Simple Man Politics

August 31st, 2010 that’s the date to remember. That is the day that President Barack Hussein Obama says we will have all of our combat troops out of Iraq. Wow that is only 18 months to wait before everyone’s loved ones come home from the Iraqi theater of operations. I bet you that so many wives, husbands, and parents are so excited that they are all a quiver with the anticipation of their long overdue reunion of their families.

Oh…..wait a minute did I say all of the combat troops out by August 31st, 2010? I’m sorry that was wrong, it is what the Obama said, but it is still wrong. Actually only 100,000 troops will be out of Iraq by that date. There will still be up to 50,000 troops there when we reach that date, so not everyone will have their long awaited family reunion after all.

By the way did I forget to remind you all that we are getting ready to step up combat operations in Afghanistan with a surge in troop deployments there? With 14 brigade combat teams currently in Iraq and many of those personnel with current combat experience I am sure that some of those fine young men and women will see their duty tours extended for that party, which means even less family reunions for families with their folks in Iraq.

Obama broke the news of his date for withdrawal at Camp Lejeune, NC. Many of the marines currently stationed at Camp Lejeune are getting ready to deploy to Afghanistan. Obama also told these young warriors that most of their brothers in arms in Iraq would remain there through the end of the year to make sure that the national elections there go smoothly but that they would be out by the end of August 2010.

It does appear that the President will keep his promise to start withdrawing troops from Iraq soon. However some of the leadership within his own party does not appear to be happy about the extended timetable for withdrawal or the number of troops left behind. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D) said that 50,000 troops left in Iraq was a little higher number than he anticipated. However former Republican Presidential Candidate and Senator John McCain (R) and House Minority Leader John Boehner (R) have both supported the plan with cautious optimism.

It seems to me that while President Obama is keeping his promise to withdraw troops from Iraq that he is not really keeping his promise to his supporters about a full withdrawal. I cannot say that this displeases me as I believe that they will do anything to undermine Bush’s Iraq policy in an effort to remove him from our history or to at least portray him as a failure for not leaving Iraq sooner. I also believe that President Obama has learned the hard way that leaving Iraq will not be so easy and I am sure he will learn a few more hard lessons with regard to our foreign policy as his administration continues over the next four years.

I also understand why a lot of people feel that we never should have gone to war in Iraq. We found no WMD’s there, although we know that at one time they had them and used them against their own people under Saddam. We also know that when we invaded Iraq we found no terrorists, but we did find evidence of their camps and Saddam’s cooperation with those groups. There is also a widely held consensus that G.W. Bush was just finishing what his dad started because Saddam tried to assassinate Bush 41, which we have the evidence that the assassination was at least planned and probably attempted.

The truth of the matter is though that Saddam Hussein was a very bad guy and a destabilizing force in the region just as Ahmadinejad of Iran is now. I also believe that since Saddam refused to cooperate with the UN inspectors and his violation of over 14 UN Security Council resolutions that it was time for him to go. Let’s be honest here for a minute we helped to create this monster by supporting his government at one time, so we had to clean up our mess.

Unfortunately I think Iran is our next mess we are going to have to clean up to, because we supported the former Shah of Iran, who was latter ousted in the Islamic revolution that took place while Jimmy (The Peanut Farmer Carter) Carter was president and resulted in US citizens being held hostage by the very monster that now runs the nation of Iran. I know for sure that the last thing we can afford is an Iran with a nuke, so I guess Obama is going to get some more on the job training as Commander in Chief.

That’s all for now I hope you all a fabulous weekend. I will see you all next week, CIAO4NOW!!!!!

Today’s topic is the United Nations, one of my favorite topics although I don’t talk about them very much. The reason I don’t talk about them very often is that in the grand scheme of things that I write about they don’t play a very important role. However I will write about them today because they have stuck their thumb in the American tax payer’s eye again.

The American people give the UN more than 5 Billion Dollars a year, headquarter the UN here on US soil in New York City, and usually provide the bulk of UN peacekeeping forces around the world. With this information in mind here is the rub and a case in point.

