We are living in a bizarro world it seems

I'll admit it. I'd like to see the tax compromise be modified slightly.

First, I'd like to see no extension whatsoever on unemployment. Isn't 26 weeks enough? Now we have 52... 99... some people want even more than that. If you have been out of work for 99 weeks, perhaps you should lower your expectations. McDonalds is ALWAYS hiring. So is Wal-Mart and a lot of other places with similar unskilled labor positions. So it only pays $8-$10 bucks an hour. Isn't that more than you are getting on unemployment and after 1 to 2 years living off the government don't you feel a little bit bad about taking that much money. If you've worked hard during your adult life and you lose your job, I will give you 26 weeks of unemployment. You earned that. You paid taxes and so you have some stuff coming your way when you need it, but like I said 26 weeks is enough. And please don't give me that argument that there are single moms out there that are on unemployment from their $45,000 a year job and can't afford to take that $22,000 job at Wal-Mart because they can't pay for childcare. If you make that kind of money there are other government programs to catch you outside of unemployment.

Back to the tax issue now. I guess I agree that the middle class is those under $250,000 but there are a lot of small business owners that make more than that but do live paycheck to paycheck. These are the folks that took a chance and do the hiring. They work 60 to 70 hours a week and in the end it is their butts on the line if their business suceeds or fails. Yet, we are going to turn them in villians and say they are the rich... those folks aren't the rich. Heck, people that make $1 million dollars are the upper class but I wouldn't even call them the rich. People that make $1 million dollars a year still have to go to work most days of the week. They still have bills to pay. They might pay to have their 6,000 square foot house cleaned but it is not like they have a live-in made, a butler and a chef. So you want to raise taxes on those making maybe $5 million a year.... OK, I'd be OK with that. You can go ahead and call them the rich. I'm fine with that but Americans need to get some clarity on who is the rich and who are the well off, upper class, upper middle class, etc.

So let's just assume then that you kept all the tax cuts in place except for those people making more than $5 million bucks a year. I'd be OK with that. Let's also assume then that you didn't allow any more extensions on unemployment benefits. Let's hope that you could put a deadline out there and say July 1, 2011 if you have been on unemployment for more than a year... YOU ARE OFF OF IT FOR AT LEAST 2 YEARS. That would give folks 6 months to prepare. And, moving forward from that date unemployment is no more than 6 months. If you can't find a job in 6 months that pays the bills, you've got more problems than finding a job... you've got a laziness problem.

There is a simple way to solve this entire problem that would get rid of the need for income brackets, write-offs, AMT, etc. and that is simply to have a flat national sales tax..., not a VAT but rather a consumption tax. How about this. Let's set a tax bracket of 10% for every American and if you don't pay taxes at all you get no refund. If you make more than $1 million bucks, you pay an extra 5% on that. And then you pay a 1% sales tax on everything that you buy. There is no don't pay it on bread and milk, or you don't pay it on winter coats, you pay it on everything. You want to put a sin tax out there on boos and cigarettes...I'm OK with that. You want to put a fuel tax out there similar to the one we have right now or maybe just a little bit higher and put that money in a lockbox for infrastructure... I'm OK with that too. A plan like that would save the government millions on the IRS and would completely simplify the filing process. It would also allow money to circulate around the private sector much more efficiently and completely while allowing the Fed to drag the vigorish off the top time and time again. The windfall would be ridiculous for the government and it would actually be fair because people that have money spend it on goods and services and those goods and services would always be taxed. The rich would have more money to drop into investments which would further the economy that much more.

It is ridiculous how simple that program would be. It is so simple that it would never work because it is not fair or politically correct. It doesn't make people feel good about the way we are helping people. But as I remember it, the saying goes The Lord helps those that help themselves. So maybe, if we had a tad more accountability and a little more sense to the way our government gives and takes money we could actually accomplish something.

You've had the votes all along so pass it...

You said it yourself Mr. President. That's what elections are for.

You don't want to go over the cliff on your own though do you? Because that's what you see this as. You are going over a cliff and if you don't do it your base will lose all its enthusiasm. You have to take them over the cliff with you because then, when it blows up, you can point to the things that "they" stuck in the legislation and say that is was the reason it all failed.

Get real Mr. President. It was a farce. The entire thing was a dog and pony show. You got to create the ground rules. Harry Reid got to be rude. Nancy Pelosi got to be on TV.... a lot. You got to tell all your personal stories about how you have talked to people and your Senate and House yes folks got to talk about the calls they have taken from their constituents. What they really should say is, my aide took this 1 minute call from this guy who we don't know and don't care to know but it makes for a great story. We aren't going to help the guy at all but it sure does make it look like we care. Both sides do it but man did the Dems lay it on thick today.

So go ahead Mr. President. Do it. You are scared to do it because you know what is going to happen if you do. You are going to lose in November. You are going to lose in 2012. Your side has no ideas except for taxing and spending so go ahead and vote to tax and spend some more.

That strategy has gotten you no where for the last 40 years. It didn't work for FDR, LBJ, or Carter. They all laid the framework for this explosion that is about ready to hit our economy. It can't be fixed now with your side standing in the way. Government can't fix it. Only the free market can.

So pass your regulations and laws. Get voted out and then let the side with the real ideas role it all back and put the framework in place that will allow for millions of Americans to truly succeed and make their own way... not rely on another handout.

2 to 4 years of this crap should be more than enough to buy another 12-16 years of the folks with the really good ideas in power to fix everything that your side continues to try and break.

Time to crack down on this Iran deal

Either you are with us or you are against us.

