The Voice of Reason: Why Many of Today's 20-Something Liberals Will Be Conservatives Tomorrow

So you're in college or have recently graduated from college.  You have this Utopian view of what the world should be, that there should be no poor people, corporations are evil, profit is a four-letter word, rich people pay too little in taxes and conservatives are evil people who simply don't care about others. You've bought into messaging of President Barack Obama and the Democratic Party, like so many of your classmates.

I can see why you see the world this way.  I had similar beliefs when I was 19, 20 and 21 years old, but then a funny thing happened to change my view of the world.  I grew up, and so will you.

Once you start working and paying taxes, your beliefs will begin to change.  And then once you marry and start raising a family your views will change even more dramatically.  Let me explain why.

Once you graduate and start working, you will see the percentage of what you take home diminish as your income increases.  As you work your way up the corporate ladder or build your own business, you will be asked to contribute more and more of what you earn to the federal government.  Each year, as your income increases, you will pay more taxes to the point that you wonder whether government receives more of your paycheck than you do, once you add all of your federal, state and local taxes and fees together. 

A few of your college classmates and friends will somehow never be able to find a good job, so they will rely on government checks to survive.  A few will receive food stamps.  A few will sign up and receive disability.  Even more will receive welfare.  You will realize that the difference between your success and their failure isn't that government didn't provide them with an equal opportunity. You will learn that the reason that they aren't successful is that they didn't work as hard or as long as you have. 

After years of watching your hard-earned tax dollars support government programs that help the poor, you will see that the percentage of people living in poverty hasn't diminished.  In fact, you see that as government programs expand, more people take advantage of them instead of working as you have.

You will also learn, whether you work for a company or build your own company, that people are employed because companies earn a profit.  Without profit there will be no jobs.  You may lose your job at an unprofitable company, or, if you own your own company, you may have to lay off a few of your workers because a new government regulation or an increase in your tax rate took away part of your profit. 

You will learn that your savings and investments also rely on companies being profitable and growing.  If companies are profitable and prosper, your investments will grow accordingly, but if they aren't successful, you see your nestegg grow smaller or disappear completely.  You begin to realize that your retirement and the retirements of others rely on the ability of American businesses to grow and prosper.  You will also see first-hand that government often puts unreasonable roadblocks in the way of companies being successful. You will learn, as I have over the years, that government is often the enemy of business.

And then when you marry and have children of your own, your views change even more.  You become very protective of your offspring to the point that you don't want your children doing the same things that you may have done as a young person. You also realize that every dollar you send to government is a dollar that you can't save for their college, put food on the table or buy their clothes. You resent working so hard for so little of what you earn, while so many aren't working and receive the benefit of your tax dollars.

As you enter your 30s, you may begin admiring successful older people who give back to their communties in time and money.  You will notice that the majority of these people are conservative.  These people worked hard, built a successful business that employed people, providing them with a good wage, and now they want to give back even more to their community. They care deeply about others, and they share with you what they've learned -- that the only way to change people is to change their behavior and that handouts rarely if ever have a long-term impact.  You listen and learn as these role models support programs in their community that help to move people out of poverty through efforts that help them to learn job skills and money management. 

You may become involved in programs like Habitat for Humanity, which is exponentially more successful than government housing because people who receive houses through this non-profit have pride in their homes because they pay for them and help to build them. You begin to see that government, through what you once viewed as "kindness," often holds people back by giving them that handout, instead of providing them what they really need, which is a hand up out of poverty.

You now see the world in a much different way.  You look back to your early 20s and your college years and begin to see how wrong you really were. 

You realize that you're now a conservative.         





    

The Voice of Reason: Obama's BS vs. Ryan's Substance

On almost every television talking heads program, in nearly every newspaper article and on every radio talk show, Democrat operatives have been using the same words from scripted talking points
to describe Republican Vice President nominee, Paul Ryan.

Extreme.  Radical.  Right wing idealogue.

The reason they are doing this is very simple.  President Barack Obama cannot run on his record of 40-plus months of unemployment over 8%, our national debt increasing by half (50%) under the President's watch although he promised to cut it in half, and the worst economic recovery since the Great Depression. President Obama's only hope at being reelected is to make the Republican option so unsettling to voters that they will reluctantly vote for the President in the November election. 

This is the reason why a Democrat super PACs developed an ad accusing Republican nominee Mitt Romney of causing a woman's cancer death.  This is why the Democrats, including Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, made outrageous claims that Romney might be a felon and that the "word's out" that Romney didn't pay federal income taxes for 10 years.  This is also why leaders in the Obama Campaign tried their best to smear Romney's work at Bain Capital.

Advantage Obama. 

