Hank Paulson, Jr. has the unenviable task of trying to shore up America’s economic system after it was looted by his compatriots, with the help and encouragement of the Democratic Party. The Republican Party played a supporting role, and George W. Bush just happened to be in the White House. Poor timing on his part. Mr. Paulson didn’t need the job. He was very comfortable in his post at Goldman Sachs. But, when his country called, Paulson answered and shouldered the load as Treasury Secretary. This is a scary, stress-laden job with huge downsides and incessant second-guessing by politicians and media types thathave no idea what they’re talking about. There are hundreds of moving parts and thousands of possible combinations that can end in disaster. And, there’s probably no single person in the entire country that’s better suited for this responsibility than Secretary Paulson.

But, we have to consider his mindset. Although he is tough, direct and dedicated, he operates reflexively within the Wall Street mental paradigm. And his moves are anticipated by Wall Street, the banking system and the Fed. For example, the bank bailout bill he championed had a provision to buy toxic loans from banks, entitled TARP (Troubled Assets Relief Program) which spurred stock brokerages to immediately apply for federal charters as bank holding companies, and therefore eligible for free money from the government. Even Goldman Sachs, his former employer, has asked for an expedited charter as a bank  holding company. Secretary Paulson deftly maneuvered around his Wall Street peers, choosing instead to buy equity in troubled banks, rather than buying their loan portfolios. It’s a smart move. So, instead of praising the man for making fast, effective decisions and changing the plan to reflect reality, Congress and the media are jumping all over the guy because he changed his mind and didnt’ let them in on his strategy. Had he done so, the morons on Capitol Hill would have called their buddies in order to give them an unfair advantage.

Henry Paulson is doing a good job, given the circumstances. What’s truly scary is the prospect of Secretary Paulson leaving his post, to be replaced by some Democratic ideologue that will surely drive this country over a cliff. If President-Elect Obama has any sense at all, he’ll retain Secretary Paulson until this most acute state of economic distress eases up.

This site is not about conspiracy theories. There are plenty of other sites for that stuff. But, this writer has been compelled to question the motives of Democrats and their environmental allies given their actions over the last few months. When gasoline was surging past the $4 mark, and while natural gas and home heating oil were hitting new highs, the Democrats did everything in their power to make matters worse. Even though George W. Bush issued an executive order to openup offshore drilling, Nancy Pelosi was able to stop it and then respond with an even more restrictive bill that effectively closes off drilling to 95% of America’s coastline.

The Democrats also oppose clean coal initiatives, nuclear power, diesel fuel, new refineries, new pipelines, tar sand and oil shale extraction, new coal-fired or gas-fired power plants and upgrades to the electrical grid. The question is why? What do Democrats have to gain by forcing Americans to starve and shiver in darkness? All kinds of possibilities bubble up: Are Democrats being paid off to do this and by whom? Is this a way to create misery so that Democrats can maintain their stranglehold on America’s poor and working class? Does Bill Clinton, who gets paid tens of millions by OPEC producers, still have clout within the Democratic Party? What possible motives could the Democrats have to deprive America of its own natural resources? Oh, they do support wind power. But even with all their hot air, Democrats know wind power is impractical. So, what’s the real story?

Growth in energy supply and energy infrastructure spurs general economic growth. This country’s economy was built on cheap, abundant energy which is still possible, even if emission controls are applied. What will stop this country cold are the restrictive, reactionary and regressive policies of Democrats and their friends in the environmental left. Responsible energy development is the key to economic growth. Anyone who expends so much effort to stop it must have something else up their sleeve.

Consider what liberals have at their disposal - Hollywood, celebrity worship, alcohol, drugs, promiscuity, mysogeny, sloth, greed and all manner of human frailties. These are the incentives, the lures, that are used to degrade and debauch our society. From the ‘liberal’ perspective, it’s okay to be an utter failure as a father, mother, friend or even as a human being, as long as you harbor resentment and hatred toward those who work hard, take care of their own and occassionally show up at church. From the ‘liberal’ perspective, it’s definitely not hip to stay married, care for your kids, stay sober, try to get ahead or believe that just maybe there’s a divine plan. That immediately puts you in the category of rube, hick, redneck, reactionary and racist. Heck, that makes you a clone of Dick Cheney, who according to Vice-President Elect Joe “Plagiarism is my middle name” Biden, is the ‘most dangerous man in America’.

