The true class warfare is the political class against the citizen class. If you haven’t noticed, the politicians want us to “fight” among ourselves and to take the real focus off of them. It’s amazing how politicians never refer to themselves as rich or wealthy. They don’t want the average citizen to realize that they are also doing financially well. How could the American people who are less fortunate to vote for them if they too are rich and “not paying their fair share”?

While I agree that a good portion of our population is not making ends meet because of their income. Approximately 15% of the U.S. population is living under the poverty level set by the federal government. Currently a family of four making 22,314 is considered to be living at the poverty level. I do agree that making 22,314 a year to support a family of four is low for today’s standard of living, we must also think about where in the country the family is living in. There’s a difference between living in New York City and Mobile, Alabama when you think of the cost of living in those areas. A family may make it just fine in Alabama, but they sure wouldn’t in the Big Apple.

Politicians also like to use the poor as their personal puppets in the battle against the Republicans. It’s a shame that the media doesn’t do a better job in disseminating the facts form the myths. Here are just some facts about the condition the poor are in.

*The typical “poor” household in America has a car
*78% of “poor” households in America have air conditioning
*64% of “poor” households in America have cable or satellite TV .. most have
two TVs, along with a DVD player and VCR
*Most “poor” households in America with children have a gaming system such
as an Xbox or PlayStation
*38% of “poor” households in America have a personal computer
*Most “poor” households in America have a refrigerator, an oven and stove,
and a microwave. They also have other household appliances such as a
clothes washer, clothes dryer, ceiling fans, a cordless phone, and a coffee
maker.
*The typical “poor” American has more living space than the average European.
*The typical “poor” American family is able to obtain medical care when needed.
*The average “poor” household in America claims to have sufficient funds to meet all essential needs.

If you look around the world you will see that most poor people in other countries don’t have it as good as “poor” Americans. We as a whole are doing better than the rest of the world so we need to stop this class warfare game and realize that we live in the best country in the world. If we don’t and we continue to let the politicians use this tactic to get average people fighting among themselves, they (politicians) will be the only winners.

Why is it that we allow our representative and Senators to disregard what is expected of them to do while serving as a public servant? Why is it that these same politicians will come looking for us to vote them back into office when they know they did a lousy job the last term? It’s because they think they’re doing the right thing for the American people. I say it’s time for them to wake up and realize that they’ve screwed this county for years to come.

As a responsible family man, I’m required to look over my finances and make decisions on what are the priorities in our lives to make it work for us. I take the time to re-evaluate our income and expenses every six months. I do that since I work for myself and things change on both sides of the equation. Some months I make more and other times not. The same goes for the bills. I’m always crunching numbers to see where I can maximize the capitol I have to work with. Too bad Congress and the president can’t do the same.

I recently read an article about how balancing the budget for Washington is much different than for the individual. I say BULL! Washington needs to do the same as all who have to balance their books. Need it be a corporation, an individual or the federal government. In the article, the author states that during a poor economy, Washington will spend more because of programs like unemployment. While that may be true, it still doesn’t explain why in the state of Florida, Workforce Agency of Florida spent $14,000 of tax payers money to buy capes. That’s right superhero capes with a cartoon figure of Dr. Evil Unemployment for the unemployed. You can’t make this crap up. The agency felt that doing this would help them connect with the community better. The unemployment office is not there to better connect with the community, it’s there to help the community get a job.

We now have Obama coming out next week with his new plan to help create jobs. Of course we saw how the last one went…$878 Billion and we now have a higher unemployment rate and a trillion dollars in added debt. The article does say that when the economy is doing good, the federal government should not be running a deficit. Since when has there been a group of politicians that didn’t spend the tax payer’s money like a drunken sailor? It’s unlikely that this bunch of career politicians will do anything positive for the economy and the country as long as they’re in office.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Vote all of the current politicians out of office the next time they’re up for re-election.

The double standard that goes on within Washington is ridiculous. No matter which political party is in control, the same games are played against the other. Here’s a quote from the then Congresswoman Hillary Clinton (D-NY)

“I am sick and tired of people who say that if you debate and you disagree with this administration somehow you’re not patriotic. We should stand up and say: We are Americans and we have a right to debate and disagree with any administration.”
— Hillary Clinton, April 28, 2003

That’s right, these words were spoken by our current Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton. She made these comments when the republicans had control of the House and the Senate. Hillary is absolutely correct. We, as Americans have the right, given to us by the Constitution, to have the choice to agree or disagree with our elected officials.

Now years later when the shoe is on the other foot, it’s wrong for Americans to disagree with the Obama Administration. It seems that when any group or another political party go against the current power, they’re considered wrong and will be referred to as “extremist’, “fanatic” or a “racist” Of course let’s not forget the favorite one of the Obama Administration and Democrats alike,… Wait for it…

“terrorists”.

