Is there any party of the people?

I wrote this post back in 2012 and never finished or posted it.  I think it's just as relevant now so I'm going to put it up exactly as I wrote it then.  Some things just don't seem to change. 

            I thought I was a republican until I heard Chris Christie's keynote speech.  Instead of fixing problems with social security and Medicare he thinks senior citizens who earned these benefits with their hard earned dollars should give up their benefits to benefit some future generation.  He preaches a lot of foolishness about teachers and their unions.  Ronald Reagan once said "government can't solve the problem; government IS the problem."  One thing he is right about, though.  We desperately need some real leadership in Washington. 

            He tells us we all have to sacrifice.  That's nonsense.  If we get the government off our back we can get by just fine.  Government does have a role to play, it's just not that of our daddy.  We need government regulation of gigantic multi-nationals like oil companies.  But we need careful oversight of that government regulation to be sure it doesn't become a bigger problem.  We need real government control of our import policies.  We are letting below cost imports drive our own industries out of business.  Why? 

            I find that there are several points in the new republican platform that I can't support.  They want to pass a law making all abortions illegal for any reason.  Now I don't support abortion as a method of birth control, but making it all illegal is unreasonable.  Basically, I think the government should get out of the abortion business altogether and leave things as they are.  This is a decision that should be made by doctors, families, and religions.  It is NOT a function of government in my opinion.

            Then I hear we are going to replace Medicare with a vaguely described multi level system.  You know, Medicare is one of the few government programs that is mostly working.   It is paid for by a direct tax on income of 1.45% which is matched by employers like social security.  Medicare is made up of several "parts" the main ones being part A and part B.  These cover hospitalization and doctor's visits and pay about half the actual costs with the recipient paying the remainder.  It discourages waste because the recipient has to pay half of all costs.  It also helps to control medical care costs by limiting the amount it will approve for any procedure.  It certainly could be improved, but all in all it's a pretty good system that has worked for 47 years. 

            I find it astounding that we can't produce a good sense party in this country.  Where are all the decent people?  Obviously not in politics in either party.

            Unfortunately, that's the way I see it.           

Installment number 3 of my platform

3.  I propose some changes to our election system.  First off, elected officials will no longer receive a pay check.  It doesn't make any sense to pay a pittance to a man who must be a millionaire to be elected in the first place.  There will be no more election contributions nor PACs.  Instead, to run for election a candidate must procure the backing of a major network.  Let's face it, the current two party system hasn't worked in decades so instead we will have Sen. Joe Smith, Co, CNN.  This strikes me as a win-win deal since the networks will try to get a candidate that they can make look good and gain viewers.  Does anyone really believe we could select a worse candidate this way?  Wouldn't it be great to vote for someone you wanted to instead of the one you hated the least?  I still remember the last presidential candidate that I voted FOR instead of against someone else.  It was Barry Goldwater and the year was 1964.  Anyway, elections will continue to be held in the same way except there will be no primaries unless individual networks want to hold their own.  It's easy to scoff, but think it through. 

The median amount of election fund raising in the House (including the non-voting members...) is $1,350,902 (for Rep. Janice Schakowsky).  This is for a position that pays about $175k per year and they have to run again every other year. 

http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/uscongress/a/congresspay.htm

Here's installment number two of my platform

2.  There would be no Tea Party if the republican party were representing their constituency.  As it is, somewhere between 18 and 31 per cent of voters support the tea party depending on which poll you believe.  Since the huge majority of tea party members are republicans and no more than 50% of voters are republicans it doesn't take a math prodigy to see that you can't win a national election as a republican without their support.  Having said that, do you really know what the tea party is about?  I took a look at their website www.teaparty.org and didn't see anything extreme about it.  In fact it was probably less inflammatory than Cnn.com or Foxnews.com.  The liberal press is trying to implant in our minds that there is something wrong with the tea party and if they say it enough it becomes fact, just like any other whispering campaign.  I can't support ALL of the political positions of the tea party, but I agree with most of their primary points.  If I were running for election I would make an active attempt to gain their backing. 

 

 

I've decided it's time to post my platform in case I have to run for President.  I'm going to do it in stages but in no particular order.  Anyway, here's the first installment.

Here's my platform in no particular order

 

1.  I don't believe there is any advantage to the US in the current Iran deal.  I believe the sanctions are helping curb the spread of terrorism as well as helping to slow down the attempts by Iran to become a nuclear power.  I believe that removing the sanctions will force Israel to strike against the Iranian nuclear facilities in self defense which cannot help but become a major war in the middle east.  As to the nonsense about the US economy failing and the dollar being dropped as the world's stable currency please consider the fact that the euro has dropped 23% against the dollar.  What would you suggest as the new world currency, the ruble? 

Medicine and Politics

            Both Republicans and Democrats are in trouble over medical issues in the upcoming Presidential circus.  It's amusing because if they just used a bit of common sense both parties could avoid the problem.  Let's take a look at the Republican problem first. 

            At some point between the twinkle in the eye of a teenager and the following twenty or so years an impulse becomes a person.  The issue is when does that happen?  I favor when they turn 21, but I suppose that isn't a popular position.  Realistically, no one knows at what point a person becomes a person.  Could it be when the sperm first fertilizes the egg?  There are some people who take that position.  Could it be even earlier?  I don't see why you can't make that argument.  To some people it happens when the baby departs the mother into the world.  If this was a logic problem, or even a legal problem I would be happy to debate it.  Unfortunately I don't believe it is either of those.  It is a medical or moral problem.  The government has proven amazingly inept at making decisions in either of those arenas.  In spite of that, the Republican party insists on deciding for us at what point a fetus becomes a person.  So long as they hold to that position it will cost them many votes - especially among women. 

            The Democrats on the other hand have a different kind of medical issue.  A few years ago they went the time honored political route of creating a problem so they could get credit for solving it.  The problem they decided on was that there were people who didn't have medical insurance.  Come to think of it, there are people who don't have life insurance either, maybe they will tackle that one next - but I digress.  Their approach to making everyone buy insurance was to create a government program where the government would actually pay about 95% of the insurance premiums.  Then they came up with this nonsense that rates couldn't be based on risks, everyone had to be charged the same thing whether they were in perfect health or on the waiting list for a heart transplant.  They made their program - laughingly called "Affordable Health Care act" - so expensive to the businesses that had previously provided health care for their employees that the businesses dropped the coverage in wholesale lots.  Then the states expanded their free medical care programs and the Democrats considered these new poor people as newly insured thus allowing them to claim that more people actually had insurance than before.  The problem with the whole program is that the public is slow to react, but they do react eventually and they are no longer buying this silliness. 

            So, when it all sorts out, I suspect that whichever party manages to deal best with their medical issue will wind up the big winner in 2016.  What do you think?