After listening to President Obama's mealy mouth, woefully poor speech the other night, I woke up last night thinking about what I would have said had I been in the Oval Office. My approach would have been to "declare war on the spill' bringing together all the creativity and "get er done" attitude that exemplifies the American spirit and exceptional ism. Here are some of the points that I would have covered:
a. I would immediately establish a clearing house for ideas on cleaning up the oil. Suggestions would be submitted to a committee of marine and environmental engineers with the instructions to encourage "out of the box" solutions. Decisions would be given an immediate yes or no in no less than a week. If the decision was positive, the entrepreneur suggesting the plan would be given a week to be on scene in the Gulf at an assigned location. He/she would be given a week for initial progress report. An evaluation would be made if there would be additional time given. If successful, payment would be based upon several criteria all depending the amount of oil removed from the Gulf.
We have already seen many ideas by people like Kevin Costner who has developed a machine to remove oil from water. When the leak occurred, he called the White House and offered his machines, he was rebuffed. I understand that BP has now ordered 30+ machines now. This is just one example of machines available now which could have helped to minimize the damage to the Gulf. Did we hear anything like that from the President?
b. I would immediately authorize ships from around the world to work on the oil spill. At last count there were over 3o nations that offered oil skimmers, ships and equipment to help control the spill. Obama has told them, no.
c. I would immediately authorize the dredging of the Gulf and creating berms to prevent the oil from getting into the marshes. Bobby Jindal, the Governor of Louisiana has been asking for this for weeks. Why did it take weeks?
d. I would authorize payment to the shrimpers and crabbers in Louisiana and Florida to use their boats to put out the booms and to assist the people who were approved by the clearinghouse. Why are we we not using these boats already in the area? Also why is the firm in Maine, not being allowed to ship the booms they have made? We need all hands on deck whereever they live.
e. I would authorize the use unemployed workers to clean beaches, birds and do whatever work was necessary to return the Gulf to its previous condition. Why are we not encouraging the unemployed to work on a project? Is this not a "shovel ready" project? We could use them to monitor the work being done by the project approved by the clearinghouse. We already are paying them unemployment, it would not cost us any more. We might also move some of the FEMA trailers from New Orleans to house these people.
f. I would immediately authorize the continued drilling in the Gulf. Any platform that was in place would continue. All drilling would continue under strict Coast Guard and Mineral review.
g. I would immediately order the Coast Guard to inspect all skimmers operating in the Gulf for safety. These inspections would be done while the skimmers were in operation. If there were not enough life vests or fire extinguishers or other equipment, they would be provided by the government. There should be no suspension of work while these inspections are on going.
h. I would authorize a non-governmental investigation of the cause of the fire on the rig. No government wonks blowing smoke. We need to find out why the fire started, why the fire was not allowed to burn and why the rig was sunk. We also need to find out what procedures should be in place on similar platforms and what preventative measures should be taken anytime we are drilling in these deep waters. The investigation must be done by those who have in depth knowledge of drilling rigs operating in deep water. For example, it should include everyday people like tool pushers who understand that operation . BP should also be represented.
i. And lastly, I would have never talked about cap and trade at this time. We are in a war. A war with an enemy that keeps oozing to the surface, covering the Gulf with the black goo and killing birds and other marine life. We can beat this enemy but it will take the same imagination and determination that Americans showed in the early days of WWII. We cannot do it by creating new government programs. We cannot do it when we stop local governments from acting in the interests of their citizens. We must break down the bureaucracy, get it out of the way. We cannot do it with off-the-shelf ideas, we need creativity. We must be willing to try new ideas, new remedies and yes, maybe seemingly crazy plans. We can do it but we need a leader to express the American exceptional ism that I know there is.
President Obama failed on all levels. He did not inspire, he did not have a plan, and he had no new ideas. All he has is more government programs. I do not know about you, but for me, Americans have always been able to conquer adversity if only allowed to do it on their own. It is time the President learned that.
