To read the tribute to SFC Marcus Muralles, please click here
Thursday, July 10, 2008
What We've Learned about Politics Today
If you're Phil Gramm, you learned that McCain will denounce you and Obama will make fun of you if you tell the truth.
"You've heard of mental depression; this is a mental recession," he said, noting that growth has held up at about 1 percent despite all the publicity over losing jobs to India, China, illegal immigration, housing and credit problems and record oil prices. "We may have a recession; we haven't had one yet."
"We have sort of become a nation of whiners," he said. "You just hear this constant whining, complaining about a loss of competitiveness, America in decline" despite a major export boom that is the primary reason that growth continues in the economy, he said.
"We've never been more dominant; we've never had more natural advantages than we have today," he said. "We have benefited greatly" from the globalization of the economy in the last 30 years.
What was wrong with that? You can't walk outside your front door or turn on the TV or radio and not hear the whining. It's everywhere.
As for the "no recession," he's right. We don't even have a stagnant economy. It's growing. We continue to have an uptick in the economy each quarter. It's small, but it's there. Our economic problems, in my opinion, and mostly the fault of Congress.
What do I mean? Well, several years ago, Congress moaned and groaned because "poor people" were being "disenfranchised" because they couldn't get a home loan. Loan companies, not wanting to get Congress upset, gave sub-prime loans to people who had no business getting a loan. And when those "lucky" borrowers couldn't pay their debts, we had the "housing crisis." And the whining begins.
Also, Democrats in Congress, led by the nose by environmentalists, refused to allow new drilling in the US, and made regulations so strict that there have been no new refineries or nuclear power plants in decades. Energy prices go up because of that. And the whining continues.
I can go on, but you get the idea.
Senator Gramm got it right. We are in the middle of a mental recession. We have become a nation of whiners. And it needs to stop.
"You've heard of mental depression; this is a mental recession," he said, noting that growth has held up at about 1 percent despite all the publicity over losing jobs to India, China, illegal immigration, housing and credit problems and record oil prices. "We may have a recession; we haven't had one yet."
"We have sort of become a nation of whiners," he said. "You just hear this constant whining, complaining about a loss of competitiveness, America in decline" despite a major export boom that is the primary reason that growth continues in the economy, he said.
"We've never been more dominant; we've never had more natural advantages than we have today," he said. "We have benefited greatly" from the globalization of the economy in the last 30 years.
What was wrong with that? You can't walk outside your front door or turn on the TV or radio and not hear the whining. It's everywhere.
As for the "no recession," he's right. We don't even have a stagnant economy. It's growing. We continue to have an uptick in the economy each quarter. It's small, but it's there. Our economic problems, in my opinion, and mostly the fault of Congress.
What do I mean? Well, several years ago, Congress moaned and groaned because "poor people" were being "disenfranchised" because they couldn't get a home loan. Loan companies, not wanting to get Congress upset, gave sub-prime loans to people who had no business getting a loan. And when those "lucky" borrowers couldn't pay their debts, we had the "housing crisis." And the whining begins.
Also, Democrats in Congress, led by the nose by environmentalists, refused to allow new drilling in the US, and made regulations so strict that there have been no new refineries or nuclear power plants in decades. Energy prices go up because of that. And the whining continues.
I can go on, but you get the idea.
Senator Gramm got it right. We are in the middle of a mental recession. We have become a nation of whiners. And it needs to stop.