The UN internal judicial body known as The Administrative Tribunal or UNAT, has just ruled that the UN must pay the legal fees of Benon Sevan. Sevan is the former chief of the UN Iraq Oil for Food Program, which cost a whopping 60 Billion Dollars worth of scandal and corruption. Sevan is currently in hiding in Cyprus.

In 2007 Sevan was charged with bribery and wire fraud in connection with the oil for food program. The charges were brought by the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York. His lawyers are requesting 880,000 Dollars plus interest from the UN to pay his legal fees and the UN has pledged to abide by the UNAT ruling. All of these while the criminal faces up to 50 years in prison.

This is not the first time that UNAT has issued such a ridiculous decision either. They did the same thing on Kofi Annan’s watch ordering a years back pay to a former UN official with the UNDP who was then accused of killing 32 people during the 1994 Rwanda genocide. Even though there was a huge public outcry Annan issued the payment.

The reason that this is our problem is that the monies being paid out for these ridiculous decisions by UNAT are funds given to the UN by American tax payers. Benon Sevan is a criminal charged by the US government with two federal felony counts and should be extradited to the US to stand trial, but instead we have to pay his legal fees. UN officials charged with any sort of corruption should be brought to trial, not have their legal fees paid.

I personally feel that most of the UN General Assemblies main body are criminals. Yet we allow the UN to continue to function and right here on our own soil. They feed on our people at every opportunity and we pay them for their pleasure. The only thing that unites the UN is that they are usually united against the American people without whose support they would not even be a damaged nonviable entity.

I think that not only should we not pay the legal fees of those international brigands, but that we should hunt them down and bring them to justice. That is if you can find any real old fashioned American justice here any more. I don’t think we should stop at that though. I think we should withdraw our financial support and membership in the UN and evict the entire organization. We don’t need them they need us.

That’s it for today my friends but I will be back soon. Have a great day CIAO4NOW!!!!!

Well here it is midway through the week and it has been a week filled with a lot of activity in the political arena. Unfortunately I believe most of it is not going to be good for our country. Although the democrats would like all of us to believe otherwise I just can’t help but feel like we are on a roller coaster ride with no brakes and a steep fall into oblivion at the end. I know, I know I sound like the doom and gloom guy Instead of Obama this time, but everything seems to be pointing me in that direction.

On Monday we had Eric Holder down at Guantanamo taking a look at the detention facility there. After his tour and meetings with the chain of command for both the detention facility and the base he said in an interview with the press that the facility was run very professionally and is doing a great job. However he also said that even though they are doing a great job hew would close the Gitmo detention facility any way, which means those wonderful terrorists could be coming soon to a prison on US soil near you. These are just the people we need right here in our homeland.

National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair also told the House Intelligence Committee that Guantanamo Naval Base should be closed just because we are not popular the world over, and those countries won’t deal with us. What I want to know is when did we forego our nation’s security just for the sake of international popularity. I guess we really don’t need our first line of defense and the warning system it is responsible for.

Of course there is also Barack Obama’s great speech before both houses of congress last night where he pled with the nation to support him and his massive spending porkulus bill. He tried to tell everyone that without going into debt to the Chinese even more and without spending billions on products not scheduled to begin before 2010 that we could not stimulate the economy now. I am trying to figure out how that is supposed to work still.

As if the first 800+ Billion Dollars wasn’t enough the lower house of congress approves another 410 Billion Dollars today for domestic programs increasing entitlements and the entitlement mentality. That’s right instead of the American people doing what they have always done, which is pick themselves back up, brush themselves off, and get back down to business the Democrats are going to save them all by doing it for them.

On a lighter note though our vaunted and fearless VP Joe Biden pulled off yet another gaffe in an interview CBS’ “Early Show”. This gaffe was in the techie field of the internet. While discussing the stimulus bill he told viewers to check out a government run website tracking stimulus spending. He did admit that he was embarrassed that he didn’t know the sites number and asked an aide if they had the number. Hmmmm I didn’t know websites had numbers. As most web savvy people are aware websites are identified by their URLs or addresses even thought hey do use a number system and are identified by their numeric IP address. I just found it funny that the most web savvy administration would have an official who thought the web worked like a telephone.