Friday, June 18, 2010
Friday, June 11, 2010
Joran van der Sloot
One can only wonder how many other girls van der Sloot has attacked and potentially killed in the past five years since he is alleged to have killed Natale Holloway. Obviously he is very quick witted and cagey but even the worst criminal soon gets caught which seems to be happening in Peru. However, the one question that no one seems to be asking--are there any other victims? Where is the vaunted media? Why are they not asking this question? If you Google"other van der Sloot victims" you see a couple articles but nothing much else. Why I ask? Someone as sick as this man definitely has issues and to think that he has only attacked and killed two girls would be very superficial. So if any reporters read this, get on your hobby horse and find out more details.
Another issue of this case that baffles me is the involvement of the FBI. Why on earth, did they deliver him $25,000 in "hopes" of finding the remains of Natale. This guy will continue to lead all investigators around the mulberry bush for as long as he can. He will confess and then recant. He will tell them he has all the details and then change his mind. Why would you ever want to deal with this type of scum? Joran van der Sloot is only in it for himself. He does not care about anyone that he has hurt. He is an international murder and dealing with him is like trying to get your hands on the wind. He will tell you what you want to hear as long as it is in his best interests. Had he not been captured on video, he would have gotten away with this also. But the "fat lady" has not sung yet on Joran van der Sloot. My fear is that he will find a way to escape this case also, then he will have two families (or more) to get money from.
The families and the FBI should never deal with this guy and hopefully his Karma will catch up with him! We can only hope.
Another issue of this case that baffles me is the involvement of the FBI. Why on earth, did they deliver him $25,000 in "hopes" of finding the remains of Natale. This guy will continue to lead all investigators around the mulberry bush for as long as he can. He will confess and then recant. He will tell them he has all the details and then change his mind. Why would you ever want to deal with this type of scum? Joran van der Sloot is only in it for himself. He does not care about anyone that he has hurt. He is an international murder and dealing with him is like trying to get your hands on the wind. He will tell you what you want to hear as long as it is in his best interests. Had he not been captured on video, he would have gotten away with this also. But the "fat lady" has not sung yet on Joran van der Sloot. My fear is that he will find a way to escape this case also, then he will have two families (or more) to get money from.
The families and the FBI should never deal with this guy and hopefully his Karma will catch up with him! We can only hope.
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Who would rent Obama's College Apartment?
Today, I opened up my Yahoo! browser and found an article that baffles me. Who would ever want to rent Obama's apartment? I suppose if you were this big Obama Freak and wanted to be closer to your hero, I guess that might be one reason. Or if someone was caught up with celebrity (is he really one?), that might be another. However, for those of sane individuals who might still exist in this country, I cannot see any reason. It is a cramped old apartment with few amenities although it does have wood floors!
Are we so deprived of joy in our lives today that we have to live our lives through celebrities, near celebrities (reality show pimps) and anyone who might be more interesting than the way we view ourselves? If so, "get a life." Find something interesting and make your life interesting. Stop wishing we were like these people. I have news for you, most of them are very plastic, as shallow as tin foil and as interesting as watching paint dry. Of course, there are some who are very real, but the majority are not! In fact, in most cases, you are more interesting than they are!
So next time you see a celebrity, whether it is President Obama or Cher, realize they put their pants on one leg at a time, just like you! They are not more important or more interesting than you. Most of these celebrities pine for the day they did not have the fame and the trappings that come with it. How would you like to be followed 24/7 by photographers? Celebrity is not what it is made up to be by the press. Yes, they may have money or fame, but what they have given up is a "personal" personal life.
And getting back to the apartment, who cares if the President lived there? Do you really think that his charma will rub off on you? Will it make you more interesting? Will it make you rich or successful? I doubt it. I repeat "get a life."
Are we so deprived of joy in our lives today that we have to live our lives through celebrities, near celebrities (reality show pimps) and anyone who might be more interesting than the way we view ourselves? If so, "get a life." Find something interesting and make your life interesting. Stop wishing we were like these people. I have news for you, most of them are very plastic, as shallow as tin foil and as interesting as watching paint dry. Of course, there are some who are very real, but the majority are not! In fact, in most cases, you are more interesting than they are!
So next time you see a celebrity, whether it is President Obama or Cher, realize they put their pants on one leg at a time, just like you! They are not more important or more interesting than you. Most of these celebrities pine for the day they did not have the fame and the trappings that come with it. How would you like to be followed 24/7 by photographers? Celebrity is not what it is made up to be by the press. Yes, they may have money or fame, but what they have given up is a "personal" personal life.
And getting back to the apartment, who cares if the President lived there? Do you really think that his charma will rub off on you? Will it make you more interesting? Will it make you rich or successful? I doubt it. I repeat "get a life."
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
Gulf Oil and contribution
Obama until late has been very quiet when it comes to the oil spill in the Gulf. According to press releases, he is "monitoring" the situation and allowing BP to take the lead in the solving the problem. Only lately has the White House started to take a more visible approach. This occurs after Obama's popularity and job performance numbers keep falling like a sinking ship. Yesterday in the Los Angeles Times comes an article which sort of explains the tepid response by our Commander in Chief. Seems that Obama, Rahm Emanuel and the Democrats are up to their ears in complications with BP. Could not happen to a better bunch of guys. And on top of that, seems that the Interior Department last year (yes, that is '09--well after Bush left office) exempted BP from an environmental study. Could that be the result of money and influence? That would not happen in this crystal clear transparent administration!!
The article is entitled "The ties that bind. Remember Rahm Emanuel's rent-free D. C. apartment? The owner: A BP advisor." June 7, 2010 posted at 3:34 pm.
So what do you think?
The article is entitled "The ties that bind. Remember Rahm Emanuel's rent-free D. C. apartment? The owner: A BP advisor." June 7, 2010 posted at 3:34 pm.
So what do you think?
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
I just read an article by Charles Krauthammer and it blew me a way so much that I have to repeat it here. He nails the Obama foreign policy misadventure better than anyone I have read. For those of you who still believe in "change", you are getting it with both barrels and America is going to pay for it. We are no longer a Tiger, even a Paper Tiger, we are yesterdays newpaper and you know where that goes! Are you as upset as I am? Please let others know what you feel!
The Fruits of Weakness
Charles Krauthammer - Townhall, May 21st, 2010WASHINGTON — It is perfectly obvious that Iran's latest uranium maneuver, brokered by Brazil and Turkey, is a ruse. Iran retains more than enough enriched uranium to make a bomb. And it continues enriching at an accelerated pace and to a greater purity (20 percent). Which is why the French foreign ministry immediately declared that the trumpeted temporary shipping of some Iranian uranium to Turkey will do nothing to halt Iran's nuclear program.
It will, however, make meaningful sanctions more difficult. America's proposed Security Council resolution is already laughably weak — no blacklisting of Iran's central bank, no sanctions against Iran's oil and gas industry, no nonconsensual inspections on the high seas. Yet Turkey and Brazil — both current members of the Security Council — are so opposed to sanctions that they will not even discuss the resolution. And China will now have a new excuse to weaken it further.
But the deeper meaning of the uranium-export stunt is the brazenness with which Brazil and Turkey gave cover to the mullahs' nuclear ambitions and deliberately undermined U.S. efforts to curb Iran's program.
The real news is that already notorious photo: the president of Brazil, our largest ally in Latin America, and the prime minister of Turkey, for more than half a century the Muslim anchor of NATO, raising hands together with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the most virulently anti-American leader in the world.
That picture — a defiant, triumphant take-that-Uncle-Sam — is a crushing verdict on the Obama foreign policy. It demonstrates how rising powers, traditional American allies, having watched this administration in action, have decided that there's no cost in lining up with America's enemies and no profit in lining up with a U.S. president given to apologies and appeasement.
They've watched President Obama's humiliating attempts to appease Iran, as every rejected overture is met with abjectly renewed U.S. negotiating offers. American acquiescence reached such a point that the president was late, hesitant and flaccid in expressing even rhetorical support for democracy demonstrators who were being brutally suppressed and whose call for regime change offered the potential for the most significant U.S. strategic advance in the region in 30 years.
