Rick's World

Saw this today:

I'll keep my guns,
freedom, & money...
YOU CAN KEEP THE "CHANGE!"

I couldn't agree more.

Around election time, there are often many people, such as myself, that consider the candidates running and don't like either of them. This time it's a bigger, more important election than usual - the election of the next President of the United States. Some people support Barack Obama, and some people support John McCain. Me? I don't particularly care for either of them. I will not vote for Barack Obama due to his frequently stated intention to raise taxes. I am not comfortable voting for John McCain either. I just think he is way too old to be president. I've watched him in several debates and he does not look very healthy and clearly is not as alert at Obama. I imagine that being the President is an incredibly stressful job. This kind of stress can do bad things to your health. I don't think John McCain could handle the job physically.

So I don't like either Barak Obama or John McCain. This puts me in a bit of a quandry. If I tell this problem to others, they will likely tell you, "Well, you have to vote for one of the two. Just vote for whom you think is the lesser of the two evils". This implies that there are only two people running for president. As such, I have to vote for one of them.

This is not true.

There are in fact thirteen different people/political parties running for president this year, at least based on the information in the sample ballot that I received. What? You mean you thought there were only two political parties in the United States - the Demo crats and the Republicans? Surprise! Not that I'm particularly suprised that most people think there are only two parties in this country. If the American media is any indication, this is a fact. How many parties were represented in any televised presidental debates? Two. How many parties with candidates running for president are ever mentioned on the nightly news or in the daily newspaper? Two. So that means there must be only two parties right? WRONG. The American media is incredibly biased, and I believe intentionally so, towards these two parties. If the American media were truly impartial, as they claim to be, the presidential debates would be considerably more complicated and a lot more interesting. Can you imagine thirteen different presidential candidates up on stage at the same time? That would certainly make for some interesting debates. Can you imagine all thirteen of these candidates getting equal time in the news? That would certainly lead to some interesting discussion of the issues at hand, rather than the typical mudslinging that the two main parties lob at each other.

In the interests of educating my fellow Americans to the reality of the election, rather than the narrow image portrayed by our media, I thought I'd list all the presidental candidates and provide links to their web sites for your education.

Candidate (President and Vice President)	Political Party	Website
John McCain Sara Palin	Republican	http://www.johnmccain.com
Barack Obama Joe Biden	Democrat	http://www.barackobama.com
Gloria La Riva Eugene Puryear	Party for Socialism and Liberation	http://pslweb.org
Chuck Baldwin Darrel Castle	Constitution Party	http://www.baldwin08.com
Gene Amondson Leroy Pletten	Prohibition Party	http://www.geneamondson.com/prohibition-party-2004.html
Bob Barr Wayne A. Root	Libertarian Party	http://www.bobbarr2008.com
Thomas Robert Stevens Alden Link	Objectivist Party	http://www.objectivistparty.us
James Harris Alyson Kennedy	Socialist Workers Party	http://www.themilitant.com/campaign
Cynthia McKinney Rosa Clemente	Green Party	http://votetruth08.com
Alan Keyes Brian Rohrbough	America's Independent Party	http://www.selfgovernment.us
Ralph Nader Matt Gonzalez	Ecology Party	http://www.votenader.org/index.html
Brian Moore Stewart Alexander	Socialist Party	http://www.votebrianmoore.com/
Charles Jay John Wayne Smith	Boston Tea Party	His web site is largely nonfunctional, so here's a link to his Wikipedia page.

Um... I'm going to have to pause here a minute and collect my bearings. I just spend the last half hour compiling the above list of Presidental candidates, and I have to say that I am disturbed. There are no less then three Socialist parties running (if you don't count the Socialist tendencies of some of the Republican and Democratic policies). And there's even a party called the 'Boston Tea Party'. Um, what? I'm beginning to understand why I've never heard of some of these parties before. These guys are complete nutjobs! One party sounds like a joke, and several parties want to turn this country into a Socialist country (i.e. RUSSIA). While, I'm sure some of these parties are reasonable people with a valid plan for the country, some are just crazy.

Ok, I just did the first real research I've ever done into who I'm going to vote for President and I have to say that I am at a loss for words. It's clear I have a LOT of research to do about these people. Some are clearly nutjobs and can be easily removed from my personal list of candidates, but some are still possible. I'm just stunned by how many incredibly bad people have managed to get themselves onto the ballot. And to make matters worse, the ballot doesn't even list the name of their political parties! All it has is three letter abbreviations for their party name. Until a few moments ago, I had no idea that the "SWP" party on my ballot was the Socialist Workers Party. I guarantee some of these wackos will get votes because people will just vote for whomever because they don't like McCain or Obama. This is truly disturbing.

This blog really went 'off the rails' from where it started. That list of candidates really bothers me. Is this the best we can come up with? Either the same old, same old in the Republican and Democrat parties, or a bunch of nutjobs? I worry about the future of this country.

I'm going to make a rare exception to my long standing "no politics and no sports" rule regarding subjects to talk about on this blog, because this issue must be discussed. Warning, major rant ahead!

In a recent CNN article, it described Obama's plan to "tax the wealthy". Now what does he define as the wealthy? Married couples who make over $250,000 per year or single individuals who make over $200,000 per year. He plans to increase the maximum income tax rate from the current 35% to 39.6%.