That is all for now and I hope you enjoy the Biden gaffe video. See you all later, CIAO4NOW!!!!!

As you all know the economy is in the forefront of the political news again today. I’m sure that this comes as no surprise considering it has been there since before the November 4th national election that saw Barack Obama catapulted into the White House. It was actually the economic crisis that helped to secure the oval office for the new President who ran on a platform of change, transparency, and a new style of governance for the American people.

Of course what we have actually seen from party in power both on the hill and at 1600 W. Pennsylvania Ave is definitely a new style of governing. We have seen an administration riddled with scandal over cabinet appointees and nominees who have done everything from cheat on their taxes, to awarding state contracts on the basis of contributions to their campaigns. Not to mention some who outright admit to being socialists with socialist agendas.

We have also seen the biggest increase in spending programs ever by a President in his first 100 days in office. We have seen monster bailouts of our banking institutions with a thinly veiled attempt at the nationalization of those institutions. We have also started bailing out the big three that make up the Detroit auto industry. We are also bailing out insurance companies, mortgage companies, and credit card companies.

We are even going to bailout homeowners who are facing foreclosures on their homes. The latter group often times being responsible for going into foreclosure simply because they were not responsible enough to pay their own bills and while we are at it we are going to pay off their credit card and auto loan debt to.

In addition to all of that we just got a 800 Billion Dollar stimulus bill loaded with pork and projects that wont even be ready before 2010 that passed both houses of congress and was signed into law by the President without ever having even been read by a single congressperson, or senator, and probably not even a White House official.

Congress is now waiting in the wings with another 400+ Billion Dollar bill and we aren’t even through the first 100 days of a new presidency or even the first year. As if that isn’t enough of our tax money being spent before it is even made Obama has pledged 900 Million Dollars to rebuild Palestine as if we can actually afford it.

With all of that going on as well as his own party working against him and having no support amongst Republicans on the hill in a gesture of good will Obama now points the finger at former President Bush and blames him for all of our economic woes, because he was President and initiated the first bailout mistake, which Democrats wanted to make anyway.

All of which flies in the face of the truth that the economic problem started with Freddy and Fanny who were forced by Barney Frank and Chris Dodd who chair the committees that regulate them to make bad loans. Not to mention the fact that McCain as well as a few other conservatives warned that Freddy and Fannie were in trouble, and were told by Frank and Dodd that all was well and no need to worry.

One thing is for sure in my view and that is that it’s definitely going to get worse for all of us before it gets better. I for one can’t wait to see the spin that our glorious leader the great Barack Obama puts on all of this in his historic economic summit speech tonight. I am sure it promises to be full of doom and woe if he doesn’t get what he wants.

I am also very sure that the continued negative reaction by Wall Street as well as the continued negative reactions by the American people to this glut of spending and lack of real economic stimulus will fall on the deaf ears of Obama and company who will only blame someone else for their mistakes because of it when they fail.

My friends that is all I have to rant about today, but I am sure I will find something else to rail against very soon. Have the best day possible, CIAO4NOW!!!!!

I was sitting in my office trying to think about what to write about today and I couldn’t find anything going on in politics today that I haven’t already written about, and I didn’t really feel like beating a dead horse today. So I decided to check my email and found this wonderfully written but of correspondence. At first I found it to be a little bit funny and I even got a good chuckle out of it, but then I realized something.

I realized that this would be the perfect solution to the ever widening gap in the ideologies and philosophies of the two major political parties who have most of the power in our nation today. I for one am all for this plan as I heartily agree with the author of this piece of potentially historical legislation. Give it a read and let me know what you think.