They've watched America acquiesce to Russia's re-exerting sway over Eastern Europe, over Ukraine (pressured by Russia last month into extending for 25 years its lease of the Black Sea naval base at Sevastopol) and over Georgia (Russia's de facto annexation of Abkhazia and South Ossetia is no longer an issue under the Obama “reset” policy).
They've watched our appeasement of Syria, Iran's agent in the Arab Levant — sending our ambassador back to Syria even as it tightens its grip on Lebanon, supplies Hezbollah with Scuds, and intensifies its role as the pivot of the Iran-Hezbollah-Hamas alliance. The price for this ostentatious flouting of the U.S. and its interests? Ever more eager U.S. “engagement.”
They've observed the administration's gratuitous slap at Britain over the Falklands, its contemptuous treatment of Israel, its undercutting of the Czech Republic and Poland, and its indifference to Lebanon and Georgia. And in Latin America, they see not just U.S. passivity as Venezuela's Hugo Chavez organizes his anti-American “Bolivarian” coalition while deepening military and commercial ties with Iran and Russia. They saw active U.S. support in Honduras for a pro-Chavez would-be dictator seeking unconstitutional powers in defiance of the democratic institutions of that country.
This is not just an America in decline. This is an America in retreat — accepting, ratifying and declaring its decline, and inviting rising powers to fill the vacuum.
Nor is this retreat by inadvertence. This is retreat by design and, indeed, on principle. It's the perfect fulfillment of Obama's adopted Third World narrative of American misdeeds, disrespect and domination from which he has come to redeem us and the world. Hence his foundational declaration at the U.N. General Assembly last September that “No one nation can or should try to dominate another nation” (guess who's been the dominant nation for the last two decades?) and his dismissal of any “world order that elevates one nation or group of people over another.” (NATO? The West?)
Given Obama's policies and principles, Turkey and Brazil are acting rationally. Why not give cover to Ahmadinejad and his nuclear ambitions? As the U.S. retreats in the face of Iran, China, Russia and Venezuela, why not hedge your bets? There's nothing to fear from Obama, and everything to gain by ingratiating yourself with America's rising adversaries. After all, they actually believe in helping one's friends and punishing one's enemies.
Charles Krauthammer is a 1987 Pulitzer Prize winner, 1984 National Magazine Award winner, and a columnist for The Washington Post since 1985
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Second Amendment Rights In Danger
A report that just crossed my desk that was written by Reuters and illustrates the damage that President Obama is doing to the country. The second amendment is, if not the most important, one of the most important of them all. Without the ability of the citizens to fight their government by force of arms, the government can do whatever it wants to its citizenry. Those who study history know that the first thing tyrants do is to terminate the rights of individuals to own guns. It was done in Germany and Russia and it could be coming to the United States courtesy of our President.
I have checked the Reuters site and it was indeed published on October 14, 2009. You might have seen this before, however, I have not.
The cards are lining up for an Obama takeover. He already has appointed unelected"czars" to run many parts of the economy, forecefully took over private business i.e. GM and Chrysler, rammed health insurance onto American citizens who did not want it, is spending our economy into oblivion and is prepared to allow the United Nations to control conventional (guns) weapons which guts the second amendment. This is just a short list of what damage he has done. Be prepared as time is of the essence.
Are you upset yet?
I have checked the Reuters site and it was indeed published on October 14, 2009. You might have seen this before, however, I have not.
The cards are lining up for an Obama takeover. He already has appointed unelected"czars" to run many parts of the economy, forecefully took over private business i.e. GM and Chrysler, rammed health insurance onto American citizens who did not want it, is spending our economy into oblivion and is prepared to allow the United Nations to control conventional (guns) weapons which guts the second amendment. This is just a short list of what damage he has done. Be prepared as time is of the essence.
Are you upset yet?
U.S. Reverses Stance On Treaty To Regulate Arms Trade
The decision, announced in a statement released by the U.S. State Department, overturns the position of former President George W. Bush's administration, which had opposed such a treaty on the grounds that national controls were better.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the United States would support the talks as long as the negotiating forum, the so-called Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty, "operates under the rules of consensus decision-making."
