The White House Chief of Staff tells the press that Obama is madder than hell about the on-going, and long-lived VA scandal. He “has the scars” to prove it. I guess they are as tough to live with as the real-life scars veterans live with, physical and mental. Jerk.

Now mouthpiece Carney is also saying Obama is as mad as hell about the treatment of Veterans at the VA medical centers. The thing is, Obama hasn’t said it publicly himself. Well, he did back in 2007 when candidate Obama was busy sucking up for veteran votes.

“After seven years of an Administration that has stretched our military to the breaking point, ignored deplorable conditions at some VA hospitals, and neglected the planning and preparation necessary to care for our returning heroes, America’s veterans deserve a President who will fight for them not just when it’s easy or convenient, but every hour of every day for the next four years.” 11/12/07.

Well, you can’t have it both ways, Barry.

If you said that in 2007 and were talking about the previous seven years, and the press is saying it now, that means it has been a problem for 14 years. Are you having a case of selective amnesia now, or convenient anger?

40 cases have popped up from just one VA center of Veterans dying or having had died waiting to see a doctor. Some of them were in such pain that they killed themselves rather than prolong agony through more waiting. Those backlogged cases in the hindreds of thousands? Deleted. The longer than Bataan Death march waiting lists? They kept those people on a separate, secretive list.

Meanwhile, just last year, the VA handed out millions of dollars to top VA officials for performance in reducing the backlogged cases.  Of course, they showed better performance.  They hid cases off book and swept everything else under the rug.

Maybe Barry’s just chalking it up as another front on the now obsolete War on Terror. I mean, all these returning Iraq and Afghanistan veterans are just domestic terrorists in disguise. Deny them care and they’ll eventually die–beith their hands (the VA) or their own. Problem solved. Somebody sure has a reason to be mad as hell. But it isn’t the ass clown in the White House…unless he’s just mad the story came back to life on his watch.

Ever wonder why we are in such financial duress as a nation? We owe other nations, many of whom do not like us very much, some of whom actively fight us on proxy battlefields, and we owe ourselves over $17 trillion dollars. That is a 17 with twelve zeroes behind it. Our Gross Domestic Product in 2012 was 15.68 trillion. That (GDP) is the monetary worth of every product and service we as a country produce, consume and export. So, if we used all of that value for an entire year, no one being paid anything, no bills being paid, we couldn’t pay off our debt in a year.

The first thing we have to make sure is understood is that the federal government produces no goods, sells no product, and generates no revenue. Their money comes from the citizenry in the form of taxes and fees. Staying with 2012 figures, the final budget for that year was 2.469 trillion. We spent, however, 3.769 trillion for a deficit of 1.396 trillion dollars. Just for 2012.

When Bush was president, over his eight years, his administration ran up deficits greater than the sum total of all previous administrations. A large portion of his deficits were in the form of defense department expenditures. We fought two wars for the better part of a decade and did nothing to budget for them. Taxes were not raised. War bonds were not sold. Goods to the public were not rationed. We simply borrowed the money from ourselves and other nations.

Obama has managed to nearly double Bush’s deficit figures in only five years. One of the wars has ended. The other is going to end this year. Where is the money being spent? Just examine the largess of government workers, their salaries, and their perks.

The President earns nearly $400,000 per year. The Vice President earns $230,000.   We have a cabinet of secretaries each earning $199,700. There are fifteen of them. So, these seven people collectively are paid 3.6 million a year. More actually when you consider that the VA Secretary, the hapless and idiotic Eric Shenseki, earns and additional $181,000 for his military retirement atop his $199,700 salary. The head of the CIA makes another $199,700. The Director of the FBI makes $178,700. The White House Chief of Staff, essentially the president’s executive bitch, makes $172,200. We’re closing in on $5million and we’re still just at the executive level.

