Stuff Prez candidates should bring up

I simply do not understand why some things aren’t in the public discussion of politics.  If some Republican candidate would bring up these subjects, I guarantee it would cause a media stir and it would make him/her look like a genius. 

            Retirement.  70% of seniors say that retirement in USA is in a state of crisis.  Whenever you have 70% of anything in politics, that’s a huge issue and a sure winner for someone who gets on the right side of it.  Median savings upon retirement is $50,000.  Median SS income is $16,000.  Taking $3,000 a year out of savings gives a median income of $19,000 a year.  That’s food stamps territory.  Add health problems and see how far $19K goes.  To make matters worse, SS is collecting less than it pays out (since 2012) and left unchecked SS and MC will use up All discretionary budget funds by 2030.  “All” means no money for military, Post Office, national parks, Coast Guard rescue and a thousand other functions of government. 

            So a smart candidate needs to spell out a program.  Christie has tried this but he doesn’t spell it out in human terms that capture the dire consequences to the country.

            Military Recruitment and Education.  21 million young people are eligible for the military but we cannot recruit about 200,000 a year for the following reasons.  7 million are too obese.  6 million cannot pass the necessary tests, especially math. Many others have children or tattoos and crime records or other social/dependency problems. Our recruiters hand out lots of incentive bonuses, free college, career training, etc. yet we still fall beneath recruitment quotas every year. While physical/ health problems and social problems are a difficult problem interwoven in our society, failing a math test is just a matter of training for 99% or recruits.  What the hell is wrong with our education?! Of the 45 OECD countries (developed world) we are 28^th in math, 28^th in science, 17^th in reading.  If our local public schools can’t get it done, perhaps we need special military pre-schools that can teach stuff like how to add three 2-digit numbers in your head (necessary to assess windage corrections in rifle shooting).  Surely our kids are smarter than the ones from Appalachia and inner cities who fought bravely in Vietnam, aren’t they? I’d also relax the tattoo prohibitions in consultation with our military leaders.  Our country’s military is being forced out of existence by diabolical leadership.

            War on Women.  What women want is a society where they can freely develop a fulfilling life with their talents and destiny.  Pro-life is not war on women.  Cradle-to-grave security as a disguised form of dependency serfdom is a war on women.  You don’t become a true princess by sitting around sucking up benefits.

Climate Change.  About half the people believe that increased CO2 has caused a global warming, predicted to be 2 degrees in the next 100 years.  Chemical composition of the atmosphere, however, is just one of several effects postulated by scientists.  What someone needs to say in a debate is this.  Okay so you believe in 2 degrees due to CO2.  What about solar radiation?  It varies considerably more and we have historical records of it.  The Little Ice Age from 1309-1850 dropped temperatures 9 degrees.  The Medieval Warming was several degrees warmer.  And what about oceanic circulation.  When that changed during the Younger-Dryas 12,000 years ago, temperatures dropped 17 degrees.  And the nutation of earth’s rotation which changes axis tilt causes 30 degrees temperature drops and brings on ice ages.  Why is no one saying anything about this?  I’ll tell you why.  Because CO2 production is the only effect that allows politicians to call for socialism.  It is the only effect that government can make people feel guilty about so that government can tell you how to live and what to do.  This is how socialism works.  And does government ever truly fix anything?  I suggest we rely on private sector solutions to our CO2 production and tell government to get out of the road of the people!

            Islam. President Erdogan of Turkey, a key ally of ours, is also a conservative Muslim.  He says there is no such thing as moderate and radical Islam.  “Islam is Islam” he has said.  And there are aspects of Islam that order the followers to take over the entire world by peace or by force.  Then offer a few quotes of the Quran. Explain that these are non-abrogated passages. (Doctrine holds that there are false verses in their scripture that are overridden by later revelations.) “Terrorize the infidels and beleaguer them.  Cut off their heads and cut off their fingers.” Sura 9:3.  “Kill the infidels wherever you find them.” Sura 147:43.  Point out that the faith will not rest until Sharia Law supplants all other law.  So then the question becomes, will refugees from Syria live in quiet toleration of faiths in America?  We should only accept immigrants from Islamic states through meticulous screening and probably far less than the 200,000 that Obama is letting in from Syria.

