STIMULATE THIS!

STIMULATE THIS!

So now it’s time for another bailout. The one last month didn’t do the trick, apparently. 800 billion wasn’t quiiiiite enough. We’re gonna have to try harder.

Hey I got an idea for stimulating the economy. Everybody who reads this, go to www.garygraham.com and buy my damn book! (ACTING & Other Flying Lessons) Yeah, it’s a little cheaper on Amazon, but get it from my site and I’ll even personalize it for you. (WOW!!!! I know, huh?) But really…I need the money, now that I’ve self-immolated my acting career by coming out Conservative. Baby’s horse needs two new pair of shoes. And what better way to engage in pure unapologetic Capitalism, than to shoot me a twenty-spot for a cool book. Money-back guarantee. Did I mention garygraham.com?

All right, enough shameless self-promotion! Back to the Stimulus Package our new leader proposes.

“We will create jobs.” — Pres-elect B.H. Obama

Huh?? Sounds like one big ‘make-work’ scheme to me. Just coming up with erroneous projects, simply to have people occupied with a lot of activity merely to draw a paycheck seems a fool’s errand. Like, “Move that rock pile over there. And when you finished, move it back over here.” (Okay, maybe not moving a rock pile… but do we need another railroad museum? I didn’t realize there was a shortage.) Oh, but we’ve got to rebuild out infrastructure, you say. We need to do these projects.

Oh really? If we needed them so badly, why didn’t the voters vote for a bond to fund them? If these projects are so essential to the lives of average Americans, why weren’t they willing to cough up the green to pay for it? Because they’re make-work projects, that’s why.

“This plan would create more than four million jobs,” said Obama on his website. The report also stated the estimate was “subject to significant margins of error, depending on what Congress does.” (Man… Talk about making it up as you go along…)

A ‘job’ arises from the need for some task to be accomplished. Mr. Obama, as most Democrats do, believes that dynamic is actually in reverse; that the task arises from the need for a job. Aside from being just plain goofy, this belief is in conflict with any rational economic model of fiscal cause-and-effect, and what’s more, it completely defies the laws of physics. Physics are not arbitrary. Causal dynamics travel in one direction. Even the Messiah can’t reverse them, regardless of how charming and clean and articulate.

In the Cart-Before-the-Horse category, this one ranks at the top of Liberal dumbthink. We can extrapolate this absurdity out further to include the government assuming completely the job search and placement for the prospective employee. Government will find out what skills the prospective employee has. What interests he has. What personality traits. What hobbies, likes and dislikes, perhaps what astrological sign, and whether or not he enjoys long walks on the beach. Then and only then can the Federal Government determine just what sort of job our prospective employee might be comfortable with, be ethnically and culturally compatible with, and which would fit into his particular schedule and/or bio-rhythms.

This, times four million. Sound like fun? I can’t wait to hear what they call this new department. Maybe, the Bureau of Job Creation and Placement. Nah, too simple. How ’bout, The Department of Emergency Economic Reacquisition and Employee Re-dissemination? Now that’s a title I can get behind. That’s a title that can fill a government wall. And that’s, what, maybe ten thousand jobs right there! Oh yeah, it’ll cost. They may need to raise your taxes to fund this new department. But we shouldn’t begrudge the higher taxes – hell, we’re patriotic!

And by the way…how much is this new department, the “Office of the President-Elect” costing taxpayers? (Hey, that nifty sign on the podium can’t be cheap.)

“We will create jobs,” says the President-elect.

Shut uuuup… That’s not your job description, Mr. President-elect. We create jobs, Mr. Obama — private industry, businesses, large and small, free market capitalism. Your job is to protect the nation from our enemies, foreign and domestic, and protect against fraud. Or didn’t you read the Constitution? And no — “promote the general welfare” doesn’t mean hand out welfare checks in the form of tax rebates to people who don’t pay taxes.

Once again, I am absolutely positive that I was conked on the head and have been in a coma for thirty years. In the interim of my slumber, somehow the major obligation of the federal government in this country (funded by the hapless, yet apparently affable and compliant American taxpayer) has become finding you a job. And now, to get that job, you don’t even have to get out of your robe and fuzzy slippers – the jobs come to you! That knocking you hear on your door – why, it’s a job! Presto-Change-O!!! Thank the Good Lord we’ve finally got a truly compassionate man in the White House. Can’t pay your bills, too many mouths to feed, don’t want to work in a McD’s? No problem! You don’t have to worry about a thing now; President Obama is going to take care of our every need. Don’t know about you, but I got a tingling up my leg!”

FTS!

We’re told we borrow too much money. We’re told we’re supposed to live within our means, to save and budget. Then the government forces banks to okay home loans for people who can’t afford to pay the mortgages. And now we’re told we have to bail those people out, to keep them in their homes they can’t pay for. But then, apparently, according to the new administration, we’re not spending enough. That we need to go deeper into debt as a nation (stimulus plan) to free up money, so everybody can spend more, to help out the economy. So which is it? Spend, save, limit debt, overextend debt, what? It’s hard to keep up.

President-elect Obama this week toured the Lincoln Memorial with his family. He called President Lincoln “an inspiration”. And I thought to myself, ‘an inspiration…to do what??’ Bury the taxpayers and future generations in hopeless trillion-dollar debt? Laminate our youth with the notion that individual responsibility is an arcane concept? That they are incapable of understanding the complexities of sound economic decisions, so, in overriding compassion, the federal government will abrogate private responsibility with the bail-out paradigm. From banks to auto conglomerates to porn purveyors to the Average Joe Victim-of-the-System.

