Ethics Education

Supervisors, managers and corporate executives are customarily held to a higher standard from that which we demand from common employees. This is to be anticipated since the upper echelon of corporate America is expected to be knowledgeable with all of the company's rules, be a capable leader and to set daily examples for the workers.

Unfortunately, the majority of our corporate leaders fail to live up to these expectations and which brings up questions concerning the corporate environments ethical concerns. In response to the question of "Do I think ethics classes would reduce corporate wrong doing", the answer is an enthusiastic no. I really do not foresee that any ethic classes are able to redeem the corporations from their wrong doing in any way, shape or form. If one were to consider a philosophy known as corporate social responsibility we would eventually discover that the program is actually nothing less than a series of eye candy intended to align their corporate activities with the expectations obtained from the stakeholders. It is in effect a large public relations program.

When a university student finds that he can not calculate simple advanced mathematical problems the university will assign that student to remedial math classes. Similarly at the public servant level, states are taking a similar stance. They are forcing state officials to take curative ethics courses. With this growing popularity of ethics classes several years ago, I signed up for an ethics training course, compliments of the state of California. The course was established by the California State Attorney's office to satisfy the 2005 state law which required such training for all state and local public officials.

The California law, AB 1234 makes it mandatory that the official complete this course within six months of being hired. They have also established requirement to take a refresher course at two-year intervals.

Assuming that similar courses would be established for the corporate leadership, I would have to say that the program would be a failure if not properly managed. First off, as is noticeable with AB 1234, one can not dictate the proper ethics which should be followed. This is something that must be nurtured and developed by the individual himself. Then we encounter the age-old inquiry of how one goes about judging what is actually ethical? When examples are presented concerning this uncertainty of ethics we discover that sporadically the message is clear while at other times it emerges as foggy or undefined. It is not always easy to see the demarcation lines of this.

David Robinson and Chris Garratt in their book "Introducing Ethics" argued that the constant erosion of morals has resulted in a society drained of its values. However, in a time magazine article entitled "Summer of Mistrust" the magazine reported that 72 percent of American's polled feared that public issues concerning ethics were not isolated examples but rather the norm in company's efforts to deceive the people. Adding to this malcontent we discover the American people are utterly sick of the openly unethical dealings which they read in their daily newspaper. To this I too must agree.

I would have to declare that the most common cause as to why ethics fails would be that mankind generally does those actions which are most convenient. By it's very definition an ethical dilemma is defined as an unpleasant choice which relates to a moral principle. It is usually much simpler to do that which is easy to accomplish as opposed to what could be construed as right and proper when confronted by such confusing issues. I feel human beings are prone towards failing personal ethics conditions.

In today's competitive business world CEOs and business leaders do that which is necessary to win. Most people hate being a loser and this is especially noticeable in a business environment. We discover business leaders who are confronted with either winning or being ethical. We have all heard the old saying which relates to how the good guy always finishes last and those that want to win believe that by embracing ethics they would greatly limit their options and opportunities for succeed.

Often people consider morals and ethics as similar peas in different pods however there is a basic fundamental difference. Morals are the fabric where ones personal character is defined whereas ethics presents the actual social system where ones morals can be applied. To phrase it in a slightly different manner, ethics develops from standards of behavior which is expected within society.

A typical example involving ethics and morals would be during a criminal trial the defense attorney may believe that his personal moral code is contradictory to committing murder as the offender has done however the attorneys ethics advises him that his accused client must be defended faithfully even when he knows the party involved is guilty as charged. His ethics demands this defense even in sight of the fact that if freed of this crime the offender would likely commit additional offenses. We see in this case where the legal ethics overrides the personal morals in order to uphold justice.

Fortunately, we are seeing an increased interest in evaluating ethical business practices however as with the California ethics course it can not be peddled as a mandatory course and expected results. It is essentially a new era of understanding for the business leaders where most of the glamour has been removed. Changes in corporate strategies often reveal that clients want key corporate executives who not only can make the company money but also are willing to take a stand on tough ethical decisions which involve integrity and moral values.

My personal philosophy towards ethics is that I do want to be an ethical person as do my fellow human beings. This would indicate that yes perhaps in the future ethics classes may help to a degree towards correcting unethical corporate behavior however we must always remember ethics is never a political issue, a social issue or a business issue. It is purely a personal issue.

Copyright @2012 - Joseph Parish

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The Optional Mandate

I grew up believing that mandates are mandatory. Bedtime was a mandate, as was homework. If you ignored a mandate you suffered consequences, such as getting a bad grade or not being allowed to stay up to watch Topo Gigio on The Ed Sullivan Show.