            Liberty.  So many people say that we have a constitution based on Christianity or no religious origins. But if you ask where they got that info they are clueless.  But we founded this country on the principle of Liberty.  All the founders knew what Liberty was.  It was a term coined by John Locke, the father of modern psychology and a government philosopher who has two direct quotes in our Constitution and thoroughly influenced our founders.  Liberty means being able to follow the inner voice in your head, that is, follow your dreams, follow the Holy Spirit, follow your faith.  If you have a mission in life, be it from God or your own deduction, being allowed to follow it is the absolutely fundamental bedrock of our ideals and our Constitution.  No Liberty?  Then you are just a lousy serf of an overreaching government.   

            Try a few of these at the next debate and see if it doesn’t set off the Mainstream Media to gobbling like turkeys. And see if it doesn’t enthuse a few R voters.

Dems don't understand this

            Liberal Democrats can’t understand why everybody in rural and small town America doesn’t vote Dem.  Let me explain.

            When the Spanish conquered Latin America, they had a system called Haciendas, or plantations.  A friend of the King  or a hero got a large land grant in the new territory which of course included the Indians.  To get the Indians to agree to serfdom, the Spanish landowners used the carrot and stick method. Cattle and sheep provided a bountiful diet to the natives who had subsisted on things they could trap, fish and shoot with arrows, mainly birds and rabbits and fish.  If good beef didn’t convince the Indians, they were ruthlessly rounded up by the landowner’s army and forced into servitude. Never did it seem to cross the minds of the conquistadors that the reason the Indians wouldn’t comply was that they saw their way of life being abolished wickedly.  That’s because the Spanish were a proud people in 1500, having run the Muslims out of Spain. Triumphalism made them cock-sure they were right.  After all, they had Christianity, armies and a central government to organize things.    

            Lib Dems offer free stuff from the government.  The South and rural parts of America are the poorest and thus, progressives reason, should be gladly accepting the goodies.  But only 38% of non-college educated whites will even consider voting for a Democrat.  Why?  This puzzle has dumbfounded libs for years and was especially expressed in Frank’s book “What’s the Matter With Kansas?”  Why do the urban poor love Dems and rural poor hate them? And if the free stuff won’t work to make Democrats out of rural people, Obama has turned up the heat on small town banks and businesses making it very difficult for them to loan money and comply with mandates.  Still the folks vote R.

            The answer is the same one the Seminoles and Sioux had.  Their saw  their way of life being abolished.  People choose to live in small towns and on the farm because their love of community, closeness and the land trumps free stuff from a far-off government.  If you live in rural America everybody seems to own their own business or farm and they want freedom instead of free stuff.  In recent years the disconnect between Washington and small town America has widened and it is said that people don’t trust either party.  Now they are ready to vote for Trump. 

            I think this is only half true.  People feel left out of the American dream by a socialist President who conspires against rural America (they don’t vote for him) and by the capitulating Republicans in Congress.  But of the two, they continue to vote more and more Republican. (1200 statewide offices gained and 25 states have become solid gov+legislature Republican since 2010.)  That’s because the promise of free stuff leaves out faith and family entirely.  They are distressed that the Liberty America was founded upon is dying and we are headed to become France or Greece. 
            But the Lib Dems don't understand why these folks choose it this way.  Lib Dems are cock-sure they are right.  If you try to present another point of view, they dismiss you as a "kook". 

