Laugh at Liberals Archive for May, 2005
AND NOW FOR A REAL ISSUE
Ok, enough about my “liberal” rambling about the middle east, because I like to look more at the economy, and since I’m almost finished with my education at WestPoint, I’m going to be looking for some real estate soon, and of course, there’s a REAL issue that faces most of Americans.
I’ve told you all about the Nightmare that is the Budget Deficit in one of my previous posts, “Thoughts on the economy”, well, now I plan to talk to you about another nightmare deficit, the Trade deficit. (Insert scary music here)
The Issue at hand is Mortgage rates, and why this conundrum of rising interest rates, but low mortgage rates exists.
First off before I start rambling on, lets look at some background information.
The Federal Reserve sets period rates: literally, the “overnight” cost of money. This rate is the rate one bank pays another for have a loan of money overnight. The rationale of banks borrowing from one another is to maintain what are called minimum reserve requirements. If You’re a bank and you have, say, $ 350 million in loans outstanding, you’re required to keep a minimum percentage of those loans, in cash, at all times. So if one day Bank A lends out a little more than it can cover with reserves, it borrows from it’s buddy Bank B, which happens to have a little spare cash on it’s hands.
Long-term interest rates (which include mortgage rates) are an entirely different story. These rates are “set”by the bond market, just the way the stock market “sets” stock prices. Banks, brokerage firms, pension funds, foreign countries, mutual funds, insurance companies and individual investors bid for bonds when the Treasury sells them every three months. The more demand there is the higher the “bid” the less the Treasury has to pay in interest rates to sell them. The Federal government can, and does, try to tinker with long-term rates by buying and selling bonds that it holds. But as big as it is, the Federal government Can’t control the global market. These bonds are then bought and sold all day long, fine-tuning long-term rates between Treasury auctions. And because the market is so large and liquid, other long-term loan rates — like mortgages — tend to follow suit.
So, why the conundrum? Several economist have come up with a theory that goes a little something like this.
Say you buy a new pair of sneakers at Wal-Mart that were made outside the U.S. A few of your dollars end up at Wal-Mart headquarters where they’re booked as profit in the company’s next quarterly earnings report. A few more dollars wind up in the hands of the American company that imported your new sneakers. A few more go to the truckers and owners of cargo ships that brought them to you. But a significant chunk of your dollars end up in the country where the products were made.
Last year, around $650 billion ended up outside the U.S. The country with the most, China, took in over $162 billion in 04. Oil producers, lead by Saudi Arabia, received $164 billion from American purchases of gasoline, heating oil and other products made from crude oil.
So what would you do if you were one of those countries with a piece of that $650 billion? You can’t spend it on goods and services: your country has already bought all the stuff from the U.S. that it needs, wants or can afford. You could put it in a bank, but for many countries holding surplus trade dollars, especially those with shaky banking systems, that’s not necessarily a very good Idea
Eventually, those U.S. dollars come back home in return for I.O.U.’s from The Federal Government called U.S. Treasury securities, still one of the safest places in the world to stash cash. As long as our Congress continues to spend more than it rises in taxes, we’ll have plenty of that Treasury debt to sell. All that demand helps keep interest rates low.
One reason China is getting so much attention, aside from the huge chunk of the trade deficit it creates, is that it has kept its own exchange, the Yuan, artificially low by pegging it to the dollar. No one knows just how much it would rise if it was allowed to “Float” but the strength of the Chinese economy indicates that the Yuan should be valued considerably higher relative to the dollar.
President Bush has been pressuring the Chinese to let the Yuan Float. If the Yuan rises against the dollar, Chinese products don’t look so cheap anymore. But China has been refusing to accept the move, in part, because it already holds close to $225 billion in U.S. Treasuries, why would it give this up? If the dollar weakens relative to the Yuan, that investment in Treasuries shrinks in local value. By keeping Yuan fixed, Chinese officials are preserving the value of their investment.
Just like the Euro, The Yuan can, and will eventually be worth more than the American Dollar, and eventually, the dollar’s value fate will be the same as the Deutsch Mark of Post WWI Germany, I remember in one of my old textbooks seeing a Man from that era pushing a wheel Burrow full of paper cash to the store to buy a loaf of bread. And a stamp that cost 50,000,000 marks, it appears that is what is happening to our dollar
If the dollar slides gradually, all of this may all work out just fine. But a sharp drop in the dollar would almost certainly bring substantially higher long-term interest rates in the U.S. (including mortgage rates.) Nobody wants to buy U.S. Treasuries today if they know they’re going to be worth less tomorrow. So if foreigners stop buying the paper being used to fund our federal spending spree, long-term interest rates could rise very sharply, making a house very unaffordable.
