Friday, October 31, 2008

The US Election

“Democracy has to be more than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner.”
--James Bovard, "Lost Rights"

With the US elections five days away, and if the polls can be believed, it looks like a Democrat sweep. This is as I predicted in November of 2006, although I had Hillary as the President. In my own defense as a prognosticator, Obama was not even on the radar at that time. Recent reports affirm that he set up a Presidential campaign committee in Iowa (the first caucus state) almost immediately following his election to the Senate, suggesting he had big plans from the start. Aided by a cheerleading media, and one remarkably disinterested in his questionable qualifications, links to unsavory individuals, massive fund raising and flip-flops on issues, he seems certain to carry the day. A massive turnout of minorities and young voters enthralled with this charismatic “messiah” should overcome the skeptical.

Obama’s unlikely rise to the pinnacle of power in this campaign marks a dramatic shift leftward in American politics for with his victory he will join a seriously left leaning Congress led by Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. There is an even chance that the Democrats will have a filibuster proof majority in the Senate rendering any check on Democrat legislation moot.

Democrats are drooling at the prospect of a filibuster proof Senate so they can pass The Fairness Doctrine. This is designed to simply put talk radio out of business. In other words, the Hell with free speech. With the main stream media essentially the public relations arm of the Democrats and gleefully cheering on Obama, shutting up the contrary voices on talk radio and Fox News would give the Democrats a clear monopoly on information. The First Amendment? An outdated concept. Think PBS all day, all the time.

So, what should we expect from a decidedly liberal President and Congress? Well, for starters your taxes are going up. Yeah, yeah, I know. BHO has said (endlessly) that 95% of Americans will get a cut. Of course, this is mathematically impossible since about 40% of Americans do not pay any taxes whatsoever. He finesses this problem by calling cash payments to people who pay NO taxes “tax cuts”.

Cute. He also calls various tax credits for child-care, purchase of a fuel-efficient car, etc. tax cuts.

Obama has certainly learned from Bill Clinton to parse his words carefully. (Remember: “It all depends on what the meaning of “is” is”?) He said, “I” will not raise taxes on the middle class.” The key word here is “I”. Congress would do it in any case, but more importantly, if Congress does nothing, the Bush tax cuts expire and taxes are automatically raised. Gottcha!

BHO and the Dems have convinced a lot of people that the Bush tax cuts screwed the middle class and only favored the “rich”. Wrong my liberal brethren. Here are a couple of examples. (If you want the entire list and the link where you could check this out yourself, send me an email without too many cuss words in it and I will send it to you.)

Under Clinton a single taxpayer earning $30K paid $8,400. After Bush’s cuts: $4,500.
A taxpayer under Clinton earning $75K paid $23,250. Under Bush: $18,750.
A married filer under Clinton earning $60K paid $16,800. Under Bush: $9,000.
Bottom line: If BHO and the Dems let the tax cuts expire as they have promised, the middle class will take a big hit. As to Obama’s promise not to hit the middle class… Bill Clinton made the same promise and two months into his term he raised them. Of course, “things had changed” and he was “forced” to do it. Given the (at minimum) $400 billion in additional spending he has promised….

Obama has also stated he wants to raise the rates on capital gains and dividends back to where it was during the Clinton Administration. Apparently he is so disconnected that he thinks only the wealthy own stocks. Millions of Americans have stocks in their IRAs, 401Ks or in various union and company retirement programs. This threat and the likelihood of an Obama victory are already driving the stock market down.

The US corporate tax rate (35%) is among the highest in the industrialized world. The liberals cannot conceive of reducing this tax to be more competitive and stop jobs from moving to friendlier environments. In fact, they have proposed windfall profits taxes on the oil industry (profits 9%). Carter did this and, predictably, it backfired. Remember the gas lines and oil going up 60%? No? How soon we forget.

Death taxes too are to revert to 55% after 2010; right back to where they started before the staged reduction. Same deal. Congress does nothing and bingo, you get a massive increase. BHO can still say “I” didn’t do it and besides, we need the money to put “fairness” back into the system. Sure, let’s screw the guy who spent a lifetime working his ass off.

Basically, BHO wants to increase the percentage of people who pay no taxes from 40% to 49%. This half of the American populace would have a big incentive to keep voting for the party that insures that their goodies keep flowing. (See “two wolves and a sheep” above.)

So what else? (To keep this from becoming book length I will try to be brief).