            So I took our foster daughter who was Mex out to the tallgrass prairie.  We parked atop a hill of waist-high bluestem with June flowers blooming and the wind blowing in our faces.  To one side were the buffalo of the preserve and to another was a herd of long horns on a private ranch.  I told her, the Spanish could have had it all and it is a tragedy they failed.  She nodded because if you are Mex, you have a love-hate relationship with the conquistadors.  Part of your ancestry is conquered Indians who were oppressively treated.  But part is Spanish who had Christianity and modernity.  The Spanish, I said, had horses, cattle culture, branding, saddles, spurs, chaps, ranches, and only they understood how you could make a fortune on grassland by raising cattle.  Mexican vaqueros invented the lariat and suddenly you could raise cattle and catch them without hurting them with a lance. And before them stretched 1.5 million square miles of prairie from Mexico City to Alberta to Illinois.  But the Spanish had a know-it-all central government that didn’t send enough ships to Mexico to even harvest the hides of the cattle.  Too many cattle roamed free and became longhorns and the horses, mustangs.  Horses were picked up by plains Indians, who suddenly could hunt buffalo, spare the time to train in warfare and became a formidable force against Spanish expansion.  Haciendas were run remotely and the serfs were not inspired.  It was a medieval system.  Only Christianity was endearing. 

            But then came the free Anglos who were inspired by their own homesteads and learned how to cowboy from the vaqueros.  Their system wasn’t central government and a king but free men running their own affairs.  If you can work, you have their respect and they invite you to join their family of community—sometimes reluctantly, but still they invite.  Strong family, hard work, get an education, love your land.  Dad, she said standing up tall, This is the life I want!    

Obama's blown opportunities

When people look back at Obama’s presidency, I think they will look at what could have been.  Liberals and Conservatives alike will see mostly tragedy.  Let me give you a few blown opportunities, places were Obama could have driven a Mack truck through the line and instead got sacked for a loss.

1. Black Youth.  Why, oh, why didn’t Obama make his family a role model for people of African ancestry?  He could have given the nation lectures on how families have to stay together and especially boys need dads.  Girls without a dad are 25 times as likely to have a troubled teenage life.  Boys are 400 times as likely. Obama could have filled a cabinet with qualified and prominent Afro-Americans and had black kids staying in school and dreaming of being an economist like Walter Williams, a surgeon like Ben Carson, or a writer like Larry Elder.  Oh, wait, those are all Republicans. 
2. He could have grown the Democrat party.  Coming in as a supposed centrist, it didn’t take long for him to show his real colors as a semi-socialist.  But think of the destruction of the GOP that could have taken place by a charismatic and popular centrist preaching the message of multiculturalism.  Instead, Obama has elected more R’s than any Democrat in history.  R’s have gained 900 legislative seats in state legislatures (about 5000 seats in all state legislatures combined) and if you also count state officers R’s have net gained 1200.
3. The VA, a perennial bureaucratic disaster, could have been cleaned up.  Now, in the continuing saga, R’s are talking about a voucher program to replace it. 
4. The Stimulus didn’t.  Instead it doubled the national debt with no effect on the economy.  Proof of this is to compare the growth of M2 with time vs. all deposits in banks and Federal Reserve.  M2 is the sum of all liquid money available to the people and it has crawled forward at the same pace during Obama’s recovery as during the recession. Meanwhile the sum of all deposits has wildly escalated—tripling.  But it put no money in anyone’s pocket. 
5. Gun control didn’t come about.  The opposite happened.  The Dems and Obama sell guns like crazy.  2013 had 20 million new background and firearms checks and as of Sept. 30, 2015 has a record-setting pace of 17M.  Dems sell gun control with such goofy sales techniques it makes people nervous.  They use mass killing events to try to persuade, when it is obvious that mental illness is the culprit in the slayings.  And then when the government talks about gun control it sounds like gun confiscation to ordinary folks, who rush to buy more.  Look, I could make a case that all those shootings were registered Democrats.  2015 was Chris Harper-Mercer in Oregon.  Registered Dem.  2014 was Elliot Rogers, Santa Barbara.  2013 was Allen Lanza in Connecticut.  2012, Minneapolis Mall shooter Andrew Engeldinger.  2011, James Holmes in a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado. 2010’s biggie was Jared Loughner who shot Gabbie Giffords and half a dozen others in Tucson. 2007, Seung Hui Cho, killed 32 at Virginia Tech.  What’s in common?  All were registered Democrats.  Maybe you should give up your gun if you become unbalanced and become a Dem.
6. The “Rich get richer and the poor got children.  In the mornin’, in the evenin’, ain’t we got fun!”  The QE’s and Stimulus made those in league with government and those on Wall Street do exceedingly well, while the middle class went set.  Since 2009, the population of USA has increased 20 million while there have only been 8 million jobs created.  13 million dropped out of the work force. Go figure.
7. Obamacare.  It could have been a plan with some chance of success and then the R’s would have had the impossible task of repealing it later.  Instead, it hangs like an albatross around Democrat necks.  Badly conceived as a plan to either limit or destroy the insurance industry, idiot website, co-ops going broke, Insurers bailed out, timetable for implementation pushed back until Obama is safely out of office, then all hell breaks loose when the employer mandate kills job health insurance for 60-90 million workers.  Like one woman said upon paying the penalty because she couldn’t afford a bronze policy.  “I paid and I still ain’t got any insurance!”
   When Elizabeth the Great died, Mary Stuart’s son James I became king.  He was educated and insufferably arrogant and narcissic. Because, as king, the Brits and Scots had thrown off the pope, James thought he could speak infallibly like a pope.  Where Elizabeth had used her political capital to build commerce, James played and left day-to-day government to the Privy Council.  The Catholics and Calvinists insisted on using different Bibles and James threw up his hands, finally assenting to an 18 member commission to translate the Bible.  Today, we often think of the King James Bible as the only thing worth mentioning to his realm.  

