Wednesday - January 26, 2005

Let’s Have Your Take On This

A company fires employees for smoking. Not on the job.  At their own home.

Are they right or wrong?  Should they be allowed?

Remember, they are a private company and should have the right to demand certain behaviors.  Especially if they foot the bill for the health care.

Remember, if you disagree with this company’s policy to hire those most representative of the image the company wants to portray you also must then insist that places like Hooters MUST hire fat, ugly women sporting lip hair as waitresses.  Or that Playboy MUST fat, ugly women sporting lip hair as centerfolds.  The argument being that Hooters and Playboy should not tell its employees what they can do on their own time---eat like pigs and get fat.

Think long on this one (libertarian values, Republican values, capitalistic values vs. Democratic values of mommy government telling us what to do.)

Be careful.

Now, fire away.

****Don’t forget to vote in our survey.  (Click here.)

Posted by Ranting Right Wing Howler     on 01/26/2005 at 06:42 AM   
Filed Under: • Economics •  
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   Monday - January 24, 2005

Why Social Security Reform Will Fail

Why Social Security Reform Will Fail

Unless there is a concerted effort to undo decades of government brainwashing by campaigning to convince people their future belongs to them, any effort to privatize social security is doomed to failure.

We can start with a VERY short letter to all our congress-critters:  “I demand the right to determine where my social security contributions go.  It is MY money and I want to take ownership of it.” Simple as that. 

But, as Neal Boortz points out at his site today, there are too many people who love the nanny state and really want nothing to do with the “freedom” that taking responsibility for their own actions will mean to them.

Since his page changes daily but the address is the same, I’ve copied it here for you to read.  He started out with a discussion of President Bush’s inauguration speech focusing on freedom and continued thusly:

What is the problem with freedom?  I think that the biggest problem is that people realize that along with personal freedom comes personal responsibility.  To be sure, Americans will say nice things about freedom ... right up until the time that personal responsibility rears its ugly head.  Freedom of speech?  Sure, that takes no real effort.  Freedom of religion?  No problem there.  It doesn’t really require you to actually do anything.  Introduce responsibility and consequences for irresponsibility, and the love of freedom suddenly wanes.

I saw a good example of the limited American love affair with freedom yesterday on CNN.  Three women from three generations were being interviewed; grandmother, mother and daughter.  They were being questioned on President Bush’s privatization plans for Social Security.  The grandmother was against it.  She said that this would be like the government teaching people to gamble.  She equates investing in the stock market to gambling, and has decided that it is wrong.  Let the government take your money, and then dole it out to you later.  Now that’s just fine.

The daughter was particularly troubling.  On the one hand she said that she had no confidence at all that there were going to be any Social Security benefits for her when she reached retirement age, whatever that retirement age might be.  On the other hand she said that she wasn’t in favor of privatization because she didn’t want to have to go to the trouble of making decisions on how her retirement money should be invested.  She would just rather have the government do it for her.

More examples?  They’re not difficult to fine.  Just go to the basic levels of our society.  Should you be free to negotiate with an employer on the basis of salary?  No ... we need a minimum wage.  Should you be free to buy a health insurance policy that doesn’t include pregnancy benefits?  No .. the government stands in the way.  Should you be free to chose who is going to come into your home and tell you what drapery fabric would look good with your throw pillows?  No.  The government tells you who you can and can’t hire for that job.  Do people complain?  Do they protest?  Not a bit.  Just accept the government controls and regulations and move on.

There is another troubling aspect of our lost love for freedom.  When freedom isn’t cherished people are opposed to paying a price to make freedom secure.  The United States is trying to introduce freedom into the heart of the tyrannical Arab World.  As in the past, people are dying in the effort.  Now we have people saying that it’s peace, not freedom that matters.  That might sound good until you realize that by “peace” they simply mean the absence of armed conflict.  Tyranny?  Fine.  Not even the most basic of freedoms?  No problem ... as long as there’s peace.  Today an astounding number of people, principally on the left, believe that peace without freedom is just fine, thank you very much.

Posted by Ranting Right Wing Howler     on 01/24/2005 at 07:04 AM   
Filed Under: • Economics • Politics • Social-Security •  
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   Thursday - January 20, 2005

A $1000 Financial Class For Free

Unless you’ve been living in a cave or refuse to acknowledge it, social security is big news right now.

We’ve had quite a spirited discussion on this blog about it and even trapped us a moonbat in the process.

Socialists and their fawning butt-boys, the media and AARP, are dead set against privatization.  Their reasons are many and varied and all wrong because they pre-suppose all Americans are as stupid as they are and do not know how to invest in the stock market or know how to manage their money.  They need a Mommy Government to take care of them.  Larry Elder nails it well in this piece.

No matter how you slice and dice it, it all boils down to theft of MY money from the government under the ruse that when I retire I will get some sort of “supplement” to help me out in my elder years.