"Consensus is needed to ensure the widest possible support for the Treaty and to avoid loopholes in the Treaty that can be exploited by those wishing to export arms irresponsibly," Clinton said in a written statement.
While praising the Obama administration's decision to overturn the Bush-era policy and to proceed with negotiations to regulate conventional arms sales, some groups criticized the U.S. insistence that decisions on the treaty be unanimous.
"The shift in position by the world's biggest arms exporter is a major breakthrough in launching formal negotiations at the United Nations in order to prevent irresponsible arms transfers," Amnesty International and Oxfam International said in a joint statement.
However, they said insisting that decisions on the treaty be made by consensus "could fatally weaken a final deal."
"Governments must resist US demands to give any single state the power to veto the treaty as this could hold the process hostage during the course of negotiations. We call on all governments to reject such a veto clause," said Oxfam International's policy adviser Debbie Hillier.
The proposed legally binding treaty would tighten regulation of, and set international standards for, the import, export and transfer of conventional weapons.
Supporters say it would give worldwide coverage to close gaps in existing regional and national arms export control systems that allow weapons to pass onto the illicit market.
Nations would remain in charge of their arms export control arrangements but would be legally obliged to assess each export against criteria agreed under the treaty. Governments would have to authorize transfers in writing and in advance.
The main opponent of the treaty in the past was the U.S. Bush administration, which said national controls were better. Last year, the United States accounted for more than two-thirds of some $55.2 billion in global arms transfer deals.
Arms exporters China, Russia and Israel abstained last year in a U.N. vote on the issue.
The proposed treaty is opposed by conservative U.S. think tanks like the Heritage Foundation, which said last month that it would not restrict the access of "dictators and terrorists" to arms but would be used to reduce the ability of democracies such as Israel to defend their people.
The U.S. lobbying group the National Rifle Association has also opposed the treaty.
A resolution before the U.N. General Assembly is sponsored by seven nations including major arms exporter Britain. It calls for preparatory meetings in 2010 and 2011 for a conference to negotiate a treaty in 2012.
(Editing by Eric Beech)
Comments
Another backdoor attempt to circumvent the 2nd amendment and the intent of the Constitution. Arms confiscation, and or the halt of ammunition sales to private citizens will spark civil unrest in the U.S. Obama better step back from his ambitions of a socialist world government, with him as dictator. Our economy will never recover under his pathetic leadership.
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Tuesday, May 11, 2010
The End of Western Democracy?
Today in his posting, Pat Buchanan, makes a very salient point about the debt the United States and other western countries have accumulated through the social programs that have come to the norm. Will this debt crisis cause the end of Western Democracy as we have known it for the past sixty years? I believe so.
America, Greece, Italy, Spain, Ireland, Portugal, Great Britain are all deeply in debt mostly from the social programs that CANNOT be reduced for fear of civil disobedience (also known as riots) and political reality. Who would vote for a person or party who reduced your social security, medicare, medicaid, or welfare by 50%? No one.
Once these egregious programs get started, they assume a life of their own and no reasonable person can control them. The only way is for society as a whole to disintegrate into chaos. That my friends is where we are heading.
Here is Pat' posting:
THE CONSERVATIVE REVIEW - May 11, 2010
The End of La Dolce Vita
by Pat Buchanan
Are Europe and America headed to where Athens is today?
To answer the question, consider what brought Greece to
where she is -- running a deficit of 14 percent of gross
domestic product with a debt approaching 100 percent, with
Portugal, Spain, Ireland and Great Britain not that far
behind.
How did this happen?
Protected by the United States through a half-century of
Cold War, Europe cut back on defense and ratcheted up
spending for La Dolce Vita.
All of Europe adopted universal health care. All voted in
a shorter workweek, a higher minimum wage, greater job
security, earlier retirements and munificent pensions.
As the cradle-to-grave welfare states rose, an ever-
increasing share of the labor force left the private
sector for the security of the public sector.
Tax-consumers, the beneficiaries of the welfare states and
the bureaucrats that ran them, grew in number, as taxpayers
declined as a share of the labor force. Though Greece was
far from the most productive nation in Europe, Athens led
the parade.
