Geothermal heating -- worth considering?

[HeyBub]

Seniors on Social Security rarely qualify for food stamps - that monthly payment puts them too high on the revenue ladder.

There will always be "waste." You can't build a house without making sawdust. The object is to REDUCE waste keeping in mind there is a point of diminishing returns that one might hit fairly rapidly.

Maybe a Constitutional Amendment fixing the cost of government at some percentage of GDP, except for emergencies such as war, famine, acts of God, or an attack on the distaff's "girly parts."

The Democrats also controlled Congress during the last two years of the Bush administration. As a reminder, 2007-2008 was when the country's economic system went all to hell.

Coincidence or cause-and-effect? You be the judge.

And support for Obama amongst the Jewish community has dropped a tad. As of Oct 4th, 65% of the Jews support Obama. This contrasts with the 75% support Obama received in 2008.

But do you want to see Obama's Jewish support plummet into the basement, sub-basement, center of the earth?

Consider: The Israeli Air force has but three Hercules C-130 and seven Boeing 707 refueling tankers. Now what if Israel publicly requested the "loan" of, say, twelve air-refueling tankers from the U.S.? Of course the president would decline the request. This refusal would agitate American Jews orgasmless frenzy!

Especially when Netanyahu says (parphrasing Golda Meyer): "The decision is not whether we will fight - we will. The decision is whether we fight with rocks or with every weapon we can muster."

[HeyBub]

No, I don't mean that. I neither said nor implied it,either.

I've thought, for some time, that your capacity for logical thought sometimes vanishes. This is an example.

[HeyBub]

There will always be waste. But fraud?

Fraud occasionally happens in charitable organizations. When it does, though, it is seldom with the frequency and never with the magnitude of that found with government programs. For example, just yesterday (Oct 4th):

"[WASHINGTON] Ninety-one people including doctors, nurses and other medical professionals were charged criminally after an investigation of Medicare fraud that involved $430 million in false billing in seven cities, officials said on Thursday. "

Someone with The Church of the Holy Onion would be hard-pressed to skim $43 dollars from the church's outreach program, let alone $431 million.

[Han]

"HeyBub" wrote in news:Yv6dnfTRUYkEZvPNnZ2dnUVZ [e-mail]:

Fraud happens, yes. In medical professions especially since it is so easy to finesse the system. Happens likely with charitable institutions as well, or at least used to. Nowadays you have to give name and address of the institution you give to.

The "good" thing is that those cheateres are caught more and more often. And, you're right, there probably is a point of diminishing returns.

[Han]

"HeyBub" wrote in news:Z6idnUKty4wyZPPNnZ2dnUVZ [e-mail]:

I have to put a smiley after every time I'm being slightly sarcastic?

OK, here goes: In a sense one could say that making a charitable gift tax deductible is blackmail and diminishes the charitable idea behind that gift.

[Douglas Johnson]

Or we could go back to the various Clinton policies that lead to the roaring

90's. There is a problem with each, as well as your oft-made observation that things went to hell when the Democrats took control of Congress in '07.

The problem is that just because two things happen at the same time does not mean one caused the other, The rooster's crowing does not cause the sunrise. Even if he thinks it does.

No. I asked a serious question and got two sound bite answers. I am very cynical about the ability of any government action to help much with this type of recession. See Reinhart and Rogoff's "This Time is Different".

If trader4 has some serious ideas about stimulus that could have returned the unemployment rate to 7%, I'd like to hear them. Seriously.

-- Doug

[trader4]

The most important thing is free. That's to have a president who is not anti-business. Obama has bitched about drug companies, insurance companies, wall street, banks, oil companies, coal companies.... He has waged class warfare against the class that creates jobs. He has blocked the Keystone pipeline and through the labor dept tried to prevent Boeing from opening it's new plant in SC. A plant that employs thousands to build the new 787 and impacts tens of thousands of jobs across the USA and world. He halted drilling in the Gulf, throwing thousand out of work and costing businesses millions. He's in favor of raising taxes on those making over $200,000 which directly hits many small businesses. And he hit businesses with Obamacare, which raises costs and increases uncertainty. Now, why would folks want to expand, grow or start a new business with that kind of leadership?

First day of a Romney administration, you find the idiots in the labor dept that screwed with Boeing and you fire them with a statement that having govt bureaucrats standing in the way of American business and American jobs isn't going to be tolerated. It will have an effect heard around the world, just like Reagan firing the air traffic controllers. Former high level Soviet officials said that they took note of that one and it was a defining moment even for them in understanding that Reagan meant what he said.

You immediately get the Keystone pipeline going. Again, with the message that you're not going to allow a govt to block a perfectly reasonable energy project that gets us more energy, more national security, and more jobs. There are plenty of other things along that line that can be done to send the correct pro-business message.

You work on a new flatter tax system. You get the top banking executives and business leaders together to meet with the president and figure out what can be done to get the banks lending the money they are sitting on and to get the businesses spending more of the money they are sitting on. Having a meeting with your jobs council, which I understand Obama hasn't done this year would be a good idea too. You freeze govt hiring, because govt is already too big. You celebrate American business and wealth creation, instead of pissing on it.