Stan Geiger

Gubment Gone Mad

It gets worse every year. Every year a bunch of idiots get together and pass a bunch of new laws that intrude on people's lives. They are wiser than the ignorant masses, so they propose to tell us all how to act.

On a day last year, I don't recall which, I caught a little news blurb on TV that mentioned 200 new state laws had gone into effect. Two hundred freakin' new laws in one day.

I read somewhere, a couple of months back, that over 1,500 bills were set to be introduced in the current session of the Oklahoma Legislature.

Do we need 200 new laws a year? Do we need lawmakers coming into a session proposing 1,500 new laws?

No, we don't.

The word "gridlock" gets thrown around a lot these days. I like gridlock. We need more gridlock. Government is at its best when government is doing nothing.

Let's just take a look a few items floating around in the news right now.

It appears there is a proposed Oklahoma law that will allow cops to drive around town with some super scanner so they can decide whether or not you have insurance. If you don't, you don't get a ticket. The cops will confiscate your car and throw your family out on the street to fend for itself.

Marvelous. In a country that goes around the world preaching the value of personal choice, this is a law that gets proposed.

There is a jackass politician in Oklahoma City looking to pass a law mandating that anyone that wants to get married has to go see some "marriage expert" first. The same rules would apply to people looking to split up.

I've never been married. But if I ever decided to make that leap of faith, I don't figure I'd need some so-called "expert" getting involved with it. Nor do I figure I'd need some so-called "expert" involved if I decided I had married the wrong chick.

How about fat kids? I mean we've got government that says, on the one hand, that childhood obesity is a problem. On the other, it says public schools need to give free food to kids. The percentages of student populations getting free or reduced-priced meals is huge. And it goes beyond lunch these days. Breakfast is offered up as well.

You can't have it both ways. You can't argue we are a nation full of fat kids then argue the fat kids will starve without gubment food.

Speaking of fat, politicians are all about taxing soda pop these days. Too much sugar, they say. We need a "sugar tax."

The federal government has subsidized sugar production for decades. It continues to do so. Does it make any sense at all for the government to subsidize the production of something and then tax you for consuming it?

I'm waiting for the day when the politicians decide I need a personal keeper, I need a gubment employee to come and live with me. Said gubment employ would tell me when to eat and what to eat, tell me when to turn on the TV and what to watch, tell me when to go to bed and when to get up, tell me what clothes to wear and tell me when to go to the crapper and how much I could dump.

I've got a better idea: Maybe the pricks in politics should take a shot at doing the jobs they were hired to do (managing government) and spend less time and energy trying to manage my life. Does that work for you?

Socialism is Capitalism

The word "socialism" gets a lot of attention these days. Let's take a look at that.

I watched the morning pundit shows. All the talk was about health care. Do you really think any Washington politician, from Obama on down, gives a fat monkey's ass about poor folks that can't afford health insurance? Do you really?

Politicians are about paying debts owed to big-money types. That's what health care reform is all about. It's about money.

Is anybody deprived of health care in this country? I mean if I went down to an emergency room, would I not get care?

So far as I know, there is a state law that says I get care. I would hope it goes beyond that. I would hope a doctor, sworn to treat the ill, wouldn't toss me into the street because I couldn't pay.

Doctors want to get paid. Hospitals want to get paid. Any health-related company wants to get paid.

Health insurers want to get paid. Those companies want healthy people mandated to buy insurance. They want those thousands a year in premiums paid by people that have no problems. In effect, they want a tax on the healthy populace to pay for the unhealthy populace.

And speaking of an unhealthy populace, what about the food supply? Last I heard it reported, 31 million food cards are handed to households in this country every month. How many people are being fed in those households every month? A hundred million, maybe? A third of the population, in the most prosperous nation on the planet, is eating gubment food.

Much of that food, by the way, is poison. So we talk about health care as the gubment subsidizes the poisoning of the population. Super.

Who likes the plan? Well, I imagine the biggest grocer in the nation---Walmart---likes the plan. It gets billions a month in sales paid for by the U.S. taxpayer.

How about Mr. Ed?

Educators jack up the cost of a degree through the roof. The gubments answer? Well, we need another gubment program to "help people."

Where does the money go? It goes into colleges and universities, and, therefore, into the pockets of professors, administrators and coaches.

Follow the money, folks. Follow the money and you will find socialism is capitalism. It just boils down to where the money goes.

The Office of Sustainability

Republican Mayor Dewey Bartlett created a new Tulsa department. Here we elect a Republican mayor and we get a new gubment agency; we get a new place for politicians to slot cronies into gubment jobs.

