I’ve been feeling the pains of the economy for a while now. As a self employed marketing and advertising consultant and producer, I specialized in working with two industries hit hard by the economic downturn, real estate and automobile dealers. Last year I finally reached the point where I had to go to work for someone to make ends meet. After 3 weeks of training and a month of fairly successful sales in my new job, I got laid off, along with 56 other people. Some new hires, some who had been there for a while. That was Thanksgiving of last year.

With the help of family and friends, and a little bit of contract work, my family made it through December and January, barely. I got behind on my lease payment, but my landlord didn’t seem to mind to much because he was already filing for bankruptcy and in the process of turning over his three investment properties to the bank. After sending out dozens of resumes I finally got hired for another job, which I started in mid-February and started seeing a light at the end of the tunnel.

About the same time, In February, the bank president contacted me, and in the friendliest manner, assured me that the bank would be willing to work with me and give me some time to get out, but that they didn’t want to be a landlord. They wanted to sell the property. The next day I received a notice from the banks attorney that I had two weeks to get out.

Now the problem with me getting out in two weeks is that my adult daughter who has a 1 year-old child, my adult son, who lost his job and is going through a divorce both live with me, my wife and a foster daughter that we took in last August. Finding a rental or a lease for such a large family is not the easiest thing in the world and it’s pretty expensive. I asked the bank if they would help me financially. There response was to file suit against me for rent and possession of the property. Nice. They’ve never asked for rent. They’ve never said we’ll let you stay for 30 days if you pay us for rent. The bank president knows exactly what my situation is, but doesn’t care.

Now I know my conservative friends, especially those who own rental properties might say. The bank owns the property, they have every legal right to get you out so they can sell it and recoup some of their losses. I don’t disagree. I just don’t have the money saved up to get move on their time table.

What gets under my skin even more is that the bank also took possession of the two houses next door. One of those are vacant and the other is about to be and they are virtually identical to the house I am in. But those houses don’t have signs in the yard. Mine does. I’ve actually even shown the house, for the bank. They had a prospective buyer want to view the property. The real estate agent couldn’t meet them there so I showed the house and extolled all the virtues of what a great place it was to live, etc.

The banks response was get out or we’ll file a judgement against you.

We’ll I’m trying to get out. If I had the money I would be gone already. Which brings me to my closing point. I’m not asking for pity, only patience. I’m not asking the bank for charity, only for a mutually beneficial investment on their part of a less money they they are paying their lawyer. And my question is, if your tax dollars and my tax dollars are being given to this bank and banks like it, all over the country who are doing the same thing, how does that make you feel to know that they don’t have to and won’t help somebody like me?

What it boils down to is, I have to help the bank with my tax dollars and the bank gets to sue me. God Bless America, right?

What do you look for in a leader? Inspiration? Motivation? Guidance? Reassurance? All great qualities that I wish Barack Obama truly possessed. After reading a post on brietbart.com that I discovered as a headline banner on drudgereport yesterday, I’m sure Obama possesses none of those qualities of leadership. The headline showed a picture of Obama with the text, “pass it now or we may never recover.”

Inspiring, eh?

Obama actually made the following comment in an op/ed published in the Washington Post.
“This recession might linger for years. Our economy will lose 5 million more jobs. Unemployment will approach double digits. Our nation will sink deeper into a crisis that, at some point, we may not be able to reverse,”

Is that really the kind of language a great leader would be using now? Put aside the arguments about the provisions of the stimulus package, or whether government stimulus can really even affect the free market. Let’s just talk about leadership. Here’s an alternative to the above paragraph.

The economic ills we suffer have come upon us over several decades. They will not go away in days, weeks, or months, but they will go away. They will go away because we, as Americans, have the capacity now, as we have had in the past, to do whatever needs to be done to preserve this last and greatest bastion of freedom.

A striking contrast, wouldn’t you say? That’s what Ronald Reagan told America in his inaugural speech in 1981. America was suffering from an inflationary economy and unemployment that was just as bad if not worse than today’s mess. If you want to be inspired and read a how-to manual to get out of the mess we are in now, click this link to read the rest of Reagan’s inaugural speech. It WILL give you hope.

It seems that Obama is decidedly lacking in the audacity of hope that propelled his campaign across America. Now he is employing the certainty of doom if we don’t borrow and spend our way out this current crisis. Reagan had a few choice words on that too. Again, I encourage you to follow the link to Reagan’s speech from 1981.

