Starting this weekend and continuing into next week, I will host a series of listening sessions across the 7th District. These will not be traditional town hall meetings, where a Member of Congress stands at the podium and tells you what is going on in Washington. Instead, I want to hear from you.
I want to hear what ideas you have for how we can do things better in Washington. I want to hear what concerns you have about the bills that we are working on. I want to know what you think is working in Washington and what you think isn’t. More than anything, I think of these sessions as idea raisers, where we can work together to turn your good ideas into solutions in DC.
We will start with seven sessions in the western and mid-district over the coming weekend, with more sessions to be announced in Montgomery county and elsewhere soon.
I hope to see you there!
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 12
1:15-2:00 PM Somerville
Bank of Fayette County Community Room
106 East Market Street, Somerville
2:30-3:15 PM: Bolivar
Joe’s Restaurant
1410 West Market Street, Bolivar
4:00-5:00 PM: Selmer
U.T. Martin at Selmer
1269 Tennessee Avenue, Selmer
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 13
9:00-10:00 AM: Henderson
Henderson City Hall
121 Crook Avenue, Henderson
11:00 AM - 12:00 PM: Savannah
Sweet Pea’s Family Restaurant
869 Pickwick Street South, Savannah
12:45-1:30 PM: Lexington
Grecian Family Restaurant
741 W Church St, Lexington
2:00-2:45 PM: Parsons U.T. Martin at Parsons
535 Tennessee Ave S, Parsons
The new year could be a huge year for change if we the American People do not forget what happened in 2009 and keep our focus on battling back the march of big government and their control on every aspect of our lives. In 2010, like 1980 we have a chance to change the course of this country that we love back to the principles of the United States Constitution. 2010 will not complete the change, but it is the primary step to getting to the real change in 2012 when we have the opportunity to elect someone in office that loves this country and the American people.
Has anyone stopped to think about why the other countries of the world do not like us is because we are the only country where the people have the real power. And that we should stop trying to copy the world and their system and they should come on over to our Constitutional, Representative form of government where the people have the true power in leading their country to prosperity.
I have been involved in the Tea Party events that happened this past year and I can tell you that despite what is being reported, there is a wide range of people from different backgrounds and cultures that attended these events and it was not just a bunch of “angry white men.” However, we as the American people need to resist creating a third party and begin the process of cleaning the Republican Party of the “Democrat Lites” that have infected it.
The Republican party is broken, it does not and cannot be discarded, it needs to be revitalized. It is revitalized by we the American people who tell the leadership that we will not allow them to put weak candidates up against a Democrat because there is not real different between them.
The candidate must adhere to the common principles of the Constitution as it was written and not how some people want to interpret it today. Our founding fathers were able to create a country that states we have equal protection under the law and over the last number of decades that has erroded to the point where equal protection no longer applies and the people in Washington no longer ask if the legislation they try to pass is constitutional.
We the American people have a chance in the fall of 2010 to clean house! We have a chance to change the course of history from darkness to light again! Are you ready to make history and be the people that future generations will say, “Those are the Americans that saved our country!”
So the last post we started by discussing the governments two largest social programs and we busted the myth that they are well run and successful. Now we continue by reviewing Amtrack and the Unites States Postal Service.
Amtrak is a well run Government Corporation, right?
Amtrak is a federally chartered corporation that was founded by an act of Congress in October 1970 to operate the intercity railways that went away with the introduction of the car and airplane as the primary way for people to get from city to city. A report from 2002 by the Mackinac Center for Public Policy stated it this way:
I was talking to someone the other day who is of the more liberal persuasion. He said he is afraid many Americans are becoming “radicalized”. I asked him, “How do you mean?” To which he said, “They are buying weapons and ammo by the bucket full as if they are ready to fight our own government.”
This statement has haunted me since the day he said it. What bothers me is not that he has observed an increase in sales of firearms and ammunition. It isn’t that he thinks Americans are becoming radical. What bothers me is the total lack of recognition of how “radical” our forefathers had to be to shake off the chains of tyranny.
As you know, Thomas Jefferson made some interesting and famous statements regarding liberty and tyranny. Here are a few:
“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”
“Every citizen should be a soldier. This was the case with the Greeks and Romans, and must be that of every free state.”
“…a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they (the subjects of King George, Americans) should declare the causes which impel them to the separation (from England).”
Thomas Jefferson knew that in order to gain, keep, and maintain liberty, blood must be shed. This was once common knowledge agreed upon even by his political foes. However, this view is now viewed as fringe extremism. Pacifism toward tyranny is a perversion. Americans who are simply content to allow governmental tyranny in the form of government control of health care, UN usurpation of US sovereignty, global warming policies and the like are nothing but spoiled, fattened children who confuse the abundance of prosperity with the beautiful hardship of liberty.
