Eleven Twentyfive…

25 11 2010

I have so very much to be thankful for.

A wonderful family,

Wonderful friends,

A great job,

I can eat good food,

Sleep under a fairly nice roof,

Travel when and where I need or want,

And that I am free to worship a

Heavenly Father that has blessed me so.

I live here, in America,

Land of the free and home of the brave,

and that is a blessing in itself.

Happy Thanksgiving!



On Thanksgiving…

24 11 2010

An acquaintance of mine has a friend that did a bit of research on the Holiday. I thought it appropriate to pass the following along…

On September 28, 1789, the first Federal Congress passed a resolution asking that the President recommend to the nation a day of thanksgiving. A few days later President George Washington issued a proclamation naming Thursday, November 26, 1789 as a ‘Day of Public Thanksgiving’ and for the first time Thanksgiving was celebrated under the our then new Constitution. Presidents subsequently have issued Thanksgiving Proclamations, however the dates and even months of the celebrations would sometimes vary. It wasn’t until President Abraham Lincoln’s 1863 Proclamation that Thanksgiving was regularly commemorated each year on the last Thursday of November.

However in 1939 the last Thursday fell on the last day of November. Concerned that a short Christmas shopping season might harm the countries economic recovery, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued a Presidential Proclamation which moved the celebration of Thanksgiving to the second to last Thursday of November. 32 states issued similar proclamations, but 16 other states refused to accept the change and proclaimed Thanksgiving to be the last Thursday in November.

 For two years Thanksgiving was celebrated on two separate days with part of the nation celebrating it on the second to last Thursday in November, and the rest of the country celebrating it a week later. Congress, to end the confusion, decided to set a new fixed-date for the day of Thanksgiving and on October 6th of 1941, the House passed a joint resolution declaring the last Thursday in November would be the legal Thanksgiving Day. The Senate, yet again, trying to take into account those years when November has five Thursdays amended the resolution establishing the holiday as the fourth Thursday. The House agreed to the amendment, and it was signed on December 26, 1941.

 The forth Thursday in November remains as the Federal Thanksgiving Day holiday.


On this day…

11 11 2010

…we pause in honor of those that without whom, perhaps we ourselves may not even be.

Your sense of Duty, your Honor, your Sacrifice. How can one put into words how what you have done for us means to us. For when all is said and done it is you who are why we are. Faith, hope, and the law of man are entrusted to you. We ask so much, and too often give so little in return…

To our Veterans, I thank you.

The truth of the matter…

11 11 2010
Minimum wage is directly responsible for old folks not being able to retire on Social Security.
 Over the last few years we’ve seen a government mandated increase in the minimum wage of approximately 40%. It was intended to spur our economy even higher than it was soaring at the time and help bring a better standard of living to people living in the lower income segment of society.We’ve also seen a housing market collapse brought on by a mortgage crises (a highly government manipulated industry), accompanied by a massive economic slowdown, and skyrocketing unemployment… Could the two be related?

Let’s look at the government mandated minimum wage, for in my humble opinion it’s one of the fundamental underlying issues that brought about many if not most of the economic problems we face today. A government manipulated and forced increase in the Minimum Wage ALWAYS negatively effects the very people it intends to help by slowing growth and creating inflation (it has to be paid for somehow).

As typically happens other wages must increase as well in order to keep up the “fairness” aspects of the wage increase, otherwise people are experiencing a cut in wages if thier hourly rate doesn’t increase in proportion to the minimum wage increase, which in turn slows growth across the board. And in the end, after a few years of leveling, everybody is in actuality back to right were they started from. Only the numbers sound bigger.

Costs will have risen along with wages, negating any real increase in the standard of anybodies living. Poor people remain poor, BUT those on fixed incomes, such as retirees, pensioners, those on disability, and Social Security recipients never get the same percentage of increase, which means they lose income by comparison. A rise in the minimum wage causes the value of their ‘check’ to decrease. That’s right, every time the minimum wage rises our old folks take a hit.

Somehow, when the system is subject to manipulation instead of the actual market forces of supply and demand, prices always outstrip income growth, making products cost more and more as the years go by. It’s caused the prices of product to increase in percentage when compared to income, possibly to pay for the periphery costs associated with just making a living today. That’s a hit right there, too.

Like was said, the minimum wage increased 40%, causing an across the board cost of living rise in comparison, but you can damn well be assured that the COLA’s (Cost Of Living Adjustments) for those on fixed incomes didn’t rise anywhere near 40%… Answer this: What was the percentage of S.S. COLA since 2006 or 08? That right there will tell the tale.

As a friend out there in the blogosphere said, “Why can’t the rest of the country see this?”

We wonder why people can’t pay their mortgages and the housing market collapsed… Answer: Government

It’s inherent in government to create a need for more government. If government actually ever fixed problems you have less need for government. Not gonna happen. Bureaucrats will never allow that.