Houses passes bill easing rules regulating Wall Street

Republican proponents insisted the new legislation would reduce the regulatory burden on small businesses and spur creation of new jobs.

SOURCE:  Houses passes bill easing rules regulating Wall Street – Yahoo News.

I think every one of those GOPers in this new congress need to have the words above tattooed on their foreheads. Ok more realistically written on a Post-It note and stuck on the foreheads. I’m sure that mantra is going to be their reason for every bill they pass in the coming two years as it has been for the last couple of decades. But as usual there is a big difference between rationalization and reality.

It’s funny that when they are in power Wall Street almost always does worse than when the Dems are there. When Mr. Bush came into office the stock market was at 11,000 when he left eight years later it was at 8,000 mainly due to GOP decisions made while he was in office. Then came Mr. Obama and the stock market went from 8,000 to almost double that in six years. I don’t know when the 1%ers who control more wealth than the rest of us combined are going to realize that the GOP are just not that good for them.

The “Regulatory burdens” that this new GOP majority want to eliminate are what was put in place to reign in the worst capitalistic greed. It doesn’t seem to concern these yahoos that the lack of regulatory burdens is what caused the near complete collapse of our entire economy just six short years ago.  To me, and I hope many of you, regulatory burdens are the necessary rules for living in a people centered democracy but yes I do realize that we have become much less people centered in this new century. I pray that we can turn that around.

Eliminating taxes and therefore government is the goal of much of Republican’s action. They seem to do a good job of listening to their rich donors but not so much in listening to those who elected them.  I know I have spent a lot of words here hitting on the GOP majority now in congress but that doesn’t mean that I think the other party did much better. All those yahoos need to learn some basic lessons about representing us. A democracy is about all the people not just about those who finance the political campaigns. They are there to do the people’s business not to blindly follow whatever their leadership or even more so the monied interests tells them to do. It is a shame that one of the first things they wanted to do as the new majority was to give more power to those who almost put us down. But maybe even more shameful was the second thing and that was to start whittling down Social Security. Shame on all of them for that mentality… and shame on us for not taking them to task for not doing the people’s business….

An LOL Moment… :)

In a speech on the Senate floor Wednesday morning, the newly elected majority leader suggested that the growing signs of an economic recovery — 5 percent GDP growth, 320,000 additional jobs in November, all-time highs in the markets on Wall Street and plunging gas prices, to name a few — just might have something to do with the election of a Republican Congress….

“That Mitch McConnell is one funny guy,” said Mo Elleithee, communications director for the Democratic National Committee. “He likes to remind people all the time that he’s not a scientist. Now we know he’s not a mathematician or an economist either.”

SOURCE: Mitch McConnell: It’s Funny How The Economy Improved When The GOP Took Over Congress.

Oh the politicians.  You gotta love them. I think on occasion they even believe what comes out of their mouths but the quote above is not one of them.  I searched for a photo of Mitch smiling and this is the closest I could come. He is a quintessential politician who has been in office for decades and nothing seems to be able to move him out. Politicians helping the economy?  I just pray that they don’t do too much damage. They tried to push back the rules on Wall Street that help prevent another melt-down. Thankfully that didn’t work. But they did start the dismantling process for Social Security on the very first day in power. More to come on that I’m sure…

The Less You Know….

“I am kind of like a politician. The less I know about anything, the more I can say about it.” – Will Rogers, 12 June 1928

I’m kind of like a politician myself Will. One of my favorite quotes is “You don’t have to know what you are saying as long as you say it with authority”. That should be the mantra for most of those politicians inside the beltway. Too many of those yahoos like to strut around like they are experts on everything but in reality they let the lobbyists with the biggest purse tell them what to say and believe.

Its time we started sending some “real” people to that totally fake city… 🙂

Ain’t That The Truth….

“Party Politics is the most narrow minded occupation in the World.” – Will Rogers, 29 March 1925

It is sad to say that this is probably more true today than even in Will’s Day.  But then again the Republicans in Will’s day were fighting just as hard against Social Security and the WPA as they fight today against immigration, helping the poor and healthcare for all. So maybe nothing has really changed.  Progress comes agonizingly slow when them GOPers have their fingers in the stew… Maybe not much faster with the Democrats but at least they do something…

Kind of Scary….

“If lawmakers were elected for life I believe they would do better. A man’s thoughts are naturally on his next term, more than on his country.” – Will Rogers, 8 June 1924

I don’t know about this one Will. It is kind of scary to me to think of having any politician get a lifetime appointment. But maybe you are right that some more noble beings might step up to help lead our country if they did not have to spend all their time getting re-elected instead of trying to accomplish the degree of good they want to accomplish.

I am currently reading a book entitle “The American Senate”. I will likely do a full report on the book some time in the future but for now I just want to point out that I had forgotten that through most of our history U.S. senators were not put in office by a fickle electorate but instead were appointed by State legislatures. So, at least their campaigning was limited to a very small group. Did that make them more statesmen and less politicians? I will have to study on that but I expect it to be the case.

Vehicles Of The Future….

We are generally very poor at predicting the future. Congressman Ryan who is a radical right conservative in the House of Representative recently proudly put out a ten year government budget that he proclaims will starve us from our legendary deficit spending.  With his ten year budget in hand he keeps ranting about where is the democratic ten year budget. I think maybe my Democratic friends are just too smart to try to predict what will happen in ten years. It is almost certain that it won’t represent what Mr. Ryan predicts.   Let’s face it we are just terrible at predicting the future next year, let alone in ten years.

But, political budgets are not what this post is about. Instead it is about predicting the future of our personal transportation vehicles, otherwise known as cars. I have been a car guy on one level or another for more than fifty years. During the early and mid 1960s I could tell you just about every car make and model on the road. I lived through the midwestern version of the movie “American Graffiti”.  I was a car guy even before I could afford to own one; not so much any more.

But let’s get back to predicting the future.  I can remember going to the 1960 New York World’s Fair during our high school graduation trip in 1965. It seemed like it was almost all about the future. The predictors back then knew for a fact that way off in the year 2000 we would all be driving cars that few in the skies. Roads would no longer be necessary and gasoline would be a thing of the distant past.  They were sure that all car would be nuclear powered by that distant date.

Flash forward those forty plus years and lets look at where we are.  Still driving gasoline polluting global warming cars over just as many pot holes as in those days.  I think the politicians are about the only ones who bought into that 1960s prediction as they quit collecting enough taxes to maintain our highway infrastructure. It continues to crumble down with no end in sight. It may be that in the future our cars will have to fly as our roads will probably become un-driveable.