To the Moon and Beyond

The other day Newt Gingrich, in a speech from the Florida "space coast," called for America to once again send humans to the moon, this time to establish a colony. He has since been ridiculed by many in the press, and in a presidential debate his opponent, Mitt Romney, said that if an executive had brought him this idea, "I would have fired him." This just shows the difference between Mr. Romney and Mr. Gingrich. You see, Mr. Gingrich's speech was visionary. The only vision Mr. Romney has is a vision of himself as president, and it appears he will do or say anything to get there. John F. Kennedy once exhorted Americans to go to the moon. Not the "before this decade is out" speech, but his speech at Rice University where he sold the idea to the American people. (Google JFK Rice Moon Speech--it's 17 minutes long). In that speech, Mr. Kennedy said that trying for the moon would require that we create new technologies which would themselves create tens of thousands of jobs. On this point he was right. But he made an even bigger point in that speech. He said, to paraphrase him, that in reaching for something that hard to obtain, America would be forced to rise to the best of its abilities, and we would be united in a common purpose. "We choose to go to the moon," he said, "not because it is easy, but because it is hard." Now, colonizing the moon, as Mr. Gingrich lays out, would be hard. We, once again, would need new technologies and, once again, we would have to be united in purpose as a nation. The moon could be mined or it could be the jump off point for a mission to Mars. The point of Mr. Kennedy's long ago speech and Mr. Gingrich's speech the other day is that we can't stay isolated on this little blue pearl floating in the vastness of space. Man has always searched beyond the boundaries of his world for what was over the horizon. Have we lost our vision as a species? Have we lost the urge to strive to reach beyond the confines of our limited world? We need to get back to space. We need to strive to reach the stars. Mr. Kennedy beckons us from a long ago past. Mr. Gingrich takes up the call in our present. JFK would concur with Mr. Gingrich. Mr. Romney would fire him.

Merry Christmas and Happy Hannukah

The other day there was a news story about how the rules committee in the House of Representatives had reminded members that they were barred from wishing their constituents a Merry Christmas or Happy Hannukah. Scott Rigell, from the 2nd district in Virginia, issued a wonderful video in response to this edict in which he has his staff carrying signs with those messages on them while he is talking about what he can and cannot say. He then stops by a copy of the Constitution which is framed and hanging on his wall and discusses how he's thought about this "guidance" he has received and decided that it is not only right and proper, but constitutional as well, to look into the camera and say, "Merry Christmas" and "Happy Hannukah" to everyone in his district, the state, and the nation. It was a well thought out, humorous, and yet serious response to yet one more example of political correctness run amuck.
I feel that this country has lost its bearings and it's time to get them back. If we are in government we can't say it's a Christmas holiday, but rather a winter holiday so that we don't offend anyone? We can't have a manger scene displayed in the town square because that's a violation of the separation of church and state? What about the vast majority of people who are offended by the fact that the holiday is not called a Christmas holiday anymore, or those for whom the season is less special because the ACLU had the Menorah or the Nativity removed from the town square?  Who speaks for them? Certain forces in this country are trying to regulate even the way we think and talk about mundane things. I've even heard people suggest that we start calling "manholes" "personholes" so as not to offend women. You must call people "African Americans" because you will offend them if you call them "black." However, noboday mentions the fact that white people are routinely referred to as "white." What if white people decided they, too, wanted to be called by their ethnocentric heritage? For instance, what if I demanded to be called an "Irish-caucasian American" and if people didn't do so, I could accuse them of being racist? Wouldn't that be ridiculous? Of course it would. I also think that this kind of "branding," if you will, actually perpetuates racism, let alone the fact that only a small minority of "African Americans" are from Africa. So I've got an idea. Let's quit dividing America by referring to people as "African Americans" or "Hispanic Americans" or "Asian Americans" or the hundred other ways we refer to and divide our people. Let's just refer to each other as "Americans." Let's make it okay to say "Merry Christmas" and "Happy Hannukah" if someone is in the government. Let's make it okay to put a Nativity scene or a Menorah on the town square. Let's get the Thought Police out of our lives. And let me say this above all before I quit: Merry Christmas and Happy Hannukah to everyone out there. I hope you have a wonderful holiday.