Well let them call me whatever they want and I don’t care about it one bit. As long as this country has been in existence, it’s citizens have had the right to speak up against what our politicians are doing (or not doing) for this country. Since the 2008 election, the TEA Party and other constitutional minded groups have been speaking up and making a difference with the mindset of others who are typically unconcerned with the political BS that goes on. These groups have woken the sleeping giant, which is the patriotic American people. We will save this country from the Socialistic policies of the current administration and bring it back to the smaller, limited government that it was meant to be. It’s just going to take awhile for it to happen since the policies of both parties have been changing this Republic for over 50 years.

Economist say that it will probably have little (if any) impact on the economy. The reason for that is, none of the cuts come until 2014. Many economists and the Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke advised Congress that cutting too much too soon could hurt the weak economy. They also recommended that reduced spending over the long term would help the economy.

According to the deal, discretionary spending would be cut $21 billion next year and $42 billion in 2013. Social Security Medicare and Medicaid will not be touched, as the more “politically aware” knew would happen. It was a scare tactic all along. A political tool that the politicians, both Republicans and Democrats alike, use against the other. What kills me is the fact that these cuts will only add up to about 0.2% of the entire economy’s output for that time period.

The rest of the cuts will come over a period of 10 years (why always 10?). The first phase will reduce spending by $917 billion and the second phase will add another $1.5 trillion which will be decided by a congressional committee. So let’s create another committee to look into something else the government screwed up on.

The politicians we have in Washington are trying to “fix” the problem in which they caused in the first place. Let’s face it, we are going to face the pain one day for the actions of our past. We need to cut the spending now, not over a period of 10 years. Don’t get me wrong, I know it shouldn’t be immediately. No matter what they (politicians) tell us I know the economy is struggling and as for a recovery, the past two years, the federal government has been hindering it from really happening.

I (like many of you) haven’t read this bill/deal/sellout yet, but I’m sure there’s some scary stuff in it. One thing stated in the deal is that if lawmakers fail to reach a deal on the second round of cuts, The Pentagon’s budget will automatically be cut by $500 billion.

All I can say is that this deal made it possible for all of the politicians to pass this issue off once again until after another election. OK, they avoided default, but let’s be for real, the credit agencies can still go ahead and down grade the United States.

Which in turn will cause interest rates to go up for everyone.

That is what the cost will be for the American people. Higher rates in a time when the economy is in the toilet (and will remain for some time), unemployment is at 9.2% (until the July report comes out on Friday) and the financial future of this country is still unknown.

There are billions of dollars being spent on programs that do nothing to increase jobs in America or to raise GDP. Instead of talking about those items, both parties are using scare tactics about Social Security and Medicare. Two things that will get the American voter engaged in doing something next year at the booth.

At the same time, the Democrats are feeling the pressure from the labor unions telling the Dems to stand firm on Social Security and Medicare. While I strongly believe in keeping the benefits of the two programs in place, there are other areas of the programs that can be cut. Such as administration costs of the program. We all know that government offices have to many employees in each of the different offices. They can not tell us that there is no way to cut at least 15-20% of staff within each of the programs. Most of the system is automated and to have so many employees in the system is taxing on the program itself.

The federal government has known about this issue for months now and have touched on the subject, but they wait until now to really get involved in it. Why is it that they wait until the last minute to do something? It’s because with the pressure of time, they can push the bill through quickly and claim later on that they didn’t realize what was in the bill since they didn’t get adequate amount of time to go through it. Of course the American people have short-term memory and forget that they waited and that’s what the politicians hope for, so they can do it again.

So as we see the politicians are trying to draft anything to get a majority of the politicians to vote yes on extending the debt. The Republicans in the House of Representatives have unveiled a two-tier plan that will cut $1.2 trillion over a ten year period and will only raise the debt ceiling for a few months. Obama has already expressed that he will not sign it because it’s a temporary fix.

Meanwhile the Democrats have presented their own plan to cut @2.7 trillion over the next ten years, but with a debt limit hike that will carry it through the 2012 elections. An election where Obama and many lawmakers will be up for re-election.

As we see over the last decade that the situation is getting worse as in the politicians doing what is necessary to get the fiscal condition of this country back in order. It’s always a temporary fix and not a permanent one. Each time the debt ceiling has come into play, politicians never cut the spending that is needed, instead they draft plans that cut spending in the future, not in the present. What happens is the cuts never come, but the spending and the raising of taxes always do.

We are coming to the end of the fuse and if we, the American people don’t do something to change the mindset of Washington, we will be finished sooner than later. This has gone on for way to long and it will come to an end one way or another.

