Conventional "Wisdom"

The King of Bain

Dear Moses…

So I hear you parted the Red Sea to get your people to the promise land right? 

But there is no evidence of you doing this. “Scientists” say natural plate tectonics would have created this sea.

That is bullshit. I believe that you alone created this sea and saved your Jews. You lead them to the promise land.

But what happened to those Jews killed during the Crusades and the Holocaust ehy?

Why were you not able to part the lands so the Romans could not enter the Jewish lands?

Why did you not break down the fences of the concentration camps?

I guess I can forgive you on these ones though, you were probably busy. Someones gotta eat those jelly doughnuts right?

From your dearest bros,

Emicho and Adolf

You are Still the 1%

From New York to Oakland to…Namibia? Yes a new “Occupy” movement has started in the in the poverty-ridden parts of Africa and South America and Asia. They have seen the immense power of protests that have caused absolutely no change in the industrialized world and have decided to take action. These starved individuals have decided to take to the deserts and rainforests to fight for their rights!

            But you may ask who exactly their targets are? No it’s not the hedge-fund managers or corporate executives of Wall Street; it is in fact the protesters on Wall Street. Yes these up-and-coming hunger-ridden freedom fighters are in fact protesting a protest.

One local village boy in Southern Ethiopia said that “those well-dressed, well-fed protesters do not know what suffering is. They all have salaries in five-figures. If they don’t have jobs, maybe they should consider working instead of camping.” (The boy had more to say, but someone mistook his right leg for a broken twig and kicked it. The boy was rushed to nowhere, as there are no hospitals in this part of the world).

            Another lady, mother of 18, wished she could be as privileged as the Western 99%. “I would give anything to live their healthy lives.” (She was actually willing to give anything, trying to give me one of her children).

            The local South American villager pointed out that “you may be suffering, but at least you still  have a toilet.”

            But the main complaint was not how lucky the American protesters are, it is how lazy they are. In the slums of India, a father who is working two jobs to support his family pointed out that “all these people have opportunities for work, but they choose to complain.”

             This cannot be true though. The protesters on Wall Street are working hard. They are camping and socializing and playing music. They are even willing to demand bathroom access at the businesses they are hurting. If that is not working I do not know what is.

            When one man was asked to respond to this criticism of the Occupy Wall Street movement, he said that “this is work. We are working to restore America!”

            That’s the spirit unemployed father of two! That’s the spirit college grad living with your parents! Do not settle for the money you may get from part-time work. If you are stuck with a Prius, get your A4! If you are stuck with an Alfani suit, get your Armani! Do not ever be satisfied. Working for a living is not important when fighting for your rights!

            But most importantly, do not listen to the African boy when he tells you that “to us, you are still the 1%”. 

Education

Applying for a higher education and doing homework has gotten in the way of learning about current events, politics, and the world around me. I would write an essay about this irony, satisfying my creative and intellectual juices while working on my writing style, but I have to edit a college essay and study for a physics test. 

Irony at its finest.

They are Rich, Not Job Creators

Lowering the tax rate on the rich, the “job creators”, will help job growth. 

Many Republican politicians, even some Democrat politicians, are claiming that this concept will create jobs. If the economic elites have lower tax burdens, because they don’t have enough money as it is, they will in return create jobs, be it in a corporation or a privately owned business. 

This is a lie.

The rich are rich because they save money. The upper-class are not selfish devils, but they are not job creators either. Lowering the tax rate on the economic elite will not create jobs.

As I said earlier, the rich are rich because they save their money. The upper-class is not just a collection of random, often pretty, people that got it lucky in life. Most all of these individuals studied hard in college and grad school. They worked hard starting at entry level jobs and working their way up, be it in finance or medicine or engineering. On top of hard-work, these individuals saved their money. They lived within their means and saved enough money to send their kids to school and be able to retire. And in a really obvious statement, how can a corporate employee earning $300k a year create a job if he/she does not have the power to? Even if they are entrepreneurs own businesses, the rich will not create jobs with the extra money. The fiscally responsible thing to do with the extra money from lower taxes is to save it. Retirement benefits and social security withdrawals are all being moved further back. Saving any money from lower tax rates will help in being financially secure. In a capitalist economy, the individual is expected to work hard, take risks, and collect wealth; not give welfare jobs with any disposable income.