Thoughts on Jihad
Here’s the Message of Jihad, “America Is an Evil Empire and must be destroyed”
Here’s what’s Happening “America Is Becoming an evil Empire”
Look into the statement released by the department of defense last week. It states that they plan to build death chambers at Guantanamo bay. Already, many terrorists are being held there without Tribunal, now I know that the rest of the world hates us, but if they are truly terrorists, than it shouldn’t make a difference if we take them to international tribunal, and present hard evidence that these men really are terrorists. Further more, there’s another Act In congress that states that the federal government can withhold people without officially charging them, and that they are no longer required to have a judges signature for a search warrant, that means they can raid anyone’s home and arrest them without charge. I don’t know about you, but that sounds a lot like Martial Law, and does little to stop terrorism, if anything it helps spread it, by re-enforcing the thought in their mind that we are evil. We are proving them right.
The Bush Administration is using the excuse that because the terrorists are not being held on U.S Soil, they do not have the right to be tried in our leagle system, further more, we are taking these people to muslim countries like Saudi Arabia and tourchering them for information. Yet, we still want to “stop dangerous madmen from tourchering and killing people” If this Martial Law bill passes, then we’re all in trouble, because then the Bush administration can say that any one who doesn’t agree with them is a terrorist, arest them and hold them without charge, ship them off to cuba for tourcher, and then death.
This sounds like some Gestapo, S.S secret police crap, and in our own democracy. It’s scary stuff, and if you look at history, Hitler came to power in a democracy modeled after our own. Bone chilling.
And so Buck claims Democracy is thriving,
is this what democracy looks like?
Is this what so many people have fought and died for?
is this what our faunding fathers had in mind when they wrote the declaration of Indpendance?
Have We Become the very thing we have swarn to stop?
This has been my thought on Jihad.
Mr. Jack
Thoughts on the Economy
Ok, while I was looking on the Internet for some news on the economy, I stumbled on a website called “The Moderate Independant.com” I like this website because it’s extremely balanced, it attacks both Democrats and Republicans alike. Any way I was looking over an article on this site about the deficit, and it ran some numbers here that I’ll quote for every one.
“Our deficit ceiling just got raised to $8 trillion. Our annual deficit is running over $450 billion. ”
“An $8 trillion debt might not be such a big deal if we have revenue of $10 trillion a year to work with – we can simply pay it down over 10 or 20 years by reigning in spending a bit.”
The fact of the mater is, we are only taking in just under $2 trillion dollars. Now you see the problem.
“In order to balance the budget, we need to cut our spending by about 25%.”
25%, just to Balance the budget, that’s not including paying the debt we owe other countries, mostly China, Japan, Korea, and Taiwan.
Here’s a quote of the federal budget as of 2003
“Defense spending makes up 22% of the budget, and Social Security/Medicare make up 37%. So, combined debt interest, defense, and retirement spending make 66% of the federal budget.
Which leaves just 34% of the budget. Another 3% is law enforcement and general government operations.
Social and development programs, the one thing that seems malleable to those who wish to cut, make up just 31% of the budget, or a total of $605 billion. Included in that number are things like unemployment payments, education, health research, college loan programs, agriculture programs, FDIC insurance of savings. Only about $55 billion total goes to programs for the poor, like food stamps, Medicaid, etc.
This is why you no longer hear the President or conservatives talk about balancing the budget through spending cuts. That old rhetoric about how just by cutting programs for those poor, lazy minorities you could balance things out is replaced by the reality that even entirely eliminating such programs doesn’t even come close to making a dent in things – you could entirely eliminate programs for the poor and still have about $400 billion of deficit, or about 20% of all the rest, much of which is uncuttable.”