Each of those Secretaries have Deputies; 46 of them, each one earning $178,700. They also have Under Secretaries, 127 of them, each one earning $165,300. Then there are Assistant Secretaries, General Counsels; 346 of these, each earning $155,500. Lastly there is a fifth layer of executive pay strati, 143 strong, each earning $145,700. So, the head of the federal government (the executive branch), 683 in number collectively gouge us for over $113 million dollars a year. Add in the House and Senate (535 each at an average of $174,000) equals $93million. The tip of this mop handle (won’t call it a spear) costs its nation $206 million a year.

Senators “work” 112 days of the year. Obama seems to golf every fucking week.

Now, bring back into mind those early numbers. $17 TRILLION in debt. A million dollars, ten thousand $100 bills. Hundreds come in bundles of 100. Each bundle of banded $100 bills is $10,000. A million dollars would be 100 bundles of $100 bills. It would fit easily into a standard sized back pack. $100 million would look like cases of wine bottle boxes stacked two high on a pallet. A billion dollars would (thus) be ten pallets of those wine bottle cases, stacked two high. A trillion dollars is a million million. It’s a thousand billion. It’s a one followed by 12 zeroes. It would be those pallets stacked two high, in rows and columns fifty deep. Yes, two high, and fifty by fifty in width and length. And we owe 17 times that.

I know that $206 million is a drop in the bucket of our 3 and 4 trillion dollar budgets. But if we waste so much money paying people to not get along or get anything done, is it any wonder at all?

We all know that money talks and bullshit walks.  Nowhere is that more true than in our current political machine.

The 2012 presidential election cost by itself about two and a half BILLION dollars.  The entire 2012 election cycle including presidential and senatorial/congressional elections ran over six billion.  Imagine, a billion dollars just to sit in the most powerful chair on the planet.  Well, it was until Obama started leading from behind and pissing away our place as global leader.  A billion dollars to sit in the chair of the fifth or sixth most powerful position on the planet.

Is it any wonder that only the most craven and egocentric among us bother to run for office?  I could not imagine announcing my candidacy only to have to grovel to untold thousands of persons known and unknown asking them to fund the mere chance of me taking an elected office.  This is how political corruption is born.  People rarely just give you money.  They want something in return.  That something, in politics, is usually access.  Access leads to grease or steerage, or favoritism.  The person donating wants something tangible in return and they will ask for it when they need it.

And the money squirts to both sides of the aisle.  Businesses will pay a little now for a greater payoff later.  Think I’m kidding?  Think I do not know what I’m talking about?  Let’s look at a few examples.  (You can see the rest of them by going to the link included.)

Verizon Communications
Profits: $19.8 billion Effective tax rate: -3.8%

Top recipients, 2011-2012
President Barack Obama: $51,493  Nothing needs to be said.
Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.): $24,450  He is on the committee for Taxation and IRS Oversight.  Convenient.
Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.): $23,700 Senate Minority Leader.  On the Senate Committee for Appropriations.
Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio): $22,500 Speaker of the House.
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.): $15,000

General Electric
Profits: $19.6 billion Effective tax rate: -18.9%
Top recipients, 2011-2012
Mitt Romney: $53,750  Think business leader Romney would have reeled GE in?  Think again.
President Barack Obama (D): $30,493.  Again, nothing to be said.
Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.): $23,900.  Pompous ass.  Left Mass., and now running again in NH.
Rep. Howard Berman (D-Calif.): $21,860  Been in Congress for 30 years—knows who to talk to and who to pay off.
Rep. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.): $19,750  Fifth largest donor for someone on the Committee for Joint Economic Development.  Remember GE’s moving jobs overseas?

Boeing
Profits: $14.8 billion Effective tax rate: -5.5%
Top recipients, 2011-2012
Rep. Buck McKeon (R-Calif.): $31,750 20-year Congressman.  Committee on Armed Forces.  Boeing is a big military contractor.
Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.): $25,000 15-year Congressman.  Committee on Armed Forces. 3 major Boeing facilities in Washington state
Former Sen. George Allen (R-Va.): $23,500  Who wants back in to politics?  Now you know why.
Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.): $23,125  Committee of Commerce, Science, and Transportation.
Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas): $20,986  Nobody is innocent.