Here’s what needs to happen over the next four years: we need to make 52% of Americans understand what America is, who Americans are and how our destiny was cast some 200 years ago. America is an extraordinary place, filled with exceptional people. How do we know that? Simple. Think about Europe in the late 1700s. Those who were restless, ambitious and dynamic, that had no place to go because of societal restrictions and class structure, gave up everything they had to come here. They were the strong ones. The weak ones gave up and stayed in Europe, resigned to their lot in life. They’re still in Europe, putzing around in a socialist purgatory that rewards mediocrity and dispenses misery. The truly exceptional? Well, they came here and they succeeded. America became the beacon of opportunity for everyone else around the world, beckoning the adventurous, the self-reliant and the motivated to come here, because here was the only place in the world where you could pull yourself up by the bootstraps and become something incredible.

And now, Barack Obama, Nancy Pelois, Harry Reid and the rest of the liberal left wants to throw it all away.

At simple interest of just 3% the Wall Street and bank bailout package incurs $287,687,232 in interest per day. Not a nickel towards repaying the principal - just interest. $287,687,232 in interest per day. Get your mind around it: 3,000 people, laboring for a year, each paid $90,000 annually, is equivalent to one day of interest on the bailout package. Take those same 3,000 people and tax them at 40%. That’s $36,000 each to be put toward one day of interest. It would take them 2-1/2 years to pay one day of interest. What about all of the interest and all of the principal? Let’s assume these same 3,000 people give up all of their earnings to the government. It would take them 1.6 billion years to pay off the principal and interest IF we stopped counting interest after just 10 years.

Another way of looking at is that every man, woman and child in the United States, all 300 million of them, legal and illegal, just got stuck with $11,666 in new debt. That’s right. Each and every one of them gets to pay this off. Oh, but it won’t really work that way. No, that wouldn’t be fair. Only the top 5% of taxpayers will be handed the bill. That means fewer than 3.8 million people will pay nearly $5 trillion, once interest is figured in, over the next 40 years. It works out to about $1 million per person. That’s in addition to current government expenditures, the existing government debt, bonds, and whatever else President Obama cares to hand out to constituents.

And so far, not a word, not a peep, about any indepth investigation or analysis as to how, when, where and by whom was this mess engineered.

The big unions labored mightily to put Obama in the White House and narrowly missed achieving total control in Congress. Better luck next time. The millions of man-hours expended for shuttle services, phone banks, sign placement, rallies, marching and picketing put Democrats in a position to win it all. And now, Big Labor wants its pound of flesh. The Employee Free Choice Act, co-sponsored by Sen. Barack Obama, is nothing like free choice. The traditional secret ballot, protected by state and federal government, would be abolished in favor of a ‘check card’. Union organizers would be allowed to collect signed authorization cards from workers without benefit of confidentiality. Those who don’t sign the check cards would be harassed and intimidated until they did so. Employers wouldn’t be notified that a union organizing drive was underway until union bosses showed up with a contract. And this the unions call ‘modernizing’ the labor movement. The National Right to Work blog of November 2, 2008 has a detailed analysis of what’s really going on.

The Democratic Party is solidly behind the Employee Free Choice Act. Passage in the House is virtually a done deal and 60 votes are a near certainty in the Senate when Congress reconvenes. This is crazy. In those few instances where unions were allowed to get around the secret ballot, union membership skyrocketed to absurdly high numbers. Does anyone think that workers voted in a union of their own free will? Does anyone think those workers’ lives where improved in any significant manner? Certainly, no one believes that the employer suddenly acquired a more professional workforce. No doubt, the union bosses were able to extract some small pay increases almost immediately. But that didn’t make it into the workers’ pockets. No, it paid the newly instituted union dues. So who’s the parasite here? Employers create jobs. Employees fill those jobs. What exactly does a union do?

Eighty years ago, the unions had a valid reason for being. Forty years ago, much of that reason vanished when the cumulative effect of state and federal labor laws provided the same worker protections. There was no reason for unions to exist except for collective bargaining - representing workers as a group to negotiate for pay raises and expanded benefits. Unfortunately, human nature being what it is, it didn’t take long for unions to begin demanding pay increases well beyond what employers could afford to pay. Why would a union do that? Simple: union bosses don’t get a raise unless the workers they represent get a raise. Yes, it’s shortsighted, it’s stupid and in the long run it’s destructive, but then no one has ever accused unions of being business-oriented or entrepreneurial.