It’s the Bail-Out Boogie!

The government seems to want us all to be wards of the State. Helpless and needy, the Daddy Government will come to our rescue and give us our daily bread. Man…I don’t know about you, but I get this dead feeling in my gut when I even contemplate these things. I never wanted to work for the government; but here we all seem to be…all of us, soon…working for the government. (Hey, a couple trillion dollars has to come from somewhere!) FTS!

Let me tell you about my Dad. A farmer’s son, growing up in rural Arizona, he and his two brothers were so poor they were the only ones at their school who had no shoes. Kids made fun of them — at which point my Dad learned the art of pugilism. Times were tough and my Gramps could barely put food on the table, much less afford shoes for his three sons and two daughters. So my Dad and his brothers worked summers in the field, and made enough money to buy their own shoes. The family moved to San Diego where Gramps got a job driving a tractor-grader. My Dad wanted to go to college, but there wasn’t enough money. So Dad got a paper-route and within a year, expanded that route to cover half the city, delivering newspapers on an old Harley-Davidson he bought junked, and then fixed up. He made it into college, supporting his education being the ‘motorcycle paper-boy’, and he even was elected Class President. Then calamity struck. While on his route one day, a driver ran a stop sign and T-boned my Dad’s bike, completely destroying it. Fortunately, at the last second he had leaped straight up, as the bike was decimated beneath him. His quick reactions saved his life, and he escaped with only scrapes and bruises.

Dad had dreams of becoming a doctor and even though he’d been accepted into a prestigious medical school, he now had no way to finance it. So my father put on his best clothes, and starting at one end of the street, went out looking for work. He didn’t stop when he heard “No, thanks.” And he heard it a lot, along with,”No, son…times are tough. Sorry.” But he kept going. It seemed no one was hiring. Still, he kept going. All day long, all week long, keeping a positive attitude, seeking out work. And he didn’t stop…until he had three jobs secured that day! Medical schools are expensive. He got a job working at a soda-fountain in a drugstore at night, and then he went to a night watchman job, which is when he did his studies. Then, in the early morning, before classes, he’d go up and down the streets painting address numbers on the curb for 10 cents a house. That’s a lot of walking – a lot of big hills in San Diego. But he made it through med school and began his internship, then his residency.

At the hospital, there was one assignment no one seemed to volunteer for – the cancer ward. No one wanted to deal with the emotional impact of dealing with the dying, with the advanced cases of pathology, the ugly smells, the filthy conditions. My father’s father had suffered a skin cancer on his ear that had resulted with partial amputation. Recognizing that since no one wanted the cancer ward assignment, and that he could possibly find an opportunity there, even explore the causes for his own father’s cancer, Dad quickly volunteered.

The chief resident was so encouraged by my Dad’s willingness to tackle this tough role, he left my father to his own devices with full authority. My Dad started by opening the windows, giving the patients air, insisting on clean bed linen, clean bandages, changed daily, and a brighter cheerier outlook from the nurses. And wouldn’t you know…patients responded almost immediately. Some actually went into remission, solely due to the new attitude. And more – my father began to learn about surgery. He researched and began to perform various cancer surgeries. Tumors were excised, resections were performed. Radiation therapy was brand new and he led new research into that, often with dramatic success. Over the two years he was there, Dad acquired advanced skills as a surgeon, which was to make him an extremely valuable asset to any medical clinic.

He moved to Orange County, California with his new wife and found a group of doctors to start private practice. He saw up to 100 patients a day, often putting in 20-hour days. He kept studying and gained a specialty degree in Abdominal Surgery. He sat on the California Board of Medical Examiners, and with the expertise he accrued, built three hospitals, and managed nine more. Never one to sit still, he developed and owned 11 different companies in the early ’70’s. Unfortunately, as a businessman, he turned out to be a terrific doctor. (As he told me, “Gary, it’s weird. Doctors are used to being told the truth. Patients come in, they tell you what’s bothering them. To lie to your doctor could mean mis-diagnosis which would be disastrous – so… people tell the truth. Then you go into business…and everybody lies!”) Of the eleven, only three of these companies ever made money. And of course, the three money-makers were medical companies. He made money doing the things he knew.

My father held to an apparently outdated value system. He looked to himself for answers. When he wanted to become a doctor, but had no money…when he wanted to go to school, but couldn’t afford shoes… did he make it anyone else’s problem? Did he get angry with the government? Demand a stimulus package? Ask for a tax break? Beg for a bail-out?

No. He manned up and took care of business. Which is what I would suggest out country would do: Man up! Quit crying, quite begging, quit quitting on yourself! Grow a pair! Or so help me, I’m gonna channel John Wayne and the two of us will come over there and kick your butt.

Okay… I don’t want to project the impression that I’m really into violence as a remedy for conflict resolution. JBut I would like to propose nothing more earth-shaking that this: Let us not abandon the values — individualism, personal strength, steady resolve, rugged self-determination — that built this country into the most successful example of Liberty and Freedom the world has ever seen.

My Dad was a Conservative from the day he got into a fist fight over coming to school barefoot…to the day that he passed from this life eight years ago. And though his wayward rocker of a son turned Left at the University…it was amazing to see how intelligent my Conservative Dad seemed as I grew into a man.

The government has no business…in business. Get the hell out and stay out. The economy goes up, it goes down. Prop it up artificially at your own peril – a peril that has now come home to us with a vengeance.