Democratic operatives realized that every day the Romney Campaign was forced to answer questions from the news media about the despicable "cancer" ad, every day that the news media kept the story alive about Romney's tax returns and every day the news media asked about Bain Capital was one more day that the Obama Campaign didn't have to talk about the principal issues in this campaign -- the dismal economy and an unfathomable debt that will be passed on to our children, grandchildren and great grandchildren.

But as soon as Romney announced that Ryan was his pick, the Democrats changed course and began attacking Ryan on Medicare, thinking that they had found a weakness that would allow them to continue to paint the Republican ticket as unacceptable to voters. Democrats immediately began making the rounds with reporters and various talk shows, using the Democrat script to paint Ryan as a radical right winger who would cut off granny's Medicare.

Instead of being defensive, though, Romney and Ryan became even aggressive, pointing out that President Obama stole $700 million from Medicare to pay for Obamacare. The Republic tandem also began talking about using Ryan's proposed budget as a framework to save entitlement programs, pointing out that President Obama and the Democrats had not proposed any plan whatsover in three and half years although the programs faced insolvency for future generations. The focus shifted from the earlier distractions of taxes, Bain Capital and the "cancer" ad to talking about saving entitlement programs and addressing the ballooning national debt. By learning about what the Republicans would be proposing, which was not to change Medicare for current recipients and those 55 or older, voters were able to see that the Democrats' plan of "doing nothing" is much more radical and extreme than the Republicans' framework to save much-needed entitlement programs for current and future generations of Americans.

Advantage Romney and Ryan.

The Democrats also discovered in the past week that it is nearly impossible to attack Ryan, a good-looking 42-year-old fitness freak, husband and father, who spends as little time as possible in Washington, traveling home to soccer games in Wisconsin on the weekends.  Democrats also found that this young leader is literally a rock star on the campaign trail, bringing in huge crowds everywhere he goes, inspiring them while talking about serious issues and framing them in a way that the average person can understand. President Obama and the Democrats also found that Ryan is able to disagree with them over substantive issues in a way that doesn't stoop to the gutter politics level of the Democrats, but instead attacks their positions with logic, numbers and good old common sense.  Americans like that.

In short, President Obama is now facing an adept communicator, Ryan, who can not only inspire voters, which is Obama's strongpoint, but Ryan can do it by providing substantive solutions and facts, which is something Obama has never been able to do.  Substance will win over bullshit every time.

Advantage Romney and Ryan.

The change in just one week has been palpable.  Romney and Ryan are raking in millions of dollars in donations and attracting tens of thousands at rallies they attend individually and together.  Romney appears to be energized, stepping up his game in a way that has impressed even his staunchest critics. In contrast, President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden have been struggling to raise money and the crowds attending their campaign stops don't appear to be energized or anywhere near the size of the Romney/Ryan crowds.  While Ryan seemingly can fill stadiums with potential voters, Biden has trouble filling a large room.  And Biden, well, is Biden, often saying the most inappropriate things, trying to be funny, trying to appeal to the Democrats' base, but alienating members of that base as well as independents.

In one week, the campaign has changed dramatically.  According to numerous sources, the Obama Campaign is unsettled, confused by the turn of events.  They've tried smear tactics, which caused more voters to have a strong negative perception of the President, and they've now tried framing the election around entitlements, but discovered that Romney and Ryan turned the issue into a discussion about the lack leadership by the Obama Administration on fixing the entitlement mess.  I wonder what the Obama Campaign will try now?

They certainly can't run on the President's record. That would be an even bigger disaster politically.


  





  

Fool Me Once, Shame on You. Fool Me Twice, Shame on Me

 

Two of the largest voting blocs -- black voters and young voters -- that overwhelmingly supported Barack Obama in the 2008 Presidential Election are among those hardest hit by the current recession.

During the 2008 election, 96% of black voters voted for Senator Obama (http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1108/15297.html), while nearly 70% of young voters (ages 18-29) cast their ballot for the Illinois Senator (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27525497/ns/politics-decision_08/t/youth-vote-may-have-been-key-obamas-win/). 

The current unemployment rate for blacks stands at 13 percent, compared to the national average of 8.1% (http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm).   Forty percent of black teenagers are unemployed, compared to 25 percent of all teenagers (http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-05-22/boomers-and-millennials-whos-got-it-worse-in-the-workplace).  To put these numbers in perspective, an African-American is 60% more likely to be unemployed than the average American of the same age group.

After three years of the President's economic policies, nearly one out of three adults (32%) between the ages of 18 and 29  is "underemployed," while 13.6% of that same age group is unemployed.  In other words, a young person is 68% more likely to be unemployed than the average American (http://www.gallup.com/poll/154553/one-three-young-underemployed.aspx).

The President is counting on these voters once again to help him win a second term.  If these voting blocs look past his powerful oratorical skills and consider his record, they will be hard pressed to find a reason to vote for him again. Actions -- and results -- speak much louder than words, no matter how well those words are delivered.

