Keep in mind that the United States is the 'Saudi Arabia of coal'*.
Obama 'would kill US coal trade' - THE election of Senator Barack Obama, combined with expected Democrat supermajorities in both the House and Senate, would lead to a radical shift in energy and trade policies set by the Bush administration, it was claimed yesterday. In his keynote speech at the annual Breakbulk conference in New Orleans, Zachry Construction procurement director Steve Richardson warned that the Democrats "want to link trade agreements to US labour demands" and seek to ensure social responsibility in the trading partners' countries. On energy, he said coal, which is regarded as a heavily polluting fuel by Democrats, “would move from life support to death.” Richardson did say that biomass (an oil alternative derived from wood chips) could be an emerging industry under a democrat administration. But noting that biomass conversion plans cost twice as much as corn to ethanol facilities, federal funding would be needed to develop the industry. - Fairplay
NOT using coal is just crazy. Much US electricity is made using coal power. Take a look at this Electricity Flow diagram for 2007. Coal is the largest fuel source for electricity production. Remember that it is domestic and not imported coal.
The Democrats talk about doing whatever to stop money flowing out of the country for energy needs, and yet there is all this energy at home that, if its use is increased, will create many new jobs and lessen the need for foreign oil. Even better, there is so much coal that the US can greatly increase production for export to help foreign countries meet their own demands for more energy. This would be a great way to get back some of those many dollars sent out of the country...
* The U.S. is, after all, the Saudi Arabia of coal. We have more than 200 years of coal reserves at our current burn rate. There are 440 coal-fired plants across the nation, with proposals to build 153 more in 42 states over the next decade, at a cost of $137 billion, to provide electricity to 93 million homes and support our energy-guzzling lifestyles. - Time
I guess Joe Biden is not the vote catcher he was made out to be by the Democrats. Not only is he almost completely absent from this Presidential Race, but now they are even dropping him from the yard signs!
Here is a photo I took while on Route 123 in McLain, Virginia on my way to vote today. I noticed the signs first yesterday which just so happened to be the first day of 'vote in person' absentee voting.
I wonder how many of the dimmer-bulb Democrats are going to complain to the election officials that they can't find the 'Obama-Warner' ticket on the ballot? You know someone is going to do it... And when Obama loses all of these idiots are going to come out of the woodwork claiming that they were tricked or whatever. Who knows, these signs probably come with a pre-designed post-election lawsuit as well.
Of course the intended plan with these signs is to connect a popular Senator with Obama as some sort of added encouragement for Warner supporters to support Obama as well. I doubt that many are going to fall for that trick. In fact I am pretty sure it was the trigger point for me in voting Republican across all ballot. I have not done that in over a decade, but seeing Senator Warner's name on the same sign made me realize that a vote for any Democrat this election is a vote For Obama, and Pelosi, and Murtha, and William ($90,000 in the Freezer) Jefferson, and Charlie Rangel, and Harry Reid, and all of those people who I can't vote for yet millions of idiotic Americans (and about 2 million illegal aliens) keep sending back to Congress to F the rest of us over. (Really, your Congressmen is caught red-handed with almost $100,000 in illegal payoffs stuffed in his freezer and instead of sending him to jail you send him back to Congress. No wonder the Democrats are so eager to 'help' the poor, at least on Election Day!) So, I voted against the one Democrat Senator I could vote against. You should consider doing so too because a 'President Obama' can't raise your taxes without the assistance of these other clowns in Congress, who appear to be almost as socialist as this guy is. So vote accordingly.
In Virginia it is possible to vote absentee in person if you are not going to be around on Election Day. Since I am going to be out of the country for Election Day I took my daughter and went to vote after work.
You still have to fill out an absentee application and they then need to check your name against the voter rolls. In my case the roll was at another location so they had to call and confirm that I was registered. Once that was done mark my entry so that I cannot show up on election day to vote again or early vote again at another location. The process was pretty quick and then I got to vote on one of the 'infamous' electronic voting machines. I had my daughter make the selections on the touch screens and then once done we collected our 'I voted' stickers.
I was a little surprised how many people were there to vote early. Still the process was quick and easy. The election staff was very courteous and helpful. It would have been nice to go vote on Election Day, but I am very relieved that it is all over for me. Now I get to watch McCain win the Election from abroad. I am looking forward to the shock that will be in Europe the day after Obama loses.