Later I became a tax professional. Taxes, I learned, are another form of mandate. They are not voluntary contributions. They are not something you can get around to paying in your own sweet time. They are a civic obligation backed by the threat of civil and sometimes criminal sanctions. You can go to jail for not paying taxes. They won't let you stay up to watch Topo Gigio in jail.

So it was confusing when the Supreme Court concluded earlier this year that the Affordable Care Act's "mandate" to purchase health insurance is not a mandate at all, but rather a tax on those who don't buy insurance. Even in the form of a tax, the mandate would still be a mandate.

Except that there really is no mandate of any kind in the controversial health care law. Although both the law's defenders and its critics acknowledge that a mandate is absolutely essential if we are going to enable nearly every American to purchase coverage, the so-called mandate as it currently stands is so toothless that it amounts to nothing more than an emphatic suggestion.

Without a true mandate to purchase health insurance, the people who buy the insurance will, for the most part, be those who are most likely to use it - namely those who are older or sicker than most of us. Younger, healthier people will tend to wait until they are sick before buying coverage, especially if they know that the insurance companies are obliged to sell it and are forbidden to exclude coverage for pre-existing conditions. Those provisions are real mandates in the Affordable Care Act.

If only the old and the sick purchase insurance, the cost of insurance will spiral higher, until it is too high for even those who want it to purchase. Mandatory coverage without mandatory purchase is a recipe to destroy insurance, not provide it.

Both sides know this, so the law requires nearly every American adult to have health insurance (once the requirement takes effect in 2014) or face a financial penalty. To collect that penalty, legislators chose the agency with the most experience getting people to pay up: the Internal Revenue Service.

But there's one big problem. When it comes to collecting the penalty, the IRS is prohibited from using any of the tools in its belt. It cannot jail non-payers for tax evasion. It cannot seize bank accounts or garnish wages. It can't impose any additional penalties. It can't even charge interest on late payments.

It can deduct the penalty from refunds, but only for those who are owed refunds in the first place. Most Americans do receive refunds, but that is simply because they have their employers withhold more from their wages than turns out to be necessary. Those who don't have jobs that withhold taxes, who are probably among the people most likely to forego insurance, and those with the foresight to adjust their withholding to avoid refunds have nothing to worry about.

Fortunately, the IRS has a secret weapon: scary letters. Elizabeth Maresca, a former IRS trial attorney who supervises the Tax & Consumer Litigation Clinic at the Fordham University law school, told The Associated Press she expects the power of the pen to triumph. "Most people pay because they're scared, and I don't think that's going to change," she said. (1) She neglected to mention that, usually, people have something to be scared of.

There is also the question of whether fear of the penalty, even if induced by the IRS's special brand of terrifying prose, would really be enough to prompt people to pay the much higher cost of insurance. The penalty for non-compliance, which will be phased in between 2014 and 2016, will be the greater of $695 for each uninsured adult or 2.5 percent of family income, up to $12,500. The average annual premium for an individual in 2011, meanwhile, was $2,196. Given the Affordable Care Act's distinct lack of any provisions to make care more affordable, that figure is only likely to increase.

As Chief Justice John Roberts wrote, many people will find it a "reasonable financial decision to make the payment rather than purchase insurance." Doing so will not be in any way illegal, and avoiding both the cost of the insurance and the penalty will be illegal in name only.

It is not too surprising that Democrats are eager to ignore these pesky problems. They know that the law needs a mandate to work. But they also know that hauling people off to jail for not having health insurance would be bad for the political health of Democratic officeholders.

What's more surprising is that Republicans seem just as invested in talking about the Democrats' make-believe legislation rather than the law that actually exists. Instead of focusing their critique on the fact that, as it stands, the health care law will be economically disastrous, Republicans have spent their time lambasting the non-existent mandate.

The collective delusion reached new extremes recently when Mitt Romney said during an interview on NBC's "Meet the Press" that, despite his opposition to the Affordable Care Act, he still wants to "make sure that those with pre-existing conditions can get coverage." An aide tried to sweep up for the GOP presidential candidate afterward, saying Romney meant that the free market, not government regulation, should ensure coverage for those with pre-existing conditions. Regardless of what he meant, Romney's comments play into the Democratic myth that it is possible to extend coverage to people who have preexisting conditions without a real mechanism to mandate insurance purchases by people who are not already sick.

There are two real choices: Require insurers to offer coverage to everyone and require everyone to buy that coverage, or don't do either. Pretending that we can do the first without the second will get us nowhere.

It's good that the two parties finally agree on something. It's just too bad that something is the decision to ignore reality.

Source:

1) USA Today, "Can IRS manage to police taxes and health care law?"

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Playing With Job and Economic Numbers Prior to Elections Pondered

Some find it absolutely convenient that the unemployment stats from the Federal BLS came out at 7.8% which would be a 3% drop from the previous quarter. That is highly unlikely and almost inconceivable, or as one former CEO put it; implausible. Indeed, I tend to agree those numbers do not even make it into the category of; plausibly deniable. More like impossible if you ask me. Nevertheless since this is such a heated debate, let's talk about it.