Whether you're black, white, Hispanic, young, middle aged or an older American, one sobering economic statistic should give every American pause:  Today, America has the smallest percentage of people working since 1981 (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/04/unemployment-rate-april-jobs_n_1477014.html). 

Clearly, the President's economic policies are not working for America, but especially for those who voted so overwhelmingly for him in 2008.

Difference Between Republicans and Democrats

While on the Internet this week, I read an interesting post from someone.  I'm not sure where it originated, but it was thought-provoking:

Republicans believe that God helps those who help themselves, while Democrats believe that blessed are those who help others.

At first glance, this statement appears to be spot on.  But after thinking about it a bit longer, I realized that this perception is part of the reason why Republicans are often misunderstood. Republicans and Democrats alike believe in helping others; they just differ in the way it should be done.

Democrats believe it's the role of government to ensure that charity is provided to those in need through government programs.  If someone needs food, there needs to be a program to make that happen.  If someone needs housing, there needs to be a government program to help that person. If someone is sick and doesn't have health insurance, government needs to step in, Democrats believe.

Republicans also believe that people in need should be supported, but they also believe that the responsibility of the individual is primary, and that government assistance should be secondary.  If a person doesn't have food, housing or health insurance, the first step is not a handout, but a hand up through work.  Republicans believe that government programs should be in place to help people through hardships until they are able to help themselves, and those who truly can't help themselves should be supported long-term through government programs.

In addition to supporting these government programs through tax dollars, Republicans believe that  charity is voluntary, not forced by the government.  People in need can and should first be helped by their families, churches and other community organizations -- people who are closest to the situations of those needing help.

Perhaps this difference in philsophy helps explain why Democrat Vice President Joe Biden contributed only 1.46% of his income to charity in 2011, compared to Republican Mitt Romney's 19.1%.  Biden probably sincerely believes he "gave at the office" through income taxes, while Romney believes that community organizations can do a better job of helping local people in need than the federal government. To be fair, many Democrats believe in government programs and contribute a large percentage of their income to charity, as Romney does.

Republicans are not the uncaring, money-hungry capitalists often described by Democrats and the mainstream news media.  Republicans sincerely care about people, as do Democrats, but Republicans believe that work, not welfare, is the way to create a society that provides everyone with an equal opportunity at success, while also providing sufficient tax dollars to support needed government programs for those in need.

Republicans are for entitlement reform, not because they don't believe people should be helped, but because they realize that by continuing the current course America will very soon reach the point where more people aren't paying income taxes than those who are, and more people are receiving government support than those who aren't. This isn't financially sustainable and puts all entitlement programs, and the people who rely on them, at great risk.

As you can see, those Republicans aren't the uncaring, selfish capitalists described by Democrats and the mainstream news media.  If anything, Republicans care enough about these programs -- to be honest with the American people about their future and to try to save entitlement programs now so they will be available for future generations of Americans.



 

President Needs Lesson in Economics

During a news conference on Monday, President Barack Obama slammed presumptive Republican nominee Mitt Romney for his business experience, saying that Romney was more interested in making money than creating jobs while at Bain Capital.

There are two major problems with the President's attack on Romney: 1) America is and has always been a capitalistic country driven by profit, and 2) the President's record on creating jobs has been absolutely horrific.

If you're an American, you're living in a capitalistic society.  When you go to work, you either work for someone who is trying to make a profit, or you own your own business and are trying to earn a profit. Profit is not a four-letter word; it's what drives America and it's what has made America great.  If owners of companies were to focus on hiring the most people, instead of earning a profit, very few companies would actually stay in business.  Profit is what drives companies like Apple Computer, Microsoft and even the mom and pop shop down the street to innovate and prosper.  It is also what allows companies to hire more people and expand.

While at Bain Capital, Romney's job was to provide a healthy return to investors.  He and Bain took huge risks, saving dozens of companies near bankruptcy and their workers from the scrap heap, all for the potential of earning a reward for their investment.  Sure, a few companies went bankrupt even after they received an influx of much-needed capital, but 80% of the companies Bain Capital invested in either added or saved jobs.  Thousands of jobs were added by companies supported by Bain Capital, helping more families all across America to put food on the table.  The money raised by Bain Capital was provided by private investors, who risked losing most if not all of their investment if the companies did not show a profit.  Instead, under Romney's strong leadership, they made money and more employees were hired.  This is American capitalism at its best.

In comparison, the President has wasted billions of dollars acting as a venture capitalist -- except he's gambled with OUR MONEY.  A large number of companies supported by the Obama Administration, including Solyndra, have filed for bankruptcy, costing taxpayers billions of dollars.  If those companies had an 80% chance of thriving, then venture capitalists, including Bain Capital, driven by the potential for profit, would have invested long ago. They haven't invested because these alternative energy companies will not be profitable until their technology improves dramatically and the cost of production drops exponentially.  If private equity firms driven by profit won't invest, why should our government?