On Friday, Representative Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tx) insinuated in a very strong manner that some members of Congress are against raising the debt ceiling because President Obama‘s race.

On the House floor this past Friday Jackson Lee is quoted, “I do not understand what I think is the maligning and maliciousness [toward] this president,” said Jackson Lee, a member of the Congressional Black Caucus. “Why is he different? And in my community, that is the question that we raise. In the minority community that is question that is being raised. Why is this president being treated so disrespectfully? Why has the debt limit been raised 60 times? Why did the leader of the Senate continually talk about his job is to bring the president down to make sure he is unelected?”

She also had the nerve to say that Obama has been targeted like no other president before him. Her comment being, “I am particularly sensitive to the fact that only this president — only this one, only this one — has received the kind of attacks and disagreement and inability to work, only this one,” said Jackson Lee from the House floor.

“Read between the lines,” she continued. “What is different about this president that should put him in a position that he should not receive the same kind of respectful treatment of when it is necessary to raise the debt limit in order to pay our bills, something required by both statute and the 14th amendment?”

“I hope someone will say that what it appears to be is not in fact accurate,” said Lee. “But historically it seems to be nothing more.”

I would like to inform Ms. Jackson lee that we can no longer pay our debt as a notion because of all of the other times that Congress raised the debt ceiling. It has nothing to do with anything else. In 2006 when G.W.Bush wanted to raise the debt ceiling (which was wrong then too in my opinion), the Democrats fought against it. What has changed the minds of the left to want to do it now? Is it because they have the power or are they the ones who are being racist?

“Tonight’s speech was a reminder that, for decades, the policies of Republicans and Democrats alike have failed. Libertarians are asking people to take matters into their own hands. Instead of just complaining, we’re encouraging ordinary Americans to step up and run for Congress on the Libertarian Party ballot line.

I can say exactly the same thing about President Obama’s speech tonight that I said about George W. Bush’s State of the Union speech in January 2008: ‘Tonight’s State of the Union address went much as expected. Instead of calling for a more limited role of the federal government in American society, the President laid out plans that would only increase the government’s intervention into the realm of economics, health care, education and foreign policy.

I am weary of the President’s unspoken premise that only government–indeed, only the federal government–can accomplish good in our society.

President Obama seems to be totally blind to the concept that government can cause problems rather than solve them. His speech was filled with ‘More’: more handouts, more spending, more programs, more bailouts, more regulations. We Libertarians want less government, not more.

Not to be outmatched by the Democrats, the Republican Party conveyed its lack of seriousness in addressing this nation’s government spending problems by having Bob McDonnell, Virginia Governor for eleven (11) days, deliver its rebuttal to the President. If they were really serious about addressing the dire fiscal circumstances of this nation, they would have had Paul Ryan, a six-term congressman from Wisconsin, who has proposed the most serious plan of anyone in the two older parties to keep us from going off a fiscal cliff.

Last week, Alan Auerbach, Professor of Economics and Law at UC Berkeley and US government fiscal policy expert, said that the Democratic and Republican parties are in a ‘death embrace’ with their government spending. The only political party that is rationally and forthrightly addressing the need to cut government spending and end our culture of ever expanding entitlements is the Libertarian Party.

As Americans lose hope in Obama, we Libertarians are warning voters against running back to the Republicans who got us into such big messes in the first place. Republicans started the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Republicans made the false intellectual case for bailing out banks and car companies. Republicans argued that deficits don’t matter. Republicans gave us the giant Medicare expansion bill.

The President’s suggestion of a ‘spending freeze’ was especially ludicrous and insulting to the intelligence of Americans. The amounts involved are minuscule, and Congress won’t accept them anyway. Will Obama sign the spending bills that ignore his ‘freeze’? You bet he will. Instead, the President should demand across-the-board cuts in all areas, including entitlements.

The President talked a lot about jobs. Unfortunately, the policies he supports are responsible for most of the unemployment we see today. High taxes, minimum wage laws, hiring regulations, firing regulations, mandatory unemployment benefits, and other government interference make it much more difficult for businesses to hire and keep employees. As expected, the President’s prescription is to increase the dosage of this government poison.

While our nation is declining dangerously right now, a turnaround could be straightforward and simple with steps like these: 1. Bring our troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan; 2. Stop rewarding failed companies with bailouts; 3. Cut taxes and spending and let the free market work.

Finally, on the matter of political rhetoric, I call upon the two older parties to stop spoon feeding politics to the American people as if we are a bunch of overgrown children. These are difficult times that call for more than rhetorical flourish or positioning a group of diverse people around a politician. Older party politicians need to be specific about their proposed policies, as Libertarians are.