What's With Our Youth?

As I mentioned in my bio, I teach 8th grade English.  One of the things I have the students do is write, write, write.  One of the prompts I use describes a scenario where it's hot and dry, and there is a bank of vending machines in a park.  You realize you don't have any money, but at the same time notice that someone has accidentally left a bag of money on the bench near the machines.  Nobody is around; nobody is watching.  Is it okay to take the money?  I teach in a fairly well off community, but I was still appalled by the answers.  Sixty seven percent of my students said it was okay to take the money.  Only a handful said that it wasn't okay because it wasn't theirs, and most of these said they'd take it to the police to try to find its rightful owner.  There was a time in this country when the number who wouldn't take the money would have been about 95%.  There is a moral vaccuum in this country which has permeated our society.  "Sexting," flash mobs, drug use, sex at a very young age--all these things are evident in the majority of today's youth.  And it's just getting worse.  You wouldn't believe the books they read (those that do read anyway), or the movies they watch.  I'm talking about thirteen year old kids not just watching, but obsessed with movies like "Saw."  When I was thirteen, I watched "Psycho," but only because I was staying overnight at a friend's house and we watched it late at night when everyone was asleep.  My parents would have killed my if they'd known about it.  Today's youth goes and watches the most horrific or sex-filled movies with parental approval.

On top of the fact that the morals and values of today's young people are quickly eroding, I am appalled by the fact that many of them know almost nothing, despite the fact that, by the time I see them, they've been in school for seven years, not counting kindergarten.  I always try to blend history into my lessons (I'm also licensed to teach that subject), so when they ask me how old I am, which they invariably do, I tell them I was born with about two years left in the administration of Dwight Eisenhower.  They look at me with blank expressions, so I make it more current.  I will tell them that I was 17 the year we ended our involvement in Vietnam.  They have no clue about that either.  I show them a picture of Jimmy Carter or Gerald Ford or, incredibly, Richard Nixon, and they don't know who any of those people are.  Sometimes, when trying to make a point, I'll bring up a movie or something.  They don't know who John Wayne was.  Let me repeat that.  They don't know who John Wayne was.  Once actors like John Wayne graced our movie screens, and the characters he played taught America and its youth about things like honor and responsibility and loyalty and courage.  Now they watch movies about people being tortured by psychotic killers--and they laugh about it!  Look at their "heroes," and it's no wonder that we are raising a generation of children who are amoral and who participate in degrading and dangerous behavior.  Paris Hilton and Britney Spears, both of whom felt it necessary to go without underwear and be photographed spreading their legs as they got out of cars.  Lady Gaga, who found it necessary to drape herself in raw meat.  Angelina Jolie, who once was famous for wearing a vial of blood around her neck.  Tiger Woods, whose serial philandering sends such a great message, especially in a world plagued by AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases, and whose cursing and spitting on the golf course are seen by millions.

The seemingly endless list of hormone using sports starts sends a great message as well.  I remember watching players who performed with honor, such as Hank Aaron and Nolan Ryan and Jack Nicklaus. I watched an interview with Nicklaus once, and in it he remarked that he was watching a replay of a tournament and saw himself lining up a putt with a cigarette dangling from his mouth.  He thought to himself, he said, how many kids must be seeing that, and he quit smoking that day and never smoked again.

We've seen Lindsey Lohan jailed repeatedly for various offenses, and become a serial participant in rehabilitation.  The #1 song in the nation right now, by Katie Perry, is about a young woman waking up after a night of drunken partying with her home in a mess, and wondering whether or not that mark is a "hickey or a bruise."

