They say it's not important if you win or lose, but that you have fun in the process. To me that's a copout, because I always win, and I have more fun! Winning is fun, I am not sure why more people don't get it. But I have a sneaky suspicion as to why this is, you see, I just bet that most of the people that say stuff like that, are not very good at winning, rather they are really good at making excuses, and probably fairly good at the blame game.

In fact, I think we have a real problem, I think we've allowed too much of this attitude to permeate our society. Indeed, it seems we've collected leaders and representatives to govern our lives who spend a good amount of time reporting this socialist, loser attitude. It's quite unbecoming of an American to act like this and say these things. You see, there's nothing wrong with winning, there's nothing wrong with doing your best, and that is practically an American tradition.

Apparently, what we have is a group of new leaders who were tapping into the negative biofeedback, the low self-esteem, and this psychological depression of the electorate, and they are trying to make people feel weak, and then they come to their rescue, and tell them they will solve all their problems. Why would anyone stoop so low as to use such a manipulative strategy on their fellow citizens? Worse, what type of an American would allow themselves to be manipulated in that way.

For someone to say it doesn't matter if you win or lose, well, that's just not the truth, as it very much does matter. It matters that you accomplish things, that you are successful, that you are able to build a good life for your family, it is important that our country succeeds, and the company you work at succeeds, and it is important that you give 110% in everything you do. To just cruise through life, and have the government take care of everything for you, and while you put out little effort, that's just not American.

Please consider all this.

By: Lance Winslow
Lance Winslow is the Founder of the Online Think Tank, a diverse group of achievers, experts, innovators, entrepreneurs, thinkers, futurists, academics, dreamers, leaders, and general all around brilliant minds. Lance Winslow hopes you've enjoyed today's discussion and topic. http://www.WorldThinkTank.net - Have an important subject to discuss, contact Lance Winslow.

It has long been a generally accepted philosophy that the youth of our nation is often associated with liberal thought. And thus, right or wrong, are associated with the Democratic Party by default. The basic question is - why?

It's quite simple really. The very lack of life experience synonymous with youthfulness is the key.

When we are young, many of us tend to be idealists rather than realists. Now, idealism in and of itself is by no means a bad thing. But, unless the fantasy is coated with reality, it can be very dangerous. The two major examples of this are the Communist theory of government and the concept of Marxism.

In theory, Communism is the perfect government and should result in a Utopian state. However, it has never succeeded and cannot succeed in the real world. Human nature simply won't allow it. Instead of a Utopian ideal, put into practice Communism and Marxist thought have resulted in little more than widespread poverty, an unbelievable gap between the rich and the poor, heavy oppression and utter chaos.

The other major reason why young people tend to align with liberal thought is that quite frankly, they make for an easy target. The reasons for this are two-fold.

The first reason is that our children are so very impressionable. They can easily be molded to believe things through the use of the education system, advertising and other means of communication and information. When I was in school, we where taught that Democrats are for the "little people" and Republicans are for the rich and wealthy. Sadly, I'm sure some of us just took that as gospel and never delved deeper in search of the truth.

The lack of delving deeper speaks to my second point. Many young people lack either the desire or the drive to do more than take the word of the so-called authorities that bombard them with one-sided information. Sources like "The Daily Show" and the 30 seconds of news snippets periodically shown on MTV at least influence, if not completely form their views.

But, there is hope.

New research suggests that 40% of young Americans now consider themselves conservatives. That is a staggering number considering the history of this demographic. This suggests that at least some of the youth are taking the initiative to find out more than simply what they are being fed by the mainstream media.

It also seems to be a generally accepted idea that as most of us mature, we tend to take more moderate (like myself) or conservative stances. Again, this goes back to the issue of real world experience.

Perhaps Winston Churchill put it best when he said, "Any man who is under 30, and is not a liberal, has not heart; and any man who is over 30, and is not a conservative, has no brains."

By: Jason Greiner
http://www.3riverscreative.com

Economics 101?