Verizon took issues stating that they pay a lot in taxes and investments.  The last word is key—investments.  They get tax breaks on their investments.  Why not upgrade your system from 3G to 4G if the government is going to subsidize it?

Another article details 26 large companies that pay no taxes.  They include:   (picture did not import in.  Go to the third link to see it.)

PICTURE SHOULD HAVE BEEN HERE.

Notice that many of them—SIXTEEN of them are energy companies.  Pepco is an energy distribution company, as is NiSource.  Apache is a natural gas and oil exploration company.  Look at your gas & electric or utilities bill.  I personally pay almost $3000 a year to Xcel and IREA combined.  Aurora has about 300,000 residents.  If we use a modest half figure (150,000) as customers it comes to $439 million annually between these two companies.  And they need a tax break sufficient to make their effective tax rate go into negative numbers?

My tax rate last year was about 11%.  If I incorporate myself as an energy firm and start giving select politicians money, can I stop paying taxes?  Or should I go into politics?

http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2012/08/2012-election-will-be-costliest-yet.html

http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2012/04/top-tax-dodging-companies-politicians

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/25/corporation-tax-rate_n_4855763.html

Cliven Bundy, a cattle rancher in Nevada has been able to poke the eye of the giant and get away with it—for now.

See, Bundy raises cattle and for years has had his cattle grazing on “federal land”.  About 85% of Nevada is federally owned so it is a stretch to even call it a state as such.  Bundy and his past relatives have been grazing the same land (his cattle, silly) since the 1880s so he sees it largely as a continuing of a long past agreement.  The gubmint sees it differently.  Since 1993 Bundy stopped paying them and now they say he owes over a million dollars in past fees.  Bundy says the fees charged would run him out of business and speculates that is the gubmint’s intent all along.

The gubmint also forwards that the land Bundy’s cattle graze on is also home to an endangered desert tortoise and that the cattle “routinely” kill them.  As if the cattle see the tortoise and like an 8 year-old seeing a spider on the sidewalk move heaven and earth to splat them.  Other sources say the Bureau of Land Management also are guilty of killing the tortoise in their practice of “land management”.  The gubmint wants Bundy’s cattle off “their” land.

Enter state Senator Harry Reid.  Yes, Harry is a politician.  This makes him just a step above a child molester  and otherwise a piece of shit and a liar.  Harry has been linked along with his son Rory to a Chinese firm that were going to construct a wind farm of sorts on the BLM land that Bundy’s cattle graze upon.  Some background here…

Harry has already been linked to suspect and shady land deals where he bought “shit land” for very little and shortly after the land was sold at outrageous profits for some construction effort.  I’m talking hundreds of thousands of dollars.  (Sort of reminds one of the Hillary cattle futures windfall of profits.)  Harry’s son  just happens to be a lawyer representing the Chinese firm that would build this green energy farm, probably for pennies on the dollar for the land and also being subsidized by YOU the taxpayer.  They profit, you pay.

The gubmint’s response?   They send in over 200 armed agents to surround the property and to confiscate the cattle “illegally” on federal land.  One rumor had the gubmint euthanizing the cows.  Another had them selling them presumably to pay the amount back owed since 1993.  The Bundy’s went public.  Members of local and national militias arrived—armed—to help protect and defend the Bundy’s private land.  Cowboys came to help.  Members of the Oath Keepers also arrived.

One official was quoted to say that he hoped the armed invaders “had their funeral plans made.”  Imagine that!  The gubmint threatening the lives of people who had yet to pose any physical threat of bodily harm.  The threat did not have the desired effect.

Today, the gubmint blinked and backed down.  See, everything is political to them (the left).  Everything.  Somebody higher than Harry and Son ran the numbers and saw that this was no longer politically feasible.  Bundy’s cattle are reportedly going to be returned and they will be allowed to graze on the disputed lands.  This probably means the boundaries of the wind farm will just be moved elsewhere.  A friend of mine thinks the DHS will get its turn and make Bundy disappear.  Hopefully Bundy has HIS affairs in order as far as land possession is concerned.  The gubmint can’t kill the entire family, can they?