Not a day passes by where I do not read some letter to the editor or some editorial where the authors wail and gnash their collective teeth and say, “But what if the stock market crashes like it did a few years ago just as you retire?  What about those poor people who lose everything?”

Well, let me tell you something, Boopsie. If you are fully invested in the stock market by the time you retire, you DESERVE to be wiped out for being stupid.  Because that’s exactly what you are: S-T-U-P-I-D!  And Larry Elder has ID’d your ass.  Not only that, you are GREEDY!
There’s a great saying on the Street: bulls make money, bears make money, PIGS get slaughtered.  And if you are a pig, we will feast on your bacon.

So, does anyone believe that we would embark on such a task as privatization without some sort of education effort first?  And the effort is as simple as a risk test associated with some percentage charts which track where you should have your money and in what percentages.  Just like you get that little notice from the SSA telling you what you’ve paid in and what you will probably get, so the government or the companies that handle your PSAs will send you annual statements advising you of what you should be doing and what you should avoid.

Allow me to give you what I use for my own financial well-being.  Remember, I retired at 45.  I do not have a lot of money but I am comfortable, not extravagant.  Granted, some of that is a military pension but most of it goes to an ex-spouse and the federal government in taxes.  The balance is investments. 

The information I am about to impart to you is worth millions but I give it to you for free.  That’s what the “benevolent” in Benevolent Dictator means.  However, if you feel like contributing towards the BMEWS fund (renewals are due this month and all contributions gladly accepted!!) then use our paypal link.  We appreciate it.

First off, take a risk assessment test. Many are available.  Fidelity has a good one as I believe so does Vanguard.

Assuming you can have moderate risk taking ability, between the ages of 18 and 40 a person should be fully invested in stocks.  A good all-inclusive index fund is sufficient.  The more risk you want to take, the more you should seek riskier investment instruments--individual stocks, market sectors, global stocks, margins, puts, calls, etc.

At the age of 40, the individual should then pare his stock holdings down from 100% to about 75% with the balance in a good bond fund.  More risk averse investors may decide to leave everything ride or invest their bond portion into riskier corporate bonds or junk bonds.

This 75/25 mix is good for about 10 years.  At age 50, the investor should do some more re-balancing.  The stock portion of the portfolio should then go to around 65% with 35% in bonds.

At age 55, the percentage should change again.  This time to a 50/50 mix.

By age 60, the percentages should be 25% stocks and 75% bonds.  At age 62, that mix goes to 20/80.

By 65, it should be 10/90.  This way, should the stock market collapse and knowing that it usually recovers within 5 years, you are never really hurt.  You can draw checks from your account because your bond portfolio side will stay safer and is not subject to such wild fluctuations.  Meanwhile, as the market recovers, THAT portion of your portfolio will continue to grow and make your losses disappear.

Remember, the market works in nothing else but cycles.  Time will pull you out of a bad one.

Again, this is for the “social security” portion of your investment holdings.  You do not want to screw with these monies too much.  For your “regular” retirement portfolio and other investments, the percentages are almost similar but accept more risk since you now have one portfolio holding up the other.

Also, your percentages will vary based on whether or not you collect a retirement check which is pretty much guaranteed (teacher, military, GS employee, etc.) You can take more risk since now your retirement table has three legs (the SS leg, your retirement portfolio leg, and your pension check leg.)

It’s that simple.  Lesson over.  Come on, fork over some money! 

Posted by Ranting Right Wing Howler     on 01/20/2005 at 07:49 AM   
Filed Under: • Economics • Social-Security •  
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An Opportunity To Excel

One of our readers asked the question:  how many days has President Bush taken as “vacation” and how does that compare to other presidents?

I tried finding the answer but frankly can’t spend much time on it so if you know the answer, let us know.  Consider it as an opportuntiy to excel!!

For the record, going to Camp David does not count.  It may seem like a getaway but he never really “gets away.”

Going to Crawford would count so long as you factor in the days when the President does no meeting with other dignitaries or use the ranch as a springboard for visits to other places doing presidential “stuff.”

Same applies to Clinton or Carter, etc.

On a side note, what I DID find was a little table that shows average vacation days per country. Take a look and then ask yourself why we are the greatest nation on earth?  Could it e a “work ethic?”

Then you must consider how much productivity the Euro-weenies lose to strikes and work slow-downs.  Here’s a great example from our friends at Fuck France. 

Posted by Ranting Right Wing Howler     on 01/20/2005 at 06:35 AM   
Filed Under: • Economics •  
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   Monday - January 17, 2005

Airbus Kicks Boeing’s Ass

This is embarrassing.

Here we have a European conglomerate, headquartered in France (of all places) kicking Boeing’s ass in airplane manufacture.