And, I know I’m probably just wasting electrons, but can’t we go back to the days in which the President sent a copy of his speech to Congress and left it at that. The speech last night took 1/7000th of an entire year. I think the vast majority of the American people would agree that we have better ways to spend our time.”

William Redpath has served as the Chairman of the Libertarian Party since 2006. For more information, or to arrange an interview, call LP Executive Director Wes Benedict at 202-333-0008 ext. 222.

The LP is America’s third-largest political party, founded in 1971. The Libertarian Party stands for free markets and civil liberties.

The Libertarian Party is America’s third largest and fastest growing political party. Libertarians engage in a variety of projects, working for everyone’s liberty on every issue.

The Libertarian Party was created in December of 1971 by people who realized that the politicians had strayed from America’s original libertarian foundation, with disastrous results. Their vision was the same as that of America’s founders — a world where individuals are free to follow their own dreams in their own ways, a world of peace, harmony, opportunity, and abundance.

Libertarians are practical; we know we can’t make the world perfect. But, it can be better. Libertarians will keep working to create a better, freer society for everyone. As William Allen White said: “Liberty is the only thing you cannot have unless you are willing to give it to others.”

“Libertarians believe the answer to America’s political problems is the same commitment to freedom that earned America its greatness: a free-market economy and the abundance and prosperity it brings; a dedication to civil liberties and personal freedom that marks this country above all others; and a foreign policy of non-intervention, peace, and free trade as prescribed by America’s founders.”

Libertarians believe in the American heritage of liberty, enterprise, and personal responsibility. Libertarians recognize the responsibility we all share to preserve this precious heritage for our children and grandchildren.

Libertarians believe that being free and independent is a great way to live. We want a system which encourages all people to choose what they want from life; that lets them live, love, work, play, and dream their own way.

The Libertarian way is a caring, people-centered approach to politics. We believe each individual is unique. We want a system which respects the individual and encourages us to discover the best within ourselves and develop our full potential.

The Libertarian way is a logically consistent approach to politics based on the moral principle of self-ownership. Each individual has the right to control his or her own body, action, speech, and property. Government’s only role is to help individuals defend themselves from force and fraud.

The Libertarian Party is for all who don’t want to push other people around and don’t want to be pushed around themselves. Live and let live is the Libertarian way.

The latest one to make the rounds features Congresswoman Shelia Jackson Lee, a Democrat from Texas. It shows Jackson-Lee answering and talking on her cell phone while a woman from the audience is asking a question. As you watch it, it seems that this Congresswoman isn’t even listening.

The Congresswoman was a guest on the Greta Van Sustren show on Thursday to have her chance to explain. Throughout the entire segment, Congresswoman Jackson-Lee was filibustering. She was being very evasive and only wanted to get the health care message out. When Greta asked her who was on the phone (in the video), she replied, she was wasn’t trying to be rude and apologized to the woman that asked the question at the town hall meeting. She continued with pushing the health care bill and stated that she has read all 1,100 pages of the bill. She finally confessed that she was on the phone with the “Hot Line” that was set up for the politicians to get assistance during tough questions at town hall meetings. Here’s one of the clips. You decide if she is being rude.

Jackson-Lee said that what she is trying to do is to convince the people that this is what’s best. What I want to know is, why is she trying to convince anyone? I may not have read all of the bill myself, but I have read a few highlights. This bill is not a bill to reform health care, it’s going to change it completely.

It’s a shame that the people that were elected to these positions aren’t listening to the people who voted them in. The politicians in Washington aren’t listening to the American people any longer and the only way to change that is to vote them ALL out when they’re up for re-election.

It’s a shame that many (if not all) of these politicians are just going through the motions of actually listening to their voters. Quite a few of them have canceled their meeting and the ones that are having one are just trying to pacify the crowd.

Arlen Specter (Republican turned Democrat) had a meeting this morning and from the way his posture and his actions gave me the impression of not really listening to the people. When one woman asked a question about health care. She read from the Bill that at a certain age, the persons coverage would be limited. If a seventy-four year old with cancer, that patient would not be given the treatment to fight the disease. The Senator gave a snappy answer as to the statement is just a lie and 1that that is not the case for the elderly. He immediately asked for the next question and did not go into detail of the bill.

These politicians no longer care about the American people and in my opinion should be voted out of office at the first chance that they come up for re-election. Not just the Democrats, but the Republicans as well. The position of a Senator or a Representative was never meant to be a career. It seems that all politicians have forgotten the fact that they work for us, the American people. We are their base and they need to be reminded of the fact. No matter who is up for re-election, they should be removed from the position. The political ties that they have made have gotten too big.