I is going to fix social epidemics....and you cans too! (6 of Society's Ails)

"Anytime the government gives something to us, they first have to take something from us."- crazy Huckabee (He forgot he was running for a government position)

"A capitalistic society is only successful when people have a good work ethic." Jonathan Mullen, World Reknown Idiot

Before you read this and in the back of your mind try to classify me and my perspective, I am going to help you. I am a republican to the core but I have never voted on any republican even once. The ideals of the Republican Party are great, but I don’t know if such ideals were ever put into practice. Therefore, I am a 28 year old conservative idealist that looks at our bipartisan system like they are a bunch of hogwash, pork-barreling crips and bloods.

Here is some more information to help you classify me. I live in New Mexico. New Mexico is ranked as the 7th poorest state in the U.S. We rank #2 for teen birth rate! Pretty sweet. It has some major problems, but somehow, I love this place. My wife is a labor/delivery nurse and my dad is a pharmacist. They both live in New Mexico. They say that 90% of the people they deal with day in and day out are on some sort of government support for the medical attention they are receiving. My dad says that he has noticed that government assistance is a generational concept. He sees the grandparents get the aid, then the parents, then the kids, and now the grandkids. People are raising their kids with the understanding that it is ok in life to stand with your hand out waiting for help and that there will always be someone there to fill it. I repeat, they say that 90% of the people they deal with day in and day out are on some sort of government support for the medical attention they are receiving. Does that sound like a system that can support itself?


As was previously promised, I would add some info, albeit pessimistic, on various government systems of which I have developed a strong opinion.

Welfare

Welfare of yesterday…..

………Welfare of today

Problem: Most people almost took a dump in their pants when they found out the 2009 bailout package for corporate welfare was going to be about 900 billion dollars. But we pay in excess of 680 billion every year for the administration of federal assistance in the U.S. and no one even flinches a muscle. 23% of our nation’s budget is dedicated to Medicare and Medicaid. That number has nothing to do with the 21% going to social security. Living near White Sands Missile Range, I see everyday how much the “defense” infrastructure helps our developing community with employment, projects, community support and research expansion. Yet only 21% of our budget goes towards “defense.” The biggest piece of the pie is federal assistance, and I ask the question what are we getting from it? Is this a system that is getting better the more money we dump into it?

Answer: My brother wrote a comment to me that suggested that we the “American People” have become so entirely dependent upon government aid in all of its forms that it is basically impossible to ever pull the plug on this system without some serious repercussions. I whole-heartedly agree with that sentiment. Real change is difficult; I am not talking about obama change, I am talking about the real thing. If real change is done for the right reasons, no matter how difficult, the end result is almost always worth it. That I know. Pull the plug. Ensure care for the mentally and physically infirm and, of course, children. That’s it. By the way that fat lady in the picture above would not be considered physically infirm but the people sitting next to her on an airplane may need government assistance.

Unions
Problem: It is sad that we point the finger at General Motors management for being on the brink of collapse. Here is an interesting fact for you: The current veteran UAW member at GM today has an average base wage of $28.12 an hour, but the cost of benefits, including pension and future retiree health care costs, nearly triples the cost to GM to $78.21, according to the Center for Automotive Research. Wow, it costs GM $78 bucks to have a guy with maybe a high school education to turn a wrench. Now keep in mind that GM doesn’t want to pay that kind of wage but that is what the price of today’s unions are. An average Chinese wage is $0.57 per hour -- or $104 per month – which is about 3 percent of the average U.S. manufacturing worker's wage. Unions know how to price themselves out of work faster than anyone. I am actually amazed that the U.S. manufacturers in the last 50 years of “union rule” can compete on a global scale at all.

Answer: We have 6 times the amount of plaintiffs’ attorneys as ANY other country in the world. Trust me, if there is any wrong-doing towards anyone of any kind we have more than enough qualified (and unqualified) workforce to handle the problem. Unions were established to regulate fair pay, institute worker’s rights, ensure a safe workplace, and control managerial abuse. Current unions are nothing more than a self-serving mob. Ow that was pretty harsh but I liked it.

Prison

Prison of yesterday…..

……Prison of today

Problem: In 2001 the average state or federal inmate was costing society $22,640 per year or $62.03 per day. One out of 100 people in the US are in jail and 11% of those people are not even U.S. citizens! We spend 22 thousand dollars to put up with somebody who is most likely never going to become rehabilitated. The average household income is just over 50 thousand dollars. Now I want you to envision me using the voice of a television sales person; “Just think, for just half the cost of one quality American family we can imprison somebody who has roughly a 48% to 77% (based on demographics) chance of going right back to prison as soon as they get out. Awesome! What a value!”