It is a dangerous thing to not recognize that our elected officials can be domestic enemies. However, it is even more dangerous for the populace to recognize it and then do nothing. I am afraid for my country. If there is no revolution in the ballot box, and we fall completely under tyranny, I can forsee the “extreme” elements of our country taking up arms to restore this country. If they do, they will simply be watering the wilting tree of liberty.
Do I desire this? No, absolutely not. What I desire is for our elected leaders to govern, not rule; to govern in the best interests of the people, performing their roles as representatives of the people and the states, rather than perverting their roles and turning them into positions of power over the masses.
I pray for a ballot revolution in 2010 and 2012. God, may it be so.
Back on 3 Dec, I put up a post about the FCC and their game of hide and seek for the ‘field meeting’ that was suppose to be held today, but was changed to the 14th. As of right now, Monday - 10am, their site STILL has no place and time set for the Memphis meeting. I’m wondering if the supporters of the new so called ‘fairness doctrine’, which has no interest in fairness at all, know where the meeting is to be held, and at what time? Perhaps it’s just the public, aka opponents, they don’t want attending?
Upcoming Field Event(s)
Dec 14, 2009
FCC Field Hearing on Digital Inclusion
Location: To Be Announced…
Memphis, TN
Funny. It says right on their site:
In an effort to solicit input from the public in the development of a National Broadband Plan, the FCC will host field hearings throughout the country.
If they really want our input, perhaps they should stop playing childish game? Just a thought.
When talking about the healthcare issue the people that support a plan where the government gets involved seem to forget some historical facts that should give them pause before turning our health over to the government. Has there been anything, and I mean anything, that the government has controlled that has been successfull? I am not talking about the federal government only, but states too.
Let’s look at the items that the government has control of right now:
Crashed pickup looted with woman trapped inside(not linkable)
Sixty-nine-year-old Helen Hutton was injured and trapped in an upside down vehicle Saturday afternoon, but that apparently elicited little sympathy from a Savannah man.
According to Savannah police, Jimmy Milstead, 38 saw the crash as an opportunity.
Milstead allegedly stole a Weed Eater from the wrecked pickup truck driven by Helen’s husband Floyd Hutton Jr., 68 and carried it to his mother’s house just across the road at 145 Bain Road.
This is one real good reason why I prefer my cats! What kind of person sees an injured elderly woman, and just leaves her in order to steal? I don’t understand people anymore, and I’m not sure I want to!
Page 324 includes an $8 billion tax on individuals that have non-government “approved” health plans.
Page 348 levies a $28 billion tax on businesses that cannot afford to offer insurance to their employees.
Page 1979 raises an almost $150 billion tax on many middle-class workers using so-called “Cadillac” health insurance plans.
Page 1997 will cost families and individuals an additional $5 billion by prohibiting the use of savings set aside for health care expenses through health savings accounts, flexible spending accounts or health reimbursement accounts for the purchase of non-prescription or over the counter medicines.
Page 2010 will make the cost of lifesaving medicine more expensive by taxing pharmaceutical research firms an additional $22.2 billion.
Page 2020 will ultimately lead to increases in the cost of advanced medical devices like pacemakers by raising taxes on medical device manufacturers an additional $19.3 billion.
Page 2026 will increase the health care premiums paid by millions of Americans through a new $60.4 billion tax on health insurance companies.
Page 2040 increases the Medicare payroll tax on those earning more than $250,000. This new tax would cost $53.8 billion.
Page 2044 will eliminate a tax break in current law on Blue Cross / Blue Shield Providers and Beneficiaries, which equals about half a billion dollars annually, if at least 85 percent of revenues are not spent on clinical services. This new tax will result in higher premiums.
Page 2045 will create a $5.8 billion tax for patients receiving elective cosmetic surgery.
In case you have not already heard, the corruption in the U.S. Senate has reached a new low. Senator Mary Landrieu, Democrat from Louisiana, sold her vote on the cloture motion on the Reid Healthcare Bill for not $1oo,000,000 as had been reported for the past couple of days, no she held out and proclaimed proudly on the Senate floor tonight “I am not going to be defensive,” she declared. “And it’s not a $100 million fix. It’s a $300 million fix.”
I have listened to Jim Cooper talk about the health care plans the past several weeks. He claims to be a “Blue Dog” Democrat, based on principal and fiscal conservatism, but in the end whether it is the stimulus plan, the budget or healthcare he falls right into line and votes how Pelosi tells him to vote. Just like Saturday, November 7th Rep. Cooper released that I wrote about here where he proves that he has no foundational principals that he believes in. He is nothing but a politician that will say all the right things to the people he talks to, but does the exact opposite in the end.
On Monday, Rep. Cooper had a guest commentary in the local free newspaper that was 700 words long and said a whole bunch of nothing. The title is “The problem with the status quo” and he says some great things that has some actual facts in it with some bashing of those evil insurance companies. I especially like how he says the fault lies that Congress back in WWII did not get the opportunity to vote for any of it and did not intend it as if they are the be all, end all. Here is what he had to say about the beginnings of the flawed, but best healthcare system in the world:
