Alex's Journal

The BBC is reporting that Germany is exiting the recession that has affected the entire world for the past couple of years. Germany, along with France, is one of the first countries to emerge from this economic downturn and yet the German government did next to nothing to try to pull the country out of the recession.

An article in the Wall Street Journal states the German stance on it:

“Germany has the most capacity in Europe to increase spending, but Berlin has argued against running up big deficits…”

“Last year, according to the IMF, the U.S. pumped an extra 1.1% of GDP into the economy. Germany did next to nothing.”

I think the American government needs to take a page out of Germany’s book. For being a socialist country, Germany seems to have less government intervention in the economy than we do.

Apparently the Federal Government now allows itself to legally steal your computer and make it its own property for the use of domestic or foreign interests. This is all sorts of messed up. I found the video at another blog called Tom’s Place.

This is a great video.

I am sure that most of you have seen this video or at least have heard about this. A teenager in North Carolina was taken in the middle of the night by federal agents because he was suspected of being a terrorist.

As the video states, the mother has had virtually no contact with her son. In all likelihood the boy probably will not even have a proper chance to defend himself. Who knows what will happen to him?

Ironically the federal government seems to be using the excuse of patriotism to undermine the very rights inherent to every US citizen they are claiming to defend. I really don’t understand it. Even if this boy was in fact a terrorist, as a US citizen, he is entitled to due process. But of course the KGB, I mean the FBI, doesn’t agree.

This is absolutely absurd! Led by Muslim nations, the United Nations has actually voted 23-11 in a vote “that urges member states to adopt laws outlawing criticism of religions.” What kind of smelly horse poop is that? How can the United Nations vote to restrict the criticism of religion? Does that mean I will go to jail for saying that Christianity is a mirage of meaning for the intellectually challenged? For saying that Islam is a hallucination of righteousness for the morally impaired?

Here is a portion of the article:

Freedom House condemns the UN Human Rights Council for undermining the universal right to freedom of expression by once again passing a resolution that urges members to adopt laws outlawing criticism of religions.

The “defamation of religions” resolution, introduced by Pakistan on behalf of the Organization for the Islamic Conference (OIC), passed today by a vote of 23-11, with 13 abstentions. Muslim nations have been introducing similar resolutions since 1999, arguing that Islam-the only religion specifically cited in the text-must be shielded from unfair associations with terrorism and human rights abuses.

You can read the entire article here.

Here is an interesting tidbit of information on how to start the day off positively I found on another blog:

The following should put a smile on your face for the entire day (unless you’re a Liberal – they have no sense of humor).

Open a new file in your computer.

1. Name it ‘Barack Obama’.
2. Send it to the Recycle Bin.
3. Empty the Recycle Bin.
4. Your PC will ask you: ‘Do you really want to get rid of ‘Barack Obama?’
5. Firmly Click ‘Yes.’
6. Feel better?

GOOD! – Tomorrow we’ll do Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid the day after…

Reuters has an interesting article about how the addiction to bailout money from the government could wind up causing a lot more trouble than it is worth.

U.S. companies, consumers and communities may grow so addicted to government financial help that cutting them off could trigger another recession soon after the current one ends.

Between the U.S. Federal Reserve’s trillions of dollars in lending programs, the $787 billion stimulus package and $700 billion — and counting — in bank bailout funds, no one can accuse officials of soft-pedaling their crisis response.

But there is increasing concern that when the flow of public money subsides — beginning next year when much of that stimulus package is spent — the economy still won’t be strong enough to stand on its own.

Let’s see, we have companies such as AIG and GM who cannot stay afloat without bailout money, but what is going to happen to them when the bailout money is all gone? What happens to them when the government won’t or can’t give them more money? Their businesses are going to fail. They would have failed in the first place without a bailout, so why is the waste of money that is the bailout worth giving them in the first place? To “try and save them” is not going to do any good, because, as the article argues, companies are just going to grow dependent on an automatic, assumed income from the government. There is no motivation to change themselves and make themselves more efficient and profitable independently. So where do we end up? With companies reliant on government money to survive.

Throughout the majority of Obama’s campaign for the presidency, he pledged to work with Republicans in a spirit of bipartisanship. In the three weeks he has been president, Obama has proved time and time again that his promise of bipartisanship was hollow. This is particularly true when we take a look at his obsessiveness with pushing his economic stimulus bill through Congress.

President Obama has spent most of his time as president trying to get an economic stimulus bill worth almost $1 trillion through Congress in tact. While the bill did pass the through the House of Representatives, not a single Republican representative voted for the bill. Republicans voiced their concerns about the bill to a mostly deaf president, who turned around and called them “irresponsible” and the delay “inexcusable” while completely avoiding the issues raised by the GOP.