After the baby boom ended, the pill arrival in the 1960s.
Then came abortion on demand in the 1970s.
The fertility rate of Greece and every European nation
fell below the 2.1 births per woman needed to replace an
existing population. Greece's birth rate has been below
zero population growth for three decades.
Result: In Year 2000, Greece had just under 11 million
people and a median age of 38. In 2050, Greece is project-
ed to have just under 11 million people, but the median
age will be 50.
Were Greece a company, the solution would be bankruptcy.
But Greece is a country. And a bailout of $141 billion is
being put together by the European Union and International
Monetary Fund.
Why? Because, should Greece decide not to take a chain saw
to her welfare state, but walk away from her debts and
default, she would blow a hole in the balance sheets of
the biggest banks in Europe.
Then the banks would have to be bailed out.
Seeing Greece's bondholders being burned, terrified holders
of Portuguese and Spanish debt would start dumping their
bonds, forcing Madrid and Lisbon to pay a higher interest
rate both to sell new bonds and roll over the old ones
coming due. Rather than savage their welfare state
programs, and risk riots in the streets and a massacre at
the polls, Madrid and Lisbon, too, might look agreeably at
default.
Chancellor Angela Merkel, though exasperated with the
Greeks, is urging Germans to back the $141 billion
bailout: "Nothing less than the future of Europe... is
at stake."
Merkel believes there is no alternative. But there is an
alternative -- a restructuring of Greece's debt or a
default where the holders of Greek bonds suffer the fate
of the holders of bonds from Lehman Brothers and General
Motors.
Inevitably, this is what is going to happen.
For how long will Greeks work longer, retire later and
live on smaller pensions, so holders of Greek bonds can
get their interest payments right on time?
The EU and IMF may, with the bailout of Greece, kick this
can up the road. But the crisis will return. For the
nations of Europe have made commitments beyond their
capacity to keep, given their growing debts and aging
populations.
And America is not all that far behind.
While the federal deficit is not 14 percent of GDP, it
was 10 percent in 2009 and may reach 11 percent in 2010.
Trillion-dollar deficits are projected through the
decade, bringing the public debt -- held by citizens,
companies, foreign governments and sovereign wealth
funds -- close to 100 percent of GDP.
And the unfunded liabilities of Social Security, Medicare
and federal pensions rival those of Western Europe.
States like California and New York, larger than Greece,
look a lot like Greece. Were it not for the scores of
billions dished out to them by Obama's stimulus, some of
these states would have come close to the brink New York
City went over in 1975.
Many of these states are today laying off teachers, letting
felons out of prison, and looking hard at the salaries and
pensions of civil servants. While the temptation is great
for Washington to bail them out again, the United States
government itself has now begun to attract the concerned
notice of holders of U.S. debt.
That we are witnessing Oswald Spengler's "Decline of the
West" seems undeniable.
La Dolce Vita is coming to an end. The ever-expanding
European and American welfare states of the 20th century
will contract in the 21st. Some have already begun to
shrink. A time of austerity is at hand.
Indeed, what is about to be tested is democracy itself.
Can democracies that attracted universal applause in the
golden years of rising expectations impose upon their
citizens the enduring and painful sacrifices necessary in
a time of retrenchment?
We are about to find out.
END OF Conservative Review
Copyright 2010 by NextEra Media. All rights reserved.
Please feel free to forward this, in its entirety, to others.
America, Greece, Italy, Spain, Ireland, Portugal, Great Britain are all deeply in debt mostly from the social programs that CANNOT be reduced for fear of civil disobedience (also known as riots) and political reality. Who would vote for a person or party who reduced your social security, medicare, medicaid, or welfare by 50%? No one.
Once these egregious programs get started, they assume a life of their own and no reasonable person can control them. The only way is for society as a whole to disintegrate into chaos. That my friends is where we are heading.
Here is Pat' posting:
THE CONSERVATIVE REVIEW - May 11, 2010
The End of La Dolce Vita
by Pat Buchanan
Are Europe and America headed to where Athens is today?
To answer the question, consider what brought Greece to
where she is -- running a deficit of 14 percent of gross
domestic product with a debt approaching 100 percent, with
Portugal, Spain, Ireland and Great Britain not that far
behind.
How did this happen?
Protected by the United States through a half-century of
Cold War, Europe cut back on defense and ratcheted up
spending for La Dolce Vita.
All of Europe adopted universal health care. All voted in
a shorter workweek, a higher minimum wage, greater job
security, earlier retirements and munificent pensions.
As the cradle-to-grave welfare states rose, an ever-
increasing share of the labor force left the private
sector for the security of the public sector.
Tax-consumers, the beneficiaries of the welfare states and
the bureaucrats that ran them, grew in number, as taxpayers
declined as a share of the labor force. Though Greece was
far from the most productive nation in Europe, Athens led
the parade.
After the baby boom ended, the pill arrival in the 1960s.
Then came abortion on demand in the 1970s.
The fertility rate of Greece and every European nation
fell below the 2.1 births per woman needed to replace an
existing population. Greece's birth rate has been below
zero population growth for three decades.
Result: In Year 2000, Greece had just under 11 million
people and a median age of 38. In 2050, Greece is project-
ed to have just under 11 million people, but the median
age will be 50.
Were Greece a company, the solution would be bankruptcy.
But Greece is a country. And a bailout of $141 billion is
being put together by the European Union and International
Monetary Fund.
Why? Because, should Greece decide not to take a chain saw
to her welfare state, but walk away from her debts and
default, she would blow a hole in the balance sheets of
the biggest banks in Europe.
Then the banks would have to be bailed out.
Seeing Greece's bondholders being burned, terrified holders
of Portuguese and Spanish debt would start dumping their
bonds, forcing Madrid and Lisbon to pay a higher interest
rate both to sell new bonds and roll over the old ones
coming due. Rather than savage their welfare state
programs, and risk riots in the streets and a massacre at
the polls, Madrid and Lisbon, too, might look agreeably at
default.
Chancellor Angela Merkel, though exasperated with the
Greeks, is urging Germans to back the $141 billion
bailout: "Nothing less than the future of Europe... is
at stake."
Merkel believes there is no alternative. But there is an
alternative -- a restructuring of Greece's debt or a
default where the holders of Greek bonds suffer the fate
of the holders of bonds from Lehman Brothers and General
Motors.
Inevitably, this is what is going to happen.
For how long will Greeks work longer, retire later and
live on smaller pensions, so holders of Greek bonds can
get their interest payments right on time?
The EU and IMF may, with the bailout of Greece, kick this
can up the road. But the crisis will return. For the
nations of Europe have made commitments beyond their
capacity to keep, given their growing debts and aging
populations.
And America is not all that far behind.
While the federal deficit is not 14 percent of GDP, it
was 10 percent in 2009 and may reach 11 percent in 2010.
Trillion-dollar deficits are projected through the
decade, bringing the public debt -- held by citizens,
companies, foreign governments and sovereign wealth
funds -- close to 100 percent of GDP.
And the unfunded liabilities of Social Security, Medicare
and federal pensions rival those of Western Europe.
States like California and New York, larger than Greece,
look a lot like Greece. Were it not for the scores of
billions dished out to them by Obama's stimulus, some of
these states would have come close to the brink New York
City went over in 1975.
Many of these states are today laying off teachers, letting
felons out of prison, and looking hard at the salaries and
pensions of civil servants. While the temptation is great
for Washington to bail them out again, the United States
government itself has now begun to attract the concerned
notice of holders of U.S. debt.
That we are witnessing Oswald Spengler's "Decline of the
West" seems undeniable.
La Dolce Vita is coming to an end. The ever-expanding
European and American welfare states of the 20th century
will contract in the 21st. Some have already begun to
shrink. A time of austerity is at hand.
Indeed, what is about to be tested is democracy itself.
Can democracies that attracted universal applause in the
golden years of rising expectations impose upon their
citizens the enduring and painful sacrifices necessary in
a time of retrenchment?
We are about to find out.
END OF Conservative Review
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