Their new A380 is about to be launched. I hate to say it but it is a beauty!

It has 4 (FOUR) aisles, can seat 555, has two complete decks, carries 33% more passengers than the 747 and goes 5% further while doing it.  Go ahead, do the math.  That’s about a 20% increase in efficiency!!  Oh, did I mention it weighs 308 tons?  Yep, that’s 616,000 pounds!

Pictures here courtesy of Drudge.

Boeing better wake up.  QUICK!

Posted by Ranting Right Wing Howler     on 01/17/2005 at 06:43 AM   
Filed Under: • Economics •  
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   Thursday - January 13, 2005

Health Care

I almost did not blog about this article by Walter Williams until I read this paragraph:

Americans spend about 1 percent of their income on drugs. Seniors spend about 3 percent on drugs, less than the amount they spend on entertainment. Spending on drugs, as a percent of total health-care spending, was 10 percent in 1960. It’s roughly the same today.

Did you catch that last sentence?  For all the bitching and moaning and carping by the panty-waisted left in this country hell-bent on socializing our health care, this little fact is a bombshell.

Throw that in the face of your leftist friends next time you discuss the “cost” of healthcare.  But bait them first.  Ask if it was cheaper in the 60s.  They’ll fall for it every time.

Posted by Ranting Right Wing Howler     on 01/13/2005 at 07:01 AM   
Filed Under: • Economics •  
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   Thursday - January 06, 2005

The List Gets Longer

I came “this” close (place thumb and forefinger about a hair’s width apart) to buying some office furniture at Staples.

Then I read this.

(NOTE: This post was spell-checked prior to submission.  Any errors should be blamed on the spell-checker program.  Grammar errors are intentional.  I speak like that.)

Posted by Ranting Right Wing Howler     on 01/06/2005 at 06:31 AM   
Filed Under: • Economics •  
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   Wednesday - December 29, 2004

Let’s Get Serious Now

On The Subject Of Oil.......

It all started with this story about the Saudis increasing their oil reserves to 461 billion barrels.  That’s a shitload of oil!

So I began a little research to try and figure out oil consumption worldwide. 

I shouldn’t have done that!  What I found was what I was looking for----plus some!

First off I wanted to know how many barrels of oil the world consumed per day.  In addition to discovering that as of 2003 consumption totally about 76 million BPD I also found out our oil supply was more diverse.

Remember back in the glory days when oil was about $26 a barrel?  Well, Saudi Arabia chose that time to:

curtail production in response to weak demand and to a significant 1.45 million barrel per day increase in non-OPEC oil output. Large daily production increases occurred in Russia (640,000 barrels), Kazakhstan (150,000 barrels), Canada (170,000 barrels), Angola (160,000 barrels) and Brazil (160,000 barrels).

You may be asking yourselves, “Yet with all this oil flowing from everywhere how come oil is over $42 a barrel today?” We’ll get to that another day.  Remind me.

Back to the original quest....so far so good.

Then I see where US consumption is about 18.5 MBPD versus world consumption at (back in 1999) 73.25 MBPD.  I wonder why that was thrown in there like that with no qualifiers.  So you should not be surprised to read that I am getting a bit leery now.

Then I see this bullshit by some barking fucking moonbat in our OWN GOVERNMENT!!!

When discussing oil consumption he says:

The U.S. consumes 26% of the world’s oil every day! Or, 300 million U.S. consumers out of 6 billion world consumers, that’s 5 % of us, use 26% of the oil.

What inane, stupid, mindless drivel!!!!  OF COURSE WE CONSUME 25% YOU STUPID MORON!  WE PRODUCE 25% OF THE WORLD’S GDP!!!

The level of stupidity when it comes to government bureaucrats knows no bounds, apparently.

And then they go on to say world productivity is ever declining.  What bullshit!  If anything, it’s been increasing!  Witness the Saudi development mentioned above.  And we’ve not even tapped into ANWR.

So, after all that, I concluded that at current consumption rates we’ve got about another 17 years’ worth of oil just from the newest Saudi finds.  For some reason I do not think we will be running out of oil.  Like all commodities, when it TRULY gets low in quantity we will find ways around it.  Natural gas cars, anyone?

Posted by Ranting Right Wing Howler     on 12/29/2004 at 07:39 AM   
Filed Under: • Economics •  
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   Monday - December 27, 2004

More Local Chats

Over the weekend I had another discussion with some folks who were dyed-in-the-wool liberals and blamed corporations for much of what is wrong with America.  These folks think the middle class pay all the taxes and corporations just make shitloads of money and pay none.

It’s too bad I did not have this to throw back in their faces.

What they also fail to realize is that corporations that do pay taxes do not do so temselves---it is the consumer who buys or hires their services that pay those taxes through the revenue they contribute to that corporation.  So the higher the rate on corporations, the more costly our lives become.  But that’s an issue for another day.