Much has been said about the burgeoning federal debt recently. Since being inaugurated, President Obama has spent more money than all previous United States Presidents combined, adjusting for inflation. That being said, President Obama has spent money that doesn't exist. Estimates by the Congressional Budget Office, the place that reviews money coming in and going out that the government proposes in legislation, has pegged our trillion dollar deficit as dangerously near the point of no return. If something isn't done to curtail, cut and stop spending soon, the United States will lose it's credit rating, and for the first time in history, default on it's debt.

So how did we get here. I'll see if I can explain simply. As we should learn about budgets and income and expense, every single dollar the Federal Government spends, has been collected through some tax placed on the individuals and businesses that fall under it's power, in this case, the United States citizens. We work to provide for ourselves and our families, enjoy vacations, save money for retirement and live our lives. The government taxes us and levies fees against us for the work and products we provide and produce. If the government spends more money than they take in, the difference is called the deficit and must be made up by borrowing money. More often than not, the government will sell bonds to another government, like China, and pay interest on those bonds so they can continue to spend when they don't bring in enough from taxes.

President Obama and Democrats in power have decided that spending money that hasn't even been earned yet, by ourselves and our unborn progeny is the way to remove us from the recession. This line of thinking comes from Keynes, an English economist during the early 20th century who wrote extensively on the spending power of the government and what it should be able to accomplish during periods of negative or no economic growth; i.e. during a recession with high unemployment, few jobs, and little goods and services being rendered or produced.

With almost 100 years of time between Keynes economic theories and the present day, we do have quite a bit of real world data to use in examining how accurate Keynesian economics really are and if they work on planet earth. The short answer is they don't. They fail miserably and prolong the recessionary periods during which they are implemented.

FD Roosevelt, who is championed as the President who brought the country out of the Great Depression during the 1930's followed these principles to the letter through his burgeoning deficit spending and "job creation" at the government level with all of his projects across the country like the WPA, NRA and a host of other alphabet soup government agencies. He did this using borrowed money and by raising taxes. His principal belief was that the government could make people work to bring the economy back around, using their own money, or lack thereof to do it.

In order to understand this theory of economics, it would be like you being out of work with no income or reduced income. You take a cash advance or special offer from your credit card company to borrow against your credit line to have some money back in your pocket. If you think that by borrowing money from your credit line, putting it in your pocket and then saying, you've got income again is preposterous and doesn't make any sense, you'd be right. You haven't improved your ability to care for yourself at all, you've only made yourself a slave to the issuer of the credit card company that loaned you the money and now wants you to pay interest on the loan. You still have no income and now have debt you have to pay for because you borrowed money you didn't have. This is insane.

Rational people understand that eventually you'll reach your credit limit and not be able to borrow anymore. You still have no income and are now in danger of defaulting on your payments of borrowed money to the bank and are in fact worse off than you were before.

This describes exactly the problem the we face now. Only, when you and I reach our credit limit, we can't just raise our limit and borrow more money to spend away that which we haven't earned. This is exactly what the Democratic Congress has done this year on more than two occasions, rather than stop spending. We only have so much time left, before our debt literally renders our country bankrupt and finished.

To conclude, Keynesian economic theory does not work. Never has; never will. In fact, those countries that didn't spend, specifically in Western Europe, during the 1930's Depression, on average saw their economic activity and countries improve a full 7 years before the United States did, and only the onset of World War II allowed us to ramp up our production and start putting people back to work and not living on borrowed money as we are doing once again, right now.

As history repeats itself, we sure aren't electing anybody to lead us who knows anything about history and basic economics.

By: Dan Orr
I'm Dan Orr, an entrepreneur with businesses in real estate and e-commerce. I work with rent generating property and recently entered the online affiliate and money-making web based products world.
http://www.topfloorview.com/affiliatemarketing.html

What kind of bureaucrat would declare his love for Britain's stingy, depressing, complicated, cold and arbitrary National Health Service by describing it as "generous, hopeful, confident, joyous and just"?

That would be Harvard-based pediatrician Donald Berwick, who recently received a recess appointment as Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services by the bureaucrat who describes his pessimistic and stale vision for America as "hope and change."

Recess appointments are an executive procedure used, for better or for worse, when the Senate gives a presidential appointee a difficult time during confirmation hearings-for example, when they filibuster a nominee. Obama's appointment of Berwick bears the distinction of having been given without a confirmation hearing having even been scheduled.