Now that we are on the idea of the accumulation of wealth, the wealthiest “people” of all, corporations, will not create jobs with lower tax rates. The liberal media heckled Mit Romney when he said that corporations are people, but wrongly so. In pure legal context, Romney was correct, corporations are people. Not saying that it is right, just saying that it is a fact in the legal context. So technically corporations are legal context. Common wisdom would lead to the belief that these companies would create jobs. Most Americans work for a corporation. But as jobs are being cut, profits are going up.

Corporate profitability in America has not just rebounded from the recession of 2008 but increased. But with this increased profitability, there has not been an increase in jobs. This is due to the fact that the purpose of a corporation is to make a profit. Its status as incorporated means that its duty is to return max profits to its shareholders. Creating jobs, when they are unnecessary, does not create profit. This does not make corporations monsters. They are only doing their jobs to the best of their abilities. Lowering taxes will just give corporations more profits, thus satisfying their shareholders even more. 

But the main reason that tax cuts on the rich won’t work is not a direct result of the decisions of the rich. As mentioned earlier, corporate America is currently more profitable than ever. The recession helped these companies “trim the fat”. The record profits show that there were so many expendable corporate jobs during the economic boom before 2008. Why would corporations rehire these people if they do not bring value to profit-making? It makes absolutely no sense. Getting rid of the fluff jobs helped refocus companies and made current employees work harder. The recession was a lubricant to corporate America, removing all the gunk and cleaning up the engine.

Now I am wondering the same thing as you, how do we create jobs? That is a difficult question that not even the president can effectively answer, much less a blogger. Although I am against the mainstream Republican idea that lower taxes on the rich will create jobs, I am in agreement that government cannot create enough jobs. Liberal tv hosts like Rachael Maddow suggest that hiring people to work in infrastructure is a great idea. Create jobs while improving America. This is a great short-term idea, but when the construction worker fixes the bridge, where will he work? Long-term job growth will be in new industries. Corporations want students with specific education focuses like statistics, and emerging industries like biochem need as many educated workers as they can get. But the government cannot force anyone to pursue these fields. It is up to the individual to pursue fields where jobs are growing.

Fox News says to lower taxes on the “job creators”. Although this is what the the Fox News demographic wants to hear, this will not work. If wealthy individuals and corporations are making profits and are financially secure, there is no incentive to create jobs. Republican politicians always talk about incentives; there is a perfect example where their policies do not create any. Smart wealthy individuals save their money, and lowering tax rates on them will give them more to save. They are not selfish, they are smart. The right wing says that it is not the role of the government to create jobs, but nor is it the role of wealthy Americans. Expecting the rich to create jobs is basically an indirect way of giving out social welfare. The unemployed cannot expect the rich to handout jobs, rather, they need to look into fields where jobs are needed.

America did not become America through handouts, public or private. America became America through a pursuit. The pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness. 

Obama’s Vacationing, Unamerican Bus

Conservative media: Think before you attack.

President Obama is constantly receiving criticism for the most obscure things, and most of these attacks are hypocritical…

1. Obama is being attacked for taking too many vacation days. Conservative media is criticizing him for being lazy, even though Obama hasn’t taken that many vacation days. To this point, Obama has taken 70 vacation days. Through this point in his presidency, George W. Bush had taken 225 days of vacation. So what is the merit of this criticism? Yea, I don’t know either.

2. Rick Perry is questioning whether Obama loves America. But you may say that Perry is the one that wanted to secede Texas from the Union. Well, when criticizing Obama one does not have to be logical, only loud-mouthed and appealing to the ignorant.  

3. That Nigerian-born, Muslim liar Barak HUSSEIN Obama is driving around Martha’s Vineyard in Aerosmith’s tour-bus. Wait that was Bush who did that in ‘03, not Obama? Oh oops, well the bus is still costs $1 million. Obama is wasting the taxpayer money! Wait he didn’t choose the bus, the secret service chose the bullet-proof bus for him? Aw shucks, well it still costs a fortune. What? There are two of the buses, one for Obama and the other for the Republican candidate for the 2012 campaign? O…but Obama still wasn’t born in America, no matter what his “birth certificate” says. Is this hypocritical? Yes, but unexpected? Unfortunately, no.

I am not saying that Obama is perfect. He is far from a perfect president. Heck, he is far from a successful president. I’m not sure whether I want him or Romney to win the election in 2012. But all that aside, the pointless, hypocritical attacks are unnecessary. Attack him on his failed stimulus plan or lack of authoritative presence (aka lack of balls), not on trivial facts where Republicans have made even bigger infractions…

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