It wasn't too long ago that I started paying attention to the current events of our nation and how the rest of the world effect each other. Honestly, I didn't really care much for it because there is way too much out there that you simply just can't understand it all! In my naive mind, things are going to happen regardless my opinion. One night a friend and I were watching the news and he pointed out: "Patsy, we work hard for our money, don't you want to know what 'they' do with it?" That question alone made me curious into what actually happens to all these taxes we pay and all the taxes that are taken out of our paychecks.
I don't like wars as much as the next person, but regardless my opinion, it's in the Bible that war is inevitable, so there's really nothing I can do about it based on how I feel. Point blank, the war is still continuing and from the speech last night, doesn't sound like it's going to end very soon. We don't know how it is over there and what the men and women have to face each morning when they wake up. Even though back at home we face an economic crisis, their crisis are of actual life or death situations. The President wants to send more troops, even if we don't agree, this isn't the time for us to argue over it. If we are to be a strong nation and be an example to the world, then we need to give peace a chance at home and support his decisions. A divided nation will only make it worse at this point. You need more troops, fine, send more... but don't forget the American people back at home who are still suffering.
Since Obama has taken office, he's done nothing but spend, spend, spend! Yes, he might have given us an extra tax return, but what's an extra $500-1k per person going to do? Then all the incentives he's been offering to "stimulate the economy." All this money giving is just causing Americans to spend more with money they don't really have! If you want to "stimulate the economy" Mr. President, how about investing all that money into creating more jobs??? Remember that saying: "Give a Man a Fish, Feed Him For a Day. Teach a Man to Fish, Feed Him For a Lifetime"? Well, I'm asking you to STOP GIVING US FISH and give us an opportunity to fish!! My generation grew up to believe that going to school would put us in a better situation then our parents. We would find a good stable job and raise a family with more money then what we grew up with. I'm grown up now and all those stories sound like myths to me. Yes, we are more educated then our parents (on paper), but look at us!! The ones who are truly suffering in this economy is my generation!!! How is it that my friends who never finished school make more money then me and I actually have a 4 year college degree???? Why should it be so hard for me and my other colleagues with degrees to find jobs??? I shouldn't be competing with a high school student for a mall job.
As a victim of the economic crisis, all my goals feel so unattainable from the harsh reality that there really isn't any decent work out there. I would LOVE to go back to school, but how can I if I can't even afford to? I have always wished to take care of my parents one day and pay them back for everything they've done for me, but I can't, I can barely keep myself above water.
Honestly though Mr. Obama, the $30 billion that you're talking about w/ sending in 30k troops, you could really spend that money back at home. Let them fight for themselves. Yes, they might be living in a corrupt state, but who are we to fix it? Your focus should be on our economic status, not theirs. You say that it is in our best interest security wise to take care of this situation, then if that's the case, why aren't you beefing up security back at home? Two uninvited guests were allowed to the State Dinner and a one of your own Majors who happens to be a middle eastern just went crazy in Fort Hood and killed 30 of your soldiers.
Eight years is a very long time especially for a war and our nation hasn't gotten any better, in fact, it's gotten worse. My dad and brother work for the United States Postal Service, a branch of the government where 8 years ago they felt secure in having a job. Now, 8 years later, they pray at night before they go to bed that they wake up still employed!! I've tried to be patient and allowed for change to happen... and it has... I'm jobless now. Thanks a lot!
God Bless the Soldiers out there!
Ok, well let me start off with the only thing I agree with in your blog is "Give a man a fish and feed him for a day, teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime"
ReplyDeleteYou blame the economy and the president for your problems, problems such as not having a job. Guess what, the truth is it is your fault you don't have a job. Let me ask, what 4 year bachelor degree do you have? Don't tell me business administration or some useless art appreciation degree.
When you go to college, the whole point of it is to network yourself, do internships, and sell yourself. Make yourself marketable to future employers.
Second, The economy didn't go to hell because of President Obama, although he is doing his best to help it. No I'm not a democrat and no I'm not black. If you've ever taken any government classes you'd know that George Bush was the one who deregulated many laws that made the mortgage market crash and burn.
The mortgage market is basically a huge fuckin stock market. When people take out loans they have to pay them back, so lets say the bank loans out 100k, if the person who takes the loan out pays the entire loan back the bank gets about a 20k profit because of interest rates.
Lets get into what adjustable mortgage rates are. This is the motherfuckin beartrap that so many idiots fell for, and its not just the idiots that fell for it, its the idiots that set it out.
AMR = Adjustable mortgage rates, are basically a bait and switch. They put up a sign that says you only have to pay $1000 every month on a 200k loan, in 5 years we'll adjust it. Well in 5 years when the mortgage rate jumps to $1700 people can't pay it so the loan defaults, the bank forecloses the house, and now we have a house sitting there that is useless to both the bank and the idiot who took the loan out.
Now where did all that money go then? Easy, the person who actually built the house got the money. The bank basically bought the house, and the bank can't sell the house to anyone. So its a "toxic asset"
Now why is that a problem to us? If people don't take loans out the bank doesn't make any money, and if the bank doesn't make any money it can't give out loans.
Just think about this, if no one spends money, then all business don't make any money, if businesses don't make any money, they start "controlling cost" and guess what people are, who aren't working? USELESS, and guess what happens? They get laid off! This is unless the businesses can invest money in capital, technology, and stay a float till customers come in. Guess how they do so, THROUGH LOANS!
Now why is the mortgage market like a stock market? Well banks give out mortgage loans, and then they pass it on to another company, which a lot of people put in money to, which makes it profitable. This is unless the loans start defaulting.