Since when does it make sense to increase taxes on the 'wealthy' - the very people that have worked hardest for their money and provide the jobs in this country? Where do you get off telling me that since I earn a good salary I should be punished???

While I'm certainly no expert on politics or economics, it doesn't take a genius to figure out that you stimulate the economy by lowering taxes, not raising them! By lowering taxes, you put more money into people's hands. When people have more money, they will spend that money. If people have less money, they obviously are going to spend less money. This means the economy will get worse, not better.

Also, since when is it right to 'redistribute wealth'? Why are we punishing the successful to help the failures in life? I work hard for my money. I went to college, I learned a trade, I got a good job, and I worked hard. I made money. I spend and invest my money wisely. I'm doing quite well. I am constantly reading books on many different subjects. So let me get this straight, a hard worker like me, should be punished by being forced to help all the unemployed ignorant idiots out there that seem to think that they are entitled to something because they are breathing?

This whole Democrat obsession with bigger government, punishing the wealthy, increasing taxes to fund more and more useless government programs has bugged me for a long time. This is one big reason I've always tended towards the Republican/Conservative side of the fence. I've been a registered independent my entire voting life. I voted against Bill Clinton both times he ran. I actually voted against George Bush in his first election and voted independent. In his last election, I was one of those 'idiots' (as many people seem to think of us) who actually voted for him. Do I agree with everything George Bush has ever done? No! I disagree with his idea of establishing a Constitutional Amendment to ban gay marriage. Of course that idea didn't have a snowball's chance in hell of succeeding so I basically ignored that. Should we have invaded Iraq? I don't know. That's a matter for much debate. Should we pull out of Iraq? I don't think we should. Regardless of whether we should have ever gotten into Iraq in the first place or not, we are in there now. If we left Iraq now, the entire Middle East would collapse into chaos.

People, when are you going to realize that the government screws up everything it touches? Do not depend on the government to support you. Get a job. Pick up a book and read it. Learn something. Go out and help yourself improve your situation. You need to be constantly learning, constantly exploring new things. Read at least one non-fiction book a month. Pick up books on random subjects you know nothing about but look interesting. Talk to and surround yourself with successful people. Don't surround yourself with losers. Social Security is a joke. Anyone who thinks that they are going to be supported through Social Security when they get old are living in a delusion. Universal Healthcare is a joke. Any attempt to do that will cause medical care costs to skyrocket and increase the amount of bureaucracy you have to deal with to ridiculous levels. Put at least 10% of your income every paycheck into a 401K or equivalent. Max out your contributions to a Roth IRA. Invest in mutual funds long term. Buy mutual funds that have a profitable 10-15 year track record and then don't touch them. Don't panic when the market goes down. The market goes down one day, and it goes up the next day. It's done that for the last 80 years since it's inception. In the long term, the stock market has always made money. If you invest in good mutual funds, you will make money. If the market goes down, be happy! That means you can buy more mutual funds for the same money! Then when the market goes back up, those mutual funds you got at a bargain will be worth a lot more!

So, now that you've read my rant, you probably think I'm going to vote for John McCain. The truth is, I don't know. While he is a Republican, I am very concerned about his age. He's at least as old, if not older than Ronald Reagan was when he entered the White House. In the times I've seen John McCain talk on TV, he almost seems to me to already be a 'dottering old fart'. Being President is no doubt a very stressful job. I question whether he has the health or even mental acuity to handle the job at his advanced age. I largely kept my mouth shut regarding the presidential election up until now because until we got down to the 'Final Two', it didn't really matter. Now that we have them, I'm not sure if I'll vote for McCain or maybe an indepedent candidate. A lot depends on who McCain's Vice Presidental candidate is.

Am I against Obama because he is black? Absolutely not. I've been fascinated to watch his campaigning for president. He's the first black man that I've ever seen who has a very good chance to be elected president. He's also the first black presidential candidate that I've ever seen that didn't strike me as a complete nutjob (like Al Shapton and Jesse Jackson do). I'm concerned, however that the amount of racism that still exists in this country will at minimum not allow him to get elected, or if he does get elected, some racist nutjob will try to assassinate him. Should that happen, that means his Vice Presidential candidate becomes President. We still don't know who that will be, though there's been a lot of talk about the possibility that Hilary Clinton will be that candidate. Dear God, I hope not! That woman scares the hell out of me. She will do and say anything to get elected, just like her husband did. I never liked Bill Clinton either, but I could never quite put my finger on why. There was just something slimy about him, and I feel the same way about his wife.

Now, if I do decide to vote for an independent, you may be saying "You are wasting your vote. The independents don't have a chance of winning." While that is probably true, I don't consider it a waste of a vote. The point of voting is to vote for who you think is the best person for the job based on their qualifications and policies. If everyone voted only for the big two despite not liking either one of them, that to ME is a wasted vote. Why are you voting for someone you don't like or don't agree with? Vote for someone who you think is the best person for the job. If enough people realized this, we might actually be able to end this ridiculous two party system we have. I've often wished there was a way to vote against a candidate. However, there is no real way to do that, other than to vote for someone else. If no candidate matches what you are looking for, then don't vote for anyone. I'd rather know that I didn't vote for anyone than know that I voted for a candidate I didn't like. I made my like/dislike of this person known by not voting for them.

I have to say that up until I read this article about Obama's plan to increase taxes, I was on the fence about him. This news story has pushed me over the edge though. I will never vote for him now, nor do I think anyone else should.