Trading Places

This is a classic scene from the film, 'Trading Places.' If you haven't seen it yet go to a movie store now, rent it (get popcorn too), come back home, watch it, and then continue reading. I'll wait....


That'll do nicely.


With the new year coming swiftly many are looking back to remember what has happened in the last year and decade to say, 'Wow I don't know how we came out of that.' I would rather not look at the depth of the valleys behind us but would prefer instead to turn towards the mountains that we have before us to climb. There are a lot of things we have to do in the next year and decade.

We must fix Social Security. There are many in the country who think that Social Security shouldn't exist anymore. There are some who think that once a person has worked for 20 years they shouldn't have to lift a finger ever again. These two viewpoints obviously have a lot of space between them and some compromise is necessary. I would like to see care for the poor and disabled to be removed from Social Security's charter so that it may be regulated separately from retirement benefits for retired workers. The quickest and easiest fix for Social Security is to put more people to work to put more money into the system. That would also, I might add, solve a lot of other problems...

We must fix Healthcare. Yes the Senate passed a version of a bill and yes the House of Representatives passed one too. now the Joint Committee has to agree to something and God only knows if they can do that. Once they do it's going to be a miracle to see it passed. Legislation takes a very long time, especially of this magnitude. When a bill has as many provisions in it as this newest healthcare bill does, it usually dies.

We must fix the economy. As mentioned earlier, putting more people to work will fix a lot of our problems. We must return to being a producer and exporter of goods and return to a strong dollar fiscal policy so that our nation may once again 'rule the world' with our goods, services, and money instead of our military.

We must fix the military. Our current path is unsustainable. We must find a way to be able to maintain our safety and deter future attacks without the deployment of a quarter million men and women in harm's way and the possession of 9600 nuclear weapons. Raising tax barriers against other countries will not improve the condition of the domestic worker. That will only hurt our relations with other nations that we want to buy our products. We must instead tear down the regulation barriers that make it so difficult to own a business in this country.

We must fix civil rights. I don't know if anybody noticed or not but a justice of the peace in Louisiana refused to marry a man and a woman who were of different racial backgrounds. He quit his job after severe political pressure to do so. Every single day men and women of homosexual orientation are refused their equal right to the pursuit of happiness. We must end this hypocrisy or else we should stop criticizing countries like China for their moral fallacies.

We must fix our infrastructure. Our bridges are falling apart, our roads are old, our phone and internet and cable lines are becoming outdated. Surely there is some way we could fix all of these and a few aforementioned problems... ah yes. That stimulus money could be used to update our power grid and our roads and our other vital tools so that we can step into the 21st century (a little late). This would create countless jobs as well as accomplish a necessary goal. We might also send some people down to New Orleans to fix the levies, that would be nice.

I think that's a pretty short list but a hard list. We must look forward to the challenges ahead of us to accomplish them or else we will see another decade pass us by rife with problems. Many other countries have seen such 'lost decades' and we can be sure that more will in the coming years. I would hope that we are not on the latter list. I would hope that we, like Dan Akroyd in the film 'Trading Places' can join with the Eddie Murphy's in the world who have taken our place at the top and overcome our problems.

Merry New Year to everybody and I'll see you a little farther down the road.

I Don't Have Time To Discuss This In A Committee

Someone should draw a comic of Barack Obama shouting that at Nancy Pelosi while she shouts the classic response, "I am not a committee!" Would Joe Biden be Chewbacca? (I would cast Harry Reid play C-3PO and Olympia Snowe play R2-D2 (not to say that Ms. Snowe is a little person but referencing her minority status as a Republican and the character being the lone voice of reason that nobody wants to listen to) The Millenium Falcon could have the word Healthcare on it since the two were both standing on shaky ground at the time of the exchange. I digress.

The Senate came in to work on Christmas Eve so that they could vote on the most important issue of the year: healthcare. The headlines on Christmas morning read that the Senate had passed landmark legislation set to go to committee in the new year. They didn't even need 60 Democrats or any Republicans to move on to voting and the 58 Democrats and 2 Independents also voted yes on the actual bill, moving the bill into the next stage of the legislative process.

I'm blogging from my work computer so if you read this before I can fix it, look up 'I am a Bill' on youtube and enjoy the video.

The link in the title takes you to an article from the Washington Post that compares the House and Senate bills on some of the major points.

I'd like to give the Dems kudos for muscling a bill through both houses of Congress. It's been a long time since a Democratic majority in Congress actually meant anything other than creating a sitting duck. I'm going to hold off my commentary on the healthcare bill until a final version is passed by Congress simply because there are too many facets to explore and I don't want to write a thesis (that's a lie, I don't mind writing it but apparently nobody would read it).

Hopefully the next piece of life-altering legislation that comes through Congress will see a more productive response from the GOP. While "You Lie" activates the base, garners some campaign money, and wins some elections in off-years, giving 30 million Americans health insurance improves the quality of life in our country and might win the Presidency (again).

In he dream world I like to think we might create some day, the moderates will split off from both parties and then nobody would have a majority and would have to form coalitions to get anything done, much like.... almost every country in Europe has to. (Aren't they making an international President soon? We'll talk about that later)

I think that's where I'm going to end this one. I'm glad that something got passed and I'm glad that the Dems flexed their muscles. I hope that the GOP does more in committee to help mold a more cost-effective and private-run bill and I hope that people will realize that higher taxes aren't always a bad thing. Merry Christmas to all of you and thank you for reading!