Answer: England was the smartest country ever when it came to their prison system. The solution for people that didn’t want to live by the rules, England was kind enough to buy them a one way ticket halfway around the world for some exotic scenery. Then the inmates were compassionately informed that they could never return to England. Not a bad idea! I would be willing to donate Hawaii for a good cause. Then have sharks with frickin laser beams to patrol the perimeter of the islands. Murderers get Oahu. Rapists get Maui. You get the idea. You can’t complain about living in Hawaii. If you refuse to live by the rules then why should we spend the time and effort to try and fix you? Go fix yourself in a tropical paradise….with sharks…..and laser beams.





Baseball

Baseball of yesterday……

…..Baseball of today

Problem: You know I have been trying really hard to find out how much money our government has spent on looking into the recent epidemics of baseball. I can’t. I do remember Jon Stewart saying something to the effect the congress spent like 50 times more time on looking into steroids within baseball as they did establishing how much money would be used on the 2009 bailout. Hhhhmmmm good priorities. Who cares?? Isn’t the MLB organization established to regulate things like this? Why is congress even getting involved? How is their investigation for the good of American citizens? To make sure a couple baseball records are only broken by non-steroid using players?? Really? Really? Congratulations congress, you have truly shown your value on this one.
Answer: Kill anyone in congress that thought this problem was important to the American people. Anyone suffering from such a mental illness is clearly beyond rehabilitation; therefore, they must be put down.

Healthcare
Problem: There have been a couple of things in times past which were controlled by a private industry until the government seized control of them. Some examples of this are the education system, charity AKA welfare, MLB, banking sector, home mortgage control, FDA, on and on and on. All of those government controlled programs are so complex that I really can’t comment on them in one statement. But I can say this much, anytime the government has seized control of a system it has functioned but not very well. The common characteristics of the downside of government intervention are prolific waste, meetings of newly created overseeing committees, money and lots of it, and a lot more than I am willing to think up.

Answer: I am convinced that the only instances in which the government needs to intervene on a system are when something unlawful is happening that the current privatized system will not mitigate. I have seen nothing in history to tell me that governmentally provided healthcare will be an improvement upon our current system. It will just be another handout and more waste. Today, many people only work because they need healthcare; therefore, they work. Give them free healthcare and I can promise you an apathetic result.


Illegal Immigration

Some illegals immigrants……

……Another kind of illegal migration

Problem: I actually think illegal immigration is great. When else can you convince someone to work in the continental U.S. for approximately one dollar per hour? We need people that are willing to do the tasks that we think we are above. Examples, chili picking, painting, digging a hole, house cleaning, cutting the grass, sorting the gravel from pinto beans, etc. Ok now I am sounding racist. The downside of illegal immigration is the near daily event my wife gets exposed to where a girl comes to an American hospital to deliver a child. She came across the border about 3 hours ago. The delivery has complications and requires surgeries or something of that nature. The kid gets its American citizenship and we get the $52,000 bill. Thank you very much, come again ding ding. It is supposedly unethical for a U.S. hospital to deny medical attention regardless of the fact that this girl knowingly came into our country to abuse our healthcare system. That bugs me. 17% of California prisons are comprised of people that are considered illegals. Each year, state governments spend an estimated $11 billion to $22 billion to provide welfare to immigrants. The simple economic problem is, which is quite debatable, do illegal immigrants give more than they take or vice-versa? The number of latino voters in the U.S. nearly doubled from 5.9 million in 2000 to more than 10 million last year. More than 75% of new immigrants voted for obama. With overwhelmingly convincing numbers like that I can promise you the Democratic Party will do everything in their power to guarantee more government aid for illegal immigrants. That is almost as sure as buying a vote.

Answer: I am all about people trying to make a better life for themselves. I think that illegals that come here to work are mostly good people trying to help their families in the best way they can. My only reservation about illegal immigration or legal immigration is this: you should never get more out of the system than you put in. In 1996 we reformed the welfare system to make sure people were not getting more out of the system than they put in. That system renovation failed as it was overrun with even greater need as time went on. The real reason that immigrants need so much government aid is this: immigrants are eleven percent of our population, but they are 20 percent of the poor population. Don’t ask a poor person to come to the U.S. unless you plan on helping them out, simple as that. The simple economic problem is, which is quite debatable, do illegal immigrants give more than they take or vice-versa? Of all of the problems I just discussed here, this is the one I don’t have a real answer for. I don’t know.

Summary

Who am I to judge society? I don’t know what they are dealing with every day. In fact, I am willing to bet that my life is very cushy in comparison to most. I eat, I work, I play, I sleep. Repeat. Yet, I get the sense that people think they deserve something just because of where they were born, what color their skin is, the social structure they have been exposed to, whether or not their daddy spanked them, etc. Therefore, they see their life cycle as…I eat, I play, I sleep, I’m a freakin American so you owe me some money! Repeat.