> Democrats and Republicans
>
> Dear American liberals, leftists, social progressives, socialists,
> Marxists, Obama supporters, et al:
>
> We have stuck together since the late 1950's, but the whole of this
> latest election process has made me realize that I want a divorce. I
> know we tolerated each other for many years for the sake of future
> generations, but sadly, this relationship has run its course. Our two
> ideological sides of America cannot and will not ever agree on what is
> right, so let's just end it on friendly terms. We can smile, slate it up
> to irreconcilable differences, and go on our own ways.
>
> Here is a model dissolution agreement:
>
> Our two groups can equitably divide up the country by landmass each
> taking a portion. That will be the difficult part, but I am sure our two
> sides can come to a friendly agreement.
>
> After that it should be relatively easy! Our respective representatives
> can effortlessly divide other assets since both sides have such distinct
> and disparate tastes. We don't like redistributive taxes so you can keep
> them.
> You are welcome to the liberal judges and the ACLU..
>
> Since you hate guns and war, we'll take our firearms, the cops, the NRA
> and the military. You can keep Oprah, Michael Moore, and Rosie O'Donnell
> (you are however, responsible for finding a bio-diesel vehicle big
> enough to move them).
>
> We'll keep the capitalism, greedy corporations, pharmaceutical
> companies, Wal-Mart, and Wall Street. You can have your beloved
> homeless, homeboys, hippies, and illegal aliens. We'll keep the hot
> Alaskan hockey moms, greedy CEO's, and rednecks. We'll keep the Bibles
> and give you NBC and Hollywood .
>
> You can make nice with Iran , Palestine , and France and we'll retain
> the right to invade and hammer places that threaten us. You can have the
> peaceniks and war protestors. When our allies or way of life are under
> assault, we'll provide them job security.
>
> We'll keep our Judeo-Christian Values. You are welcome to Islam,
> Scientology, Humanism, and Shirley McClain. You can have the U.N. But we
> will no longer be paying the bill. We'll keep the SUV's, pickup trucks,
> and oversized luxury cars. You can take every Subaru station wagon you
> can find.
>
> You can give everyone healthcare, if you can find any practicing doctors
> (that is practicing, Howard Dean) who will follow to your turf (sic).
> We'll
> continue to believe healthcare is a luxury and not a right.
>
> We'll keep The Battle Hymn of the Republic and The National Anthem. I'm
> sure you'll be happy to substitute Imagine, I'd Like to Teach the World
> to Sing, Kum Ba Ya or We Are the World.
>
> We'll practice trickle down economics and you can give trickle up
> poverty its best shot.
>
> Since it often so offends you we'll keep our History, our Name, and our
> Flag.
>
> Would you agree to this? If so please pass it along to other like minded
> patriots and if you do not agree just hit delete and hang on.
>
> In the spirit of friendly parting, I'll bet you ANWAR on who will need
> whose help in 15 years.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> John J. Wall
>
> Law Student and an American
>
> P.S. Please take Barbra Streisand.

I hope you all enjoyed reading that, I know I did. I will try to be back soon with something a little more current in politics if I can find something in politics that is actually new and newsworthy, and I am sure the left as well as the right will endeavor to furnish me with something real soon. Have a great day my friends, CIAO4NOW!!!!!

Well my friends T.G.I.F. Of course you all know what this means, this means it is time for the last post of the week. There is a lot going on in politics right now that I can write about, but I think I’m going to stay with the topic that Joy picked for my blog yesterday, which is the stimulus bill and the start of the nationalized socialist healthcare plan in it that both houses of congress and the administration passed into law and signed off on without so much as one congressman, senator, or administration official reading it. However I am going to put my own little spin on it and tell you something that it might mean and shock the hell right out of you.

Now bear in mind that they have only laid the foundation for a national healthcare plan within the bill so far and it is not yet complete, but when it is we will have lost any and all control that we currently enjoy with regard to our own healthcare. This is because they plan to have everyone’s medical records placed into a nation wide data base for easy access by healthcare professionals. Oh and by the way the database will be overseen by a governmental official and the DHHS, whose job it will be to streamline healthcare making it more cost effective and affordable. I mean for the government that is.

What this will does is put a bureaucrat instead of a physician in charge of determining whether or not to continue what ever treatment you are currently on, whether or not to receive a new treatment that may be necessary, or whether you will receive any treatment at all based on cost and your health. All of this means exactly the question that Joy asked you all yesterday, which is are you ready to die for America? That is not what I intend to shock all of you with though. Here is what I do intend to shock you with.