This is a lesson to us all though.  Go public and have a grass roots theme.  With enough support, the gubmint will back off.  They don’t want the cause of personal responsibility and freedom to grow roots and grow support.  They want dependency.  It is your call.

Last week, Brendan Eich, CEO of Mozilla (for about a week) resigned after pressure from gay rights groups.  See, back in 2008, Brendan made a political donation of $1000 in support of California’s Proposition 8, a “marriage is between a man and a woman” thing.  A quick look at the calendar… yup, it is 2014.

So, something he did on his own time, using his own money, of his own volition SIX YEARS ago, comes back to haunt him in his public life and means of income.

I believe that marriage as defined by the state is a privilege (not a right–sort of like driving) that is between one man and one woman.  Back in 2008 so did Brendan Eich.  So did B. Hussein Obama for that matter.  One pundit on TV (probably MSNBC based on how vapid it is) compared people who are against gay marriage to holocaust deniers and that it is RIGHT for them to be cast out of their jobs.  So, if I believe that gays should not be married, then I also do not believe Hitler was in charge of the purging of six million Jews during WW2?  Seriously?

It is a non sequitor.  Why is no one calling this guy the idiot he is?

As far as anyone has come forward, Brendan Eich did not discriminate against gays at the workplace.  He didn’t tell fag jokes or promote straights over equally qualified gays.  He merely exercised his political voice in a monetary way six years ago.  Clearly, one is not allowed to do that.  The thought police are here and they have procognition powers.  Bill Maher must have some kind of Kryptonite against these thought police though.

“I believe there is a gay mafia.  If you go up against them, you get whacked.”  –Bill Maher

As in IOU, the taxpayer.

Remember late last year the scare that rippled through the media about how milk prices may soar if the Farm Bill does not get passed?  Probably not.  But I do.  The sky was falling, they were so serious.  See, the government already props up the price of milk (at our expense) but if there was no deal on the Farm Bill, the price the government would pay was going to increase dramatically making them the prime target for dairy sales.  This would reduce the amount available at stores and would thus, result in a rise in prices.  Dairy farmers win and consumers lose.

That’s the end result when it comes to the Farm Bill even when they do come to an agreement.

The Farm Bill is a five-year agreement.  The government calls it something else each time, and the title drifts further from sounding like anything related to farming each time.  In 2008, the President Bush vetoed the law (the Food, Conservation and Energy Act) since he thought there was too much expansion in the food stamp part of the bill (47% more than the bill from 2003).  Yes, the farm bill is where most of the money to be spent on food stamps is appropriated.  Congress overrode his veto.

In 2012/13 the bill was called Agriculture Reform, Food and Jobs Act.  No provision of the law that I’ve found had anything to do with creating jobs.  Then it was called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).  So now its name is totally connected to food stamps and has no titular connection to farming whatsoever.  (How about that?  A little truth in advertising!)  What helped it pass was the $800 million reduction (over ten years—the standard for all government spending/saving calculations—in food stamps.  Even then, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack told reporters he did not expect the cut of about 1 percent of the food stamp budget to have a significant impact on recipients.

The current tab?  Nearly $100 billion per year of which 80% or more is for food stamps.  Of the rest, only about 10% of farmers receive over 75% of the subsidies. Some of these “farmers” were in fact Congressmen, lobbyists, and other government officials and celebrities.   Bruce Springsteen and Jon Bon Jovi receive farm subsidies.