CNBC Debate

On the evening of October 28, Oklahoma recorded a Richter 7 earthquake centered in Ponca City.  It was not caused by fracking but by me pounding the walls and stomping on the floor in delight at Ted Cruz nailing the moderators with 5 examples of their snarky questions just posed to the previous candidates.  If I had been in attendance at the People’s Republic of Boulder, I would have waited for the crowd to stop applauding then stood up and said, “Excuse me, sir, but your ass has been nailed to the wall over there by Cruz.  If you need assistance in getting it down, I have a wrecking bar you can use.”

What that incident convinced me was that Cruz does indeed have a genius memory to have recited the 5 snarks the moderators had dished out to someone else (in order!). Warning: Do not sit across from Ted Cruz in a negotiation or court case. Are you listening, Vladimir Putin?

Considering how well the other candidates then joined in the objection to stupid questions, I’d say the debate was a success for most of the field.  Individual results may vary.  Fiorina’s zinger on crony capitalism was great (Although I call gov’t-big biz partnerships Fascism which historically they are.). Cristie’s note that we have huge problems while they want to know about fantasy football was also terrific.  Rubio’s defense of his missed votes got big applause, then Jeb was dumb enough to try to bring it up again.  What nobody explains to the public, and you don’t realize until you follow legislation, is that 90% of the stuff they pass is 99-0 votes.  To set aside April 2 as Charlie Daniels Day, to designate August as International Dog Poop Clean-up Month, etc.  The big controversial votes are the ones your Congressman needs to show up for. 

So, given that candidates got 30 seconds to respond to questions while the moderators took at least that long “framing the question” (Give their own biased speech) how would I organize a debate? 

First use Republicans to moderate and instruct them to ask quick questions.  Since these debates are really Q&A sessions for candidates, that is, each person gets separate questions, they've become more like a slap-dash interview while 9 others are in attendance.  Why the media does it this way is beyond me.  Could be because journalists are so dumb and unoriginal, they couldn’t get over 50% on my physics quizes in college.

So here’s how I’d organize it.  People want to know the differences, character, style, persuasive ability, and stands of each candidate.  Don’t even pretend it is a debate.  Call it a forum.  Have the moderators ask the same question repeatedly and give the candidates 3 minutes to respond and build a case for their solutions. Maybe 5 guys get the same question before going onto another--or all 10.  And make it general enough that the folks watching can see what kind of approach each candidate takes. 