I did get a promising sign of a coming McCain victory earlier today when my one member of staff who is an open Obama supporter told me that she thought McCain won last night's debate. This confirms my belief that he did really well (You can find my live blog of the debate here) as I am sure it was hard for her to admit it and she just went and said it. I knew better to ask her. And if she thought that McCain one that many other Obama followers are sure to as well. So good things are coming!
Seems that I will be drink blogging the last Presidential debate tonight.
Until then, make sure you watch the hard-working plumber ask Obama about how he plans to tax his hard earned money and the amazing confirmation of Obama's plan to redistribute income to the masses:
Also, in case you have not heard, the court in Ohio has gotten the State to admit that they are sitting on over 200,000 questionable voter registration cards. See Ace of Spades for more details here:
1955 - Off to the kitchen for a drink and to clean up from dinner (Pork Roast!)
2032 - Dishes done, TV on - FOX News
2056 - Shifted to the laptop. Enjoying an icy VodkaTonic
2057 - Coming into this debate I guess I am feeling pretty confident that McCain will win the election. I plan to vote on Thursday as I will be in Europe on Election Day.
2101 - Hofstra - Good old Long Island. I'm from LI. The North Shore.
2102 - They shook hands. Got that out of the way.
2108 - McCain starts off with calling for the Government to permit a do-over for homeowners who bought too much house. I am in favor of the Government buying these houses from the banks after they are foreclosed and then have the houses torn down. Obama - Also wants to help these deadbeat homeowners, as long as the banks don't profit from it. So both ideas suck.
2109 - McCain brings up Obama's socialist tax plan that he explained to Joe the plumber. Good for bringing it up! Obama - 'Who do we want to cut taxes for?' Brings up ExxonMobil is even. So FU all those stockholders, including me and my kids. Obama anti ownership of stock. Doesn't matter if your capital gains is not increased, your going to get less because he will take it straight from the company!
2113 - McCain strikes with Obama's ideal of Income Re-Distribution. Obama's response was frankly weak. And it seems like he is going to let it lay going straight into the next question. His voice sounds nice, it your not listening to the words.
2116 - Budget tightening - Obama plans to go through the budget line-by-line as portrayed in Dave the movie. I am all for it, if you can manage to do that. McCain's across the board cut is more doable, because it is simple to do.
2120 - Eliminate ethanol subsidies! Kill them off. Corn should be for food and the planet is hungry. McCain will also target pork project earmark's, including Obama's 'projector'.
2120 - Obama downplays earmarks neglecting to note that it costs the Government billions! McCain promises to balance the budget. "If you wanted to run against Bush you should have run four years ago." Direct hit. I could have sworn I hear audience clapping.
2123 - McCain is dominating this debate. Obama is struggling to cover the numerous areas McCain covered in his comments.
2125 - McCain: 'Your standing up to your party is just not convincing.' Obama makes no reply.
2127 - Obama is running a negative campaign and it is unfortunate that you are not telling the truth, such as when you agreed to accept Government funding and then did not.
2130 - Obama is not talking so smooth today. McCain points out that every other add during weekend football was a negative health care ad and they are not true.
2132 - Obama: 'I had nothing to do with Senator Lewis's comments.' Another poor response. McCain pointed out that Obama never repudiated his comments. Obama calls his comments appropriate. Now not appropriate. I am pretty sure he said it was appropriate comments. A slip-up or do I need another drink?
2135 - McCain stands behind his rally supporters. Nice move. Points out negative supporters at Obama rallies disturbing Obama. That is because of the Palin is a c*nt shirts Obama supporters are so fond of lately. I think Obama was disturbed that McCain might mention the specific shirts.
2136 - McCain strikes on Ayers and ACORN.
2138 - Obama tries to explain away Ayers by linking him to a Reagan supporter. Sorry, but all that does is make me want to think what Annenberg was thinking! (Annenberg gave millions to the group that Ayers and Obama were on the board of)
2140 - McCain pushes Ayers and does it well. McCain has the last word on Ayers. Also good. Bias note - I am still voting for McCain.
2142 - Obama points out his running mate, Biden's strong points. Sorry, but that is not going to work for people who know him already. It should not go over too well with anyone who drives I-95 through Delaware.
2145 - McCain talks up his running mate, Sarah Palin. Obama supports her attention to special needs. They both think the other's running mate is qualifies to be president, with Obama leaving it to the voters. McCain saying yes and immediately pointing out how Biden has been wrong on major issues including Iraq.
