Cap and Trade Is Bad for You and Your Family

Go read this article from the Wall Street Journal on the Cap and Trade legislation.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124588837560750781.html

Cap and Trade is a hidden tax that will drive up the price of energy for you, me, and every other person out there. It's all done in the name of the environment, but in all actuality it just hurts the economy. The U.S. is not polluting this world near to the extent that China and India are. That doesn't mean we shouldn't do our part to keep our part of the world clean. But putting more stress on an already stressed economy does not clean up the earth. It just stresses the economy further which discourages people from updating their old junky car to something that doesn't pollute nearly as much and that's more fuel efficient as one example.

What can you do? Call and write your senators and representatives and tell then to vote against this. Let them know their job depends on it. Supposedly they may be voting on this as early as tomorrow, so don't wait. Call and write NOW!!!
http://www.senate.gov/ for your senators
http://www.house.gov/ for your representatives

Emergency Post!!! A Compromise Stimulus???

Word is that republican Senators Arlen Specter, Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe will cross over to vote with the democrats in a compromise bill that is still at $780 Billion!!!(update may actually be more like $830 Billion give or take) Ohh what a compromise...that was a VERY Generous compromise. 42% Tax cuts and 58% new spending. But we don't know what what the cuts are and what the spending is. If you still oppose this stimulus contact these senators and let them know. They are announcing this on Friday night since America isn't paying attention over the weekend. They will likely vote on it before the weekend is up.

This is the link to the congressional budget office's assessment of the bill that passed the house.
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/99xx/doc9968/hr1.pdf
To sum it up, it basically says that the money that goes to the states for programs and infrastructure will not be realized immediately due to the time it takes to plan, solicit bids, enter into contracts, and conduct regulatory review. Also some business/work is seasonal in nature ie schools do repairs in the summer when school is out, and road work is generally not done in winter in many parts of the country. Brand new programs require planning, developing procedures, criteria, regulations, etc. "Throughout the federal government, spending for new programs has frequently been slower than expected and rarely been faster."

"CBO expects that many of the larger projects initiated with funds provided by H.R. 1 would take up to five to seven years to complete." If it's not spent immediately, how is this stimulating the economy?

One final thing to note, but you should go check it out.

"CBO estimates that the costs to the private sector of complying with H.R. 1's new
requirements and conditions would likely exceed the annual threshold established in
UMRA for private-sector mandates ($139 million in 2009, adjusted annually for
inflation)."

Just because they don't represent your state, doesn't mean you can't write them and let them know your opinion.

http://collins.senate.gov/public/continue.cfm?FuseAction=ContactSenatorCollins.EmailIssue&CFID=5075464&CFTOKEN=11385212

http://specter.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Contact.ContactForm

http://snowe.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=ContactSenatorSnowe.Email

For a list of any other senators you might want to contact
http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

It's a shame that we have let our senators and representative get away with not representing us. It's time to get involved and take action and contact them in some way shape or form. Next time they are up for reelection, VOTE THEM OUT!!!!

Term Limits - Not Such a Bad Idea

"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves money from the public treasure. From that moment on the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most money from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world's great civilizations has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through the following sequence: from bondage to spiritual faith, from spiritual faith to great courage, from courage to liberty, from liberty to abundance, from abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependency, from dependency back to bondage." - (Alexander Tyler is given credit for writing this in regards to the fall of the Athenian Republic but snopes.com can't validate this. It really doesn't matter who wrote, the sentiment and caution is a good one)

For those of you that think America is a true democracy, let me correct you. We are a republic that operates under a representative democracy. Simply put, we don't vote on policy and law, we elect senators and representatives to represent us in Washington and vote "on our behalf." So those of us that voted for them are represented and the rest of us are SOL Don't believe me, look it up. So I guess that's not really a representative democracy either.

Here's the problem with that. There aren't any term limits for Senators and Representatives. Why is that when the office of the president now has a two term limit, it isn't deemed necessary for our other elected officials? Whatever happened to the concept of public service? I'm sure many of them go in with the best of intentions but it seems like after term one or two they start enjoying the power they have and they make votes based on what they feel like making rather than how their constituents would prefer they vote. They could impose term limits on themselves, but they'd have to vote on it and why would anyone vote themselves out of a job? Hence where voting for themselves rather than with constituents' preferences. They vote themselves raises and all kinds of benefits. Why not? If I could vote myself a raise I certainly would.

And this is why we have complacency in this country for how our country is run. The power should be in the hands of the people not in the government. People think they can't change things so they don't educate themselves about candidates, don't bother to vote, or just vote for the name they know. What good does that do? We could essentially kick these people out of office and yet we don't. We keep electing the same ones over and over without bothering to check their voting record while in office. Not one of them ever seems to be held accountable unless they are caught in some "scandal." We have a responsibility to hold them accountable. Just like we have a responsibility to write or call them to voice our opinions to them.

I love how many politicians are "in favor" of term limits and then when that time comes they revise their position to "well if there was a bill to come up I'd vote for it, otherwise I can't do any good if I step down now." Well why haven't you written that bill?

If you limit the amount of time they are allowed to spend representing us there maybe they will actually stick to their original intentions rather than wasting their time trying to buy our votes every election. Which is another trick they get involved in. They will vote a certain way in an attempt to essentially buy votes with your tax dollars. Why do we let them do this? Again, term limits might help put a stop to this practice.