Balancing Those Who Write the Checks

(Article written by guest author, Drew Moore)

Since the inception of the FED in 1913, that organization has been shrouded in secrecy. The FED is responsible for our money, and our dollar is subject to a fractional reserve banking system. Over time, the FED has printed more money and raised or lowered interest rates to affect money supply and policy. In short, the dollar has been beaten and bruised. I would argue that the FED is not necessary and is unconstitutional because the Founders said "make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts," but for the time being we have the Federal Reserve.

The president's administration has said on numerous occasions that there needs to be transparency in our government. Now you can argue whether the taxpayer is or isn't getting that, but that discussion is for another day. H.R. 1207 is a bill that has been introduced by the good Dr. Ron Paul (R-TX). This bill calls for an audit of the Federal Reserve. Now you may say why an audit? Well in 2008 there was a bailout with the price being $700B, can anyone tell me where ALL the money went to? If you can please contact me, if you can't then pause for a moment and think: This is just one isolated point in time where we don't know what happened to all that money. Now expand that thought to almost 100 years and still we the American people are in the dark.

In 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley was enacted, enforcing rigid audit requirements on businesses. Now, if the Federal Reserve is separate from the government, just like private businesses who face staunch regulation, why isn't the Fed. audited? I believe that an audit would show that you and I have been robbed. But as mentioned above there is real substance in H.R. 1207.

As a Libertarian minded Republican, this really gives me hope. But no matter if you are a Democrat or Republican, we have common ground found in liberty. The passage of this would be a giant step on the path to restoring our Republic, in the area of economic liberty. From one American to another, please read 1207, then contact your representative and urge them to read/support/co-sponsor this piece of legislation, H.R. 1207. Let's open the books of the Federal Reserve, together we can fix the crack in the liberty bell and this is the first step.

In Liberty,

Drew Moore

ADDENDUM: Click here to access the database for Congressional contacts both in Washington, D.C., and in local district offices.

GET OFF YOUR HIGH HORSE

This week, Congress and the Administration have come out with their hands raised in exasperation.

Knock it off.

They are complaining about $165 million in bonuses given to AIG executives. Ok, I understand the frustration that AIG were given bailout funds, but they were contractually owed, and in your stimulus bill, Mr. President - that you signed and all members of your party in Congress read (in the 12 hours from writing it to passing), a provision was inserted saying that all bonuses promised before February 11, 2009 could and would be paid.

Stop complaining - you let them do it! Quit trying to act like you had no idea. AIG turned over all its financial records to Geithner for him to review before approving more funds to be given to AIG. He either didn't take the time to read about the bonuses, or didn't care.

What's worse is that now your talking about raising taxes on just the people who got the bonuses from these companies. The House wants to put a 90% tax on individuals who receive a bonus from a company that received $5 billion in bailout funds. Besides being a violation of the Constitution (Bill of Attainder - Article I, Section 9, Clause 3; Ex Post Facto laws - Article I, Section 9, Clause 3), Congress and Obama are setting a precedent that if you make too much money or the federal government thinks that you are doing wrong, then it can take away your income. That does not make sense! Let me say it again:

Even if what your doing is not illegal, if the government deems it to be wrong they will take away your money.

Finally, this issue is minuscule. $165 million in bonuses. While to most Americans it seems like an unbelievable amount, think about this: $3.1 billion, with a 'B', in earmarks were slid through the latest spending bill. Why does no one care about that. How many individuals will be affected by each one of those dollars. At least with these bonuses, the money will be pumped back in to the economy. If $200,000 is granted to build a statute at a high school, where is the long-term financial benefit? The debate over this is utterly hypocritical.

Stop acting as if you, the Democratic Party and President Obama, are offended by this action and result. You let it happen. Senator Dodd has come out and admitted that he inserted the language that allowed the bonuses to be paid at the behest of the Executive Branch. Treasury Secretary Geithner either missed the bonuses or ignored them completely, one or the other. President Obama, you should have vetoed this legislation if you did not want these retaining bonuses to be paid. You are trying to save political face and you are violating the Constitution and the Judicial Branch will shoot your legislation down swiftly and exactly.