It's as though Obama decided that the very requirement that his nominee appear before a Democratic-controlled Senate constituted an unreasonably difficult hurdle. This isn't a recess appointment - it's a vacation to Bermuda appointment.

As the Wall Street Journal noted, "Circumventing Senate confirmation to appoint the new Medicare chief is part of the same political willfulness that inflicted ObamaCare on the country despite the objections of most voters." CBS News observed, "The debate over Berwick's recess appointment makes clear what the White House knew all too well - Berwick may not have survived the Senate confirmation process, which would have turned into a proxy debate over health care reform."

Berwick, who will be put in charge of the health care of 100 million Americans without so much as a public query about his plans in office, has been quoted saying, "I am romantic about the N.H.S.; I love it." He has called himself "an American fan" of the system, "distant and starry-eyed."

In his London speech commemorating the N.H.S.'s 60th birthday, Berwick delivered such pro-American pronouncements to his audience as "Do not trust market forces to give you the system you need... I cannot believe that the individual health care consumer can enforce through choice the proper configurations of a system as massive and complex as health care. That is for leaders to do."

When it comes to Berwick's affection for health care systems centered around use of death panels, apparently absence makes the heart grow fonder. After returning home and mooning over the UK's National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence, the operational arm of the N.H.S., Berwick realized that "All I need to do to rediscover the romance is to look at health care in my own country."

That country would be the United States, which has the greatest health care system in the world, and would be a profound source of inspiration for anyone who truly loved medicine. Berwick's own place of employment is Harvard Medical School, where you would think there would have been a few medical advances in recent years to set his heart aflutter.

But no - Berwick's passion is for euthanasia counseling and quality-adjusted life years.

Berwick of course has never had to live under the jurisdiction of the N.H.S. You might call his affair with the British health care system a long-distance relationship.

Describing the supposed British backlash against American conservatives' depiction of the N.H.S. during the health care reform debate last summer, the New York Times gushed, "A Twitter campaign, We Love The N.H.S., is still going strong, with supporters sending messages about their own good experiences."

In fact, said campaign didn't even last 30 days from its first Tweet to its last, and has attracted a piddly 520 followers internationally. This is despite such helpful but unheeded administrative prompts as "What do you love about the NHS?" and "Please Retweet: 10,000 supporters visualised."

Admittedly, the riotously popular N.H.S. does have a Facebook fan page with 3,500 members. Then again, an ill-worded N.H.S. sign implying that contraception would be facilitated by... nontraditional intercourse has a Facebook fan page with 124,475 members. So perhaps fan counts are not such a flattering measure of the N.H.S.'s popularity.

Even the New York Times had to admit that Brits "complain endlessly about the National Health Service... They deplore the system's waiting lists, its regional disparities in treatment, its infection-breeding hospitals and its top-heavy bureaucracy." I guess the grass is greener on the other side of the pond!

If Donald Berwick wants to swoon over endless waiting lists, fatally protracted wait times, diminished access to specialized care, craven efforts to shield patients from learning about or acquiring costly life-saving drugs, pathetic heart attack and cancer survival rates, depersonalized patient treatment, and centralized bureaucratic decision-making about individual health care options, that's his choice. But forgive the rest of the U.S. if we aren't quite as smitten as he is.

By: Scott Spiegel
http://www.scottspiegel.com

Barack Obama

Trusted?

To Be or Not To Be

By depiction, Barack Obama is a person to be trusted without question, WHY?

Everyone else who has led this country has had to go through a process of building trust with the American people. From the days of George Washington down through today the position of President of the United States of America has been one of implicit trust, yes their have been individuals who have usurped that trust and gone overboard in their efforts to get as much from politics as they could, we have had some people in this position that did not belong there due to character defects that far outweighed any benefit they could have been to this country. We have had some individuals that have done more to destroy "Due Process" than most criminals that have gone to trial and been adjudged guilty. We have been saddled with individuals that have the morals of an alley cat, individuals who consider it nothing to lie in the face of the American public, and presiding courts, individuals that considered themselves untouchable by the laws that govern this land.

Be that as it may, the inherit quality that is looked for in the man who would be President has got to be ethical trustworthiness. I feel without that, no other qualification matters. For me having to trust what the President says is more important than anything in the area of leadership. This quality and this one alone predicate any action that would take place concerning the well being of the United States.