It's time for college and pro sports to get tough with athletes who set a bad example.  Forget about the almighty dollar for a minute and put some real teeth into enforcement.  Lifetime bans for players caught using performance enhancing drugs would be a good start.  Show the kids that bad actions have consequences.  Forget the almighty dollar for a moment and, even if it's a big star, do something which would get the attention of the youth of America and enable parents to say, "See, that's what happens when you cheat."  You know, set some examples.  Maybe then Hollywood will follow suit and promote more stars who send a positive message of responsibility and fealty, rather than ones who send a message of drunkeness, cruelty and debauchery.  More stars like John Wayne.

Pondering America's Future

My son loves roller coasters, and for some time had wanted us to take him to Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio, which is kind of the Mecca for roller coaster riders.  So we took him, my daughter, and their cousin at the end of July.  We stayed in these little cottages they have there which are right on the edge of Lake Erie.  They have little decks on them where you can sit and watch the lake and the sunset.  It was beautiful.  One day while sitting there I got to thinking.  I read an article back in the 1970's about Lake Erie and how it was basically a dead lake.  Pollution had not only killed most of what lived in the lake, but had also robbed it of oxygen.  Swimming was disallowed--it was too dangerous and filled with chemicals.  The writer at the time said that it would take thousands of years for the lake to come back.  Yet here it was, in front of my eyes, and it was far from dead.  Seagulls flocked by the hundreds.  If you stood near the bank you could see fish.  A heron perched on the remains of a jetty not far from our deck.  Recreational boaters crossed the lake, reveling in a glorious summer day.  It didn't take thousands of years for the lake to come back.  More like forty.
My train of thought as I sat there turned to America and in my mind I made a metaphorical connection between the country and the lake.  Many pundits have opined on the fall of America.  They say our greatest days are behind us.  They say that unemployment will stay chronically high pretty much forever, for they say that the mechanisms of employment have changed.  They say that we are bankrupt (and they are right).  They say that our days as a super power are numbered.  I say they are all like that writer I read long ago eulogizing Lake Erie.  I say that America can be brought back, and a lot sooner than people think.  I say that we still have the best system of government, as long as it's kept in check.  I say that the freedom we experience makes us stronger, as long as we don't abuse it.  I say that, while we are in a hard time right now, we will come back and be stronger than ever.  This is America.  Our nation will once again be respected and envied throughout the world.  I say that, like Lake Erie, we will be strong again, and we will disappoint our enemies who want us to collapse and prove all the naysayers wrong.  It will not take generations to turn things around.  Together we can move forward to better days and, as in the case of Lake Erie, we will fix our problems more quickly than anyone ever imagined.

On Social Issues

I've had several people contact me and say they like my stances (or not) on various issues, but they want to know where I stand on social issues such as gay, minority, and women's rights, as well as abortion.  Let me start with gay rights.  I think that if two people want to get married and they are gay, so what?  All gays are asking for on this issue is to have the same rights as anyone else.  For instance, if I die tomorrow, my estate automatically reverts to my spouse.  That isn't currently true with gay marriage.  Why not?  I am straight, so I don't really understand why you'd want to marry someone who is the same sex, but if you do, who am I to tell you not to?  Obviously, gay marriage doesn't help propagate the species, but that isn't the point, is it?  The point is that the Constitution guarantees the "pursuit of happiness," and that's all people are trying to do.  Those who want to change the Constitution to make gay marriage illegal on the federal level are, in my opinion, making a big mistake. Now I do have a problem with gays who want to shove their agenda down my throat or the throats of my children.  For instance, have you looked at the crowds at a gay pride rally?  Leather chaps, cod pieces, pierced nipples, and these are the more mild people.  All in front of children.  We also see the agenda trying to be forced on our public schools.  Kindergarten children will now be taught "gay history" in California schools.  Kindergarten?  They don't even know what a penis is for yet.  What's the teacher supposed to say when asked by a child what "gay" means? 