That's one of the problems in this country: there is no conservative party. It doesn't matter if Republicans or Democrats are in control, government grows. The money might flow in different directions, but government grows.

The money to fund the new department is coming from Uncle Sam. Yeah, okay. So Uncle Sam pays for a job for some fat guy with a lobster and butter addiction. Great.

First, Uncle Sam's money isn't free. That's something we all need to get a hold of; Uncle Sam is borrowing that money.

Second, what happens when Uncle Sam's money runs out? Well, then we have a new agency that we have to pay for locally.

If we ever get a conservative party in this country, I might actually sign on to it. In the meantime, I'll maintain my status as a registered Independent.

I Agree with Barry

I'm sure you won't hear me say it very often, but I agree with the president: it's time for a vote on health care.

The bills in existence are unpopular with the public. In fact, the bills in existence scare the pee out of people. Word is, there aren't enough Democratic votes to pass any of them. So let's have the vote and throw them in the trash.

Our so-called "leaders" in Washington have spent a year on this issue. There are other things that need attention.

I'm for some health care reforms. But in order to get to them we have to get rid of the behemoth proposals. Let's have the vote; let's Kill Bill.

I recall a line from Glen Campbell's character in the movie True Grit. He said, "I only take one step at time. That's why God gave me two feet."

Health Care Summit Irony

I didn't watch the big health care show on TV. I did, however, see some clips on the evening news. I was impressed with the irony.

I guess the first comment I saw that caught my attention came from the president, when he said to John McCain, "We aren't campaigning anymore."

Dude, Obama has done nothing but campaign since he took office. I reckon that's because he knows a lot about campaigning but little about governing. The Air Force will likely have to replace a couple of 747s when Obama gets voted out of office. The president will have worn them out with his travel habit.

But Senator Jay Rockefeller really got my attention. He was shown scolding the Republicans for being too cozy with the health insurers. He referred to health insurance companies as sharks in the water that you don't notice until they sink their teeth into you.

Yes, Jay Rockefeller is a member of that Rockefeller family. He is the nephew of David Rockefeller; he is the great grandson of J.D. Rockefeller.

First, I couldn't believe a Democrat was scolding Republicans about coddling health insurance companies. The federal mandate for health insurance isn't coming from Republicans; it's coming from Democrats. And that's the big plum for health insurers. Health insurers want healthy people forced into paying thousands a year in premiums. Whether the money comes from individuals or the government matters none to them; they just want the money. Democrats are playing that game, not Republicans.

Second, I don't know, I didn't bother to check, but I imagine David is dead these days. But in his time, David was a bankster of note. These days, I think everybody is aware of what banksters are about.

J.D. I know is dead. In his time, he was one of the biggest robber barons in American history. J.D., more than anybody else, gave birth to antitrust laws in this country. Using every dirty trick in the book, he drove out competition and took over the oil industry. He owned virtually all of it at one point.

For a guy from that family to accuse health insurance companies of being sharks in the water looking to exploit people is, well, disingenuous at best.

The Rockefellers are much like the Kennedys. They exploited the masses to acquire huge family fortunes, then they went into politics claiming the very people they exploited to get filthy stinking rich need government help.

I don't need to hear anything from anybody with the Rockefeller name.

Three Counselors Refused

KOTV reported last night that certain Tulsa city councilors have volunteered to take minimal pay cuts this year. Three councilors---Henderson, Turner and Eagleton---refused to take part, arguing they only make $18,000 a year.

I can understand the 18k posture. And I will concur with what Emory Bryan of KOTV noted: the amount of money involved relative to the city's budget is "chump change."

On the other hand, the city is shutting down rec centers. The city has grounded the police helicopters and done away with the mounted patrol. I hear some 4,000 street lights have gone dark. Cops have been laid off; firefighters have taken pay cuts. Yet we have three councilors that won't take a pay cut of the slightest magnitude---even if the move would amount to nothing more than symbolism.

The word is "leadership."

Councilor Jack Henderson's rejection of any notion that he should get less doesn't surprise me at all. It wasn't long ago that he was bitching about being underpaid, and calling for a tripling of his pay with the stroke of a pen.

I disagree with Jack's view that he is so greatly undervalued. I figure you could go into just about any household in town and find his replacement.

But the one that really pisses me off is Eagleton. If I have the wrong guy, set me right. But I'm pretty sure Eagleton has been shooting lip about cops not writing enough traffic tickets for some time now. He wants the money to feed the city's coffers.

Eagleton---though I'm sure he has other sources of income---complains of only getting paid $18,000 on his city job. Well, there are a lot people in Tulsa that only make $18,000 a year. There are a lot of people in this city that make less than that. Still, Eagleton advocates having cops forget about real crime and go looking for someone doing 45 mph in a 40 mph zone or making a lane change without a turn signal and writing them up.