Obama’s audacity lies in his presumption that a.) This stimulus package can actually work and b.) That America is so fragile and incapable of righting herself without the interdiction of an elitist ruling class. Get out of our way, Mr. President and we’ll handle it.

I leave you with Reagan’s closing remarks.

Martin Treptow left his job in a small town barber shop in 1917 to go to France with the famed Rainbow Division. There, on the western front, he was killed trying to carry a message between battalions under heavy artillery fire.
We are told that on his body was found a diary. On the flyleaf under the heading, “My Pledge,” he had written these words: “America must win this war. Therefore, I will work, I will save, I will sacrifice, I will endure, I will fight cheerfully and do my utmost, as if the issue of the whole struggle depended on me alone.”
The crisis we are facing today does not require of us the kind of sacrifice that Martin Treptow and so many thousands of others were called upon to make. It does require, however, our best effort, and our willingness to believe in ourselves and to believe in our capacity to perform great deeds; to believe that together, with God’s help, we can and will resolve the problems which now confront us.
And, after all, why shouldn’t we believe that? We are Americans. God bless you, and thank you.

First you take bunch of bacon, about two to four packs and “weave’ it into a rectangle.

Next you add some spices. It doesn’t really matter what because you’re probably going to die of a heart attack when you eat this thing so put on whatever you like. Then you take a couple of pounds or more of Italian sausage and spread it out so it covers the bacon weave you created.

Next you take whatever bacon you have left and fry it up. Make sure it’s enough to cover the gigantic Italian sausage patty you just made. Then you drop that on top of the Italian sausage.

Now you pour on some Bar-B-Que sauce, roll up the sausage part, then roll that up in the bacon weave part and drop it on the grill.

When it’s ready you’ve got your self a bacon explosion.

Now this lovely dish is the perfect anti-liberal food. Just take a gander at its anti-liberal pedigree.
1. Its bad for you so it contributes to the rising cost of health care.
2. PETA hates it
3. It’s obviously the result of a conspiracy between the National Pork Producers Council and the big drug companies that make heart pills.
4. You can’t blame McDonald’s or Wal-Mart for this one…this is homemade.
5. It’s name, Bacon Explosion, evokes war and destruction. ( I wonder if the DOD could use this in the war on terror)
6. Its highly offensive to muslims and vegitarians and since its a perfect tailgating food, its offensive to people who think the Washington Redskins should change their name because it insults Native Americans.
7. It has hundreds of fat grams and no warning lable.
8. It’s got a phallic shape which is sure honk off all the feminists, all though its possible that Oprah has one of these in her night stand.
9. Its an American invention, which probably pisses off the rest of the world.
10. And finally, it got national attention through the Fox News Network.

So please, all conservatives….you have to make one of these bad boys at least once. Take it to work and feed it to your liberal friends or just cook one up at home, dig in and then sit back, relax and listen to the sound of arteries shutting down.

Change has finally come….thank you Bacon Explosion. Thank youl

Now I’m not so sure.

The early signs of the Obama Nation are an abomination.

First order of business. CLOSE GUANTANIMO! Damn the torpedos, full speed ahead….uh…where are we going to put the terrorist, I mean prisoners of war, I mean the alleged ruffians? Hello?……Where? Alcatraz? Really! You mean we are going to move them from the isolated island prison to another isolated island prison!

Second order of business, create the enemy. We have found him and his name is Rush Limbaugh. Now that they don’t have George Bush to blame for everything they(Obama’s people and him) are going after the only other prominent conservative with a set of balls. Compare George Bush’s tolerance and interaction with the media. The only time he ever let his slip show was when he called attack dog journalist Adam Clymer a major league asshole…..and he was right. Just so all you true conservatives know. When Obama says Republicans shouldn’t listen to Rush Limbaugh, he’s really saying Republican’s shouldn’t listen to you. Hows that for a big tent?

Third order of business. Launch class warfare. Obama says the rich Wall St. fatcats that presided over this economic disaster should be thrown in jail. What about the rich Washington senators and congressmen who did the same?

Now I read where Obama is going to “review” the Buy American requirement set forth in the proprosed stimulus package because our trading partners don’t like it. Are these the same trading partners like China, where slave labor builds everything and the state supports every businesss with socialistic policy. Or is the trading partners like France where the state blocks free trade with huge tariffs on American made products?

Now I read where Iran is claiming the failure of western society because Obama wants to “talk it over”. Hate to say I told you so, but….

Now is the time for everyone to grab the baby, throw it out with the bathwater and follow it up with the kitchen sink.