· Obama want to pass the “card check” law that would eliminate the secret ballot in whether or not a company would be unionized. Unions love this because it makes it far easier to organize a union and for this reason unions have given millions to BHO and the Democrats. Here’s how it works. “You want to join the union or would you like your legs broken? Sign here.” Even George McGovern hates this one.

* Democrats dislike free trade agreements. Obama let it slip early in his campaign that he would cancel NAFTA and force the Canadians and Mexicans to renegotiate. The Obama campaign was forced to send a guy to Ottawa to convince the Canadians that it was just campaign BS. Yeah? Pelosi has refused to even allow a vote on the Columbian Free Trade pact even though it would primarily help American manufacturers. Hoover passed the Hawley-Smoot protectionist legislation during the Depression. Unemployment went from 9% to 25%. Seem like a good idea now? (It’s a World Economy stupid.)

· Democrats have floated the idea of nationalizing IRA and 401K accounts and merging them into social security. They would guarantee you a rate of 3% on your investment. Whoopee. Argentina just did this.

· Obama has promised to eliminate missile defense. Does this sound like a great idea with an aggressive KGB controlled Russia and with Iran on the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons? He also wants to get rid of all nuclear weapons. Hopefully some cooler heads will slow him down there.

· Obama likes the idea of making illegal immigrants citizens. I guess he figures since we already spend some $90 billion supporting them with welfare, food stamps, free education and medical care, not to mention the cost of their crime, that we might as well make them Democrat voters. (See “wolves and sheep” above). More stats can be seen here.

· Our Dear Leader also likes the idea of cutting carbon emissions by 80%. Adding the prohibitive burden of a cap and trade program on to an economy in recession can only be described as suicidal.

· The next president will appoint at least a couple of Supreme Court justices. Obama has already said he finds the constitution an impediment to good social policy (socialist). He wants judges with a “social conscience”. Justice Hillary?

· Obama has made some stupid comments about Iran. However, the Iranians have come out in support of his candidacy. That in itself scares me. He’s also made some conflicting comments about Israel. I’m betting that if Iran decided to attack Israel CINC Obama would not lift a finger. This may indeed be what Biden was talking about when he let it slip that “Obama would be tested in his first six months and that we should stick with him even if we did not understand his actions.” Or, words to that effect. In case you missed it… Biden is an idiot.

· Obama hates guns. Anyone who believes in 2nd Amendment rights should be prepared for an assault on those rights in BHOs first term.

· BHO will owe a big debt to the teachers unions. Don’t look for any advances in charter schools or constraints on this obscene monopoly.

· He will also owe the trial lawyers big time. Figure on them continuing their predations on the economy.

· Drilling for more domestic oil and gas under a Obama, Pelosi, Reid power lock? Forget it.
And nuclear power? Not a chance.


I guess from the above you might conclude that I am not enthusiastic about an Obama Presidency and a Democrat majority in Congress. A hard yaw toward socialism will fail as it has in the past…. Think Carter, LBJ’s Great Society and FDR’s miserable record. But, the starry-eyed youth wetting their pants over Obama were not yet born when Carter screwed things up. And, nobody bothers to teach history anymore. So, we’ll get to learn this lesson all over again. Good luck.

PS. If McCain should somehow pull this out, I suggest you invest in a firearm and plenty of ammo. The race riots will make the aftermath of MLK’s death look like a peace march.

4 comments:

thenwlaird said...

You can tell the snows are beginning to fall in the far North. I think Drape is trying to take over for Buckley
as the New Republican Curmudgeon good job
History will show the correctness of his insight
I like the photos of the wolves & sheep (send me them)
thenwlaird

Anonymous said...

Drape, again, you have given us an excellent analysis of important events that will impact our world for years to come. As one of your biggest fans, I believe we must find a way to get your blog wider distribution. It's too late to hold back the BHO tide, but your insights are too important to keep to just a few of us. These last two blogs are brilliant. They should not be missed by any concerned voter. The U.S. is about to embark on a great adventure of "hope". We hope we're right about this guy who has achieved nothing, has no experience and has promised us everything. It's over. We are about to hire the CEO of the biggest, most powerful "company" in the history of world and the guy has no resume, no experience, has doubtful associations and a flawed message.

Ye Merrie Quilter said...

The photos were gleaned off the internet by typing in "wolves sheep" into the Google search engine. Right click on the image and select "Save picture as".

Anonymous said...

Dick, We've met, I am Rod Freed's brother. He was kind enough to send me to your blog. Thank you very much for sharing your research, analysis and humor with us. I am now committed to reading your blog regularly.

God Bless you real good!

Denny Freed