2146 - McCain points out how every response of Obama's includes a call for more spending and asks why is that?
2154 - Moved to the desktop as my wireless connection just died.
2156 - McCain 'Obama wants to restrict trade'. I am still trying to get reorganized here.
2158 (2152 when the laptop died) - McCain gives a strong reply on energy, noting that the US Navy has safely run nuke plants for decades. Obama pulls out the flawed meme that oil companies are sitting on land that they are not drilling on. There is a valid explanation for that which kills his response. Of course it is technical so most people will accept it as fact that the oil companies are F-ing with us. Still it is wrong and won't solve the energy problem. One thing not mentioned is that about half of the oil used in the US is domestic oil. Little Saudi oil comes to the US. It goes to Europe and Japan.
2200 - Obama's call to give those without healthcare the same health care that Congress has sounds nice, but what about everyone who has healthcare that is not so nice. They will all want to change over. But I guess they are left out because their situation will not change as they have insurance already.
2205 - Obama points out that McCain's plan will cost you money. Well, wake up because Obama's plan will cost you money as well, either as deductions or in taxes. Because face it, whatever healthcare plan shows up, It needs to be paid for. Think it is expensive now, wait until the Government gets into this business. And everyone thought that $600 screwdrivers were expensive! One good thing, Government health care will make this recent bailout look like nothing...
2206 - We reach the abortion subject. Hopefully we hear a question on gun control as well. Even better how about one on the death penalty.
2210 - McCain 'We shouldn't judge supreme Court Justice nominees on ideology, like Senator Obama does.' McCain is still going strong.
2211 - How long before CNN calls this debate for Obama? I guess that will work for people who are not paying attention to this debate and for people who believe in Obama's HOPEnCHANGE.
2213 - Obama's response to McCain's abortion charges: He goes and talks like a lawyer. He is a lawyer at the end of the day. A lawyer who voted 'present' on the issue. That is the same as voting no. Thanks for stating your vote though. He was probably concerned that McCain would use the 'present' vote stance.
2215 - McCain is fisking Obama's response (for the second time tonight.) pointing out the sneaky lawyers language Obama is using.
2216 - Last question!
Education!
2217 - In the last debate, Obama placed education as least important:
2128 - Obama - Education comes after energy and health care. McCain - We can work on all three at the same time. For me, if your going to put them in order, education should come first as children are our future and will be the ones finding solutions to our problems. - Link
2219 - Obama calls on parents to do their part in helping their kids get educated. I agree, it is not only up to the school. Parents need to follow-up at home.
2220 - McCain has a strong response on education but leaves Obama's comments alone, other than pointing out that some of the worse schools in the US get the most money per student so throwing more money is not the solution. Good answer.
2224 - McCain attacks the DC school system and defends 'No Child Left Behind' calling for it to be renewed. Did Obama attack it? I must have missed that.
2226 - McCain is stomping on Obama's final words, which incidentally started by agreeing with McCain. That he let pass. McCain attacks Obama's response on vouchers noting that there will be a shortage of vouchers, not enough for all.
2228 - Closing remarks for McCain. He closes on his record of service and noting the bullet points of issues the next president need to deal with reminding that you need to trust your president to handle them.
2230 - Closing remarks for Obama. He closes noting that McCain is just more of Bush. Education and 'policies that will lift wages'. That last one is complete BS. I explain why here.
2231 - All over and hands shaken!
2234 - The clear winner was John McCain. He owned this debate from start to finish.
2236 - Now watching CNN. As I tun in I hear 'McCain looked like anger management'. Just where did that come from?
2239 - CNN - 'Not Obama's night, but hey look McCain is an angry guy'. Well hey, lets have the angry guy deal with the Wall Street criminals, the UN, Putin, Ahmadinajad, Chavez....... Or do we want Obama to pall around with all this scum?
2242 - CNN commercial 'Election Coverage brought to you by ExxonMobil'. They should just give up with this type of trying to win over people. they should instead just point out that: 'Hey, we are making a fortune and that you too can profit from high oil prices by becoming a shareholder. Accounts available starting at only $50 a month!'
2245 - Another CNN commercial. 'I was raped and Sarah Palin would make me carry this baby to term.' Pretty dramatic and a cheap shot. She is against abortions but is not going to work to change the law.