Now according to the presidents revised budget plan for 2005, Home Land Security funding has gone up 10%,
Military spending has gone up 7% (yet we’re still using scrap metal for armor, how interesting)
-Sources from http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/
And http://www.moderateindependent.com
Now, according to the statement provided by my first source, the economy is growing, this may be true, but it doesn’t help the deficit problem because total government revenue is still declining. During the first 4 years of the Bush Administration, the total National revenue has been – 6.8%, yes that’s correct, NEGITIVE 6.8%
Much of this loss comes from many sources that all compliment each other
1. The Demands of fighting 2 separate wars
2. Tax Cuts during a time of war
3. Politicians who are like stupid college kids with credit cards.
4. The reliance on the Middle East for oil
I believe allot of these situations can be fixed, 1 by truly trying to develop an alternative power source, and not this Bio-diesel crap Bush is talking about, I mean LARGE SCALE alternatives, like Solar or wind power, both of which can be enormously mass produced. Simply put, there is a finite amount of oil on this planet that is rapidly diminishing, and when it does, it’s more than just energy that’s going to suffer, a lot of plastics and fertilizers are made from crude oil. There is a finite amount of oil, but there is infinite power to be harvested from other sources.
We need to see behind the smoke and mirrors that the Bush Administration has put up for us and start trying to balance the budget, because if we can’t balance the budget, that’s grounds for other countries to Invade, and harvest OUR resources, and Yes, we may be a super power, but can we really hold off China, Korea, Russia, etc… All at the same time?
This has been my thoughts on the economy
Mr. Jack
Thoughts on Leadership
From Bill Clinton to George “Dubya” (what a stupid name) Federal to state to local, we have all watched the and read about 1 thing, Our Government do little but lie cheat, steal, filibuster, re-count, or be undecided, so my question is, Why aren’t we demanding better leadership? If you can even call this leadership at all?
Both Parties in office are to blame for this; both democrats and republicans do very little but argue, point the finger, and waste American tax dollars. They accomplish nothing for the Common good; if you can say there is a common good any more.
What ever happened to TRUE leaders, ones with Decisiveness, judgment, knowledge, tact, justice, and the ability to rally an entire nation to one cause?
Right now, we have no one like this; all we have are weasel politicians who waste our time and money.
The Republicans insist on wasting time with irrelevant issues like the Shrivo case in Florida. And doing anything they can to weaken the other party, as well as suppression of Homosexuality.
The Democrats waste time viding for any little power they can gain, and trying to denounce any decision the Republicans make.
What’s worse is how no one seems to care. CNN would rather report about some runaway bride, than report on just how rotten our government has become, Fox news is so bias, you can’t really trust much of what they say, it seems the media is powerless to help, mostly because no one cares.
I believe some one needs to take a stand here.
This has been my thought on leadership.
Mr. Jack
THE BIGGEST ISSUE NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT!
As Our Nation turns it’s gaze over to remote 3′rd world nations in the middle east, single handedly taking on the whimpiest of dictaitors, a new threat emerges from the ashes of our old enemy, the U.S.S.R
If you’ve forgoten about what happened to the Evil Empire that was the U.S.S.R, heres a history lesson for you. It alienated itself from the world, and climbed into a massive debt.
Sound familiar? it should, it’s whats happening to us right now. As we turn a record surplus to a record deficit, go to war and piss off our allies, sliping into dictaitorship, a new threat looms on the horizon.
the threat? Russia.
thats right, the evil empire is re-birthing from the grave, President Putin, a former KGB heavy back in the days of the original USSR, has forged world alliances, formed his own party, rebuilt Russia’s economy, and now has won such a solid majority for his party in the elections yesterday that he likely has the power to rewrite the constitution at his will and get any law passed he chooses.
Well should we be afraid? What was the platform his new party, United Russia, ran on?
“The president is the party.” Oops, not so much like the new, western-sounding Russia.
In fact, the two pro-Western Democracy parties got less than 5 percent of the vote total. A side-effect of George Bush’s world-alienating brand of War on Terror. Democracy and things related to America are not so good in people’s mind as they once were.
President Putin endorsed President Bush for re-election. It has not even been a year since the election, and he is moving with lightening speed. The first week after our election he announced the new nukes. The next, he fixed the Ukrainian election. Now, he has eliminated the democratic election of governors and changed rules so that forming opposition parties is near impossible.
Now you know why he wanted Bush to win. He now has four more years to take advantage of Bush’s bankrupting, naïve foreign policy and absolute spinelessness. He knows the difference between a bully and someone truly strong. The bully is bold in attacking the weak but cowardly when confronted by anyone who truly is a match. Putin knows Bush loved acting tough by launching a massive attack against Iraq, a nation that had been rendered defenseless by a decade of UN sanctions, but that he doesn’t dare stand up to any real threat: not to Pakistan, not to North Korea, and certainly not to Russia.