There are no other concerns in the picking of the President if you cannot count on the integrity of the individual running. The president can even be wrong in his assessment of any given situation, though we pray he is not, as he has the final choice in the recommendation of the results of any decisions made, and at times, he possesses the only voice in that process. This President has so far not only backed off the issue of trust, he has failed miserably in maintaining any semblance of knowing what he is doing.

For example: on the issue of Health Care, he had stated that he knew the present bill was flawed, but that could be taken care of with another bill, on Immigration, he had been quoted as saying, "this administration does not have the stomach to deal with the issue of immigration"( Secure America and Orderly Immigration Act.) which did not pass. Then faults Arizona for passing a law designed to protect it's boarders, and says of the law, "I think it may be unconstitutional" Yet this law does nothing different other than re-enforce the Federal Law that's on the books?

Is there something I am missing here?

It seem to me that our President (the one everyone expected so much from) is not only talking out of both sides of his mouth, but also out of the part of his anatomy that he sits on!

On perhaps the greatest ecological disaster to hit the United States, he has said" Washington has been in charge of this situation since day one" The question that that statement brings up is "Oh really, OK exactly what have you done?" He is now faced with another conundrum, The Gaza blockade. He has previously been recorded as saying the safety of Israel is "Sacrosanct" and attacks will not be tolerated. Let's see if he keeps his word, or again turn away from what he has said. Travel forward in time

Not long ago an incident that occurred the IDF [Israel Defense Force] in responding to a ship that tried to run it's blockade of the Gaza seaport got boarded, below were Arabic and Turkish individuals with nothing else on their minds than to do harm to the IDF, which was evidenced in video that were confiscated during the raid, due to no previous incidents with the actions taken by the Israeli forces the weapons carried by the IDF were the equivalent of paint-ball guns, when attacked by the individuals on-board the ship to protect themselves from being beaten by metal pipes, chains and chairs (graphically shown on the videos) they resorted to side arms, killing 9 of their attackers. For this Israel was the dumping ground of all the vehemence the rest of the world including the most revered Secretary of State her royal nobleness Hillary Clinton who stated that she denounced the actions taken by Israel in attacking the peaceful demonstration aboard that ship, WELL AIN'T THAT SPECIAL!!!

I for one think it's about time the DUMMIES, excuse me Democrats in Washington wake up to what's going on in the world and take off those "Rose Colored Glasses" they are forever wearing. This adds to the overall mystique of the pseudo-government we are now subject to, the government that exhibits the grandiose perception that we can do nothing wrong, you only have to follow our instructions and your life will be peachy keen, UNTIL THE BILL ARRIVES, so far it is in the trillions of dollars.

YOU ASK WHERE WILL IT STOP?

YOU ASK WHEN WILL IT STOP?

The answer is: AT THE POLLS

AND WHEN YOU DECIDE TO PUT A STOP TO IT!!!!

It is us, we are the ones responsible, there is no-one else to point the finger at. Harry Truman had a sign on his desk at the White House when he was President, that sign said. The Buck Stops Here, Barack Obama has decided to usurp that phrase, too bad he can't or won't live up to it, it could change the way people see him, but as for now, he, to me remains inconsistent with the overall purpose of America, that being the thing which has set us apart from every other nation on the face of the earth, our freedoms, as they are granted to American citizens, thanks to the forefathers of this nation.

By: Conrad Trudelle
I would be very interested to receive any comments about the above article, there are more to follow, and they shall be posted shortly.

I have been to more places than most people, I have done more things than most people, I have survived more things than most others have encountered. I have continually learned throughout this process and arrived at the conclusion that the differences we see keep us curious, and that keeps us alive. Never ever stop learning, and school and college is not the only place to learn, in fact it is limiting the amount and quality of knowledge we have. Communication is what makes this planet better, we have to learn to communicate better. Communication is not only content, but also delivery.

What is really the core reasoning of automatic guaranteed failure by Progressives policies? Quite simply, the answer is complacency. Progressive policies reward complacency and encourages the bare minimum of people in life and human beings were not designed to seek the bare minimum in life, but rather human beings are designed to be challenged.