But, union leaders are street savvy. They know the traditional manufacturing jobs they once represented are no longer viable. They also know that they’ll have difficulty organizing knowledge workers like engineers or software programmers, and small business employees. Instead, they’ve targeted local, state and federal government. Why? It’s an endless source of money, courtesy of the American taxpayer. No one’s in charge, no one is accountable and the unions can run wild. And, Democrats back their activities 100%. Can it get any better than this? Yes, it can. The Democrats also back the Public Safety Employee-Employer Cooperation Act, which forces local and state governments to negotiate raises through union bosses instead of directly with police officers, firefighters and emergency personnel. Some 22 states would have to change their laws in order to comply and thousand of first responders could no longer simply ask for a raise on an individual basis. 

The cash flow from government employee dues must be gigantic. But no one knows for sure. That cash flow will be used to push for a new organizing effort across the country the likes of which hasn’t been seen since the 1930s. It’s no coincidence this is going to happen on President Obama’s watch. In fact, it’s probably been in the planning stages for years.

President-Elect Obama held his first press conference on November 6th. To no one’s surprise, there was nothing new from the Anointed One. The same, vague statements that characterized his campaign speeches were now repurposed to parry questions from reports. But then, there was little he could realistically accomplish in 24 hours. To his credit, Obama put together a somewhat credible board of economic ‘advisors’ just a day after the election and set up a press conference the following day. At the very least, he’s being proactive.

An absolute hoot was the presence of Michigan’s governor Jennifer Granholm. This woman, along with the unions that put her into power, effectively destroyed Michigan’s economy while growing the size of government at nearly twice the rate of inflation. While Michigan’s GDP was cratering and tax receipts were falling, she went on a hiring binge. The, she gave government workers not one, but two, big pay increases while the state’s budget deficit ballooned. And, governor Granholm managed to push through an ‘emergency’ income tax increase at the same time. That’s no small feat. And here she was, sitting next to Joe Biden, just one seat away from the right hand of the Anointed One. Perhaps, the President-Elect will take some lessons from governor Granholm in how to quickly drive the economy into a ditch with no hope of recovery.

Granhom, a comitted socialist and big-government proponent, has been toxic to Michigan’s middle class and small businesses, who’ve borne the brunt of tax increases. In fact, Michigan’s infamous Single Business Tax was repealed after a general revolt by small business owners. Granhom deflty introduced a plethora of ‘micro-taxes’ that increased the state’s taxation on certain small businesses by an eye-popping 1,300%. Many saw business tax increases in the 10-20% range, well above the original Single Business Tax. In other words, you don’t mess with Michigan’s tax revenue stream, most of which ends up paying unionized government employees. If you fight it, the Democrats will institute a new tax that’s even more punishing. Perhaps the Anointed One is looking to Michigan for inspiration.

The media monkeys are patting themselves on the back these days. They managed to pull off a coup, installing a Marxist in the White House and consolidating leftist power in Congress. Besides the $400 million tax credit to media producers hidden inside the bank bailout bill, there must be something else they’ll receive in exchange for bamboozling the American voter. Whatever it might be, you can count on the media to continue their cheerleading for what could become the most oppressive regime in America history. There’s no going back. There’s no time out. What Obama and Congress do with their newly acquired power will be irreversible. One thing is sure: productive, working Americans will pay for it all, in economic terms and personal freedoms.

Once the Obama Nation becomes a reality, merely voting him and his leftist compatriots out of office won’t matter. The structural changes he intends to make place government first, above all else. That means the government no longer serves the people and is no longer accountable to the people. Rather, we, the citizens, work for the government, and we are accountable to the government. Unelected, unaccountable officials deep within a vast bureacracy will hold the power of life and death over us. And no, we can’t just take it back. No one in power ever relinquishes that power without a fight. It only happened once in human history — when the founding fathers of this country drafted and ratified a Constitution which accomplished precisely that.

No, the middle class will literally have to wrest control of their lives and this country away from the bureaucrats and elites. It will get ugly. That Brooks Brothers suit is going to get wrinkled manning the barricades on Main Street.