President Bush’s publicly announced strategy was to “Shock and awe� the world into fearful submission with an awesome display of America’s power in Iraq. I should almost start laughing.
That is how bullies operate however, attack the weak to try and create the illusion of toughness. But it is obvious to anyone truly strong and courageous the cowardice of such ploys.
It’s almost sad when you think about it.
Mr. Jack
Thoughts on Global Government
I’ve been thinking about a comment made on the U.N earlier. And I agree with you conservatives, the U.N has become weak.
But, unfortunately I agree with you for a different reason.
The U.N is lacking Unity, It failed to stop the United States from going to war with Iraq, based on a hunch, that there were Weapons Of Mass Destruction in Iraq.
The Fact Is that the United States didn’t even wait for the full report of the U.N weapons inspectors to declare war.
My proposal, is that the United nations needs a reformation, it needs to become the governing body of a world nation, with a written constitution of international laws that direct the grounds on how a nation can go to war, laws on nuclear and biological weapons, punishment for Genocide, etc.
This would keep war thirsty politicians in check, as well as dictators and fascists.
Most of all, it’d keep people from interfering with other nations governments, If the nation wants democracy, than it should be able to overthrow it’s ruling body and set up it’s own democracy.
Oh yes, and I want every one to see this Neo conservative website, It was designed by an organization headed by Dick Cheney, formed in the late 90’s. In 1997, they discussed plans for invading Iraq, and as you’ll see, it appears they plan Global domination, any way, here is the link.
http://www.newamericancentury.org/
Mr. Jack
DEMOCRACY IS NOT DYING, DEMOCRATS ARE
By Buck Evinger
Mr. Jack posted his concerns about the death of democracy. While I do agree that there is a problem with apathy towards the political process by the majority of people, that doesn’t mean democracy is dying.
It’s funny how when Democrats controlled both houses of congress, the presidency, by proxy the judiciary, and the majority of state governiships and legislatures…you didn’t hear conservatives and Republicans whining about the death of democracy. What happend was the Republican party began selling it’s message to the people. The people responsed. Republicans and conservative ideas have won majority control in the last few elections because they are in tune with the majority of the electorate. (Don’t start the whining about stealing the election, it just sounds stupid!)
Republican victories are not symptomatic of democracy in it’s dying moment, that is democracy thriving! The Democratic party, now controlled by the extreme left and it’s liberal platforms are out of step with the majority of Americans. They refuse to accept it and they are dying because of it.
The only branch of government that needs checking is the judiciary. Activist judges, who were appointed and approved by liberal Democrats AND NOT FILIBUSTERED BY REPUBLICAN MINORITIES, are establishing an oligarchy of power by making law from the bench. Appointment and not election is the only method by which liberal ideas, which don’t stand up to debate or the approval of most Americans, can become law.
Why was it wrong, Jack, for congress to debate and even legislate on the Shivo case? Isnt’ that what we elect our leaders to do? It is their job to make laws that address our cultural and societal needs. Judges are to determine whether or not those laws are being broken or enforced properly. Because liberals can’t convince the people to give them the power to create their idea of America through legislative action, they use activist judges to go beyond interpretation and into creation. The Shivo case is a perfect example of why we ELECT leaders to make law. They represent our “majority beleifs” and legislate accordingly. When the law is made through legislation it is a direct reflection of the peoples will, demonstrated by their vote.
Case in point, the 200o election debacle. The law in Florida, written by the people in it’s constitution through elected representatvies, was ignored by an appointed, liberal-leaning, Florida court. The United States Supreme Court said the Florida and U.S. constitutions were clear on the the law and told Florida to follow the clearly written law and move on! Even the dissenters on the Supreme Court didn’t argue against that. They argued that the needs of the electorate in this special circumstance needed to be addressed through the judiciary. Hogwash! The law was written. If you don’t like the way it deals a hand to you in this election, suck it up, move on and try to get it changed. HAVE YOU HEARD OF ANY LEGISLATION IN FLORIDA OR THE U.S. CONGRESS TRYING TO CHANGE THE ELECTION LAWS AS IT PERTAINS TO JUDICIAL REVIEW?
Sore losers!
