I am warning anyone reading this right now, this could be a long post. I am watching MSNBC (I know, that’s a mistake right there) and I am watching all the political spin amidst the Wall Street Meltdown reports, and there are things and people and all sorts of crap getting under my skin… time to scratch it.

Spin Doctors
I want to see the spin mavens come on and talk about their candidates, and only their candidates. I would love to hear them extol the virtues of their guys and ignore the crap about the other guy. How refreshing it would be if you could go even one conversation without hearing “but that son of a bitch other guy,” add whatever topic you want in the most horrid light you can think of. I will say that the Obama people seem to not be playing the game as much as the McCain surrogates, but they both play this game and it is annoying.

Worst of all is when the moderator locks in on a Spin Man (or Woman) and they simply do not know the answer to a question and just go on to spew talking points and vitriol at their appointed opponent. It can get humorous when, say, Chris Mathews is the interviewer and he gets into bulldog mode and refuses to continue on till the campaign rep answers his questions. I love that. I just wish more moderators would grow a couple and not allow the negative spin on their shows.

On the other hand, I am not at all upset about when a candidate rep lies about their own candidate. These fun gaffs make the elections fun in a sort of “what kind of stupid are you?” sort of way. I think it is great that John McCain invented the Blackberry. At least now Al Gore can die knowing someone said a bigger boner than him.

Lies, More Lies, and Damned Lies
Is it possible to have an interview or such without someone saying a lie about something? I mean really, how stupid do these people think the viewers of these continuous talk shows are? If the lies were subtle, if they were based on some sort of reality, or if they only had a shred of truth embedded in them maybe I could buy it… sort of. Really, you all insult my intelligence and the intelligence of most of the people watching you. And you how that make you look? STUPID.

Exaggerations are lies. Sure, they are lies like the last fish I caught was a 120 pound guppy, but they are lies. Want an example? McCain saying Obama is going to raise taxes on the middle class. How often are we hearing that one? I don’t know, but yesterday I hear it a grand total of 17 times. I know because every time I heard it I put a hash mark in a little note book I carry. And since when is the middle class 250k a year? I though it was like $20k to about $100k. Maybe I am wrong, maybe the numbers are EXAGERATED.

The worst of the lot (this is like the third worst or something, but truly the baddest of the bad) are the outright lies. For the last time… Obama was born in Hawaii, he is Christian, and yes he did father two black children, by his wife and your point is???, and NO he is not coming after white women except in wanting their vote. This scurrilous type of reporting and spin is disgusting. Everyone, leave it alone.

On the other hand, ok, so McCain was a soldier, so he was a POW, but he never commanded troops, so really why does this make him more ready to be President? And why is that fact that he was a POW make him better at anything? Why is this an excuse for anything, other than maybe he was a screw up and got caught? Personally, if I were a POW and I were give the opportunity to leave because daddy was someone important, I would. Why? Simply because who the hell knows what will happen in the future and that may be my last chance of escape. There is nothing honorable about dying for a principle, contrary to popular belief; certainly the one who died will not know any better. Besides, better to assure you live to fight another day.

On the third hand, there is stuff about Obama we still do not know. We are still sketchy about his finances, we know almost nothing about his medical history, and to be honest, we know only about his family what he has let become public. Not that any of this has much if any bearing on the race for President, it is just curiosity about the man we are about to appoint to the most powerful position in the country (if not the world.)

“Do the DC Filp”
This one is mostly the purview of McCain… If you don’t get support from the public on your current point of view, flip flop on the issue and tell the big lie that you were for it the whole time. Hilary Clinton showed us the way on this tactic, and it almost worked against Obama, but in the end, the public has a memory. Also, THE PUBLIC IS NOT STUPID! Lie to us if you want, but we remember what you were in favor of or not in favor of, flip flop (or Floip) at your own risk.

McCain, Mr, Deregulator; Now FLOIP!
Obama, No Surge; FLOIP!

You get the point? I am sure you can name another 20 FLOIPs but it is 6am for me right now and my memory is not running right now for lack of coffee. Reminds me of some lyrics…

Undecided

You say it’s yes, and then it’s no;
You say you’ll stay, and then you go -
You’re undecided now, so what are you gonna do?

(Song repeats…)

So here we are in the land of the undecided candidates and we are all just waiting to figure out where everyone will really stand. The thing is, even after we elect and put into office one of these guys, we still will not know where they stand until they actually do something. I wonder how many of their promises they will live up to? I wonder if it really matters at all who we elect and if the Washington machine will just keep chugging along “same as it ever was, same as it ever was.”

Golden Parachutes
OK guys… here is a truism for you… Government cannot control the upper limits of salaries for any company. People are free to negotiate any deal they can make with a company and it is all kosher as long as that is the normal practice for that company. That is the American way, the dream of all Americans. If the government could regulate salaries in this way it would not be a Democracy, if would be a Fascist State. Now don’t get me wrong, I am all for a good Fascist Dictator as long as it doesn’t go to his head, but hey, what are the chances of that? (That last line was sarcasm folks, I use a lot of it.)

Got Cash?
With Wall Street getting ready to collapse and in need of a transfusion, there are a few things that we can do immediately to help out. In no particular order:

• Pull our troop from Iraq and free up Billions and Billions of dollars for use in other sectors of the U.S. economy.

• Time for a little isolationism. Up all import tariffs to historic high levels, especially cars, appliances and other durable goods. Eliminate most export tariffs.

• Forget drilling for oil. Create jobs and business in high tech, especially green tech. Shoot for 4 years to have 10% of all cars on the road be either electric, CNG or hydrogen fuel cell. This will start the trend to better and cleaner cars and we get to keep the cash we are sending to the Arabs who are terrorizing us anyway.

• Raise Taxes: (Personal taxes x1 earnings, Corporate taxes x10 earnings)
  
  • $0 - $11,999 up 1%
  • $12,000 - $47,999 up 2%
  • $48,000 – $119,999 up 3%
  • $120,000 - $249,999 up 4%
  • $250,000 - $999,999 up 5%
  • $1,000,000 + up 7%

• We got to bite the bullet and do it. This may not be the best solution nor the only one, and it may not be permanent, just until the book look balanced. I know inflation will be a problem, but we can cross that road when we get to it.

• Socialized Medical Insurance: This will cost to start up, but in the long run after the initial cost and restructuring fall into place, the costs will be lower and the cost to business will be lower and productivity will rise. Good all the way around.

• Cap foreign investment in our country. I know we may loose some income, but we are loosing our identity by selling it off a bit at a time. Create ways to re-buy our holdings at a discount. In short, invest in US.

So I am going to wrap this up now, I have gotten several pet peeves off my chest and feel better, especially since the coffee is good this morning.