The New York Times had an interesting article on October 5, 2012 titled; "Drop in Jobless Figure Gives Jolt to Race for President," by Shaila Dewan and Mark Landler. The article reported 7.8% unemployment figures coinciding with the early voting opening in the swing states. Jack Welch, former CEO of General Electric then tweeted: "Unbelievable jobs numbers..these Chicago guys will do anything..can't debate so change numbers?"

Interestingly enough, I had predicted that this would happen, why you ask? Simply looking back at how the Administration had played the numbers prior to other events such as the State of the Union Speech, or Mid-Term elections, and then later conveniently revised the numbers back down. In watching this, I've seen it happen 4-other times, but this time was rather curious. Thus, I hope I can expand this thought for a moment if I might.

You see, quite frankly, it is rather obvious that the questions in the 60,000 household survey were asked differently, in a different way, called upon a different skew (i.e. more people in ND than usual), or criteria was slightly altered to achieve this result. Liars figure and figures lie, and well, Jack Welch is correct, something is amiss, and this is implausible. Thus, I charge the administration with playing games with economic numbers just before the election, a typical socialist move, in fact, it is done all over the world with socialist leaders.

Of course, the Democrats now deny anyone fudged the numbers and now wishes to challenge anyone who challenges them, by making us prove how they fudged the numbers, still, no one will make the data readily available or show how the criteria was changed. Okay so, let me give you a different scenario on how hard it is to prove animal abuse as an example. The philosophical line of questioning might go something like this;

I can't prove what you kicked your dog with, but your dog is on the floor bleeding and it is scared of you, thus, with all the evidence available I believe you kicked your dog, and since you've done it before, I'd say that's the most likely scenario. So, please tell me which shoes you were wearing, and we can blame it on the shoes if that pleases you? Now do you see my point here?

The BLS (United States Bureau of Labor and Statistics) has quite often revised their numbers previously, often after coming out with stellar numbers during an event such as EU banking crisis, mid-term elections, stock market pull-backs, etc. It's almost become a propaganda machine for the government, and granted consumer confidence is paramount to a strong economic recovery, but that doesn't make it okay to create false data, especially to save a politician from his rhetoric or piss-poor economic performance.

Since Obama has never run a business and leans left towards socialism in the way he runs the nation; "fair share for all" motif as were his closing remarks in the recent debate against Mitt Romney his challenger we can forgive him, but regardless, I must ask; "Did the Obama Administration put heavy handed pressure on that agency (BLS) to produce the numbers they were looking for to propel the Obama Administration's re-election one day before early mail-in voting and early voting in swing states?"

Indeed, I think that question deserves an answer, and an investigation. If the investigation takes longer than the end of this political campaigning, and if emails, or correspondence are found to suggest what I am asking, then removal from office would be the proper way to deal with it. If he's not re-elected, then at least we will know. Please consider all this and think on it.

Lance Winslow has launched a new provocative series of eBooks on Economic Issues. Lance Winslow is a retired Founder of a Nationwide Franchise Chain, and now runs the Online Think Tank; http://www.worldthinktank.net/

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Is 47 Percent Good Enough?

It is no surprise that Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney once again has found himself in hot water over comments he made at a fundraiser. As discussed in previous articles, Romney's propensity to "misstate" his positions comes less from jumbled words and more from a value system that isn't always in sync with the majority of Americans. It appears this is yet another example.

The troubling part of the current flap is that it reveals a fundamental belief that effective governance is meant only for those who support you electorally. Karl Rove's legacy is apparently alive and well-and one of the greatest reasons why political leadership is at an abysmal low. Being a leader isn't about only creating policies, plans and strategies to meet the needs of some of the people, it is having the ability to transcend the divides and create solutions that meet the needs of the majority of people.

Creating real world results is a hallmark of effective leadership and those cannot be achieved if one is only interested in meeting the needs of less than half of his constituents. Further disconcerting is the notion that the "other" half are victims and merely wanting to soak off government. Not only is the representation completely inaccurate, it creates an environment where other opinions and ideas are toxic because the people expressing them have absolutely no "value" in the eyes of this hopeful leader. This will never be the foundation for success.

Which brings us to the truth of the current state of American politics. Between political consultants that dissect the electorate to carve a precarious path to electoral victory and the vitriol spewed on cable "news" that demonizes anyone with values and ideas other than their own, we have become a body politic incapable of talking with one another, let alone create solutions that actually work. And here is what no one is willing to say-that until we learn to talk with one another creating any lasting solutions to our policy challenges is impossible.