Republican concerns were finally addressed by Obama’s fellow Democratic party members, but without the President’s involvement. On the contrary, the President said that he will not “return to the failed theories of the last eight years” and scolded the GOP even more for the delay. Addressing Republican concerns about the bill is not returning “to the failed theories of the last eight years,” but is, in reality, bipartisanship.

Why bipartisanship will never work

In the political world, bipartisanship is a practice rarely observed. American politics have two major parties: the Republicans and the Democrats, and countless smaller political parties, including the Libertarian Party. Despite reality, in which the borders of the two major political parties have become hopelessly slurred, each party is supposed to stand for its own values and its own views on the best way of governing the nation.

Contradictory ways of governance do not lend themselves well to working together. For the sake of argument, we will address each party for what it is intended to represent instead of what it actually represents nowadays. Generally speaking, the Republicans are for big, private business and small government, while the Democrats are for big government and the individual American. The contradiction lies between the way the two parties view the government’s role in the lives of Americans and American industry.

While the core beliefs of the parties are in practice skewed, the fact that there is a difference between the two already creates problems. Members of one party will vote one way while members of the other party will vote differently.

Obama’s promise of bipartisanship is completely in vein as he has already proved. Not only is he not willing to try, but it was in vein to begin with. By completely ignoring the Republican concerns with his stimulus bill, he has proven that he is not even willing to sit down and negotiate with the Republicans. That is not bipartisanship. That is a hollow promise.

The original article was written for Despotic Democracy and can be found here.

The big question on everyone‘s mind right now is just how far will President Barack Obama take the country down the path towards socialism. Congressman Mike Pence, the chairman of the House Republican Conference, thinks the President has already began the journey with great enthusiasm. He called Obama‘s stimulus plan during an interview on Fox News Channel last Wednesday “the European Socialism Act of 2009.“

So is Obama‘s stimulus plan a means by which the government can expand itself? Absolutely. If you read carefully over what the stimulus bill entails, you will find that the expenditures are primarily on government-based projects that will not only be the antithesis to economic recovery, but will also expand government influence. After all, it‘s quite difficult to pull the country out of a slump by doing more of what helped bring it into the mess in the first place: spending too much, too quickly. With every president, we are getting further and further away from what the founding fathers of our nation envisioned for the country.

Let‘s take a step back and look at our own past. We‘ll start with the 19th century. How many economic recessions and/or depressions did we have during that century? We had an incredible amount. They were deep and they were bad. But they were over quickly. Why? Because government intervention did not hamper recovery. Government expansion and spending did not divert money needed in the private sectors to climb out of the economic down turns. Instead, the money was where it needed to be, in the hands of the individuals; in the hands of the people who need it the most.

Fast forward to 1921. Republican President Warren Harding is in the white house when the greatest economic crisis to occur since the early 19th century befalls the nation. Unemployment hit extremely high rates and production declined sharply as the country looked on in horror. What did the President do? Nothing. The economy not only fully recovered by 1923, but the economic expansion that occurred afterwards encouraged by a huge growth of production that was unprecedented and ultimately set off the roaring ‘20s.

These examples prove that the country can not only survive, but prosper under the prospects of genuine democracy and capitalism. Just take a look at the major technological advances made by this country in the 19th and 20th centuries. What do the other, government controlled, countries have to show? Britain quickly learned the lesson in the late 18th and early 19th centuries when its government began to release its stranglehold on its own markets and thereby triggering a global industrial revolution.

We are slowly putting that stranglehold back in place. By the time we see the end of this economic downturn, we will see the government with its grip on most, if not all, industries. Federal rules and regulations, inefficiency and high tax burdens will dominate the economy bringing progress to a halt.

Free market and real democracy are, as of now, a thing of the past however. And with every new bill the President signs into law, we are painfully reminded of it. Some say we should embrace socialism while others say it cannot be helped. I reject both of those statements. The American people need to rally together behind democracy and the free market, not some deified president who is dragging our country ever closer to European socialism.

European socialism. Not American socialism.

That is the way it should stay and in order to defend what so many Americans have died for in the past, when our country was more truly democratic and our markets free, we need to act now. We are not socialists. We are free-thinkers, individuals and entrepreneurs. We must hold on to the idea of capitalism through perseverance and personal responsibility. That is the American way. Let‘s rally as true Americans: behind real democracy and real capitalism.

The original article was written for Despotic Democracy and can be found here.