If the government is going to have this sort of control over you then what else do you think they will have control over with this new nationlized healthcare system? Think about it for a moment, can you guess? Don’t worry I will tell you what they will control. They will control who can and can’t be born. They will be able to determine a child’s health within the womb, at the same time they determine the health of the mother.

If the child is developmentally disabled in anyway they may decide that it is more cost effective to abort the child than to care for it medically outside of the womb, even if the mother’s health is fine and she wants the baby. By the same token they may also decide that for the mother that the child is healthy and even though the mother wants an abortion they can deny it. That’s right folks what I am talking about is population control, which sort of reminds me of China.

You all know by now that I am a pro-life kind of guy, which means I am against abortion except if the life of the mother is in danger, rape, or incest, and partial birth abortion period, which means I am all for the second part. As a parent of a special needs child as well I am totally opposed to the idea of abortion because the child is developmentally disabled. So what happened to the woman’s right to choose? It seems that the government will have the say, so there goes Roe v Wade right out the window.

Granted that is not what the bill actually says but it is a definite possibility and one I am certainly not comfortable with and people on both sides of the issue should not be comfortable with the idea either. You see government run healthcare means everyone’s health your unborn child included.

I hope that this gives all of you a pause for thought and stops you from being willing to jump in to bed with the government just because you misguidedly believe that you are entitled to something from the government, because this may be what you’re entitled to. I hope you all have an awesome weekend and I will see you all next week, CIAO4NOW!!!!!

More than once here on Simple Man Politics, both Tim and I (Joy) have discussed the stimulus bill that was just passed. I've even discussed it on my own blog, American Politics for the Conservative Woman. However, most of our posts have touched on the ridiculous spending, the silly tax cuts that don't really help anyone, and the atrocity of spending billions once AGAIN in tax payer dollars.

Many Americans are outraged at this bill, especially the idea of spending close to a trillion dollars. However, most Americans are not aware of some of the other scary issues that have come up in this bill. They've been covered up, and it's time that Americans realize what's really under there.

No doubt you've heard about Obama's lofty ideas of bringing about a nationalized health care plan. Most conservatives have felt that it wouldn't happen. You'd think that if people knew it was going on, they'd stand out against it and it would never actually come to pass. That's the problem…most people don't know that it's already happening.

This stimulus bill that was just passed included a large chunk of money that has been set aside to start a "nationwide health records database." This will be a database that includes everyone's health information. It will allow the government to see what medical problems you have, how often you see the doctor, and how you are being treated. In that 1000+ page stimulus bill, which no one in congress really read, this slipped right on through.

Now you're probably wondering where my title "Are You Ready to DIE for America" is going to fit in? Well, this is a huge step in the direction of nationalized health care with the government overseeing your care. Right in the stimulus bill, it has the stipulation on the Department of Health and Human Services, that they will "appropriate information to help guide medical decisions at the time and place of care." They will be overseeing what kind of care you get. This section also allows the Department of HHS to put penalties on physicians that end up spending too much money on one individual patient.

Essentially this new stimulus bill has started the beginnings of government run health care, where the law decides who is going to be eligible for care and what treatments they are allowed to receive. If it gets too expensive and you have too many medical problems, then you may end up doing your "patriotic duty" and dying for your country because the government decided you were too sick and too much of a financial liability to treat.

According to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, commonly known as HIPAA, your medical records are to be kept private. Let's not even get into the fact that Democrats always argue that it's wrong for the government to "choose" or "interfere" when it comes to a woman's right to have an abortion. Apparently women can choose to kill and the government can't do a thing…but the government can get involved in every single aspect of your medical history, and it's perfectly fine.

Sadly Americans keep voting for this type of "change." I think eventually they'll regret it. I'm fairly sure this isn't the change that the American people have been hoping for. There definitely is going to be a change. Soon you'll no longer even have the freedom to choose medical treatments. In fact, your duty may be the "duty to die" so that everyone else can have free healthcare. Now that's a very expensive price to pay for change…don't you think?