Maybe it’s time for conservatives to ditch the Republican party and start a new one. And, unlike the socialists hiding behind the Democratic Party moniker, this new party should be called the Conservative Party. There’s no reason to disguise the conservative movement’s true intent, as the Democrats have for the last 60 years. In fact, conservatives should demand that Democrats merge with the Socialist Party, since the former has effectively adopted the latter’s platform. Conservatives have nothing to hide, and everything to gain by promising Americans that they will restore the ideals and principles that made America great, and leave by the roadside those things that held us back, including a pervasive culture of entitlement and the consequences of social engineering by government.

The fact that conservative Republicans didn’t turn out to vote for John McCain should send shock waves through the Republican party and force the RNC leadership to reflect on how they recruit a loyal base. They’ve spent the last 6 years trying to cultivate a positive relationship with mainstream media. Sorry, that’s not going to happen. TV networks and newspapers are merely propaganda machines for the Democratic Party and those few outlets that provide an alternative, balanced point of view will eventually be silenced. Therefore, the Republicans should gird themselves for battle. It won’t be pretty, it won’t be easy, and they will get pounded mercilessly.

Having said that, conservatives need to look for different means to communicate their message. The Democratic Party and its allied grass roots organizations have been especially adept at using every form of communication technology to their advantage, aided and abetted by the news & entertainment cabal which has extensive experience and resources in that space. Conservatives must invest the time, money and effort required to build an extensive communications network that will help recruit and retain a loyal following. Republicans don’t have anything resembling the machines Democrats have created and continue to develop and maintain, always ready to mobilize voters and apply pressure when needed. This will take some time. Getting started now would be a good idea.

Senator Barack Obama is now President-Elect Obama. The crowds went wild in Grant Park and Times Square. Certainly, it’s a historic event - an African American candidate breaks the color barrier. But, there are many more accomplished and experienced African Americans who were ignored by their own parties, the media and voters in general. Why this guy? In any case, we’re stuck with our choices good, bad or indifferent. The Obama administration and a largely Democratic Congress will now shove through legislation and programs that will grow government and limit our personal and economic freedoms. It will be unprecedented in American history. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was a socialist elitist who firmly believed in and enforced a class hierarchy in the US. Lyndon Baines Johnson was a socialist elitist who firmly believed in a morally and ethicly ambivalent society. But, neither man was so brazen as to promise he would dismantle the protections of the Constitution and call for an internal, civilian security force equal in power and funding to our military. And neither man openly promised forced redistribution of wealth, pitting one class of Americans against another.

This will come as a rude shock to those who think that Obama will pay for their gasoline, pay their mortgages and give them ‘free’ health care. It will never happen. Instead, every form of taxation will be increased and new taxes will be instituted. Everyone will suffer. If you thought medical care was expensive, time-consuming and frustrating, wait until the government gets involved. You’ll be waiting line for an aspirin. There is nothing that our government does exceptionally well, with a few colossally expensive exceptions — aerospace and defense. And the reason these two areas can point to incredible technical and operational achievements is because cost, the taxpayer’s liability, is no object. Get ready for a $20 bottle of aspirin coming to a drugstore near you. Oh, that triple bypass that will save your life? You’ll have to wait 10 years. But, if you’re politically connected, perhaps a Democratic party apparatchik, you’ll be in and out in 4 days.

Today’s blog is necessarily brief. Today is when the news/entertainment cabal makes its final effort to deliver a substantial victory for Barack Obama and the Democratic Party. The major networks and cable clones assemble ‘impartial’ panels of ‘experts’ who jump to conclusions and trumpet victory for Democrats well before the outcome is truly known. They hope to influence voters who’ve yet to cast their ballots. And, they’ve succeeded. But, the work began weeks ago, when the media stampeded left-leaning citizens to early voting, itself a constitutional question in need of an answer. With ballots counted in advance, Democratic operatives would have advance notice in terms of wringing out the necessary votes on election day to create the illusion of a hotly contested but convincingly Democratic victory.

No one should be surprised that voter intimidation will take place, but it won’t be Democratic or minority voters who’ll be intimidated or harassed. It will be Republican or Libertarian voters who are the victims. But, the media cabal won’t report that. No one should be surprised that voter fraud in the form of ballot stuffing, multiple votes, illegal alien votes and of course, the Chicago favorite — dead person votes, will help boost Democratic totals. No one should be surprised that the news networks counsel West Coast conservatives to just stay home because the race is already won.

However the election ends, the victory goes to the Democrats. It appears that Americans will have to learn the hard way that socialism and big government are a fraud.