In a nut shell, this is what the Progressive agenda is all about. Elitists are the slave masters who deliver the bare essentials to life for all. Assuming that you're not an elitist, you will have access to health care, you will never starve, you will have shelter and you will have access to entertainment for a little while. Of course none of these bare essentials are for free, because really nothing in life is ever for free. You will be taxed high on your earnings or on the things that you buy or a combination of both. Regardless in how you slice or dice it, the gross total of your earnings will eventually be galvanized to a point to where you possess less funds for your self at the end. This is the Progressive concept. It is a concept of Lord over serf. You will remain in the hierarchy of society to where you were born. Now this sounds like a really great dealio if you were born at the top of the food chain, however if you were born at the bottom, well this designed system will ensure that you will remain at the bottom more often than not. The financial hurdles will be too much, for the vast majority of people to ever over come.

Now, lets say you're a person that is not very ambitious and this system really doesn't sound all that bad to you, which is very logical. It's really not the worst case scenario to have the bare essentials of life provided to you, especially considering that poverty and human desolation is far much more worse to endure and has occurred on Earth as well. That is a very sound and good point, but please do consider human nature as well as you contemplate such a society system that socialism is.

Humans are creatures that excel in life when they are challenged. A socialist system of providing the bare essentials to you in life at a high cost in taxation has always failed throughout human history because an environment of complacency for humans has been created. In fact, on paper socialism is in fact, the most perfect society system ever devised, however in the real world it is one of the worst society systems ever designed, because socialism has never taken real human behavior into account. If humans are not constantly challenged, then humans naturally evolve to embrace complacency. In the animal kingdom complacent animals perish to predators. The young bird that does not learn to fly, is eaten by the fox. So with this phenomenon in nature being well known and understood, a logical person must also consider even though humans are highly intelligent creatures, are we not part of the animal kingdom too?

Complacency rules in socialist societies, because humans are smart enough to understand that if they get something for what appears to be nothing, then maximum effort is no longer required. Humans gravitate towards personal entertainment and other personal endeavors more instead. As an entire society begins to entertain themselves more, then naturally productivity in the over all economy reduces. Once productivity reduces too much, then a societies economy begins to spend more than it creates. Massive society debts then bring the socialist society leadership to a juncture to where a decision must be made. The decision results in either leading a society into communism where forcing productivity to increase at the barrel of a gun or other terrorizing techniques are pursued or a decision is made to ditch the socialist system entirely for a capitalist system where an individual must make their own roads and fend for themselves to survive. Of course, socialism will always eventually fail due to genuine and true human nature and behavior, which always trumps designs that are drafted on paper.

The dangers of socialism in society are very evident when you begin to weigh out the planned system versus human nature. This conflict and clash always dooms the dream of a Utopia to its guaranteed automatic failure. Now you may wonder if this is proven true over and over and over again in human history, then why is it that so many politicians and elitists pursue this system? Aren't they aware of any history, a logical person might ask? Well the answer is simply, yes, these individuals are intelligent enough to know the history of the automatic and guaranteed failure that socialism always provides, but these individuals are the fox and you are the prey. These unscrupulous individuals pursue this system only to prey upon you to better themselves. Most individuals who pursue socialism today, are some of the worlds most evil and most dangerous people on Earth or are just mentally unstable and delusional. They will pursue this system relentlessly only for self adulation and lust of power, absolute and maximum power wielded over the masses. Most individuals who pursue socialism today are individuals that are pathological narcissists. This is a dangerous human condition that causes an individual to pursue maximum power for endless attention, which heading socialism in society best assists that person to achieve. Pathological narcissists are masters of manipulation and are extremely intelligent. They can always make the absurd sound so wonderful. Pathological narcissists are typically charismatic, charming and appear to be non threatening to you as well. You have never heard of a Joseph Stalin, a chairman Mao or an Adolph Hitler in a free society, who mind you, were all pathological narcissists. Free societies do not grant enough power for a pathological narcissist to wield it for evil, but socialism grants the gateway of enough power for these individuals to thrive in an arena where the meal will eventually be you.

By: Mike J Meincke
Written: July 1st, 2010.
http://taxmemore.blogspot.com