I know I’m just a slow witted conservative, with a a bad academic track record (that’s why I went into the military, according to jfk) who clings to my guns and religion because I’m bitter about having a great life, lots of friends,who are people who would do anything for me or anyone else in need, but…I digress. I need help understanding things today, as presented by the “news” media.

Here comes a little random streaming from the brain cage:

Have we really arrived at the “tyranny of the minority?” I’ve blogged in a few places, about how so many years ago the US Navy came out with a “if any one person objects, no one can smoke in a space (read room for those not lucky enough to have experienced the joys of shipboard life)” policy in the mid to late 80s. While I have never been a smoker, I did think it was odd that one could trump all, but at the same time, it does get awful smoky inside a small compartment on a ship, when (at the time) most of the crew did smoke…and “sea store” (meaning no taxes when you were outside the 12 NM limit) cigarettes were really cheap….interesting situation.

Over time, I have noticed how that entire mentality, which I deemed (and it’s most likely not original) the term “Tyranny of the Minority” as a way to easily identify the condition. Think about it. That attitude permeates our society. The self-esteem and diversity and environmental crowd push it hard, and, no longer just say it, they legalize it. Thank you, those lawyers, who regulalry subverted your common sense to the ability to buy all those fancy cars and house and political influence, but that’s a whole other topic of discussion.

What does this have to do with today? Consider the two breathlessly reported issues of this week: The “Mortgage Crisis” and Congressional inaction on securing an internally controlled energy supply.

On one hand, in the case of the “mortgage crisis,” all of us (read majority - or at least those of us who actually put a net amount of taxes in the Treasury with each paycheck), have to pay off the bad decisions of a minority. On a local real estate talk show two Saturdays ago, it was framed thusly:

120M homes in the US, 40M paid for, 40M bought after 2000 (sold today at “depressed” market prices would still yield about 45% profit), 28M owned by families/persons with good credit. That leaves 12M homes…10% of the market. About 1.2M are either behind on payments, or in the foreclosure process. “Old Math” tells me that’s about 1% or the entire mortgage market is actually the troubled part of the system. ONE Freaking PERCENT! Now…you’re the news, what do you report? “Want to know where some of the best opportunities are? REAL ESTATE!” or (get breathless, you’ll have to be to make the contrived impact) “OMG!!! OMG!!! THE SKY IS FALLING, ONE MILLION HOMES ARE LOCKED, THEIR OWNERS ON THE CURB, TOSSED OUT OF THEIR HOMES BY EVIL MORTGAGE COMPANIES!!!!” Same story, true enough numbers…extreme difference in the “take away” perception of the reality, right?

Our response? Bail out those, a 1% minority of the entire market. Make all the arguments about “predatory lending practices” you’d like, but who signed the bottom line? Who didn’t read the fine print (as all “good” lawyers tell us to do), only to employ lawyers to explain why it wasn’t their fault when they signed the bottom line. My life philosophy? Unless there is a gun to your head (or another human’s), there is no forcing involved. Grow up, take your lumps and don’t make me pay for it.

Help me understand this: Tell a successful business person they can get into a market where only 1% of it is an issue financially. See how quick they are dialing the phone to their money people, while simultaneously asking you for the wire transfer info. What am I not getting about how “BAD!” the sky is falling in the mortgage market?

Now, the second crisis. Congress is getting ready, using the heavy handed control of the majority, to leave for home to get votes to place them back in a job where they get next to nothing done for the majority of the country. You’d think they’d be embarassed with a 9% approval rating, but, holding power is more powerful in their lives than shame over a failed responsibility. They leave us, at the whim of the minority who thinks they can save the planet from the forces of the Universe. Silly little humans.

Look at that stark picture? 70% plus of American voters want to drill in the nearby oceans. Congress has to go home, it’s vacation! They have worked hard. Yeah, right. Remember the way “work” is measured from physics class? Movement from one place to another. Ending where you began = no work. Congress: Redefining “work” as run about in the same cicle, end where you began, tell people how sweaty you got, then go home and hold multi-thousand dollar a plate diners with “friends” and tell them how stupid and out of touch “The Majority,” or if you like “We The People” really are. Oh…but hold up a signed bill that takes money from net positive taxpayers and gives to those (herein after referred to as “The Minority”) who entered a contract legally and then demanded our money to bail them out. Call that work. I call it “political entropy.”

Some might call it “National Suicide,” but that might be judged by the feel good crowd as unnessicarily inflamatiory as a characterization of the issue. BTW, is there a crisis help line for a nation who has thoughts of, and seems to be making plans for, its demise? In my state, people who act like this are subect to the “Baker Act,” and are put in a safe place, for their own protection, at least for a few days.

The “Tyranny of the Minority” is upon us, and no longer just for “policital correctness” of speech anymore! Somehow Congress can pander to “The Minority” and not manage to address the real issues of the moment, and the future. Regardless of how we got here, the bottom line is money, in large sums, will flow out of our banks, to those overseas. How has it become a bad thing to keep the money in our economy when we can? The same people who want us to keep shifting our dollars overseas are the one who will crow about how large the trade deficits are each month, yet someone, for being the of the self-acclaimed (yes, you, jfk) most brilliant among us, will not manage to make this intellectual connection. Poor dumb me.

There we have it. 5 weeks more of only sightly lowered gas and diesel prices, that policy decisons that will yield actual energy products years from now couldn’t have possibly had an effect on. And, I’m sure after getting back, there will be a small matter of an FY 2009 Federal Budget that manages to become the issue to force the next stoppage of any constructive work by our elected officials, merely to help the press put out a story on how George Bush wrecked the country by not signing the budget.

My suggestion? I think we need to call Nancy Pelosi’s home home office, and that of Harry Reid, daily, or email, or fax and demand to know why they are not in Washington, DC right now, handling the business of the people.

I have often toyed with the idea of sending correspondence to all sorts of Congressional elected officials, regardless of their “district” or state designation. Why? My tax dollars pay them. They are appointed to handle the business of the people. By those indicators, I then am one of their employers. It sucks to have an employee give you the Hawaiian Freindship hand gesture all the time. Actually “The Majority” could quickly educate any one of those power hungry, tax “color that allows no other color to escape” holes, on just what would happen if they gave their supervisor/boss/employer the sign of not so brotherly love in reposnse to “I just need you to do the job I am paying you for” type of comment. I can imagine the next uttering, in the real world, would be words to the effect of “YOU’RE FIRED!” Now, in the “normal” cultural environment of PC, it’s the unspoken response of then making your life miserable to the point you then resign (for God knows we can’t fire anyone anymore for fear of a legion of lawyers coming around to retreive every email archived and wrecking your bottom line, when all you were doing was trying to keep a place of employment open for those who do want to return a day’s labor for a day’s pay). In the parallel universe of Congress, “The Majority” then do the “Animal House” frat rush thing….and allow them to pass more pay raises for their lack (rhymes with jack) of nothing for you, “The Majority.”

Somehow, when Congress garners a 9% approval rating, and still manages to have the incumbents keep their seats (and getting away with pointing at President Bush as the problem), I’m having a hard time “getting it,” but then, I cling to my guns and Bible in bitterness, as I go to work with great people in a cool job, every weekday, earning some good money and enjoying a relatively trouble free life.

Help me, please, I’m obvioulsy too dull to figure out why this is happening…

Said xformed @ 10:28 am | Permalink   

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