Showing posts with label Politics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Politics. Show all posts

Sunday, August 9, 2009

More Thoughts on Health Care

Ok, so these are my fuzzy understandings of what has gone on in this country and in the world.

I have seen people who have magnanimously given of their resources to others and who have spent their lives in the service of others.

In fact I know of a lot of such people, one of whom is Jon Huntsman who came to speak to us at my graduation commencement and left us with a book about success. He and his wife had this theory as a young couple that they should give, not only 10% of their income to their church for charity but another portion of whatever they earned to charity, they believed in giving until it hurt. They continued this practice, not only through their struggling young married life, but further on into their years of success. They have donated countless amounts of money for cancer research and have travelled all over the world helping to build villages and bring water to families in Mexico, helping them restore their city after a devastating earthquake.

He is just one such example that I know of. There are a lot of people who spend their time serving others and trying to better others lifes.

Over the past 5 decades (or so, since WWII) we have seen a trend for people to become more materialistic, people have had this "I need more" attitude. More clothes, more food, more choices, more stuff, better stuff so much discontent and it is all producing waste.

The government made it easier for people to buy houses, so people bought houses. No money down, some times loans were made to people who didn't even have a job.

Well this increased the demand for houses, seeing the demand people flocked to the construction industry, people built houses, better houses, bigger houses, never ever enough for anyone! Impossible to afford unless you went for the deal of a loan for the down payment and a loan for the mortgage with the high variable interest rates of an ARM loan to make it worth (so it seemed) lenders while to loan out this money.

This was not only the deal with houses, but with cars, and with stuff (credit cards).

I hear about the theory of regulating all of this, but the deal wasn't lean regulation it was over regulation. It was trying to help the poor in the name of equity. If the market were allowed to run as a free market we wouldn't have had all of these loans being made, people in their self interest would have prevented these loans from being made. People would not have bought what they shouldn't have bought, people wouldn't have made what they shouldn't have made, landfills wouldn't have been filled with what shouldn't have been thrown away.

This is not to say that Republicans are right, democrats are wrong (in fact I don't like either political party). What I am saying is that I see problems. I see farmers being paid not to farm, big companies who have the ear of our government putting stuff in our food that gets people addicted to it (seriously). Lies being told, people getting sick, pharmacutical companies producing pills to cure all of our ills... and creating many, many more.

There is a different way, there is the way of being grateful for what we have, of eating what is natural on God's green earth, of working hard for things that you believe in, raising your family to be good and upright and to serve others.

If this is what the norm was in this country, all over the world, there would be far fewer people getting fat and sick because of what I think of as no care.

What we need is to care, to not let lawyers bring up frivolous lawsuits that raise the cost of health care. It cost me $25 frikin dollars for a multivitamin when I was in the hospital to have R that is 1 multivitamin!! Plus to be fair and square to all the nurses that worked there they rotated between the higher paid nurses and the lower paid nurses. Every hour they went from highest paid, to mid-level, to lower level nursing care when they hardly came into my room to say "boo" to me! Plus I got right up after having R and walked around, took care of myself got cleaned up and would have gone home, literally an hour after having her, but they kept me there for 12 hours.

It was my own initiative that kept the cost of having R down lower. I knew we didn't have insurance so I went out to find a cheaper option. I found a mid-wife didn't let them test for obscure minute possibility diseases, (I knew I didn't have diabetes I really, really ate healthy). I went to hypno-birthing classes, prepared and then (because its safer and cleaner) I went to the hospital, had her natural and saved a ton of money.

If you "give" everyone "health care" as is proposed, in an inefficient, care thee not for the cost way. Then there is no incentive for people to try and find cheaper options, thus inefficiency. When people forget how much it costs they are more likely to bring baby with the sniffles to the doctor every single time they get the sniffles. They don't care about losing weight because of the high cost of being overweight, they don't care if Johnny breaks his arm, thus the risk for people not caring about the cost of what they are doing will be transferred to every single one of us.

Did you like being tied to someone who didn't care about a project that you had to do in school? That is how I see it.