Politicians recently set the minimum moving violation fine in Tulsa at $150. I've written that when I first got my driver's license, in 1974, the minimum moving violation fine was $15---and it stayed there for a number of years after. Today, the typical traffic fine in Tulsa is 10 times what it was when I first started driving---way exceeding an inflation adjustment.

Cops have seemed reluctant to issue the fines. I applaud the cops for that. The fines constitute usury; they are excessive. Eagleton, however, could care less. He wants the money.

But when Eagleton had the opportunity to offer up even a mere $150 annual cut in his pay for the good of the city, he declined.

Given that, Councilor Eagleton, as far as I'm concerned, may now shut his fat pie hole when it to comes to traffic fine revenue.

A Snake in the Health Care Grass?

The big health care show takes place in Washington today.

The House passed an unpopular behemoth bill. The Senate passed an unpopular behemoth bill. Obama basically sat things out. The people of Massachusetts dropped a Brown bomb. Now Obama has put forth a proposal, a proposal that looks a lot like the congressional proposals.

Health care reform, in its current form at least, was dead in the water. Republicans called for scrapping the current proposals and starting over. I agree with the Republicans. Obama and most of the Dems, however, want one more shot at it. Hence the summit. I doubt anything will come of it.

But something happened along the way that was very interesting.

After passage of the Senate bill, I saw news reports trumpeting soaring stock prices for health care companies. The health insurers were happy. They were expecting passage of a national mandate for health insurance coverage that would do them a lot of good by forcing healthy people to pay thousands a year in premiums while rarely---if ever---putting in claims.

If the process starts again from scratch, the health insurers will likely lose their precious mandate.

So, all of the sudden, a major health insurer operating in the key state of California bumped its rates by as much as 39 percent. I saw a woman interviewed that said her monthly premiums went from about $500 a month to a little over $700.

The move created public outrage. The national news blasted the story all over the country. Obama warned this would just be the beginning if a behemoth bill doesn't get passed. Press Secretary Robert Gibbs mentioned Anthem in an interview this morning.

I find the timing of Anthem's massive rate hike most suspect.

Fragments

Just a few months ago, Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued these condescending words to the American citizenry: "We won."

How quickly things can change. Today, there is talk of Democrats losing as many as 30 seats in the House, and losing control of the Senate altogether.

Note to politicians: Don't get cocky.

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Somebody made a movie about Barack Obama's campaign for the White House. I don't recall the name of the production. If I did, I probably wouldn't mention it, because I'm sure it's a giant piece of crap. But I did see a clip from the movie on a morning show and found it amusing.

Obama was to appear on the Today Show. As the cameras ran backstage, he complained of the hotel in which he was staying charging him $36 for his breakfast. Bacon and eggs, he said, and no orange juice.

A fellow off camera muttered, "Welcome to New York."

I wondered how much New York City's tax structure had to do with the tab. I mean taxes on businesses make it harder for them to make profits, driving up what they charge; taxes on individuals increase their cost of living, which drives up labor costs for businesses, which drives up what they charge.

There are a number of tax increase trial balloons floating around Tulsa these days. I suggest you opposed any tax increase proposal. Unless, of course, you don't mind the prospect of paying $36 for breakfast at the local Denny's at some point in the future.

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Tiger Woods has spoken. Uhhhhh, who cares?

I don't know Tiger Woods. I don't know his wife; I don't know his kids; I don't know his mommy. I have no financial stake in the man. He could decide to never hit a golf ball again and it wouldn't matter to me the least little bit.

Get over yourself, Tiger. And get over Tiger, media types.

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A judge ruled an Oklahoma anti-abortion law unconstitutional. The main point in the law banned the practice of having an abortion just because the child was of the "wrong" sex.

The judge's ruling, best I can tell, was about nothing more than mechanics. He simply ruled the law was too broad; it covered too much territory. The Legislature can fix the problem with little effort.

I'm amazed by the story, however. I can't believe a law barring people from killing a baby over gender is necessary. The very notion is barbaric.

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In Pennsylvania, a school district is being sued for sending laptops with remote-controlled cameras home with students.

I can think of no greater violation of constitutional rights to privacy than that of a government agency spying on people in their own freakin' homes.

Where are the liberals? I mean if cops were caught pulling a stunt like this, ACLU lawyers and Harvard law professors would be all over the airwaves pitching a bitch. But I guess it's okay for educator pervs to eyeball 16-year-old girls as they undress in their bedrooms.

