Saturday, October 11, 2008

The Blog To End All Blogs

This will probably be the last time I bother wasting anyone else's time with these blogs, much less my own. Not that anyone is actually reading them anyway. It's kinda funny actually; everyone seems to be opening it up, but I doubt many actually read it through. Oh well. There's just a few more things I wanna get off my chest before I give it up though.

I guess I'm going to try to sum up most of what I've talked about before and add a few extra details that I didn't get into to help explain them.

First of all, I have a question to ask though. Why does it seem like everyone is waiting on someone else to change something for them? Everyone expects things to change without having to actually do anything different themselves. The front-runner in the presidential race has based his entire campaign on one word: "change". Everyone wants it. You probably couldn't find anyone today who really thinks this country is headed in the right direction. But how can anyone actually believe that, despite the fact that our current President is a Republican, another Democrat is the one who can bring us the change we're looking for?...Or anyone from the two major parties for that matter? I think I've hit this point several times before though, so I won't dwell on it any longer. I just think Americans need to remember that (as much as I despise him) this started long before ol' Bush ever even arrived on the scene. I mean he'd only been in office for 8 months when 9/11 happened. Conspiracy theories aside, what could he have done to bring that on so fast?

Like I talked about in my last blog, during the last "debate" Obama was trying to mislead Americans into thinking we've been living under a conservative leadership, that supports free-market capitalism; and that it was this lack of regulation over the economy that was to blame for our current economic crisis. Despite the fact that the main cause of the problem stemmed from the passing of the Community Reinvestment Act, which forced banks to grant loans out to undesirable borrowers who couldn't afford to repay them. In addition, after we were taken off of the gold standard the Federal Reserve has been allowed to print money without having anything of value to back it with. Thus causing rapid inflation and allowing for drastic government overspending; the national debt began to pile up at a record pace, while the lower and middle classes struggled to get by and simply afford the basic necessities. One of the other mistakes that the Federal Reserve continues to make in an effort to "stimulate" the economy is lowering interest rates. On the surface this might seem like a good thing. Especially if your looking to buy a new home. But what this has done is caused over-construction and left the supply of homes at a much higher level than the demand for them. Apparently this makes them kinda hard to sell...or pay back.

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Okay, so now we have the housing market collapse and we need to do something about it. So, what does the Federal Reserve do? First it pumps hundreds of billions of dollars into the market (after they printed it out of thin air), then along with the treasury secretary, they decided to start bailing out all of these banks whose collapse they were responsible for. That doesn't sound so bad until you remember who's money they're spending in order to do so.

Not so much the folks on Wall Street, but believe me, these big bankers are rakin' it in right now at our expense. And what's worse, even more so at our children's expense. Now this bailout bill that just passed has given LIMITLESS power to the treasury secretary, to bailout any and every bank he feels like. This is non-reviewable. Meet the new Czar of the treasury department...Henry Paulson. I bet his buddies at Goldman Sachs will be livin' it up (even more so than before).

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Enough about the economy. It's safe to say, it's not goin' so well. And neither the Democrats nor the Republicans have offered up a viable solution to anything going on with it right now. They both just want more and more government intervention, the very cause of the problem in the first place.

The economy isn't the only area where the government is consistently pushing for more government intervention however. Watching the debates you might have noticed that if you can overlook the issue of the economy, they've kind of gotten us into another World War. They just talk about it like it's routine procedure nowadays though. Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Russia,
Venezuela, North Korea...no big deal. We're spending a trillion dollars a year maintaining our empire around the world. Nation building and the spread of democracy are pretty much an accepted part of both major parties platforms now. Both parties leave the possibility of a nuclear first strike on the table. Speaking of which, has anyone really thought about what would happen if any country dropped a nuclear bomb on another? If not the absolute end of the world, it would be the beginning of it (the end that is). I don't consider myself a Christian, but I think the Bible did mention something about the end of the world coming by fire...scary thought.

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Point is, we need to stop worrying about what countries have what, and instead do everything we can to get along with them. What gives us the right to say we can have these weapons, but they can't? Because we're afraid of them? Who's to say they don't feel the same way towards us? I find it odd that the conservatives are the ones who typically support these wars now, yet they oppose gun control in their own country. Isn't that kind of the same premise? If every country in the world owned their own nuclear weapons, who would seriously even think about dropping one on somebody else? The same rule applies to gun control. If everyone owned one, the world would either have to learn how to live in peace, or we'd all just kill each other.

People who support gun control, like people who support these wars, probably do so because they've been given a false image of gun-owners. They don't understand them; and what you don't understand you typically fear. Just as, many people fear the idea of Islamic or other countries owning certain weapons.

On the subject of guns: in a perfect world we'd never need them; but now that they're here, trying to control them would only be terribly devastating. Not only would that still leave the criminals with guns, but what's probably worse, the government as well (you know, the ones who take part of your paycheck by force...legally).