Yes I care about people, yes the cost of health care can be prohibitive, there are reasons for this. I think it is those reasons that should be explored. Not ignored and shoved under a collective rug.

I don't want to be forced to have health care, I don't want to force every body in America to pay for my problems, for my care thee not attitude. I want to care about my own fortunes, I don't have a lot of money, none in fact. But I would rather be free from the hindrance of a high tax burden, than chained to conglomerate government programs that encourage apathy.

That's what I think anyway, I know how much suffering there is out there, I hope I can help relieve it, and I hope to not be part of the problem...

and I know I cannot see the whole picture.

Healthcare Bill

I am posting this from my friends blog, I really hate the proposed health care reform bill! Just one more step towards socialism and I can't stand it! I love all you citizens of America, I want this nightmare to end of a messy health care system, but I think we all need to think long and hard before buying into something in a snap. Like we did with all of the bailouts, and our trust in the idea that we could buy a home (with no money down, and no job!! Yipee go me!). That kind of freewheeling spirit has gotten us all into a big mess. Plus I was rather annoyed at the president trying to tie in the possible recovery of the economy with passing his health care reform bill, so here we go, I oppose it, I don't believe him.

From my friend:

This email concerns the proposed health care bill which is being voted on in three weeks. This is not a stupid forward, 'cause my mom and I created it ourselves. I don't care if you're Republican, Democrat, black, white, orange, or purple-every single one of you is affected by this. Please view these links and brush up on page 136 of the bill. If you feel as scared as I do, send it to friends and ask them to write to their representatives. You won't regret doing so. If you don't, well, at least you know, right?

One of the most frightening things about the proposed health care bill is the assisted suicide clause, which says that counseling on how to forgo nutrition, fluids, and medication will be offered in place of care to chronically ill, critically ill, and elderly people. Basically if your health care costs outweigh your value as a citizen of the United States, they'll teach you how to put yourself to sleep.

Here are some video links. I know some of you have seen some of these before, but the vote for this bill happens at the end of the month! Please send the following to your contacts. Contact your government representatives and let them know we don't need this bill!

Hicksville, NY, protest and former Lt Gov:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vC3ENngYnlQ

Detroit protest:
Go to 3:20 on the following video (the rest is just enthusiastic people-watching):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiW8s-Vld88

Columbus, Ohio, protest (part II):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7-75RZuxIs

20/20 on USA health care reform and Canada's and UK's health care:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdx_2cuPgQQ

Fox on Health care:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yO9L3oyQhQ8


Part of being an American is taking responsibility for your part of the decision making. As George Washington said of the Constitution, "...its only keepers, the people". It is time to take up our pens and to let our voices ring out. It is our sacred honor and duty.

Let's keep this country free!

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Thoughts on Government

*I posted this back in March, but got a dead response... I'll try again. ;D

Note: If you don't believe in open minded, open ended thoughts and discussions please don't send me hate mail and keep it to yourself.

There is a speech given by a Jonathan Krohn, that has been circulating around on the internet, this kid is impressive and he absolutely captures something that I feel deeply, though I didn't know what name to give it. He defines conservatism as "Respect for the Constitution, Respect for Life, Less Government, and Personal Responsibility."

I believe this to be ideologically true. If we all took personal responsibility, respected our bodies, what we ate and whether or not we exercised. Where we were all able to have opportunities to learn, where we have good role models that guide us to do good things with our lives. Where we all have sound minds, opportunities to work and freedom from oppression. This ideology truly resonates with me. The role of government then is to allow us these opportunities. In this world, there are people who take advantage of other people, it is as simple as that. We have behemoth banks, corporations, and individuals who have all of the wealth. As much as I agree with conservative ideology, I have to say that the way things have been structured allow exploitation and I wish it were not so. I really hate the government expansionism that has been occurring, I don't think that it is a good solution for the world ills. I know there is a better way. Yes, personal responsibility, less government, respect for life and the constitution. Also protection from exploitation, and some type of forum of responsible citizens that are set to task to come up with solutions. I see both sides of the argument, and I don't think that they are irreconcilable.