As far as women's rights and the rights of minorities are concerned, I believe in equal rights for all.  People should be given equal consideration for housing, jobs, promotions, etc., regardless of their race or sex.  I don't know how much clearer I can be on that.  I understand the argument for redress of past grievances, but I think that labeling people just propogates racism.  We need to get rid of "African American" and "Indian American" and "Hispanic American" and start referring to people as "American."
The stickier point is abortion because a lot of people put this one under "women's rights."  However, I disagree.  I don't base my arguments against abortion on religion, but rather on logic.  We are a people who value the life of the individual.  That is why murder is a crime, assault is a crime, rape is a crime.  We value the gift of life.  Our Constitution's first guaranteed liberty is "life."  Now, that being said, think of the fetus.  There isn't a scientist anywhere who will disagree that from the moment of conception, if we do nothing, that fertilized egg is growing and will grow into a baby.  The definition of life is something which takes nutrition and grows.  That's what babies do in the womb.  However, let's assume for a minute that there is a question here of whether or not that fetus is a life.  If we're not sure, shouldn't we err on the side of life?  What if all the pro-abortion people are wrong and we have in fact been murdering babies to the tune of about sixty million of them?  Then we as a society will be the greatest mass murdering society ever--even bigger than Hitler and his Nazis.  Many women in this country will never, ever admit that abortion is murder because that makes them guilty of murder.  And think of this.  We've aborted, as a nation, about sixty million babies.  How many Einsteins, how many Mozarts, how many Ghandis have we killed?  Did we kill the one who had the answers?  It's a scary thought.  Also scary is the way fetuses are killed.  Either a solution which basically burns them to death is introduced, or tools are put inside the mother's body which cuts them into pieces, after which they are vacuumed out.  I'm not making this up, this is the way it's done.
So I agree with those who say that abortion should be a criminal act.  The doctors should be held accountable, but not the mothers.  At this point in their lives there are too many problems going on in the mothers' heads.  It's the doctors who coax them and convince them it's the right thing to do.  After all, there's big money involved.  I don't even put a caveat for rape or incest there, because if we do agree we're going to err on the side of life, then why would we make that life worth less because of the way it was conceived?  I can see putting an exclusion in there about the life of the mother, but that's problematic too because certain doctors will go on with their abortions and just label every one as the mother's life was in jeopardy.  One form of abortion should definitely put the doctor up for murder charges--the partial birth abortion.  Whenever I tell people the procedure, they tell me that I've been brainwashed by right wing propaganda, but the truth of the matter is that, in a partial birth abortion, the baby is delivered except for the head, which is left in the birth canal.  The skull is then pierced, usually with scissors, and the brain is sucked out with a vacuum.  This is done to a viable fetus which can feel pain.  If you think I'm lying, check it out.  This practice is, to me, the incarnation of evil, and it should be stopped immediately.

The Sharks are Circling

The recent debt ceiling negotiations, which I have said time and time again are just theatre because nobody is going to cut anything anyway, have drawn our attention away from the fact that several nations are taking our internal weakness as a sign that we have become weak throughout our whole structure.  While the president and the Congress talk and talk and talk, and the deadline for default gets closer and closer, we look foolish to the rest of the world.  We have a responsibility to pay our obligations, but we must also balance our budget immediately.  The fact that we have to go groveling to the Chinese and other nations to borrow money to run our government is appalling, especially given what we have now learned.  It seems that there are indications the Chinese are building electromagnetic pulse weapons with the aim of rendering our aircraft carriers vulnerable (http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/jul/21/beijing-develops-radiation-weapons/).  We know they have already tested anti-satellite weapons, as they blasted one of their old ones out of the sky in a test.  The Chinese didn't seem to care that this was a violation of several treaties, as treaties are only as strong as those who enforce them.  We depend on satellite technology in our war making strategy. Our GPS, our guided missiles, many of the precision weapons we use, are all dependent on satellites.  On another front, it seems that Iran is accelerating its nuclear program, and there is also evidence that they may have purchased rocket technology from Pakistan or elsewhere.  North Korea, a Stalinist throwback country, despite the fact that its population is starving, has gone ahead with its own nuclear weapons development and apparently has purchased missile technology from the Chinese, which would enable them to actually put the United States in range (although South Korea is a more likely target).  In the Middle East, the Muslim Brotherhood is strengthening its hold on power in Egypt.  We are their sworn enemy, and their aims include the destruction of the state of Israel.  We have been duped into thinking all those who oppose tyrannical regimes must be correct and worthy of our friendship.  We actually supported this group's ascendancy!  In short, many nations which hate us, and a couple that pretend to be our friends but in fact may harbor aspirations of becoming THE superpower, sense a weakness in our nation which has put us in peril.  I think the fact that we can't even get our fiscal house in order while the world watches is a big part of this perception.  Another huge part of this perception is the end of the United States' lead in space--we now have to depend on the Russians to take us.  John Kennedy must be turning over in his grave.  At any rate, I hope somebody is busy deciding what to do about all of this because it seems that the president and the Congress are devoting all their time to the debt issue.  That is important to be sure, but the #1 priority of government is to protect the nation and the people.  So let's quit dallying.  I say we institute my plan to eliminate the deficit (or one like it) so that the world will see that we are serious again, start buying more American products, quit borrowing money, and show the world that we have the will and backbone to act like a great nation again.  Then all those sharks in the water might think twice and decide there is a better meal elsewhere.

