The totally naked half-truth...

I suppose a million bucks is a lot of money.  Enough money it seems to bring out some strange people with stranger acts.  Perhaps even stranger is the jackass that made the proposal in the first place.  I digress, supposing someone just ran naked in front of me, and the only thing standing between that man and a million smackeroos is my say so, I'd probably give him the nod, just so he didn't make an ass out of himself for nothing.  If I were the president, and I was pushing the economy, and this guy was poor, and he needed the million, I'd give him the nod.   What better way to stimulate spending than giving some poor minority a million dollars to spend (think Elvis)?  Obama, give him his million.  He might just stimulate spending.  I'd buy some stuff if I had an extra million.  Wouldn't you?  Nope, I doubt it, you're still spending trillions of our dollars.  Hey, jackass that made the proposal in the first place, give him his damn money, or else, be a lying democrat, up to you.

J-

Diversify Diversify Diversify

Any great portfolio manager knows that for any future (hopefully) retiree, diversification is the key to staying afloat in up and down markets. In this case diverse is ideal. Diverse is however, conversely, ultimately and extremely wrong when filling positions dealing with the managers of these portfolios. At what point should we hire a woman who is less qualified to manage our money than the man that may already be managing it? At what point does it make sense to appoint someone to manage mutual funds because their skin is different? At what point does it make sense to employ anyone who is less qualified than the person who is most qualified because of skin color, religion, sexual orientation or any number of other diverse diversities? If a black lesbian woman who is half of a set of co-joined twins is the most qualified person to manage the mutual funds that I'm purchasing, please, hire her. If there is a white man who is the most qualified, hire him. Don't base decisions about my money, my livelihood, my retirement (hopefully) on quotas. There is a little paid attention to provision in the new legislation to control Wall Street that provides for an "affirmative action" type hiring within federal financial positions. Please Americans, wake up. If we crazy "racist" white people don't wake up, we'll end up three hundred years down the road complaining about the "new affirmative action" to make up for the economic slavery that was imposed on us.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/07/10/financial-overhaul-provision-promote-diversity-hiring-federal-agencies-stirs/

J-Reverse Discrimination

You get what you pay for... usually

Thanks for the phone call buddy, I'm glad I'm paying for your health care. I'd have helped before if you'd have asked (& we'd have saved money that way). =)

I was marinating T-bones tonight (from a holstein steer, not angus, and it was given to me, not bought, so get over the steak thing you crazy liberals), and I put the steaks into a bag from Wal-Mart. A "Great Value" bag. Great Value bags are not a great value. One of the steaks went on the floor, three quarters of the marinade went on me. I was pissed. You get what you pay for (and that's why The "mart" has stopped replacing "name brand" products with inferior "great value" ones). Usually, you get what you pay for.

I've been paying into Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Gov't programs of no specificity for many years now. Medicare and Medicaid are going to suffer cuts now. Don't listen to whatever the silly democrats are saying. I'm not upset about that in itself. I'm upset because the money I've been paying into these programs will likely never benefit me. I'm upset because I've not been given a choice to enroll into these programs. It seems to me that because I'm able bodied and have a strong work ethic, I'm screwed. I've not taken a dime in unemployment in my life, nor do I suppose I'll ever have to. I'd start my own business first. There are so many problems with gov't healthcare involvement. Where do we start?

How about death panels?
Lines at the doctor?
Limited tests for sickness?
Limited treatment for sicknesses you may have gotten a limited test for?

It is my understanding that ligaments in your knee are not important to the Social medicine world so long as you can still walk. That's nice. I don't think if I still had a torn ACL I'd be able to do my job. Those of you who know me will understand. If they hadn't have fixed it years ago I'd be fat lazy and on disability. Well, no, I'd have overcomed adversity and figured something out. But I wouldn't be where I am now. If ligaments are negotiable, is this still the greatest country on earth? I believe in one stroke of the pen we moved closer to tyranny than anyone even realizes.

My grandfather died. Many people have had that happen. If yours was as close to you as mine was to me, I'm sorry. Mine would be proud that I'm using him to illustrate this example. He died of an aortic aneurysm. He was in the hospital for less than a full day before he died. His hospital bill was over 40 grand. Why was it so high you may ask? The answer is that he had the best in the area working to save him. The answer is that the best charged under 20 grand. Where you may ask is the rest of that cost? BLOOD Blood was the single largest cost of his hospital stay. Seeing that blood was the largest cost of the end of his life (I'm crying now. Love you Grandpa) why is that the important part of this message? What can the government do to reduce that cost? How will they deal with these situations? My grandfather may have just been turned away due to costs. Or, more likely, the government may just try to "mandate" blood "donations". Think about that one for a bit.