Posted by Ranting Right Wing Howler     on 12/27/2004 at 09:55 AM   
Filed Under: • Economics •  
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   Wednesday - December 22, 2004

The Good News Does Not Stop

This put a huge smile on my face! Blue states to lose seats; Red states to gain seats.

Oh, Pendulum!  How I see thee swing!!!

It won’t be long now before it starts to lop off the heads of these moonbats surrounding me!

Savor this piece.  Read it slowly.  Then read it again and gloat.

BWAH! HA! HA! HA!

Posted by Ranting Right Wing Howler     on 12/22/2004 at 02:22 PM   
Filed Under: • Economics • Politics •  
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The Sky Is Falling!  The Sky Is Falling!

Not a day passes by where the MSM and cry-baby liberals lament the sad state of our economy.

Bush lost more jobs than any other president!

Unemployment is awful!!

Inflation is increasing!!

I still have people in this area I talk to (not too many do anymore!) who think Bush is a bad president.  When I ask them why they get struck by this stupid look and can no longer talk.

How bad is Bush?

I don’t know about you but in Florida unemployment is approaching the “unmeasurable” stage.  Jobs go begging.  The stores are filled.  Plasma TVs and flat screen TVs and monitors are flying out the department store doors.  People drive REALLY nice cars.  (These are not the actions of people suffering economically. And before you give me any shit about credit card debt, default rates are at their lowest in almost 10 years!)

Home prices here have almost doubled in 4 years with about a 10-15% annual rise in values.

The stock market is at its highest levels in 3.5 years (I am finally just now beginning to recoup the shitload of money I lost from my retirement account.  Don’t even ask!)

oil prices keep plummeting.  A month ago gas was $1.99.  I saw it yesterday at $1.67.

Don’t believe me about the economy?

Go here.

And here.

Posted by Ranting Right Wing Howler     on 12/22/2004 at 02:10 PM   
Filed Under: • Economics •  
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   Thursday - December 16, 2004

Stupid?  Ineffectual?

Just how much more stupid or ineffectual or incompetent or ignorant of basic coomon sense can people be?

Well, if you are part of an Illegal Immigrants Rights group, the sky is the limit.

They want to protest Gov. Ah-nold’s veto of a bill allowing driver licenses to illegals.

So what do they propose?

That people boycott buying gasoline on Monday.

DOH!!!

Exactly how will that hurt anyone?  People will still go to the mini-marts for coffees, etc. so those guys won’t get hurt. 

Let me fill you stupid fucktwirts in on something.  Listen closely you assholes.  If I do not buy gas on Monday, I will buy enough gas on Sunday or Tuesday to satisfy my needs.  And if I really need gas you think I am going to stop my business dead in its tracks just to make you incompetent fucks feel better about your worthless asses?

Posted by Ranting Right Wing Howler     on 12/16/2004 at 07:08 AM   
Filed Under: • Economics •  
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   Sunday - November 14, 2004

What Unemployment?

Posted by The Skipper     on 11/14/2004 at 07:01 PM   
Filed Under: • Economics •  
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   Wednesday - November 10, 2004

Dis-Unions

More losers are squabbling amongst themselves after the disastrous Liberal defeat on November 2. The AFL-CIO is being threatened by the withdrawal of several of its unions from the national organization that backed Kerry (who, by the way, served in Vietnam) ....

WASHINGTON - With organized labor in disarray, two unions renewed threats Wednesday to break from the AFL-CIO in a deepening feud over how to stem the erosion of membership and revive labor’s economic and political strength.

I predict organized labor will self-destruct entirely within twenty years. They served a great purpose at the turn of the 20th century, improving working conditions and wages but for the last forty or fifty years have been nothing more than a drain on the economy by causing inflated wages, by striking over increased benefits (raising all of our medical costs) and most importantly by getting in bed first with (a) organized crime and later with (b) the liberal leftist Democrats in this country (yes, I realize there is not much difference between those two groups).

You all already know how I feel about labor unions and their foron leaders who siphon off dues to support their lavish lifestyles, dip into labor retirement funds to buy jewelry and try to influence elections with strong-arm tactics. Fuck ‘em! Fuck ‘em all! The sooner they dissolve and go away, the quicker America can remain competitive in the emerging global markets. The unions have almost destroyed entire industries (automobile manufacturing and airlines, to name a few) with greatly overinflated wage demands.

That’s why you won’t see hardly any “Union Labels” on products today. All you’ll see nowadays is “Made In China”. In that country, labor is 100% organized .... kinda what the AFL-CIO and the Democrats would prefer to see in America. Commie bastards!

Posted by The Skipper     on 11/10/2004 at 09:38 PM   
Filed Under: • Democrats-Liberals-Moonbat Leftists • Economics •  
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