Other provisions of the law masked recipients of subsidies.  There was a 194-word entry specifically to keep people who received subsidy anonymous.   Obviously that never lasts.  The list is easily found but here is a small piece of it.  Zip code 20003 (near Washington D.C. you know right smack in the middle of the farming belt of the country) had 75 recipients of farm bill money totally over $841K from 1995 to 2012.  One person, William T Hawks received the lion’s share of this $841K.  He got $240K starting in 2003 for cotton subsidies.  Who is William T Hawks?  Why, he is the former Undersecretary for Agriculture.  US Senator Charles Grassley (R-IA) receives a farm subsidy at his Arlington, VA condominium.  Joining the list of DC insiders pocketing farm subsidy money was Agriculture Secretary Thomas Vilsack.  Jimmy Carter, yes, THAT Jimmy Carter also receives subsidies for his peanut farm is Georgia.  Oh, Louis Farrakhan also receives farm bill subsidies.  Billionaire Ted Turner also receives subsidies.

Here are two paragraphs lifted straight from some of the research I did:

The agricultural services industry contributed nearly $42 million in campaign contributions at the federal and state level according to Influence Explorer and spent more than $62 million on federal lobbying. Top recipients include Obama, with $474,000 and Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., chairwoman of the Senate Agricultural Committee, with $169,550.

In Chicago alone, a city without a single farm, 930 individuals and entities have received $6.1 million since 2008.  In the nation’s capitol, documents show 2,801 entities in the Washington DC area received over $18.4 million in payments from the Farm subsidy program. In New York City, 248 entities received subsidy payments. In all, the report shows just 10,806 recipients of the highest farm subsidies – $250,000 or more – with each receiving an average payment of $417,316.

“Farmers” are also paid to not farm.

The USDA estimates there are 700,968 currently active contracts in the program, while the number of farms is roughly 390,000 covering 27.02 million acres. The USDA predicts the Fiscal Year (FY) 2013 payments will be $2.034 billion. The payments vary by degree of land sensitivity and can range from $50 per acre all the way up to $134, with the average being $61 per acre.

In 2010, the annual total amount of acres covered in the program was $31.3 million. This figure amounted to $1.667 billion in annual direct payments, or about $53 per acre. According to The Wall Street Journal, contracts for the program usually last between 10 and 15 years in order to “conserve soil.”

The bill passed and was signed into law two months ago.  And it is good for 5 years.  I guess a different president would be able to nullify the bill, unless of course, he or a family member, friend, campaign bundler, or a staff worker is receiving a subsidy.  But remember this the next time it comes around for extension or renewal.  All that bullshit they sling about the cost of milk going up, or the beef shortages that will happen…it is all a load of crap.  They extend this because it is a payday for them.  Another one.  And you foot the bill.

Resources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_farm_bill

http://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2014/02/07/farm-bill-allows-congress-to-keep-crop-subsidies-secret/

Each newscast is different.  The names, labels, brands used, they always change.  But the basic premise is the same regardless of what it is called.  Abortion.

a·bor·tion  /[uh-bawr-shuh                         n]

noun

1. Also called voluntary abortion. the removal of an embryo or fetus from the uterus in order to end a pregnancy.

2. any of various surgical methods for terminating a pregnancy, especially during the first six months.

The sides used to be called “pro-life” and “pro-choice”.  Those were probably the simplest, the most clear.  One side was in favor of life, the other in favor of choice.

But the second side, the choice side began to think their label didn’t sound as good so they got the media and image groups to come up with new names–for both sides.  Even though only 24% of voters did not identify themselves with one side or the other, that does not matter to the left.  They look for ways to make changes in favor of the smallest minority.

“Pro-choice” just didn’t define the complexity of the issue.  It isn’t complex.  It is simple.

One side, the pro-life side, has a belief and value system that on this issue results in the birth of a baby, the continuation of human life.

The other side, the pro-choice side, believes that a women has the right to choose to make decisions to end the life of a baby, to snuff out a human life, at any time during the gestation period.

If there is a label change to be made, indeed it is with the pro-choice side.  They should go with “pro-death”.

It is ironic.  The left espouses, supports, and yearns for a cradle to grave mentality in as much as the government hand out programs continue.  The bitch, it seems is just getting to the cradle.