The postal service is a massive failure. That is why people choose Fedex, and UPS. Billions of tax dollars go into USPS yet they still lose letters, and packages. Fedex almost operates on a six sigma level. Don't know what it means, look it up.
You say "he sends our troops", people aren't forced to go into the army. They enlist themselves.
Presidents serve a 4 year term, not an 8.
wow..... serious? i was just venting. i'm sorry my post offended you so much, but you don't know me and i dont know you either, so please don't try to judge me. i NEVER blamed anything on obama, i just feel like the changes aren't happening fast enough.
ReplyDeletewith what you said, i hope you're doing well through this economic crisis. God Bless.
P.S. -- I know a presidential term is 4 years, but the 8 years I was referring to was the war. You seem so knowledged on the economic crisis, I'm surprised you're not aware of how long this war has lasted.
ReplyDeleteAnd if the USPS is such a massive failure, I hope they lose your next tax return.
i'm here to lighten things up. :)
ReplyDeleteanonymous above has a point, but the mortgage crisis is just the tip of the ice berg. i understand your points patsy, and i admire you for trying to understand where our money is going and finally starting to take an interest in our nation, but i think you need to do a bit more research and understand what really is going on.
ReplyDeletehere are just a few things to get you started, mind you, i strongly urge you to look at who your sources are when you find information on the internet. for example, god is great, but a christian god was not what this country was founded upon (freedom of religion). there are several people that need to be considered, ie jews, muslims, buddhists, hindu's, etc. it's best to avoid blogs that are on the agenda of just the 'bible' (ultra conservative as they call it), although a great book, i still don't think it rules our nation and shouldn't be forced upon everyone that doesn't believe in it.
the war obama is setting out to finish, should have been taken care of by Bush. and what did bush do instead? he went after iraq. now, granted the people of iraq needed help from a corrupt dictator, that war was still wrongly justified and selfish (ie. the oil was the main factor, and again as they've said over and over again, there were no weapons of mass destruction, nor did they have any evidence of it previous to the war. it was all fabricated). if bush had gone after al-queda, and bin laden from the beginning, we wouldn't be in this war mess now.
if you've paid attention to the last year, obama's struggled with the idea of even putting troops out there to begin with for months without just cause. the heads of our troops out there urged the need for more troops, they asked for 50k, obama's sending 30k. i'm against war in general, but i think thats a fair compromise. most of our tax dollars go to military funding anyway, at least i can see the need for going to afghanistan.
we lost more soldiers in iraq than needed, but like i said before, that was a selfish war handpicked by bush and his colleagues to help in THEIR endeavors. did catching saddam help us as a nation? no! it infuriated the heads of al-queda more because what did we do again...go into war with a country that we didn't have an issue with but oil.
we are still plagued by terrorism, and the main source of it is afghanistan. they train people to hate us (although alot of what we do doesn't take much effort from them, people hate us already). our war was and still is in afghanistan with al-queda
on to the jobs you say obama's not helping with.
if you've paid attention he and the government (don't forget that there are also senators and house of representatives that push for these bills) bailed out to several companies that needed it (although scary thought, it was just like a loan, and who better to understand what a loan is than banks).
banks got paid out (and bank of america is ready to pay back $45B, which is now putting pressure on the others to pay back soon as well). if the banks can't function, we can't function...don't blame obama for that, blame the system that's been built for hundreds of years on the bank system.
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ReplyDeletean example, usps can't function without people spending and shipping, and mailing. the more bills come through, the more business the usps has. (more jobs)
auto companies received a bailout. previous to that they laid off thousands of workers, and after the bailout, they were able to bring back most of them. (more jobs)
how about cash for clunkers? because of that, sales of auto's had increased tremendously from previous months (even years for some companies), and put the auto makers back into functioning business (and if you read online that it wasn't, make sure to check their sources or at least fact check their claims). (more jobs)
cash for clunkers was such a success that other countries have adopted the idea, and even other industries have used the idea, cash for home appliances, cash for caulkers (to increase jobs for the unemployed), and the new-home-buyer rebate, which was also a success to stimulate home purchases that they extended it another 6 months.
green technology is the investment for the next up and coming industry. several companies are growing because of it, and as the research improves, (more jobs) become available in the future, nation wide.
as you know in business, you have to spend money to earn money. i dont like it, but at least what this administration has given us that others haven't, is that they're laying it out there for us to see where our money is going. if you look at previous military spending, you'll find billions spent on nuclear (nucular?) weapons, that never get used, when to develop the weapon it only cost the manufacturer only a couple million. 1mil to 10mil profit, ok i can understand...but 1mil to 1bil? sounds like we need to investigate these military research firms a little closer.
another thing to notice is cost of gas. remember as bush was president, the slightest incident (oil tanker goes down, or oil truck explodes), the oil and gas companies used that to their advantage and hiked up the cost of gas from 1.50 to 3+ in less than a week. and it took forever for it to get back down to 2-2.50.
with the new administration, they're letting the gas companies price it correctly, but now when an incident occurs like before, you'll see it spike 10 cents, because they know our administration now won't stand for insane markups (now this is an opinion of mine, but it makes sense)
i don't have sources for you, nor do i intend for you to take everything i've laid out for you to be things you should believe in. open your mind a bit and see what's out there. do your research and listen to what other people have to say, but don't believe everything they say. i watch fox, cnn, msnbc all the time. the majority of it is crap, but at least it gives me direction to find out what the truth really is.
god bless the internet...you'll never find the truth laid out right in front of you, you always have to dig for it