Time to Throw Out the Baby with the Bathwater

With a full half hour before October 1, there is little hope to avert a government shutdown.  And if it does get solved the debt ceiling will be the next self inflicted crisis.

THIS MUST STOP!

The House of Representatives is completely broken.  The extreme right wing seems willing to cause huge financial upheaval to get its way.  The last time the debt ceiling was an issue, there was speculation that the US might default on some of its obligations.  Our credit rating took a hit that cost taxpayers millions. This had NEVER happened before and here it comes again.

The house is blocking almost every bill that might make the President look good.  This is obstructing legitimate government efforts - and just for the sake of right wing politics.

I could go on and on but you get the idea.  But how can it be fixed?

Senators have 6 year terms so onlly 1/3 of them is up for re-election at one time.  The House, however, has 2 year terms and faces re-election  every two years.  So the solution seems simple to me:

Reject every member of the House and elect someone new.  It doesn't matter f they are Democrats or Republicans or Independents, throw the bums OUT! Vote for the non-House candidate.

We need a nice fresh House of Representatives.  It will take commitment and constant effort but we could do this in 2014.  Even if only a majority of the seats are lost it will send a powerful message that our Representatives should represent us and not special interests.

Counter Example

In logic, one counter-example completely disproves an assertion of fact.  For example, the National Rifle Association has made the statement:

"The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun, is a good guy with a gun."

As the tragic shootings at the Washington Navy Yard show, this is false.  In this case the killer shot an armed security guard - kind of the definition of  'a good guy with a gun'.  Not only that, he took the guard's own gun.

So  to recap, the good guy with the gun did *not* stop the bad guy with a gun. Even worse, the good guy's gun was used by the bad guy for bad things.  The good guy did not stop the bad guy and, in fact, his presence with that gun contributed to the violence.

Is this a bribe?

Thinking about the movie Gasland. It documents several settlements where the gas companies paid people to be silent when their water was so bad you can set it on fire.  There are several scenes of folks turning their faucets into bunsen burners.

 I thought, why do those settlements always gag the recipients?  OK I know that answer.  The settlement keeps the victims from saying how much they were paid so the company could keep it quiet and not admit they had done anything to the water.

Here's my real question: why can a publicly traded company conceal it's finances like that?  You have a company paying people off and hiding the amount - it is a pretty sleazy practice but is it bribery?

EDIT:  I realize thoughts about Gasland were from The Colbert Report, the August 15, 2013 episode.  Check out the 'The Word' segment.

How to deal with North Korea

North Korea blows up an a-bomb and people want to tighten sanctions.  Does that really work?  No.  The solution, and this will scare the crap out of the NK leaders, is anti-sanctions.

Here's the idea - shower the North Koreans with protein bars.  Wrap them in paper as it would probably become a crime to have empty foil packaging.  Put nice uplifiting messages on them explaining that we care and we have way, way too many of these protein bars; so many we can't keep them in our blue jeans, they fill up our cars and we've had to build extra rooms in our houses just to store them.

Sanctions only hurt the common people - and they're in pretty bad shape anyway.  Start with Pyongyang itself.  You cover all those open areas with yummy protein bars and the nukes will be on a truck to China in a day. 

The last thing the regime can stand is the fact they can't provide for their citizens.  But we can!  And it would crush them. It will take some work to deliver the goods safely but we have drones, high flying aircraft, t-shirt cannons.  Attach  parachutes and let the prevailing winds carry them over without us ever being over their airspace. 

I have to give partial credit to our kids who always look at problems from unique viewpoints - they inspire me.  And my wife started it decades ago suggesting that all the wheat we used to ship to the Soviet Union should all be packaged as breakfast cereals.