Politics: October 2008 Archives

The election is in a few days. While it has become plain to me that the reporting of the polls has been manipulated (along with everything else) by a media actively campaigning for Obama, the math apparently says that the amount of manipulation is not enough to flip the basic result: an Obama victory.

I would be very happy to be wrong about this, and enough people to make a difference could still change their mind, but I'm pretty much resigned to an Obama victory.

I'm still going to vote for McCain, and urge everyone I know to do the same no matter how hopeless it may seem to you.

I have seen too much evidence that Obama intends to lead this country into an economic, foreign relations, and Constitutional disaster of epic proportions.

I love this country.

Therefore, I am going to fight until the bitter end to save it.

I am going to the polls on Tuesday. I am going to vote for John McCain. I'm going to continue to urge all like minded voters to do so, no matter how hopeless the election may seem. That's the easy part. Who knows, we may still bring it off. In any case, by making the win as narrow as possible, it will reduce Obama's political mandate - and power to bring about dangerous change. If enough other people follow this path, we may even put enough spine into the Republican congressional leadership to stand up and make the best fight of it they can.

But if Obama wins, I am not threatening to leave the country. I am going to stay and hold that lying two-faced populist, totalitarian incompetent's feet to the fire to the limit of my ability to do so.

I am going to be scrupulously fair and give him credit for anything good he does.

I am not going to make up stuff about him. If what he has said he wants to do is what he does in fact do, the truth will be bad enough to convince anyone even vaguely rational. I won't need to make up chants like the deranged left has done for George Bush.

If the Big Lie works for the left, imagine what pure facts are going to do for the right and center.

I was too young to vote in 1976. But I remember that President Ford's leadership and plans were working, until he lost the election.

I remember all of what Jimmy Carter did. I lived through his hand-wringing about a "national malaise". The national malaise was of his causing.

Jimmy never tried to repeal half of the bill of rights, as Barack Obama has said (and voted!) to do. Specifically, the first, second, fifth, sixth, eighth, ninth, and tenth amendments are in danger of becoming dead letters if Barack Obama wins, and any pretense of the judiciary being neutral arbiters of the law. For that matter, the thirteenth amendment is in danger (the conscript national service corps he wants to establish). If Whoopi Goldberg is worried about being a slave, she should maybe vote against the man who has said he wants to do something that violates the thirteenth amendment, instead of for him because he indirectly shares some genetic heritage with the group who were slaves If you're worried about a draft, maybe you should vote for the man who believes in the all-volunteer military (John McCain), instead of the man who has said he wants to draft people - just not for the military.

Most importantly, Barack Obama has convinced me that he wants to give our most productive citizens and corporations as much reason to leave take their dollars, their jobs, their investments, and most importantly, their innovative energies out of our country and into others as he can. I want to keep these folks around, in this country, so I will raise the biggest voice I can in their defense.

I remember how Ronald Reagan turned us around. I'm looking around, and I just don't see such a figure in national politics today, and what Barack Obama wants to do will bar most of the avenues he had to make his case, get elected, and enact his agenda. So I'm going to stay, and I'm going to make as much of a fight of it as I can, no matter what anyone else does.

Barack Obama is no man on a white horse. He is a trojan horse. I'm fully aware of what happened to Laocoon, but I must stand up and speak the truth as I see it. I love this country too much to stand by, no matter the cost.

(expletive) unbelievable. Or rather, should I say, all too believable: House Democrats Contemplate Abolishing 401(k) Tax Breaks

Words fail, but I'm going to try anyway: Do you have any idea how much of a difference for the worse it will make for the economy? Do you have any idea how much it will hurt the retirements of the "working class" folks they say they are trying to help? For the economy, about the size of the mortgage meltdown bailout every year, while restricting our economic growth rate by at least a third. For the 401k, do the math with a 28% yearly drain on contributions and income within the account, and over a 40 year working lifetime, it cuts the size of the nest egg by a much larger factor than the tax rate.

It is the fact that this money currently accumulates tax deferred which is the biggest reason why it is a good investment. The company match is actually number two. Let's say you contribute $1000 per year. If you contribute multiple thousands, just multiply the results by however many times you contribute $1000. If you get an 8% compounded rate of return, this will cut the size of the nest egg from $281,000 per thousand per year, to $112,000 - sixty percent of the money just gone, and seventy percent of the actual increase in value (you would have $40,000 even if you put it in a mattress). And here's the sick part: For costing you $169,000, the government only collects $43,000 in taxes! If they just waited until you start withdrawing, at the end of your career, they'd get close to $79,000 at the same tax rate! Is this brain damaged or what?

Don't believe me? It's pretty trivial to program in the spreadsheet of your choice.

Change the assumption to a 10% rate of return (very achievable), and instead of $488,000 times however many thousands of dollars you contribute, you only have $163,000 as the multiplier, and the government only collected $63,000 in taxes, as opposed to over $136,000 if they just waited.

Admittedly, there's also Time Value of Money calculations to make, but this is just so unbelievably stupid that I had to check my calendar and the date stamp to make certain it wasn't an April Fools Day joke taken out of context. This is lose-lose-lose by any measure - unless your only criteria for "benefit" is "the government gets your money now"

These are set up to allow Presidential Candidates to appeal directly to large amounts of people. So how did they do?

I'm going to hold my tongue until later.

Three Poll Questions and lest it be unclear, one person, one vote (in each), i.e. enlightened democracy rules.

How did Sarah Palin do?

How Did Joe Biden Do?

How did it influence your likely vote?

UPDATE: For some reason, pollcode is cutting out two answers I asked for "About equal - but I'm now more likely to vote Obama/Biden" and "About equal - but I'm now more likely to vote McCain/Palin" I've tried fixing this three times with no success. If one of these applies to you, since this is a voting question, please answer as if your respective choice did better and you're now more likely to vote for them

PS: If you voted while I was trying to fix it, those were lost. Please do make a vote that will be counted

As last time, I'm holding my impressions until later.