Kansas vs. Missouri

Why on Earth would Missouri want to follow this lead?

On the American National Deficit

...and responsible politicians, office holders, government representatives and political parties:

More?   Here you go:

Link: 

Federal Deficit Falls A Shocking 32% Under Obama

What's actually taken place since the historical 2008 election

And this in spite of the Republicans obstructionism.

America's real problems

Americans: we don't put our country first

One of many things that's wrong with America is, as suggested above, that we don't put the country first.

We don't pull together to work out our problems.

We aren't Americans first, any longer, and we haven't been for some time.

It's all "Left" or "Right" or Conservative or Liberal or Libertarian or Tea Party member or some thing else, first.   THAT becomes more important.

Further proof, today:

Key GOP senator quits bipartisan group seeking to cut deficit

By ANDREW TAYLOR, Associated Press

WASHINGTON – A top Republican senator in the bipartisan "Gang of Six" seeking agreement on a plan to cut the deficit by $4 trillion over the next decade dropped out of the group on Tuesday, saying that his colleagues weren't willing to cut enough from benefit programs like Medicare.

Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma said he doesn't see how the group can reach agreement and that he would stop participating in its discussions.

I think we all agree we spend too much, as a nation, and that we need to reduce that spending.  It seems a given.

So the nation calls on you to be part of a small group of 6 people to make suggestions to and for the government for just that, so that we cut that spending and what do you do?

You quit.

Thanks, Senator Coburn.  From the rest of America, thanks for putting either yourself or your political party first.

That will get us nowhere but thanks very much.

Finally, Washington is catching up with us

From The Huffington Post, Rep. Barney Frank and Rep. Ron Paul, just now: Why We Must Reduce Military Spending As members of opposing political parties, we disagree on a number of important issues. But we must not allow honest disagreement over some issues to interfere with our ability to work together when we do agree. By far the single most important of these is our current initiative to include substantial reductions in the projected level of American military spending as part of future deficit reduction efforts. For decades, the subject of military expenditures has been glaringly absent from public debate. Yet the Pentagon budget for 2010 is $693 billion -- more than all other discretionary spending programs combined. Even subtracting the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, military spending still amounts to over 42% of total spending. It is irrefutably clear to us that if we do not make substantial cuts in the projected levels of Pentagon spending, we will do substantial damage to our economy and dramatically reduce our quality of life. Welcome to the party, boys. Now, make it happen.

On KCMO School District budget and the KC Star

So The Star covered Superintendent Covington's meeting yesterday and plans for the KCMO School District.

And it was pretty informative, to a point. Fortunately, they didn't really put a "spin" on it--they just covered it very matter-of-factly. Good for them.

But there's a couple of things here that needs to be further pointed out that they didn't report--some shortcomings.

First, I was just told that, if the District doesn't do this and cut these schools, the 285 teachers and the 40 to 50 million dollars in expenses these cutbacks involve, this same District would be
financially bankrupt by next year.

That's pretty big, obviously, and that just can't happen.

But it wasn't mentioned in the paper.

Further, secondly, should that happen, Jeff City would have to take over.

And no one wants that.

No one.

Third, the good news is that, supposedly there are lots of teachers who are in line for retirement so they'll be asked to do just that. From what I understand a lot of them abe bailing already.

Fourth, note the date the Superintendent gave for everyone to respond and vote. He wants this ready for a vote at the Board's next meeting--Feb. 24--ten days from now.

Wow. That's a bit of a whirlwind schedule.

But these people have done the research and tried their best to come up with a plan to address the big budget problems.

It looks as though it's going to sail through.

Finally, if anyone does come out against this, really, they'll have a huge challenge to come up with any other options. How else, exactly, do you cut 40 to 50 million dollars in expenses from the budget
without closing these approximately 20 schools and slashing employment roles?

If you're out there and have any better ideas, you'd better speak up quickly.

It seems as though Superintendent Covington is the right man, doing the right things--the things that need to happen--at just the right time.

Stay tuned.

The meetings this week should be interesting.

W's lost it

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Six Days Seven Nights

Barack Obama Interview
John McCain Interview

Sarah Palin Video
Funny Election Video

Rest assured, folks

Conservatism isn't dead.

The thing is, what is and has been wrong for conservatives and Republicans is George W. Bush.

There is patently, absolutely almost nothing that is or was conservative about this guy: He never met a dollar he didn't want to spend; he grew government larger than any other President on his watch; he intruded government into more lives than any other President; he mixed more religion into government and government into religion than any other President; he got the country into more debt and deficit spending than any other President, etc.

Face it--the facts are George W. Bush has been the worst President ever and he's been a bloody nightmare for both Republicans and conservatives.

Getting rid of this clown--or having him walk off stage, anyway--will be the best thing that ever happened to Republicans, the Republican Party and conservatives and conservative thought. Then, once he's gone and we all start collectively forgetting--and most Americans will forget, sadly--conservatives and Republicans can go back to talking about cutting government, cutting government spending and all that they've always proposed and supposed themselves to be.

It would just be nice if they'd keep government out of bedrooms and religion, once and for all, for starters.

The "Trillion-dollar President"

George Walker Bush gets another distinction.

From November's federal deficit report, we're told that we're absolutely on track, as a country, to have a federal deficit of one trillion dollars.

And sure, we're fairly numb anymore to reports of millions and billions and now trillions of dollars worth of anything, let alone deficits, that it has lost meaning.

I know that.

But the fact still remains that we, the United States, are going to have the largest, trillion dollar budget deficit in the 232 year history of the country. (Sure, there's inflation in them-thar figures but it's still the largest deficit ever and it DOES mean something).

Anyway, that gives this worst-ever President--again, George Walker Bush--the additional ignominious distinction of being the most profligate, spending, wasteful, irresponsible trillion-dollar President, ever.


My point in bringing this up is, first, to make sure people know it and second, to make sure we don't forget it.

Ever.

Never.

We must never forget.

And it was the Republicans and the Republican Party who, during their years of control of Congress who, among other things, took "pay-go" out of our government. (Pay-go is, more literally, "paying as you go" or, more specifically, the rule of law that used to be in effect--again, before Republicans took it out of our laws--to only create spending if you had a place in taxes from which it was coming. For example, the lawmakers could create a bill to spend money but it had to either come from a new tax--which they are not wont to create--or from killing some other program).

And this "pay-go" program is something, now, that the Democrats should put back into law but they can't or won't anytime soon because of the huge, ridiculous financial mess and straits we're in.

We're in too much debt and have too big of problems to be responsible right now.

And that stinks.

Let's never forget who got us here.

3 Movies all Americans should see

Last evening, I finally got to watch the movie "Who Killed the Electric Car?".

It immediately made clear to me that this one, along with 2 others, are three simple, important, informative movies that, like it says above, all Americans should see.

And they should see them not because we need to blame anyone (George W. Bush), or because we need to punish anyone (George W. Bush), but because it's important to know what happened in our recent past so we also know where we are now, what we can do--what we're capable of--and where we should go and what we should do, as a country.

Last night's movie told of the magnificent, simple electric "EV" car (electric vehicle) General Motors was, at first, required by California to build and its temporary, short-lived success in California and Arizona and expedient, diabolical demise, due to both GM and the oil companies, with the help of local and state government.

It's fascinating, not well-known, sad, frustrating and, again, important.

The second movie we all should see is "Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room". It told of the financial and economic raping of America by one group of people from one corporation, with the complete and total backing and support of our very own President at the time, one George W. Bush. (Sound familiar?). There's so much more here that happened that we all need to know about, before, during and after this debacle.

The last film that should be required viewing for us is "Uncovered: The Whole Truth About the Iraq War".

This should be self-explanatory but actually, most Americans think they know what happened to get us to where we are now when, in fact, the buildup to this Iraq War has many details and components to it most don't know. Also, after we invaded Iraq, it was found we didn't really have a plan for its occupation, making an even larger, greater mess and causing many more casualties.



What's sad is that precious few Americans have seen these films.

What's sadder is that so few will--or want to.

Again, how can we know where to go and what to do if we don't even know our recent past?



We're going to be paying for this Administration for years--both for this war and the economy.

If there's a hell--and I don't think there is--there would be a special place for this President in it, surely.