This is abominable. The district should get hammered in court. Anybody with anything to do with this should be fired immediately and brought up on criminal charges.

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Obama went to Las Vegas, swiped Uncle Sam's credit card and promised $1.5 billion in housing aid for five key states.

He talks a good fight about changing the culture in Washington and blah, blah, blah. Then he goes out and engages in classic Washington pork barrel vote buying.

A man's actions speak louder than his words.

Headed for the Wall

I caught a blurb on a national newscast the other day that said the federal government has borrowed $431 billion in the first four months of this fiscal year. We are running at a record pace.

I saw a journalist on one of the pundit shows make reference to America as we emerged from WWII. She noted that if predictions come true and we push the national debt to 100 percent of GDP, it will be the first time since the big war ended.

After a decade of borrowing in an attempt to address the Great Depression plus WWII spending, sure, our country was up to its butt in debt. We survived. Assuming we can do it again ignores the fact that we live in a much different environment today.

Social Security was around post WWII. But the ratio of taxpayers to benefit recipients was huge. Not so today. Last I heard, the ratio sits at 3-1. The ratio is expected to drop to 2-1 in the near future.

Medicare and Medicaid didn't exist back in the day.

Our nation's infrastructure was much smaller in 1946. Nowadays, it is enormous---and rotting.

In 1946, we were the last one standing, if you will. Germany, Japan, Britain and France were bombed into oblivion. We escaped untouched. The communist Soviet Union took the heaviest casualties of the war. India and China were of no concern. Our nation, in short, faced a bright future.

Things are much different today. We have 78 million Baby Boomers entering entitlement age. As noted, we are faced with massive infrastructure challenges. Asia, the European Union, the Russian Federation and, for that matter, Latin America, stand as challengers to our economic supremacy. We aren't looking up from here; we're looking down. We cannot afford to rack up the debt we are racking up, period.

I can't tell you when, but I can tell you it will happen---barring changes now. A day will come when the Treasury spits out $100 billion in bright shiny securities and there will be no buyers.

So what happens when Uncle Sam has $100 billion in obligations to meet in a given month but there is no money to back the checks?

Chaos. That's what happens.

Cut and Run Politics

Evan Bayh is the latest big-time senator to call it quits, claiming he is simply fed up with partisanship. I find his excuse dubious at best.

Sure, it's a rough time for Democrats. Heck, it's a rough time for any incumbent. But reports say Bayh had $13 million in campaign funds and a strong lead in the polls. It appears he was going to have no problem winning another term. Yet, he quit.

We experienced a similar situation in Tulsa a little while ago. Our beloved mayor, Kat Taylor, up and announced she would not seek reelection. Then, strangely, she bought TV time and ran ads telling us of her greatness. Her announcement fueled a lot of speculation. Was she going to run for Congress? Was she going to run for state school super?

Well, as it turned out, the Kat wasn't running for anything; she was running from something. She didn't want to risk being elected to a second term and having to deal with the current budget woes. She cut and ran.

Bayh is cutting and running. And he's not the only one.

Obama's proposed budget calls for $3.8 trillion in federal spending over 12 months. If I'm not mistaken, that's up $200 billion year-over-year. The budget calls for deficit spending of $1.6 trillion. If you're counting, Obama proposes borrowing 42 percent of spending. Projections say we are on course to have an official national debt exceeding $20 trillion in just a few short years. Actuaries say the unfunded liability for the entitlement programs is a staggering $70 trillion.

Elaboration is called for, but for now I'll simply say Congress is no longer in a position to do what it has done for the past 30 years and, as they say, kick the can down the road. Tough decisions have to be made---and they need to be made now if this nation is to survive. Those decisions---all of them---are going to be very, very, unpopular.

In short, dancing around the fringes won't git 'er done. Military spending is going to have to be cut. Social Security spending is going to have to be cut. Medicare and Medicaid spending is going to have to be cut. Spending on things generally classed as welfare is going to have to be cut.

Even after all that, taxes will likely have to be raised. And limiting a tax increase to the top 1 percent won't be good enough.

No senator wants to cast votes to cut funding for everything near and dear to the hearts of Americans. No senator wants to vote yes on a tax increase. But the simple fact is, we're out of time. The borrowing has to stop; the budget has to be balanced.

Adding to the situation where Bayh is concerned, I think he still holds out hope of making it to the White House someday. They say it's difficult for a longtime senator to get elected president. The voting record gets in the way. Can you imagine a guy running for president when his senate voting record shows, for example, that he voted to cut Social Security benefits and raise taxes?

If Bayh ever does manage to get the Democratic nomination, I doubt he would have a shot at my vote. A guy that bails when times get tough doesn't have the balls to be president.