Example: Moderator:“Let’s talk about the economy.  Why is it so bad and what would you do to fix it?  For 400 years America has created more new companies than the number which closed their doors—until the last 6 years.” Then for the second candidate, same first 2 sentences above but the third one will be: “Growth the past 6 years has averaged 1.5% whereas it consistently was 3+% for over 200 years.” Next candidate, same first 2 sentences, then “Since Obama began, US population has increased by 17 million but only 7 million new jobs have been created.  10 million have dropped out.”   By quoting supporting statistics like this, the candidates would be encouraged to respond. Build their cases, exhibit what they will do.  Thus by the end of the evening, listeners would be able to compare them much more thoroughly. Let 'em speak for themselves!

Same strategy with foreign policy questions, social issues, and all the rest. 

Okay, CNBC moderators, what weakness do you have and how are you compensating? What say? You stayed up all night smoking joints with the Colorado news guys? And you do this because you have been depressed ever since flunking descriptive physics in college?   

10 political things to be happy about

1. Paul Ryan is likely to be Speaker of the House. He’s articulate, smart as a hoot owl, policy wonkish, and well-known.  For 20 years, Congressional Republicans have lived fearful of news media condemnation of “shutting government down”.  Ryan sounds like he would favor recovering the power of the purse and will be good enough spokesman that he can counter Obama.  Does he agree perfectly with me? No, but Reagan said if somebody agrees with you 80%, support ‘em.
2. 72% think Hillary owes us a better explanation of her shenanigans with emails and Benghazi.  Whenever an issue has over 2/3 of American people, that means it is even affecting the 1/3 who will support somebody no matter what. Hill’s still in trouble with the trust.
3. Obamacare’s in deep trouble.  Costs have risen so much that the lower middle income can’t afford a policy that the all-knowing god of government has demanded they get.  So the 20 million people (CBO estimate) who were supposed to have bought policies by now are only 8.5 million.  And that is only the folks who would have to buy their own private policies. Employer mandate hasn’t even kicked in yet.  That will really tick people off when their employer can’t afford their health insurance and dumps them onto the Obamacare website. Now we need to repeal the provision that the feds will bail out insurance companies.  Maybe the Dems will want to defend their bail out of Insurance Giants.
4. Maybe Trump is gradually fading.  (though I still don't understand R-primary polls that include Dems and Indies)  I listened for his conservatism and can honestly say that he fails the Reagan 80% rule.  How about a conservative?!! Practically everybody else in the field is okay by me though I have a favorite.  But some big mouth, so in love with himself that he thinks the sun rises and sets on his words, was a lib just a  couple years ago, and has little of substance to say on many issues?  That sounds like Obama!
5. Cruz is well positioned to inherit the outsider banner if Carson seems too meek.  Beck tells about how Cruz came to him in private saying the media thinks he is “robotic” and asked the energetic Beck how to cure this.  They got into a discussion about some policy and Beck says he told me, “No you’re wrong for these reasons.” Then proceeded to list 6 reasons like a wikipedia page.  Beck told him he was amazed at his retention. “Yeah, they say I have an audiographic memory. When a subject comes up, I guess I have a file in my head.” “Have you ever had an IQ test?” “Yeah, it’s 180 but I don’t like talking about this.”  Beck told him not to change a thing and use his brain as an advantage. 
6. Rubio is up and Bush is down. At last a young, positive, good looking guy who tells about politics often in inspiring story form like Reagan did.  He is Hillary’s worst nightmare—will make her look old with tired ideas. She;s the person Donald should have said, "just look at that face!"
7. USA is poised to become the next Persian Gulf of oil and gas.  Production at 10 M barrels per day has surpassed Saudis.  Despite OPEC’s induced glut that has reduced prices by more than half, our frackers are surviving and US production continues to increase.  18 new LNG plants are on line to be built.  If we can supply Europe with liquid natural gas, it would cut off Russia’s stranglehold and get NATO and the EU back to thinking along our lines. Meanwhile, as an oil sufficient country, we’d be immune to blackmail by the middle eastern loonies.
8. Everybody, and I mean every economist is now saying that the Stimulus and QEs did absolutely nothing. Yet we doubled the national debt.  The guy who started Van Kampen mutual funds explains it best:  Imagine you are Italian and you have an uncle who drives around in a Cadillac with some mysterious overweight in the trunk and weapons under the seats.  All the relatives are worried sick that he is hooked up with the Mafia.  One day he comes speeding into your driveway and rushes up with two suitcases. “I have to hide these in your basement, but I will be back for them later.There is a million dollars in this suitcase.” Question: would you touch the money when he leaves?  Of course not, and that is what happened to the banks.  Gov’t poured big stimulus bucks into banks but banks were scared to lend because if they incurred bad debts, the feds were also telling them they were increasing regulation and wouldn’t hesitate to close the bank down. Now maybe all this idiocy will stop when we get a new Prez.
9. El Nino is here. Warmer winters on average and more moisture.  That means a likely end to the drought of the Midwest and better crops.  Only the people in the concrete jungles hate El Nino because they don’t like a rainy day. All you global warming guys pay attention.  Raising the temperature and stirring the oceans to make more precipitation is a good thing.  More food, less famine.
10. Still not satisfied?  Well, October 27, 1787 was the day that Madison began running articles in the New York papers about the proposed Constitution that later became known as "The Federalist Papers".