2247 - CNN to undecided voters: 'Who won the debate?' Winner Obama, but this time she actually counted hands.
2248 - Black undecided voter 'Ayers not an issue but he didn't address the ACORN story and I was disappointed in that.' She shifts to another voter and feeds her 'Was Joe the plumber a gimmick?' She dutifully replies using yes, gimmicky.
2254 - I'm all done for tonight. Thanks much for those of you who have stuck through with this.
The driving force of the current credit crisis is the housing bubble. This brings out a big problem. Just who can afford all those houses?
Clearly, many people who purchased houses over the last couple years were not able to afford them. Now, don't accept that BS being tossed around that these people were no longer able to afford their houses only after house prices fell. What a crock. The monthly payment didn't change just because the value of their homes went down. What changed was their ability to sell the homes for a profit (Or to refinance while cashing out more equity). Once it was no longer possible to re-sell their homes for a profit, they lost interest in them and all of a sudden they became 'victims'.
Now with the credit crunch, banks are only interested in giving mortgages to people who they expect to pay the loans back and only as much as they can afford to pay back. This is as it should be. Banks are after all in the business of making money, not giving it away.
More responsible lending standards will have the effect of reducing the pool of qualified buyers. So as the supply of homes is growing the supply of home buyers is shrinking at every price level. This should result in a reduction of home prices. This appears to be happening just not to the degree that it should, yet.
Now, Senator Obama, as part of his Presidential Tax plan, wants to raise the taxes on people who earn $250,000 and up.
It seems that his supporters don't seem to have a problem with that. Too bad, because they should as it will effect them. (And not just plumbers!) For example, how much house can you buy with a yearly salary of a quarter million? As it turns out, you can get about $800 thousand dollars worth of home with a salary like that. Few people earn that much money in the US. But if Obama raises taxes on those who earn that much and more, he will further reduce this already small poll of qualified home buyers.
Is this important? Take McLean, Virginia. There are almost 500 homes for sale and over half of them have asking prices of over $1 million. That is 200 homes in one area for over a million and half of those homes are going for over $2 million.
As it stands now, a very small percentage of the population makes that much money. All the better for Senator Obama to pick on them as the voice of opposition is small. For those looking to sell their expensive homes their one main option will be to reduce their asking prices to reposition the homes to match the new reduced income levels. You might even say that this is a good thing for the poor. Unfortunately that is not incorrect. Most poor would need to increase their income to be better able to afford their own homes. Senator Obama is not promising to do that if he becomes President. What he is promising to do is to have the Government provide more services and to force employers to provide better benefits to employees.
So what do you think is going to happen to salaries if:
- Companies have to pay more tax to the Government.
- If your health care is company-provided through Government Regulation.
- You have to pay no income tax (Keeping all your income)
- The Government adds to your income with refundable tax credits
The result is increased compensation, but not increased income. Your immediate needs might be better met, but you have less cash to decide how to use as you please. And if the Government is taking care of you and deciding how your employer needs to take care of you, those are all sorts of responsibilities that no longer need to be taken into account which certainly does nothing to pressure employers to increase your pay. In fact, it increases the likelihood that more money goes to the Government instead of you!
--------------------
--------------------
Reference: See the distribution of houses for McLean below. As you can see, the picking lower on the list are pretty slim. Also note that while housing might be overly expensive in this area, the area also has a healthly supply of well-paying jobs for those who are qualified to hold them.
Everyone is discussing Barack Obama's attempt to explain to a plumber why it is a great idea to take more money away from people like this hard working plumber, and give the money to other people who would never do a plumber's job:
"Your new tax plan is going to tax me more, isn't it?" the plumber asked, complaining that he was being taxed "more and more for fulfilling the American dream."
"It's not that I want to punish your success. I just want to make sure that everybody who is behind you, that they've got a chance for success too," Obama responded. "My attitude is that if the economy's good for folks from the bottom up, it's gonna be good for everybody ... I think when you spread the wealth around, it's good for everybody." - (Found at National Review's 'The Corner')
Who is behind a plumber? Growing up I had two neighbors who were plumbers. They both owned their own businesses. Despite being owners they both did most of their own work, although one was a bigger business than the other and employed other plumbers. Two of my brothers would work with them over the summer. I didn't, well simply because I saw how difficult the work was and decided that it was not for me. I am not sure who Obama thinks is behind a plumber, but in my experience, you are not standing behind a plumber for very long unless you are doing hard work. After all, pipes don't fix themselves.