If you’ve ever played Risk you recognize the difficulty that comes from trying to conquer, then maintain “Russia” (the greenish colored countries).  Five countries (Ural, Afghanistan, Middle East, Siam, and Kamchatka) are the gateways into Russia, defending against attacks from Alaska, Ukraine, Egypt, East Africa, and Indonesia.  Twelve countries make up the “continent” and owning it is rewarded by an extra 7 armies per turn.  North America, by contrast is only comprised of 9 countries and has to defend 3 ways in.  Owning it is worth an extra 5 armies per turn.

So, why the Parker Brothers geopolitical lesson?  The game parallels today’s current events.   When someone finally makes their play to control that continent, anyone owning those countries in Africa, Europe, America, and Australia have no choice but to attack.  To sit back and wait is to allow that player to consolidate power until they possess such overwhelming force to blast a path through all adjoining continents.  Letting someone control all of Russia is to cower and hope to be eaten last.

It is where we are today.  It is difficult to maintain control of a large continent like Russia.  But, Putin is doing it.  He took Crimea and the world basically yawned.  Obama scolded and John Kerry (Did you know he served in Vietnam?) wagged a finger at him and said “you don’t do that in the 21^st century.”  They both told our fledgling allies that Russian is naked and alone.   But just as in high school, the football jocks with the huge package aren’t at all embarrassed by being seen naked in the locker room.  They may even perversely enjoy it.  Now, he is parked on the eastern edge of the Ukraine with 100,000 troops and armor.  Europe is decidedly not going to be eaten last.

Putin is a bully and a thug.  He is a former KGB Colonel.  He recognizes power and preys on opportunity and weakness.  The world and especially Obama have given him plenty of both.  The only thing he respects (or fears) is someone stronger than him with the demonstrated resolve to use that strength.

I’m not advocating for war.  We’ve had enough of that for a while.  Plus, we don’t have any military-minded or experienced people in positions of decision making where it comes to the use and training of our military.  It is an art and a science.  You don’t enlist at the rank of Sergeant or Colonel.  But we have to do something.  Doing nothing is simply asking to be eaten last.  We’ve been the world’s policeman for so long, it IS our job now.  No one else is going to do it, or could even if we asked them to.

But we could stop him—and without firing a shot (unless he said screw it and attacked.)  K.T. McFarland wrote this great article about how it could be done.

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2014/03/03/how-obama-could-stop-putin-ukraine-power-grab-without-firing-shot/

Will we do it?  I doubt it.  After all, Obama just canceled the two missile programs that won us our last three conflicts.  Yes, the Tomahawk and Hellfire missile programs were quietly defunded this week.  Putin probably cannot believe his good fortune.

Okay, say I’m a small business owner with 20 employees.  5 of them have been with me since the start up and are making, say, $14.00 hourly.  Not a lot of money to be sure, but nothing to sneeze at.  Another 5 have been with me for 3 years are in the $11 range.  The rest are new, less than a year and make either minimum wage or just above it.  The federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour though many states have minimums higher than that.  Here is where the math starts so if you are not careful, your eyes will glaze over.  But here is also where the liberal mindset of a “living wage” starts to impede on small business–the engine of our country’s economy.

Minimum wage times 40 hours is $290. Times 10 employees is $2900 a week.  That is just the newer, lower half of my labor force.  The long timers earn $560 per week.  Five of them:  $2800.  The middle earners, using $11 as a benchmark earn $440 each per week, or $2200.  So, my business has to earn $7900 weekly just to make payroll.  That is almost $95,000 annually in sales just to make payroll.

I’m not really a business owner so I don’t know all of the intricacies of paying the bills for one.  I have a friend who owned a book store.  His roughly 1200 square foot place ran him perhaps $2000 a month in rent.  Ching!  Another $24,000 in sales just to break even.  Now I’m at $119,000.  Add in utilities, and internet (since all businesses have to be able to go online), estimate $375 a month.  Another $4500 a year, and we’re at $123,500.

I could go on and on.  So let’s just say I need $140,000 in sales just to get to the starting line.  No profits are calculated to reinvest/grow the business and no salary for me, the business owner.