October 19

October 19, 1781, the British surrendered at Yorktown.  The war was effectively over. Cornwallis had fought the American guerillas throughout the South, and they had worn his army out, then won decisively at Cowpens.  The American commander at Cowpens was my great grandfather 7 generations ago and he was worn out too.  After the battle he handed over his command and painfully got on his horse and rode home, unable to continue.  Cornwallis decided to retreat to Yorktown, a small seaport in southern Virginia hoping to be reinforced by fresh troops and supplies from the British navy.  But the French, who had waffled for a long time, had finally sent a fleet to bottle up Chesapeake Bay and Washington, who had fought a rearguard action since the start of the war, decisively rushed south and besieged Cornwallis.  Thomas Nelson, governor of Virginia, who had signed the Declaration of Independence told a cannoneer to fire on a fine-looking brick home.  “It is my home, he explained, “best in town, so that is where the British have headquarters.”  Sure enough, the first cannon ball went through a window and blasted a table where the officers were having lunch.

Cornwallis had no choice but to surrender. The Yankees had finally become a powerful and well-trained army, and they stormed the ramparts.  After Cornwallis surrendered his ceremonial sword and Washington handed it back,  the British soldiers filed past the Americans laying down swords and rifles.  The big innovation of 18^th century warfare was to keep your army well-supplied with arms and boots and uniforms.   The Americans were barefoot or wore rags, and most had no uniforms.  Cornwallis supposedly said, “They are undefeatable.  They fight like dogs.”  Bands on the American side played “Yankee Doodle”, a tune that British regulars had made up to poke fun of the colonists during the French and Indian War, 20 years earlier.

Washington seemed worn out too.  When, a short time later, an insurrection of his officers, confronted him with demands for pay from Congress they’d never seen, he reached into his coat to fish out a pair of glasses to read what they had written.  “I’m sorry, this war has ruined my eyes,” he apologized.  Glasses were rare in those days and considered a sign that your eyesight really was shot.  The officers who had come to the meeting angry at Washington and Congress, suddenly were overwhelmed with emotion, some openly weeping.  They took back their letter and shook hands with their general, and bid him good-bye to return home.

  Long war.  America had won it's independence and freedom.

Miscellaneous stuff

We took some time off to visit Branson and see some shows, then go to War Eagle Craft Fair.  I have a few observations.

Have you ever noticed at just about every craft show, half the sellers have something Christian?  Signs and doormats say things like “As for me and my house, we shall serve the Lord”, crosses and symbols made in hundreds of ways, Christian books, Christian logos, etc. Then walk through any mall and notice Christianity is almost banned.  What this says to me is that people want their faith and they buy it at craft shows.  Meanwhile the big businesses who market nationwide big box stores, are scared of a few rare complaints about showing some faith.  That’s why they were quick to adopt “Happy Holidays” and made the public angry over the banishment of Christmas. 