Is it really that easy... yes I truly believe it is. This is not a popular opinion around the world and with a lot of the lefties here in the states. But let's be honest. America runs the world. Here is proof.

Think about your latest tragedy either natural or biological. Which country consistently steps up in a big way. U.S.A. that's who. Tsunami in the Indian Ocean... USA. Earthquake in Pakistan... USA. Aids out of control in Africa... billions from the USA. Earthquake in Haiti... USA.

So with that in mind, I think we've earned the right to dictate our terms to some regard. Especially when you figure that the crazy guy over there refers to us as the bad guy. Used to be the crazies would bag on "The West" in general but now those same crazies are putting their minions by the truckloads into westernized cities across Europe. Doesn't mean that all Muslim communities in Western Europe are bad, just like they aren't all bad in the USA. But the bad guys do tend to blend in.

Back to my point though, when Ahmadinejad gets on his booster stool so he can reach the microphone it is not like he is up there ranting about Belgium... it is all US and the Jews all the time. So I would pretty much say this is our problem to deal with and we are going to have to deal with it how we want to.

Here is what I would do. We all know that companies in Europe are doing business in a big way with Iran just like they did with Iraq. For this reason, sanctions w0n't achieve anything. It is laughable to think that they will because France, Germany, Italy, they went around the NATO sanctions in Iraq for years and we knew it but we let them because we didn't want to look like the big bad U.S.

So we can't really dictate to Europe... so be it. But can't we humiliate them. Point out the things they are doing. Bring them out in the open. In turn I'm sure Europe would pull out some of the U.S. dirty laundry but who cares. It is not like our reputation can get worse at this point.

As for China, we've got some power there. China holds roughly $800 billion of US debt. So President Obama thinks he has got to play nice with them. No being nice to the Dalai Lama. Putting up with their crappy toys that are filled with lead. Letting U.S. oil companies work with them to drill right in our backyard.

If I were Obama I would make the following announcement. This countries top priority is going to be to completely pay off our debt to China in the next 24 months. Can we do it... sure we can.... will we have to.... absolutely not. China NEEDS the U.S. in a big way. In 2008, the Chinese sent $400 billion worth of goods to the U.S. That represents about a third of the all Chinese exports. This is a country of more than a billion people. They can't afford to have the U.S. go under which is why they keep loaning us money.

But, as I said, imagine if Obama said we are going to pay back the Chinese the $800 we owe them and if we need loans we will get them from other entities. In addition, we are going to pay attention to the U.S.-China trade deficit ($266 billion in 2008) and try and right that ship by putting controls in place that would enable countries like South Korea, Japan, Vietnam, etc., to import more goods to the U.S.

I know some of this would really be hard to accomplish but if Obama made these kind of statements he would get the Chinese attention really quickly. So, when you publicly asked the Chinese to help reign in the Iranians they would be forced to pay more attention. They just simply would.

Would the U.S. relationship with the Chinese become more adversarial. Of course it would... but does anybody really believe the Chinese really like us anyway. Of course they don't. I don't like them. Don't like what they stand for.

We have no gun to hold to the Chinese head except for one... trade. So would it be painful. Absolutely. Might mean people have to pay an extra 10% for this or that but in the long run it could save the country tons of money by creating an environment where China has to play along and help us reign in Iran which could save us billions in military escalation and another arms race.

Let's give this a try

I have thoughts in my head. Many thoughts. Most of them are inner crapolla that even I am interested in for just a few seconds. But I do have thoughts, feelings, analysis if you will that I need to share and since the Internet never runs out of paper why not out here.

I doubt anyone will care to read my ramblings. I'm actually not going to invite anyone to this blog but I am going to actively post to it. Most of the time it will be political in nature... hey great another political blog... .just what we need. But I will also comment on sports, pop culture which to be honest gives me bad gas, and whatever inner crapolla as I reference above is swimming around in my head.

Today's big story as Joe Piscopo (sp??... so sue me) is Tiger Woods and the apology heard round the world.

It is not my place to judge if it was sincere or not. To be honest, it is nobody's business but Tiger's to determine if he is truly sincere. No one can crawl in his head and break through to figure out if he means it or not so let's move on. His new life starts from today and really the only thing that matters is his children.

I was talking to a buddy today about this and I put it to him like this. Everyone wants to know about the golf, the 19th major, his pursuit of greatness. Who cares. If somebody came to me and said, hey Wayne, you can be great professionally... truly great... the best ever... but in return you will lose your wife and family. I would say I will take the average professional life and keep my wife and family thank you very much. I'm sure there are some men that would choose the greatness professionally. I won't judge them, but myself and the buddy that I posed the question to agreed that NOTHING would come between us and our families.

So here we go then. If Tiger is sincere he is going to stop the ballyhoo, get help, focus on his kids and his wife, and eventually get back on the golf course. But he better be a different Tiger. He better not use the F word on the course, throw clubs, refuse to sign autographs. He doesn't just need a marriage makeover. He needs an image makeover and according to many pundits he needed an image makeover BEFORE this came out.

So good luck Tiger. You aren't my favorite golfer but you are revolving around the Sun just like the rest of us now. You realized it today... actually probably over the last 12 weeks you've begun to realize it. So let's move on. You get the help you say you need. Fix your marriage. Spend time with your kids. Tell them and Elin that you love them. Show them that you love them.

And then come back out and play golf but remember one thing. The hint of invincibility is gone now. Your fellow PGA players aren't going to be as intimidated by you anymore because even though you may hit it further, knock it closer, and putt it straighter than most of them. They didn't have to go on international TV and read a 13 minute statement about how much of a dirtbag they acted like. In effect, it's like giving them a 2-stroke mental advantage on the first tee so be ready.