However, if you take out the people who are in the food service industry (they earn tips of which they claim only a portion of) and retail (some of whom make commissions), there are really only 1.5% of the labor force that earns the minimum wage.  Most of these people are below the age of 24 and are usually students or in a trainee position.  People learning a job should not expect $60K a year.

Now, the government wants to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 per hour.  It is required if you have a government contract, but that is their target for everyone.  It presents quite a dilemma for the owner.  I have 5 people who have worked for me for three years and have earned their way up from minimum wage (which was probably lower when they started).  Now, by mandate, I have to pay the newest 10 people almost as much as they make.  The 5 middle earners are going to want a raise too.  The top 5 wage earners are going to take notice too.

My choices:

1. Absorb the added costs.
2. Raise prices to my customers
3. Lay off workers to compensate for the added wage costs from the new minimum
4. Reduce hours for my staff to reduce my labor costs.
5. Close the business and lay off 20 people
6. Sell the business and let someone else deal with this

Absorb the costs.  No serious business owner is going to do this for long.  Let’s examine this realistically.  Once $10.10 is approved, they’ll go for $12.00 an hour, then $14.

Raise prices.  This is the simplest way but also the most dangerous.  I may raise prices beyond the acceptable threshold of my customer base and lose business.

Lay off workers to compensate.  This is one of the ways many business owners are fighting wage battles as well as Obamacare budget crunches.  The raise to $10.10 from the current minimum of $7.25 is $2.85 per hour.  Times 40 per week is $114.  Time 10 employees is $1140.  Times twelve months of the year is $13680 annually more I have to pay in labor costs—the easiest controllable expense to manage.  One minimum wage worker makes $15080 annually.  So, if I layoff one worker I almost break even—except for the added cost I’ll have to endure to give everyone a similar wage increase.

Reduce hours across the board.  In this age of shared sacrifice, reducing everyone’s hours is what many in the government would say is most fair.  It’s a stupid and invalid argument.  Why should my best and longest serving workers have to work less time, make less money so that the lowest earning among them make more?  The government says I’m liberating the worker from having to work a full 40-hour week.  Yes, liberating them to go find another job at 40 hours per week so that I lose their experience and drain the brain pool.

Close the business.  If I’m underwater, this could be a viable option.  Shut it down and liberate my team to go find other work.

Sell the business.  Also a viable option.  The government is so rabidly anti small business, one would be crazy to try to do a start up.

Liberals in Washington just see the first stage when they propose legislation like this.  They only see that they think they are helping the working man by providing them with higher wages.  They do not see the ripple effect in the rest of the pond from the pebble they dropped in.  Or if they do see it, they do not care.

Maybe we should treat them all as a small business.  They have to pay their staff out of their own salary budget.  Every time a federal wage increase happens or they want to hire a new page, they have to figure out how to pay for it from their own salary base.  Ah, but that would be too much like making them live in a world of reality.

Another day of the week near the end of the month, another delay in implementing the mandate on individual coverage for citizen’s to buy insurance under Obamacare.

Just two weeks ago, the government stated they had “no statutory authority” to extend the deadline to sign up.  Paraphrase:  It would be illegal for them to extend it.  There is no basis in law.  No legal precedence.  HHS Secretary Sebelius even said, “Once that 2014 open enrollment period has been set, they are set permanently.”

So, they are admittedly breaking the law.  Again.

Harry Reid blames not the poor planning and implementation of the law.  He blames the low educated, the stupid masses.  See, they do not know how to use the Internet so they can’t sign up.

So it is either stupid people or liars to Harry.  They need their grandkids to sign them up and they need to swear on a Bible if they are going to talk to anyone about the ordeal it was in order to sign up.

I have a great idea.  Why not, when the grandkids sign up the old, stupid, let them enter their own credit card number in to pay the premiums!  Granny is probably on a fixed income.  Besides, the money borrowed to pay for the program belongs to the grandkids anyway.

These idiots talk about wage fairness and income redistribution all the time.  They won’t admit that the real redistribution is from their generation to ours–not from the rich to the poor.

It is time to scrap this mistake and replace it with something that works.