Democracy is not dying. Democracy is winning. Democrats and liberals are losing, their stranglehold on the media and governmental power are dying and they can’t stand it.
Harry Truman, a famous Democrat who had absolutely no philosophical resemblence to today’s Democrats, was giving a speech when a supporter shouted “Give ‘em Hell Harry!”. He responded. ” I don’t give ‘em hell. I just tell the truth and they think it’s hell.”
The truth of being wrong, so consistently wrong for so long, is hell on liberals and hell on the Democratic party.
May it rest in peace.
NEWSWEEK: WHO IS REALLY TO BLAME
by Buck Evinger
Who is to blame for the 20 or so deaths, and possible more, and the harm done to America’s reputation in the Middle East?
Is Newsweek at fault for publishing the story, now confirmed by Newsweek to be untrue? Yes, they should have known that these unsubstantiated accusations, especially these, would have repercussions. BUT…ask yourself this question. If the Christian Bible had been so descrated, would a gang from the Southern Baptist gone out and killed a bunch of people?
Of course not. This was a one paragraph report in a “quick-read” section of a weekly magazine that, under other circumstances, would have gone un-noticed. Here are the details of why it didnt’.
A Pakistani activist, rich boy and former cricket star, Imran Khan, is trying to make a political name for himself in the post-Taliban middle east. This guy is an Usama bin Laden in the making. It was his ranting in front of TV cameras that lit the uproar on the Arab street and led to the deaths of 17 people in Afghanistan. He or an aid read the story in Newsweek and saw an opportunity to use it for personal gain. He got on TV, denoucing the U.S. and announcing his intention to introduce legislation in the Pakistani congress to ban Quran burning. (Sound familiar)
Once that fire got lit, the terrorists we are fighting, needing no other reason, decided to kill people and make a point. Ultimately, they are murderous thugs who used this opportunity to kill people for their “cause.”
That doesn’t give Newsweek a free pass. They should have known better and should have waited until they got a response from the Pentagon before publishing. They also have an obligation, to the families of the murdered innocents, to try and right the wrong.
At first glance, I was outraged at Newsweek for doing what they did, but my gut tells me it could have been anything that the small minded, power hunger Khan would have latched on to in order to see havoc ensue. Keep your eye on this Khan fellow. His name will come up again.
READ THIS IF YOU WANT TO POST
This site started out as something different. I thought it would be by conservatives, for conservatives only. BUT, a funny thing happened. Liberals started visiting and posting on a regular basis. The conservatives on the site started debating the liberals on the issues. The liberals debated right back.
I’m not going to say I’ve had my mind changed on anything, but I have certainly enjoyed the debate. Since this site seems to have a life of its own, I’m going to let it grow the way it wants to. For that reason you need to read this article and the previous post.
Thanks for helping us grow. Tell your friends, suggest ideas and changes, we do listen. Keep up the good work.
Buck Evinger
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POSTING RULES ABOUT TO CHANGE
By Buck Evinger
Hello everyone! Sorry about the delay in posting comments last week. I was out of town on business and for some reason, could not access the website administrative panel from my remote computer. The webmaster was also unavailable because of work. It was just one of those things. See below on how we are going to prevent it from happening again.
NOTE TO COMPLAINERS & WHINERS
The only thing I ever edit or prevent from posting on this site are the following.
1. Long, stupidly long links to web sites that jam up the entire page. DON’T POST THEM. As I have said four times before. Retype them with just the basic web page and type instructions on how to find the link.
2. GRATUITOUS INSULTS. “You guys are all f***ing idiots!” will never get posted…No name calling….you jackasses.
3. Ripoffs from other writers. If you copy and a paste the work of another writer, publication, etc. IT MUST HAVE A CREDIT TO THE WRITER AND PUBLICATION. If not, I will delete it.
NEW RULES
Now for the new posting rules. EVERYONE, WHO WANTS TO POST SUBSTANTIAL ARTICLES ON THIS SITE, ON THE CENTEROF THE PAGE, NEEDS TO REGISTER UNDER THE LOGIN LINK.
IF YOU HAVE ALREADY REGISTERED, SEND ME AN EMAIL, buck@laughatliberals.com AND I WILL UPGRADE YOUR STATUS TO POST CENTER PAGE.
I will reserve the right to delete any post or prohibit any writer from posting.
I am a pretty fair person and enjoy debate, so I’ll let almost anything slide. Just be passionate, factual and fun!
Buck