I do not care about the bonuses. Not one bit. And secretly, I think, neither do you, Mr. President, Mrs. Speaker, and other Democrats in Congress and throughout D.C. Here is my assumption:

This is a trying time in our nation. A small, undercurrent and counter-culture group is attempting to change the mindset of the citizens of the United States. You are angering the masses towards wealth. Those with wealth and excess wealth are inherently evil. They are the bad guys. It is the wealthy's fault for those who do without. You wish to tax the wealthy and the established in order to be fair to those who are not as well off. And this bonus situation gave you the platform to continue your movement. A mere $165 million and the wealthy are nothing but corrupt and incompetent. They are thieves of our citizen's money. If you can make the masses hate wealth, you can make everyone believe that mediocracy is valuable. If you make people believe that unnecessary sacrifice is patriotic, you can change the world. You can kill capitalism if you can make people believe that no one is smarter, better, or more valuable than anyone else.

The new members of the Democratic Party are trying to shift our nation away from our foundations and everything that the United States has stood for for over two centuries. Playing the blame game in this bonus situation, stirring up imaginary conflicts among members of the Republican Party, and attacking dissenting members of the media are all attempts by this new movement to hide their true actions - nationalizing corporations, over-regulating the economy, constricting wealth, and promoting the educational agenda of socialist/left-wing organizations.

We must not let the wool be pulled over our eyes. Keeping the Constitution at the forefront of every issue is the best way to defeat this attempted governmental conversion. Stay strong, fight for liberty, defend capitalism, and always respect the Constitution and we can never go wrong.

Leading by Example - Presidential Style

"No Earmarks!"
"No Signing Statements!"
"No Lobbyists!"
"No Back-room Politics as usual!"
"Spending Cuts and No Tax Increases!"

While a majority of our nation was swept up in the "shock and awe" of Obama's campaigning, most of his supporter's have been swept under the rug when it comes to the actualization of his campaign promises. For those who have never been behind Obama's ideas or visions, we have been completely thrown under the bus. It seems that 95% of Americans will not see their taxes "not rise." 100% of Americans will see some of their inalienable rights alienated. And politics are no longer "as usual," but are regressing further and further.

Obama has outright lied to the American people. He promised to veto any legislation that came to his desk with earmarks. Yet this past week he passed the $410 billion bill to continue government funding for the rest of the fiscal year. And the bill was laden with 4,000 earmarks. His excuse: we have no choice. Great example for the youth of America - say one thing and do another, and place the blame on someone else. Remember, we're in the financial crisis not because of Obama, but because President Bush drug us here.

In his attempt to take focus off of his administrations failures so far (multiple appointments crashing and buring in regards to taxes; inability to avoid lobbyists or earmarks; increasing troop numbers in foreign conflicts and extending his own proscribed deadline for bringing troops out of Iraq) the administration has used its mainstream media (MSM) cult following to shine the camera on voices of opposition. Labeling Rush Limbaugh as the head of the GOP, questioning how Sean Hannity can fuel the fire of Republican opposition, claiming the Republicans in the House of Representatives are the "Party of No," and using Robert Gibbs to belittle dissenters of the administrations economic plans, i.e. Cramer and Santelli. When will he stop being so PARTISAN. Making other people look evil does not make them evil, it makes you the bad guy.

50+ days in and the country is in much worse shape than it was at any point of the Bush Administration. But Obama continues to refuse to "let the buck stop here."

The Government and Medicine

Today, let us talk about the growing movement to nationalize, or should I say "standardize" the medical field. The Obama Administration has laid out plans to spend at least $634 billion (page 67) over the next ten years to expand health care in the nation. In it's budget, half of the "down payment" will come from raised taxes and revoked tax write-offs from those earning $250,000 or more a year.

Before I get started, however, we'll go over a few facts. Obama claims that 45 million people in this nation don't have health insurance. In other words, 85% of us do, and 15% don't. When the numbers are put that way, it doesn't sound like such a crisis, huh? Of those 45 million, 18 million make $50,000 or more a year, 10 million of those are at atleast $75,000 a year. 10 million more aren't even U.S. citizens. Finally, of those remaining not already covered, 14 million qualify for Medicare/Medicaid/SCHIP, but simply aren't signed up. But that's ok, American's should have to sacrifice for those too lazy or cheap to get around to providing for themselves.