Friday, March 6, 2009

Smoke Rings and Matterings

I have recently been reading some short stories found on this web site:

http://smokeringmattering.blogspot.com/

He's a good author, really insightful and I recommend his work to all you lost souls out there.

In fact I feel inspired to write more. When I get a spare moment I want to see where I can get with my writing.

I also want to explore my thoughts on who should control charitable efforts such as helping the poor and needy and what kind of form the organization of these efforts should take.

I KNOW Your all DYING to hear about this, but I feel strongly that things are heading into a difficult mess of governmental oversight.

Briefly,

I think commities of concerned citizens should take up the matters of feeding and clothing the poor and helping the homeless. Issues should be raised and brought to the general publics attention by honest men and women.

We should work to find way's that people can be more self sufficient, such as working in a communal garden, an issue I have brought up before.

I want to learn more about why Democrats seem to think that the only way of meeting the needs of our countrymen means creating more government programs. I think that taxing people in order to feed the poor etc. is inefficient.

Here are a few of my observations. When you give people food stamps, welfare, "free" health care. Here is what happens. Food stamps, allow you to buy food from designated stores. There are some stores that you can buy really healthy food around here, but there prices higher than the local farms and farmers markets. SO you end up with an inefficiency in that you have to spend your money in a place that charges more for the same goods than if you had earned the money and were free to do with it as you pleased. You don't have an incentive to save, you will be given x amount of dollars every month and it must be used for food. Cutting back to use the money for another purpose is then futile. In the case of health care, you can only see ... doctors on the program, they are generally paid less than they would be on a fair market basis and have little incentive to bring innovative treatments to your attention. There is less of an incentive to take care about what you eat and how much you exercise because there will always be health care. (There are so many inefficiencies and messes in health care that it would take a lot of words to describe them. I don't feel like doing it right now). If the government is in charge of our jobs, you have to pay x amount to ... employee. It sort of distorts the system as well...

Write more on this latter.

~Strawberry Girl

Thursday, March 5, 2009

Balance of power

Well, I have been thinking a bit about the balance of power in Washington. I have not really thought too much about politics before. But the last couple of years I have been trying to become more informed. In my classes at UVU I have found that, living in a really Rupublican state, there was alot of tension about the subject of politics. Why? Because a lot of my professors were democrats, really liberal democrats and our student newspaper was really liberal as well. This because the other nearby school is really Republican and there was a lot of animosity that was aparent between these professors and the other school. What bugged me is that most of the students at UVU and most of the surrounding area are Republican and the democrats of the school were always saying and doing things to bug them (it was really aparent).

With that as a background... I had a class, don't remember which one, where we talked about the way that America flip flops from Republican to Democrat, back and forth. The teacher mentioned that he had never seen one party stay in power more than 8 years. He also mentioned how it was healthy for the country to have this shift in idea's and power.

Here are my thoughts on politics. I think that there are too many special interests, too many lobbyists. I like trying to protect the earth and real human rights. But I don't like the liberalness about the current Democratic regime. Obama has got into office and put into place many really liberal policies, he changed the rules about government support of abortions, he put forth even more spending of imaginary money, yet he is a really "green" president I don't know how good this will turn out to be. The power shift has made it possible to talk to countries that we haven't been speaking to for a while, Russia, Iran, I don't know about North Korea.

What my assertation is, and a lot of people I know, is that both of the "reigning" political parties have departed greatly from the constitution and our rights outlined therein. The great ideals of our founding fathers have been ignored, forgotten and changed. This saddens me a great deal, the men who established this country were learned men who had studied the great societies of the past and were trying to set up this country with the best principles that they had learned. But even from the beginning those with wealth exerted an influence upon the drafting of the constitution. It never would have passed and this piece of land would be an entirely different landscape. If they had not included the provision for slavery. Unfortunantly, those southern states would not have come in if the document didn't contain the provisions. I think that a lot of the miscief of politics comes from the compromises, where everyone really know's that what they are compromising on is something that is a bad deal.

I am pro-freedom, anti anything that distorts or takes away that freedom. I don't like corporate rule, I don't like elitist rule. But I do like it when honest and learned men rule. Is that going to happen in my lifetime? I don't know. I am a supporter of Ron Paul, he is a little bit extreme, I can recognize that a lot of his idea's are radical and would confuse and outrage the general public as well as people in congress. He is the closest thing that I know of to my ideal politician however.