I do find is very amusing that Obama is telling a plumber that the reason he wants to increase his taxes is to 'spread the wealth' that the plumber is earning through hard work with people not willing or able to do that work themselves. For some reason Obama seems to think that these people are providing some sort of support with his reference to 'everyone behind him'. Well, I know that if you are standing behind a plumber, you going to be put to work, either holding a flashlight, handing a wrench or lifting some pipe, a radiator or even a water heater. In exchange the plumber then pays them a salary. That is how the system works, when politicians are not promising people a salary for doing nothing. (Other than voting Democrat). That's called welfare.
However, for most people, the only 'support' they are going to provide a plumber is when they put their 'behind' on a toilet and when done flush it. Maybe the plumber should have advised Senator Obama that he has plenty of something other than money that he can share and doesn't need any more of it in the form of the Senator's tax plan BS.
Senator Obama's free-for-all position on abortion is disgraceful. Lucky for him, abortion has yet to be a real issue during this election. That's too bad for the rest of us since his position on abortion is so extreme that it would probably even sway voters who do not see abortion as a real issue away from him.(See note below)
Take this video using Obama's Own stated position on abortion against him:
Then there is this hard to understand cruel position he took while an Illinois State Senator:
When Obama was in the Illinois Senate, the Born Alive Infants bill came up three successive years.
In 2001, three bills were proposed to help babies who survived induced labor abortions. One, like the federal Born Alive Infants bill, simply said a living "homo sapiens" wholly emerged from his mother should be treated as a "'person,' 'human being,' 'child' and 'individual.'"
On all three bills, Obama voted "present," effectively the same as a "no." Defining "a pre-viable fetus" that survived an abortion as a "person" or "child," he argued, "would essentially bar abortions, because the Equal Protection Clause does not allow somebody to kill a child, and if this is a child, then this would be an anti-abortion statute."
In 2002, Obama voted "no" on the bill. - Human Events
John McCain's VP pick Sarah Palin has started to talk about the abortion issue. It is about time this be discussed. As I discuss in earlier posts linked below, I think if people were a little more responsible in practicing safe birth control, there would be so many less unwanted pregnancies that this country would have to deal with and this issue would not be such a divisive one as it is now.
Note: I myself think that abortion should be legal but that politicians should do much more than to teach women about their right to abort a baby while doing nothing to teach then how not to get pregnant in the first place. I guess being ignorant is a right too, eh? So, I don't want you to have a baby you don't want to take care of. There are just much better ways to avoid getting into that situation...
No, I'm not talking about the housing bailout. Seems that my wife and I missed out on that one for foolishly thinking that houses in Northern Virginia were overpriced. Nobody told us that we wouldn't have to pay a mortgage.
So, instead of kicking ourselves that we didn't go wild and purchase a house we couldn't afford and then refinancing it to buy nice new cars, new furniture and electronics and then reward all our 'hard work' with a nice long vacation, we thought that it might be a good idea to get ourselves in line for the next Government bailout.
The big question is where will bailout mania strike next? If I had to guess, I would say a bailout of national Credit card debt.
This is the perfect place for the Government to help fix the economy. There are two ways this will work. First, it will give many Americans a 'clean slate' and remove a huge burden that is preventing them from buying more things to power the economy forward. Second, by paying off lots of credit card debt, the Government will help re-capitalize banks that are currently neck deep in accounts with maxed-out credit card limits.
Remember, you can't collect on ANY BAILOUT if you have no debt. Don't feel guilty. For sure nobody else is. I bet that the Democrats will even call carrying massive credit card debt as 'Patriotic'. So be sure to do your duty...
See, this is what bad behavior breeds. Even more bad behavior.
--------------------
Note: Remember, that at the end of the day, you are ultimately responsible for your actions, at least until you die or the Government relieves you of that responsibility. This is my way of sarcastically responding what I consider to be bad Government. Want advise, talk to a lawyer or accountant!
The Democrats talk about doing whatever to stop money flowing out of the country for energy needs, and yet there is all this energy at home that, if its use is increased, will create many new jobs and lessen the need for foreign oil. Even better, there is so much coal that the US can greatly increase production for export to help foreign countries meet their own demands for more energy. This would be a great way to get back some of those many dollars sent out of the country...