Perhaps instead of listening closely to those Marxist professors and attending socialist conferences while in college, our President should have taken Economics 101. In this basic class, he would have learned about the law of supply and demand and other basic principles of economics that would guide him as he attempts to lead the world's largest economy out of a deep recession.

Fortunately, this election season, we have a  choice.  Romney already understands and has prospered from the principles of capitalism President Obama clearly never learned.





 

West Virginians Voted Wisely in Selecting Convict over Obama

Much of America was astonished that a convict in a Texas prison, Keith Judd, would garner 41% of the vote in the May 8 West Virginia primary, nearly beating the incumbent president, Barack Obama. 


"What are those uninformed, uneducated West Virginians thinking?  How could they possibly select a convict over a sitting president?  Those West Virginians must be racist, aren't they?"  This is probably what most of America was thinking. 


Before jumping to any conclusions, though, let's take a look at each of the candidates.


It's evident that Judd can't be trusted.  He's a convicted felon serving a 17 1/2 year sentence for extortion.  Prior to the election, his background was pretty much unknown. The bio provided to the news media, and which the news media publicized, was largely a work of fiction.  According to his bio, Judd is a Harvard-educated musician whose mother was a 1920s actress and whose father helped to develop the first atomic bomb.  The news media blindly publicized his bio for all voters to see.


In comparison, we are beginning to understand that Obama's biography from the early 1990s is also a work of fiction.  We learned last week that the President's bio publicized by his literary agent described Obama as "Kenyan born" in a booklet printed in 1991.  This same literary agent continued to include Obama's birth place as Kenya until 2007, just a couple of months before he announced his intention to run for the presidency. We've also learned recently that a girlfriend described in Obama's autobiography was a compilation of a number of women he dated.  What's true and what isn't true about Obama's bio?  It appears that Obama's biography has "evolved," much like his stance on a number of issues.


It's evident that Judd was not properly vetted by the news media.  They took his candidacy on face value, not really checking into his background or even his views.  Clearly, this was a disservice to West Virginians who cast their vote on May 8.


Obama wasn't properly vetted by the news media, either, before voters went to the polls in 2008, and even now as Americans prepare to select a new president later this year.  Although he wrote in his autobiolgraphy of using drugs from marijuana to cocaine, attending socialist conferences and being attracted to the teachings of Marxist professors, the news media have asked few probing questions and have provided very little coverage about his background.  The mainstream news media have acted more like cheerleaders and the President's public relations people than journalists.  Chris Matthews and other so-called journalists feel all tingly when Obama speaks, and they aren't afraid to admit it.


Judd has no legislative accomplishments, and based on his current residency and prospects for at least the next decade or so, he probably never will. 


As a candidate in the 2008 election, Obama could also boast of few if any legislative accomplishments.  His claim to fame was voting 130 times as "present" in the Illinois Legislature, and he authored no significant legislation as a U.S. Senator. Obama's most significant claim to fame was a rousing speech he gave at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. 


Judd will have a 17 1/2 year record when he's finally released from prison. During that time, Judd will have perfect attendance, not taking a single day off or taking a single vacation. Although Judd really hasn't accomplished anything, he also hasn't done anything in prison that has raised the ire of ordinary Americans.


By comparison, Obama now has a record of over three years as President.  While he's taken dozens of vacations and played hundreds of rounds of golf, the economy is in the tank, the real unemployment rate is at its highest rate since the Great Depression, and millions of Americans are out of work, underemployed, or have simply dropped out of the workforce.  Obama's EPA is essentially trying to kill the domestic production of all fossil fuels.  In West Virginia, with hundreds of years of coal reserves to power this country and several thousand mining and mining-related jobs, Obama's policies will ultimately result in a death sentence to the West Virginia economy.  America has no coherent energy policy other than wasting money on new technologies that aren't yet economically feasible, and even our staunchest allies do not trust America under Obama.  The country is going into debt faster than ever before, saddling our children, grandchildren and great grandchildren with debt and the strong likelihood of their standard of living being lower than previous generations of Americans. Other than authorizing Navy Seals to kill Usama Bin Laden and implementing a health care law that the majority of Americans don't want, Obama has no accomplishments of significance as President.  A recent 99-0 vote by the Senate, controlled by Democrats, sent the proposed Obama budget to the scrap heap.  To think that his proposed budget couldn't get a single vote of support should send a powerful message to all Americans about his effectiveness as a leader.  Of course, the mainstream news media barely covered this story, so most Americans aren't even aware that his proposed budget went down in flames.


After looking more closely at the two candidates, maybe West Virginians aren't uninformed, uneducated and racist.  Maybe they're the smart ones, after all.  The most surprising fact about the primary isn't that West Virginians voted for a convict, it's that Judd didn't win.