pitch forks, demanding that I shut up and just write the damn check. In the chaos that follows the ultimate collapse of our economy owing to irresponsible, wild public spending, these guys will be on the opposite side of the battle lines, and we both will be armed with pitch forks.

Inflammatory and insulting remarks aside, which side will you be on, and who will you be waving your pitch fork at when Armageddon arrives?

Next post: 'The Fix.'

What's it feel like to be a parasite, Americans?

You know who you are. As much as 50% of working age and retired U.S. citizens are moochers, in addition to untold millions of illegal aliens. Since you know who you are, I am talking to you, dead beats.

Yes you, who expect for some unknown other person to pay for your health care when you casually walk into the emergency room with a runny nose, and suck up the system's time and energy, and then walk out without paying a dime. Or worse yet, when you carry no medical insurance, and develop an existing condition, then expect someone else to treat you? The latest horrible law that has come down the pike (Obama Care) mandates that insurance companies issue you a policy despite your existing condition. This is not insurance, it's welfare, and you are the recipient. Or, in other words, free loading off of the rest of us.

You, who are here illegally and send your illegal kids to public schools, towards which you have contributed nothing, and suck up other public goodies towards which you gave squat.

And what about you old mooching geezers, who suck up all kinds of medicine and pay precious little for it, if anything, simply because you are old and the government gives you a Medicare card. And you bitch and whine about your lousy, feeble little co-pay when it occurs.

And speaking of mooching old geezers, I am speaking of parasites like you who cash your lucrative, opulent social security check each and every month, and yet you know in your heart of hearts that you never, ever contributed anything close to what you have taken out, and what you expect to take out for the undetermined future. And be honest (if that is even possible), you are not even close in your lifetime contributions to what you are cashing and expect to cash.

What is life like for you, you parasites? Don't you ever wonder where this money comes from to support you in your cozy, comfy lifestyle which you don't pay for? Do you think that the Money Fairy just flies in to Washington and dumps truckloads of cash into the U.S. Treasury? Do you even care where the money comes from? Probably not.

And if you don't care, that makes you one of two things: 1) stupid, or 2) evil. Which do you prefer? It is an amoral being who consciously takes from others without giving back any effort for what they take, and that would be defined as evil. Or if you just don't bother to think that your lifestyle is supported by others, then you are just a garden variety idiot. Which is it, mooch?

And you biggest moochers of all: public employee union retirees (this includes public school teachers, firemen, police, librarians, utility companies, and on and on and on and on...): you gutless parasites retire at age 50 or 55, and live the life of Reilly on the public dime for the rest of your free loading life, while the municipality that you used to work at gets the bill for your pension each month, in addition to having to replace your dead beat body with another younger working mooch to back fill what you should be doing until age 65, if there were justice in the world. Do you really think you earned your pension? Not even close, you slacking dead beats. You are killing our society, and you don't even care.

You know the country would be better off without you.

You know that, don't you?

Econ 101 for Dummies (a.k.a. Econ 101 for liberals)