We saw a country show, the Chinese acrobats, and Shoji Tabuchi.  In all three cases they had good things to say about USA.  Even the acrobats, who don’t talk during the show were outside in the lobby gushing about how happy they were to have been selected to come to America to perform and what a wonderful experience this is.  Shoji is the Japanese classical violinist who loved country fiddling and came to America, tells lame jokes while making all sorts of noises on his violin.  His endearing feature isn’t just the music but his love for his adopted land.  And of course country shows always end with something patriotic.  Democrats are turned off by patriotism.  Do they not go to country music shows? 

I hear Trump is now blaming W. for 9/11.  Why does he remind me of Floyd R. Turbo under that hat, spouting idiocy? But I will tell you where I am sympathetic toward a guy like Trump.  I believe it is nearly impossible for a businessman to become President.  That’s because to be a successful businessman you have to take risks and fail often.  Most people are risk averse.  Politicians pretend they have never been wrong and get more votes.  But then we will never change government unless we have someone who will take risks politically.  I still hold out hope for Carly and Ben, but already they are damning Carly because she was fired from HP.  That’s because she tried to take HP in a direction of personal computers where the founders didn’t want to go.  But today, HP’s computers are proof she was right.  I’d be proud to have been fired that way.  Just don’t try to sell that to the 80% of Americans who cling to their jobs and don’t want changes.  (Realistically, I think Cruz might bridge this gap.)

While I was gone, about 20% of our city’s voters voted for a huge school bond.  I say ‘school’  with some irony, because it was 6 million for a new football stadium pressbox, 4 million for a new weightroom, and 10 million for a performing arts center.  Almost nothing for education where it counts.  I asked a couple guys in Arkansas, one a teacher selling crafts, how Arkansas has the fifth rated schools in the country.  They pay teachers better, as well as Kansas and Missouri, and 10% more than Oklahoma.  But Arkansas’s total tax take is lowest in the nation at 6.7% of average person’s earnings.  How so?  They have very low property taxes and pass modest school bonds. This fits with what I see.  I drive all over OK and see towns with run down houses, but the school looks like some Frank Lloyd Wright marvel.  Do we need this?  Some of my best education took place in temporary trailer houses.

Dems seem stumped when asked what the difference is between themselves and socialists.  Let me help.  Socialism is the philosophy that government controls most everything.  International socialism is where the gov’t owns all the means of production—communism.  National Socialism is where gov’t owns or controls only certain large industries but sufficient to control society overall.  Let the street flower vendors remain as is.  For industries government doesn’t own, this has a corollary. Government can’t control a scattered industry with thousands of players, so it seeks to consolidate everyone into a few large companies, giving mega-corporations favors, while persecuting the small guys out of businesss.  This is precisely Obama’s intent, as it was also Mussolini’s, Peron’s, and Hitler’s, and every progressive’s since Debs and LaFollette.

Cubs beat the Cards this year and from this point forward I am hoping the Cubs win it.  What! You say, has an old Cardinals fan lost his rudder?  Nope.  I am sick and tired of hearing the Cubs blather on about their darned goat or some other spell that has been cast.  Maybe they can turn it around and become a normal team.  Look, you team lost in the past because they didn’t play so well.  All the world can tell you this.  Just like all the world can tell Chicago that the reason they have so many teens killing teens is because you have gangs and incomplete families.  On second thought, maybe I’ll be all in for the Royals.

Speaking of baseball playoffs, I think the modern system of a month’s worth of playoffs with 10 teams is a failure.  When I was a child, it often became apparent who was going to be in the World Series by mid-September. People who normally rooted for the KC A’s who were 30 games out, nonetheless studied the likely pennant winners, got familiar with their players and still watched the Series.  Today, half the people are interested at the beginning, but root only for their favorite team.  Once your team loses, you turn off the championship.  MLB’s big horror is when two small market teams, far from the east and west coasts, play in the Series because no one is watching.  The season is too long—everybody says this! Once you start playing in cold weather, curve balls and sinkers don’t curve and sink. It advantages the hitting teams.   All the off days mean that a team with just 3 good pitchers instead of 5 is advantaged.  Wild card teams, often the hot team of September are often advantaged. You don’t have to play a good season, just finish hot.  Good grief! Go back to just a single playoff series and get it over with by Oct. 7.