New York Post

What was it that the most liked member of the Kennedy dynasty said? "[S]o, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country." Too bad that idea was flushed out to sea with Johnson's Great Society, bringing entitlement programs to many and a "couldn't care less" inclination to most.

1986 can be looked at as a year in which Congress openly invited illegal aliens to flock to our giving nation. The Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act guarantees anyone, no matter their legal status, funding - anything - access to medical care, even with foreknowledge that payment cannot or will not ever be paid. Free emergency health care.

Wait, what about the Hippocratic Oath; doctors would never deny a person in immediate need, right? On one hand, no. If treatment was pertinent and necessary, doctors are held to a moral standard to save lives, but this law required them to perform any emergency task without even the chance of being remunerated.

Welcome, citizens of Mexico, who snaked your way through Arizona backcountry with a child who broke his leg on the way through; we'll pay your bill to fix him. Welcome, Mr. Canadian, who could no longer wait the weeks to get a doctor's appointment in your own country because of nationalized healthcare, but instead crossed in to Minnesota to back up our emergency rooms even more. Welcome, unemployed high school diploma holder, who instead of going to college, decided to provide for yourself by stealing and reselling copper wiring and sheeting from construction sites and lacerated your arm jumping over the barbed wire fencing around your crime scene; we'll stitch you right up and send you out the door, no cost to you.

Now, do we feel sorry for these people or for the doctors and hospitals losing their profits? Neither, the hospitals pass on the lost income to those who do pay: the patients with health insurance, the patients with the capability to pay their way. Thanks, Congress.

So far, we've seen how the federal government involving itself has done nothing but clog our health system and consequently indangered our health and safety, but that's the past. We now have to look forward for CHANGE.

Even with all the Fed interventions, we have seen our life expectancies climb up to near 80 years. Also, because the government has been blocked out of the research and development of drugs and medicine, private companies have been able to venture, investigate, and experiment with a huge variety of sciences in attempts to increase the overall health of the nation to even higher grounds.

Now, we have government intervention. And it is only beginning. $634 billion in a down payment. $634 billion over the next ten years of the government intruding in to the private sector. That doesn't even count the billions included in the stimulus bill just passed going to the computerizing medical records. The most difficult thing about this, is that Obama refuses to even say where the money is truly going and how "universal health care" will be dealt with.

1. For those of us with our own insurance, do we lose everything we've paid in to it and are forced to join some government program? If so, are medical records (now conveniently available on a computer network) going to be reviewed by government employees tasked with sending certain patients to certain doctors at certain times? Do we lose any privacy we once had with doctor/patient confidentiality?
2. Those without insurance, are they going to be the ones who have to buy in to the government program? If so, we the taxpayers are paying their way, correct? If that's the case, then we, as the guarantor, should have the ability to regulate the actions of the guarantee, i.e. you can't smoke, you can't drink, you can't engage in risky behavior, you can't be sexually promiscuous. With that, those individuals right's have been compromised because they are limited. So therefore, restrictions cannot be placed on individuals buying in to the government's universal health care. Since that can't happen, there will be no responsibility on the guarantee's part to maintain a healthy lifestyle and the guarantor will be giving away his income to pay for the irresponsible actions of others.

It is a long held belief that $1 in an individuals hand will be spent more efficiently and effectively than $1 in the government's hand. As such, if the government wants better health care for all, it should reform malpractice laws, which will lower doctor's overheads, which will then through the competition of the market, lower health costs, and finally lower insurance premiums, allowing more individuals - if they so choose - to buy in to health insurance. All this without the government really needing tax dollars.

If it truly wants to use it's might, perhaps revamping Medicare into a competitive market between a variety of companies and allowing seniors to purchase in at a rate of their choosing, i.e. more or less coverage, the "government" will be providing health care, saving senior citizens money, the taxpayers money, and encouraging economic growth by increasing health plan companies interaction in this growing market.

There are many more facets of concern facing the Obama Administration and its plan to change the American medical field. It's one thing to fix a broken system, but when the system represents the most productive, efficient, and profitable system in the world, government tinkering should be kept to a minimum.