Time to Reform the Tax Code (For Real!)

For years I've had someone do my taxes, not because I can't figure out how to fill out the form, but because I need an expert who knows what deductions I can take and who constantly keeps up with all the confusing changes the IRS makes.

From the web site US Tax Code online: "The complete Internal Revenue Code is more than 24 megabytes in length, and contains more than 3.4 million words; printed 60 lines to the page, it would fill more than 7500 letter-size pages. Looking for something buried in that mass of verbiage can be daunting." This is ridiculous. How is anybody, other than an attorney or tax expert, supposed to be able to negotiate that maze? We need a change, and we need it now. For some time now I have advocated scrapping the entire U.S. Federal tax code and replacing it with a national sales tax. Think of it. Not only could we get rid of this daunting morass of legalese and bureaucrat speak, but we could replace it with what would surely be one of the most fair taxes around. No need for tax preparers. No need for tax attorneys. Everyone would pay into the system, commensurate with what they spend, meaning the rich would pay more than the poor, but all would feel as if they were contributing.
A national sales tax would be easy to collect and easy to police. We wouldn't need the thousands upon thousands of IRS agents looking into everything we do to make sure we are complying with line 2, item 27 in sub paragraph 112. We'd have to do some rough numbers, but I'm calculating somewhere in the neighborhood of a 20% national sales tax would get the job done. We would eliminate all deductions as well, and April 15th would no longer be the day your taxes were due. You would pay your taxes as you consume. Yes, there would be no mortgage deduction. But there would be no income tax either. Everything would be taxed under my plan, but only to the extent that the revenues required to operate the government efficiently and pay down our debt were collected. You'd pay the national sales tax on everything from a stick of gum to your car to your house. Corporations would pay on what they buy as well. The machines they use, any supplies, anything they buy, would be subject to the tax.  Of course, this idea goes hand in hand with balancing the budget and eliminating the deficit. While eliminating the deficit is the priority, tax reform must happen as well. You've read about my plan to balance the budget. Well, in some areas we could save more than the percentage I recommend, which would allow us to not cut as much in others, as long as the overall spending cut totals were met. In this vein, and with this idea, the IRS could be reduced in size by 80 or 90%, allowing us to divert some of those cuts into savings elsewhere. I've also written that I think we need to get rid of the plan known as "Obamacare." As part of that plan, thousands of IRS agents are being hired to enforce the punitive taxes in that plan and the mandate which goes with it. I hate to stop any kind of job creation, but this is one place job creation should be not only stopped, but reversed. As I've said before, if we balance the budget, there will be a renaissance in investment and the economy will start to flourish. Then we can absorb all those IRS workers. The IRS will be out of your life, April 15th will no longer carry such a stigma, and we can get on with moving this country forward. Maybe we could turn the building into a giant mall or something which would generate revenue instead of sucking it up.