Anyway those are my thoughts, for what they are worth (a penny?)

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

The American Tax System

The way our tax system works....This explanation of how our tax system is "supposed" to work, comes from an Economics professor at the University of Georgia . I encourage you to take the two minutes to read this brilliant explanation, it is well worth the read.

Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all tencomes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:

The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.
The fifth would pay $1.
The sixth would pay $3.
The seventh would pay $7.
The eighth would pay $12.
The ninth would pay $18.
The tenth man (the richest) would pay $59.So, that's what they decided to do.

The ten men drank in the bar everyday and seemed quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the owner threw them a curve. 'Since you are all such good customers, he said, I'm going to reduce the cost of your daily beer by $20. Drinks for the ten now cost just $80. The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes so the first four men were unaffected. They would still drink for free. But what about the other six men - the paying customers? How could they divide the $20 windfall so that every one would get his 'fair share?' They realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody's share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer. So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.

And so:

The fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% savings).
The sixth now paid $2 instead of $3 (33%savings) .
The seventh now pay $5 instead of $7 (28%savings) .
The eighth now paid $9 instead of $12 (25% savings).
The ninth now paid $14 instead of $18 (22% savings).
The tenth now paid $49 instead of $59 (16% savings).

Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to drink for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings. 'I only got a dollar out of the $20,'declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man,' but he got $10!' 'Yeah, that's right,' exclaimed the fifth man. 'I only saved a dollar, too. It's unfair that he got ten times more than I!' 'That's true!!' shouted the seventh man. 'Why should he get $10 back when I got only two? The wealthy get all the breaks!' 'Wait a minute,' yelled the first four men in unison. 'We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!' The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up. The next night the tenth man didn't show up for drinks, so the nine sat down and had beers without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important. They didn't have enough money between all of them for even half of the bill! And that, boys and girls, journalists and college professors, is how our tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore. In fact, they might start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.

David R. Kamerschen, Ph.D.Professor of Economics, University of Georgia

OK So that is how I got this e-mail.

This is what I think about it.

This is exactly the Rupublican viewpoint (that I have heard espoused) on this subject. They think unilaterally about it, that everyone is happy "drinking their beer" or living their lives until someone or something comes along that shows in stark contrast what the system looks like.

I think that this explanation, although theoretically true, is shortsighted. Being one of the first four who would be "drinking their beer" for free I want to put in a comment. I would rather be able to earn enough money to be able to support myself, then to have to rely on other people to pay for me. Having a system set up that "supports" me rather than allows me to support myself encourages me to either be lazy or to be stupid. Stupid in that I no longer take the initiative to find ways to support myself as well as I should. Or what if I could find a cheaper "beer" or make my own "beer?" OK I HATE BEER I AM GOING TO HAVE TO CHANGE THIS TO BE Kombucha Tea made with Roobios (an herbal red tea instead of Green tea which is caffinated). So I decied that it is better to drink Kombucha tea but I am stuck drinking beer because I sold my right to make my own decisions when I signed on to this "redistribution of wealth" idea. I say forget that idea, let us all make better decisions and if your stupid enough to believe everything you are told and to not fight for truth and your own individual freedoms then you should not deserve to be wealthy either. But if you are wealthy you also have the responsibility to encourage and teach others what you know. The whole "teach a man to fish instead of give a man a fish idea."

That said, I know there is more to my own personal development that needs to be done on this subject and it is an ongoing process. I know though fundamentally that I would rather be out there being productive and trying to take care of myself rather then sitting around blowing bubbles in my "beer" and letting someone else pick up the tab. Taking care of myself feels better.

~Strawberry Girl

Thursday, September 18, 2008

Banks

American's

The propossed bailout for the banking industry cannot be allowed to pass without protest. Write your congressman. Here is a link to a website to oppose this bailout

http://stopthehousingbailout.com/

and here is a link to contact your congressmen

Stop The Housing Bailout: Send a Letter to Congress