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That pretty much covers the only issues being debated by the two major candidates right now, but I guess I kind of have a different idea than either of them on how to solve either of them. In fact, when you consider my position, you have to admit that neither of the two seem to differ much. But there are, I think...a few other issues that most Americans probably need to take a little time to reconsider their positions on.

First of all, I don't know why I even need to mention the so-called "Patriot" Act? Does anybody know when they plan on giving us our rights back? Somehow I don't think it'll be anytime soon (or ever). But that's okay I guess. I mean it's the patriotic thing to do right? Sacrifice a little liberty for safety (Jefferson rolls in his grave). Personally I'm more afraid of my own government and it's actions than I am of some radical Islamists in some third world country. If it comes down to it, I'll be the first to pick up a gun to defend my family and country, but only after I know what is truly at stake. They claimed the attacks on 9/11 were an attack on our freedoms, yet our courageous President Bush was so quick to sign them over.

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Then of course there's the war on drugs. Next they should probably declare a war on cigarettes, alcohol, greasy foods, and pre-marital sex. Since, If your a little overweight or something, it's the government's responsibility to put you on the proper diet. Then the taxpayer's are forced to pay for it, and then our police force is sent to sacrifice their lives for it. Of course if you don't stick to the diet, they'll just lock you up. They'll have to release some rapist from prison to make room for you, but...that's okay because there's a war on obesity going on you know.

The worst part is, the war on drugs wasn't a war that was ever meant to be won, and it never will be. It was just meant to be sustained like so many others. And like the rest, it just allows the government to increase the overall size and scope of their powers. If they were really interested in ending harmful drug use, and even cutting down on crime rates; they'd legalize drugs. Hell, maybe they could even give extra low interest loans to potential drug dealers to lead the drug market to a similar fate as they've done to the housing market.

Actually there is a drug that is illegal in this country, which with one use is said to end any addiction you may have. I can't actually remember the name of the drug off-hand, but I believe it was the guitarist from the Steve Miller Band who used it once to cure a 20 year heroin addiction. He never touched either drug again, however being classified as a mind-altering drug it was criminalized and forced out of the country rather than leaving it up to physicians to control and dispense the drug as they saw fit.

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One issue I have actually heard the candidates mention a thing or two about is energy independence. It seems like it might be to little too late however. We've long had the capabilities to provide for our own energy independence and have yet to do anything about it. In fact, over 100 years ago a scientist by the name of developed a way to wirelessly transmit free and unlimited energy all over the world. Why haven't we heard anything about it?...His big investor was a banker by the name of J.P. Morgan, who upon hearing of his discoveries pulled out of the project seeing as how there was no way to profit from it.

Aside from that we've got wind power, solar power, hydro-electric power and so on. Why are we so hooked on petroleum burning vehicles and fossil fuel burning power plants? Is it really us, or is that just all that we've ever been offered? I remember how ridiculous GM's EV1 looked back when it first came out. It almost seems like they made it as ugly as possible just so no one would buy it. I just recently learned however, that when they couldn't sell all of them, GM actually had
all of these cars CRUSHED! Now there's a new car company stepping up out of California, named after the same man I mentioned earlier, called Tesla Motors. They make an all electric vehicle that can go from 0-60 mph in under 4 seconds. Not only that but the car will go for some 240 miles between charges. Now, how could none of the three big automakers come up with a way to do this, yet some small start-up company out in California manages to do it all on their own?

GM's EV1

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Tesla's Roadster

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I guess what it comes down to is this; if you don't do something about what is going on in this world, chances are nobody will. Everyone seems to be too caught up in their own little world, and all the dramas it unfurls. All the while there are people who are stealing our country away from us (along with our wallets). Alone or not, I am not going to sit back and let this happen to my country. If you are ready for a real change in this country then stand up and make something happen. Every election year our choices get worse and worse, and the longer we continue to vote for the lesser of two evils, the longer we allow this problem to perpetuate itself. Too many people think they can avoid the inevitable by picking the candidate who is least likely to completely destroy the country. At some point we will have to accept the fact that the world we have created for ourselves will assuredly come crashing down; at which point we will be forced to start anew. Seeing as how, I am more to blame than my children will be, I hope this change comes sooner rather than later. There will come a time when every man, woman, and child will have to go to the streets, and stand armed and ready to resist the tyranny to which this nation is facing. There will come a time when this country is forced to witness yet another, true revolution. And there will come a time when we have to choose whether we want to make history, or if we want to make the statistics. There's no time left to wait for anyone else to make change for us. It is time we stand up and make it for ourselves. Every revolution starts with one lone individual. I am ready for this kind of change, the question is...are you?

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Thursday, October 9, 2008