There is virtually no disagreement that liberal leftists simply do not understand basic economics, and if they do, their understanding is based on feelings rather than logic. Because leftists constantly seem to get themselves elected to public office and accordingly are afforded voting rights on how best to allocate public resources, they vote with their feelings instead of with any knowledge of basic economics. This is very damaging to the country, and we need to bring these simpletons up to speed in how the economy works. Perhaps a lesson in economics, and specifically taxation policy, expressed in terms of feelings and emotions rather than in cold, hard difficult to understand charts and graphs, you know, those constructs that leftists eschew, would be more helpful. Let’s start with a basic premise that all of us would agree upon: if you had $100 in your pocket, and a stranger came up to you, reached into your pocket and took $40 and told you ‘I need this money to help someone else, because they don’t have any,’ you would feel bad, wouldn’t you? That wouldn’t seem fair, would it? Of course not. But when the local, state and federal governments do exactly this to American populations, leftists see absolutely nothing wrong with this. Those of us on the right have a huge problem with the government doing this, so liberals and conservatives see the issue of confiscatory taxation from two different points of view. Which of them is right? Well, if you agreed with the basic premise above that taking money from one American and arbitrarily giving it to another is wrong and hurtful, then the conservative argument would be more likely to prevail. Let’s expand the basic premise somewhat, shall we? Let’s say that this stranger, whose hand is currently inside your pocket snatching that $40 of your $100, tells you ‘this $40 will be better spent on stuff by people that have no money than what you would have done with it, anyway.’ How would you feel about this statement? Would you dare to ask the stranger why he thinks this, and by what basis he came to that conclusion? Would you feel bad if the stranger just ignored your protests, and just took your money anyway? Of course you would. You would probably even get angry. Of course you would get angry. But when state, local and federal legislators get together and vote on budgets, projects and expenditures, they calculate exactly how much and how deep to reach into our pockets to fund these at times foolish, arbitrary and wasteful programs. All that is needed are simple majorities in the various legislative bodies to empower spending of our money in this manner, and leftist, liberal Democrats (and RINO's; Republicans in Name Only, also known as liberals) are usually the legislators who propose such spending, not conservative legislators. Who is right and who is wrong about this process? The liberal leftists are wrong, if you agree with the expanded premise above that these liberal legislators do not know how to spend your money any better than you do. And finally, let’s take that premise to its full reality. Let’s say that this stranger, whose hand is now into your pocket up to his elbow, greedily grabbing $50 now, not the $40 he told you when he first reached into you pocket, tells you ‘I’m taking this money to spend as I see fit, because you don’t need this much money, anyway. You have too much.’ How would you feel then? Angry? Insulted? How does this stranger know what is ‘too much,’ anyway? Does he know you or your circumstances? Does he know that you have four children who would like to go to college but have inadequate college funds? Does he bother to think that you would like to leave some of your money to your children when you die? No, this stranger doesn’t take any of that into consideration. That’s not right, is it? And that makes you mad, doesn’t it? This concludes our emotion, feelings based discussion on taxation policy as is promoted by leftist liberals in our local, state and federal legislative bodies. Based on our discussion, how do you feel about how our tax policy is working out? If it makes you angry, frustrated and insulted, perhaps you would be better served voting for conservatives next election. You’ll feel better.

Obama: our weakest president ever?

In the good ol' days, when an enemy declared war on the U.S. or in any way threatened our national interests, whether it was the Barbary Pirates during the Jefferson administration, Spain during the McKinley administration, or Germany and Japan, during FDR's administration, whoever was in charge at the time (the President) would take care of business.

In the good ol' days, when some foreign power(s) got uppity and took actions contrary to American interests, the president at the time, whether Democrat, Whig, Republican, whatever, mustered the troops and got the job done to ensure whatever uppity enemy stopped doing whatever they were doing that we didn't like.

Not so, with this administration, or lesser to the point, with the last three Democratic administrations. Recall Jimmy Carter dithering and wringing his hands when Islamic revolutionaries overthrew the Shah of Iran (owing to Jimmy politically throwing the Shah under the bus beforehand) but doing absolutely nothing against the Iranian revolutionary thugs when they took over our embassy in Tehran for over a year.

Recall the next Democrat to take up the oval office: Bill Clinton watched with little or no interest as Islamic terrorists blew up U.S. interest after U.S. interest as he sat on his hands. Well, he did launch a missile at an aspirin factory in Sudan, and we all saw the impact of this bold move: bumpkus.

And now we have Julian Assange, the pusillanimous weenie who has declared himself an enemy of the U.S., dumping massive amounts of stolen classified documents onto the Internet via his Wikileaks site and Barack Obama has his lawyers write some harshly worded dispatch requesting that this enemy cease and desist.

In the good ol' days, America took care of threats with bombs, missiles, tanks, machine guns and battleships. Now, we respond to threats to our country from abroad with harshly worded letters from really mean lawyers. I'm confident that Julian Assange is quaking in his boots with the prospect of facing another volley of harhsly worded letters from Obama's pit bull attorneys.

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How pathetic America looks to the world right now. How utterly helpless and feckless we appear on the national stage as this man-child president pleads for this criminal to go away. Fat chance, with this administration and its total weakness of policy and lack of political will to do something about this menace.

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In the good ol' days, all of the past presidents (excepting all Democrat presidents from Jimmy Carter forward) would have made a pipsqueak threat like Assange disappear with little fanfare. His atoms would be dispersed to the four corners of the earth, never to materialize in this life again.

But with this weakling in office? Nope, Barack Obama is arguably the weakest president that Americans have ever put into the Oval Office.

Perhaps a constitutional amendment barring Democrats from holding the presidency would be in order. We should never be put in this weak position again.

Ever.