Since the great depression one thing has changed that has been perhaps that biggest downfall of our country. Our adhesion to religion. Why have we gone away? The government has done more and more to replace our Deity. The government will do it's best to entirely replace Him and then we'll be communist. That was a Glenn Beck-like statement. Sorry. Liberals have been trying for nearly a century now, and they will continue to try. In 1900, the church and the family was the social security, the medicare, and the medicaid. By 1940 and FDR's legacy, things had changed. By 1970 and LBJ and the "meds", things had changed more. What more responsibility does the church have to its neighbors? So, consequently money that was being used at home was going overseas to do it's good.

In every war we've had, an economic upturn would follow. That was possibly true while we were on the gold standard. Now, we borrow money from our enemies to fight a war against them.

My current state of mind is proof that liberalism and liberal conduct can drive a person insane. I apologize for the state of this blog. But I don't apologize for the state of our Union. That's their (socialist liberals) fault.

The point of most of this post has been that you get what you pay for unless you pay the government for what you pay for, then you don't. Nice easy, understandable statement.

For anyone following this blog, you've seen me write "squeezing the pig" a number of times. You may have been waiting with bated breath for the squeezing the pig essay. Now, a concise estimate of squeezing the pig.

SIN TAX

Anyone scared yet? I bet in the next few years you'll see that sins don't just consist of tobacco firearms and alcohol. You'll see that other things will be sin taxed. Fatty Foods. Sugary Foods. Electricity. Nuclear Energy. Cell Phones. Cars. Walking. Working. Preparing food in your own kitchen. Not preparing food in your own kitchen. Waking up. Breathing.

All of these things can be hazardous to your health. Since the government is going to be the one to lose the money, because they will insure us all, they can propose and will pass taxes on these activities. AND MORE. It's bad enough that the cigarette tax and alcohol tax is astronomical. It's bad enough that you can barely even buy a firearm. It's worse if your Coke and Cheeseburger cost you 14% tax. That's tyranny. I was going to spend time telling you about how just "squeezing the pigs" (meaning smokers, drinkers) would be pointless because you'd just end up with less pigs, but then after today I realized that there was more than one reason to call someone a pig (talking on a cell, eating out, drinking soda). So, sin taxes are infinitive. Let's not let them go there.

I'm exhausted. Bye.

J-

Squeezing the pig... Or not.

I'm just not ready to divulge the insights of the pig. You'll have to deal with this.

After years of trying to put my finger on the "problem" with this wonderful country, I've finally figured it out. There is one blaring problem with our society. So enormous, so all-encompassing, so draining to our society, to our government, so impossible to live without (for now), that I can't believe it took me this long to figure it out. Everyone in this country, legal, illegal, black, white, red, yellow, living and sometimes dead has probably dealt with elevated blood pressure due to this entity. It costs taxpayers hundreds annually, directly, and perhaps thousands indirectly. It costs the government a possibly astronomical amount of dough. Every year, perhaps every six months or less, they try to raise revenue to "get out of the red". Every year, perhaps every six months it doesn't work. The truth is, it never will. Any guesses?

The USPS is this mucho grande villain. They tempt us with pretty stamps that cost what, $0.42, no wait, that was two weeks ago. Now those same stamps are worthless unless you go and buy a $0.02 stamp to make them work again. I wonder how much it costs to produce a 2 cent stamp? I can't imagine it costs nothing. Lets just imagine that a 2 cent stamp costs 1 cent to print. Then that 2 cent stamp that is only worth 1 cent to the USPS has to be sold to consumers. Someone has to be paid to sell that stamp to the consumer. That person, undoubtedly, is unionized. So, someone making $30 an hour is selling this 2 cent stamp that is only worth 1 cent to the USPS. If the average transaction takes 2 minutes to complete (HAHA) at the Post Office, that employee was just paid $.10 to sell those particular 2 cent stamps. So, just to break even on the 2 cent stamps they have to sell 10 2 cent stamps. Now, if most people are like me, they probably buy as few stamps as they have to because they know they'll be nearly worthless in six months, most people are going to only buy a few at a time. Now, I've been in line at the post office a few times in my life. Not once have I ever been in and out in 2 minutes. Every second that someone is wasting selling a 2 cent stamp puts the USPS further in debt. This is a never ending cycle. The good thing is, if everyone just bought "forever" stamps we could end this cycle in a few years. Buy them now. Don't ever buy a stamp again. What would they do then? If no one needed to buy stamps because they had "forever" stamps, how could they raise revenues?

Now, at the beginning I said that this was the "one" blaring problem with our country. The point is, that if the government has their hands in it, it's going to fail unless they "steal" our money to "bail" it out. It applies to everything the government does. If Chrysler was going to fail before, they're going to descend to the depths of hell now. If Citibank was going to fail before, well, you get the idea. Now, with all that said, who wants government controlled health care?

J-

PS- Apparently the only place you can get a 2 cent stamp is the post office. The sane business entities realize there is no money selling a 2 cent stamp...