Here's some thoughts

To be a truly effective political blogger who’s main goal is to influence reform and change in the American Government, you need to be flexible. Case in point, I personally do not like Barrack Obama. I can’t stand him and I know he will go down in history as the President with the potential to be the next JFK who turned out to be more like Carter. His entire administration is a lame duck failure. That being said, sometimes he says something so smart that all but the most hard corps tea partier stops hating for a minute and listens. In the last few weeks President Obama has actually managed to impress me, and I am quite the cynic.

I mean for every universal health care debacle, the guy has a plan for making America better. How can I fault him for wanting to end our countries dependence on middle eastern oil? Will it happen? Not likely as long as big oil companies are making a profit off of regional instability and cheap labor, but that is the sad fact about America. We are not really a free nation anymore, we are a nation caught up in the corporate version of the Matrix. While I understand the reality of what our President wants to do is just impossible because it will destroy corporate profits I can’t blame the man for having a reasonable dream that in the end will benefit the average joe and not the billion dollar industries that have America in a strangle-hold.

Sure the guy hemmed and hawed about sending reinforcements to Afghanistan and then sent a much smaller amount than the commanding General in the region asked for, but then when Libya came up, he jumped right on the international bandwagon and ordered the air strikes. People are faulting the guy for committing U.S. troops to another battle when the two he promised to end are still on-going, but people wake up a minute. We can not find fault with doing the right thing. This mission is not about conquering Libya as our 51st state or stealing the oil from the region, this is to stop a dude who we already knew was a crazy asshole. Now this crazy asshole is slaughtering his people by the hundreds because they want a little freedom. Ask your grandparents what our nation did as a whole without complaining to get rid of the last crazy asshole who slaughtered people by the millions and decided Europe was his personal property? If you don’t get the reference I’m talking about World War II here when the people of this country had no problem driving on bald tires if they drove at all and buying war bonds, and walking their children to the recruiting office to go “do their part.” Today’s American citizen would protest and call it an Illegal war if Chinese tanks were rolling down the street in front of their house. Even President “I’m not George Bush” is now being knocked by the same people who elected him for doing the right thing. That is why this country will never see effective change because the young people who are going to be voting in the coming elections and are raising the next generation of voters are completely incapable of rational thought.

The point I am trying to make is that we as Americans have got to stop listening to the news media to get our information. It is said that us “crazy tea baggin republicans only watch fox news” and the “liberal lefty commies only like MSNBC”. While that is probably true it needs to end, because guess what people? Their opinions are not formed through rational thought and educated analysis of the issue, their opinions are formed by sponsors. If the oil companies pay millions of dollars in advertising dollars to Fox news you can damn well bet they are going to push the republican agenda because the oil companies make more money under a conservative government, and therefore by more advertising, and the same goes for the companies that advertise on MSNBC.

If you want rational political discussion, discussion that will focus on the issues and not who’s paying top dollar for someone’s opinion, do a little research on the internet and discuss it at the dinner table or among friends. The best political discourse I have had is not on the internet or on twitter or watching Bill O’reily, it has been sitting in the cafeteria at my local community college having a burger and talking with my friends. It was the best because we were uninfluenced by special interests or large checks. If more people learned about the issue from unbiased sources more of Obama’s good ideas would make it through the process, and less of his crappy ideas like the health care law would.

Recall Governor Pat Quinn

America, it has come to my attention there is an effort underway to recall the governor of my home state of Illinois. Here at Fix America, I the angry American support this effort. In a time of great financial strain on the American working class, the state of Illinois has decided to raise taxes. They raised the income tax to 5% of your earnings. A 2% increase doesn't seem like alot but lets break it down to an easy to understand number. For every hundred dollars you earn in Illinois, the state is going to take five. That's five dollars for every hundred on top of your social security withholding, your medicare and medicade withholding, and your federal income tax. That means for every hundred dollars made, you will take home if your lucky seventy dollars. Think about that, for every hundred dollars you make, the government is going into your wallet and grabbing thirty bucks before you even get home and start to pay the rent and the car payment and the credit card bills and if there's anything left buy some groceries. The government is the very reason the foreclosure rate is through the roof and children are hungry and living on the streets.

We pay our government so much money we can't afford to pay for our own lives. If the government would turn around and ease the tax burden on employers so they could afford to give the poor working stiffs in this country a raise so the tax hike didn't sting so bad, then maybe people would be ok with paying a little bit more. That would be nice wouldn't it? But what did good old Pat Quinn do? He decided the 2% tax hike wasn't enough, so while promising to help create jobs in Illinois, he kept his fingers crossed behind the podium and jacked up the corporate taxes too.

How in the hell are you going to create jobs in a state when you make it financial suicide to operate in the state. You tell me what business owner in their right minds is going to open shop in Illinois when the taxes in Indiana, Iowa, and Wisconsin just to name a few are a lot lower. Those states know to create jobs you need to give business an incentive to open it's doors in your state.

Quinn's excuse? The state has a budget deficit that we need to fix. Ok fine, the state is broke. I bet you would have a better shot at closing the budget gap if you LOWER taxes. Remember that incentive thing? If you bring jobs to Illinois because of lower taxes, there would be more people working, more people paying their taxes, and you would be spending LESS on unemployment benefits and social welfare programs. Wow what a simple solution!!

Right now Pat Quinn reminds me of Prince John and Speaker Madigan is his Sheriff of Notingham. The way things are going, it won't be long until you see state troopers holding kids upside down and shaking them for their lunch money after all, the only thing that matters to them is wringing as much money out of people as possible. The residents of Illinois may be starving, but hey our budget is balanced so re-elect me!

GO TO HELL GOVERNOR QUINN!

Concealed Carry in Illinois

Today a bill that will allow concealed carry permits in Illinois goes to the house floor for a vote. If you value your constitutional rights, you need to write your representatives and urge them to pass this bill. For too long the law abiding citizens of Illinois have been denied their god given, hard won right to defend themselves. Gun control laws were designed to prevent criminals from getting their hands on firearms and to increase the law abiding citizen's dependency on government protection. In Illinois it is a bigger crime to defend your family and your home than it is to be a drug dealing scumbag. It is time for the good people of Illinois to take back their rights as Americans.

Even if you have no intention of ever owning or firing or carrying a gun, we need your help. If you continue to allow the government to trample our rights, soon we will no longer live in a free and democratic society. We as Americans were given the right to bear arms less to defend ourselves from criminals, but in order to oppose the tyranny of government if it ever became necessary. Don't get it twisted Mr. FBI agent, I know your reading this, I'm not saying we need to overthrow our government, but I am saying we need to let them know that we as citizens are not happy with our rights being violated.

States that have passed carry laws have shown a significant decrease in crime rates since they game the citizens back the right to bear arms. Texas averages 5 murders per hundred thousand people, and illinois averages 6 per hundred thousand. That says to me that the anti gun lobby saying that "concealed carry laws lead to increased violence" is all bunk. In Illinois if you shoot a criminal, they throw you in jail for life, in Texas, they give you a medal and buy you a steak dinner, but Illinois must be safer since we cant carry guns right?

Please, if you feel as strongly about your constitutional rights as I do, and you must if you read this page, Join me at the Illinois Gun Owner Lobby Day (IGOLD) on Thursday March 10th in Springfield Illinois.