So let the mudslinging continue. Allow our candidates to say that nearly half the citizens of this country don't deserve their leadership and then watch us continually slip into the morass of separate and intolerance.

The only hope is to begin looking for understanding and for leaders willing to stand up and say everyone in this country deserves to have a voice... which is what I believe our Founders said to us more than two centuries ago.

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Potential Results From Obamacare

Here I am sitting once again at my desk and allowing my mind to wander this way and that. Gradually, I have come to the realization that once Obamacare fully kicks in we will likely perceive some pretty dramatic changes involving our medical services. Nothing will be as we currently know it. Since our federal government will at that time assume control of all the costs and become the final approving authority for what medical procedures are acceptable for the insurance company we will witness a vast number of private medical care facilities popping up around the country. Given that these are in fact private enterprises it only stands to reason that more of these facilities will open their doors to members only. This creates a serious hazard for the public in several ways.

You may ask how that will affect the medical services being offered. It is important to realize also that these private care facilities are just that - they are private. In no way can the government demand that they provide medical care for the common folks or to anyone that merely knocks on that door. The personnel may feel a certain moral obligation but there certainly would be no legal basis to help.

Let me briefly explain what will happen here. If you have a medical emergency and you are taken to a private medical care facility they are under no obligation to treat you. Private concerns will not be under any obligation to treat anyone who may not be a card-carrying member of their group.

Secondly, our country will experience a medical brain drain such as has occurred in other socialized medical nations. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand that the more competent of the professionals well readily accept positions with these private concerns where they are able to make a successful and lucrative living. The public sector will be left with those personnel that are less than proficient and often questionable at best.

It doesn't sound very enticing at all does it? However, we have to remember when our government gets involved in any activities which are not their concern the results are usually not very appealing and always leaves an unpleasant taste in our mouths. I just wanted to bring those thoughts to the table for further consideration as I see it coming as soon as next year. What are your thoughts on this?

Copyright @2012 Joseph Parish

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Dems Prematurely Replace "Blame Bush" With "Blame Romney"

Has Mitt Romney sewed up the 2012 election and begun issuing policy pronouncements via the Office of the President-Elect? That's what you'd think to hear mainstream news commentators tell it.

Witness the media uproar over Romney's absolutely true, courageously firm observation that President Obama's State Department is more interested in sparing the feelings of Muslim terrorists than standing up for American values.

Rather than evaluating and refuting his charges; rather than critically reexamining Obama's approach; rather than considering the repercussions of the President's conciliatory stance toward our enemies; liberals... blamed the crisis on someone who doesn't even work for the government.

Rachel Maddow cried that we were in the middle of a tense, hair-trigger confrontation requiring suave diplomatic prowess, and that Romney may just have sent rioting protestors over the top.

Newsflash, MSNBC hosts: Rioting protestors were already over the top-literally, in the case of the embassy walls they scaled and the black Al Qaeda victory banners they hoisted after tearing down and burning American flags in Egypt and Libya.

Muslim fanaticists don't need an excuse to wreak havoc against the West. A few boilerplate conservative statements by an American presidential candidate don't rouse them from a stance of tranquil tolerance to one of prickly outrage. They're already perpetually in a state of prickly outrage.

Rioters didn't require a shoddy 14-minute YouTube film trailer to cause mayhem on September 11. They were already sufficiently motivated to murder American ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens and drag his body through the streets. Even the Obama administration now admits that Stevens' murder was a terrorist attack, and new evidence suggests that Al Qaeda was behind it.

But by liberals' calculation, the real policy-driver, the de facto Commander in Chief, the actual mover and shaker who's screwing up the Middle East, is an unemployed father of five struggling to keep even with Obama in the polls.

Consider the essence of Democrats' "Blame Bush" strategy, which they initiated at the height of the 2008 presidential campaign season and have continued right up through August's lousy job numbers. Remember that their approach did not merely take Bush to task for things he did wrong. Most conservatives will happily rattle off a laundry list of complaints about Bush, from his expanding government entitlement programs to his failing to win the Iraq War early and decisively enough.

No, "Blame Bush" was the catchall excuse Democrats evolved to protect Obama from unflattering comparisons to the far more experienced Republican candidate Senator John McCain, and from criticism of his handling of the economy and international relations once President.

Obama wasted four years spending the country into oblivion; but when we failed to recover from the recession, Democrats blamed Bush for leaving him an economy much worse than was imaginable by anyone, including liberal economists we were supposed to trust regarding the restorative effect of Obama's stimulus bill.

Obama spent four years bowing and scraping before our enemies; but when he pledged to sit down and talk with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad without preconditions, and Iran responded by defying the international prohibition on continuing its nuclear weapons program, Democrats blamed Bush for creating a hostile negotiation environment.

If Mitt Romney is elected president, Democrats' strategy will transition from blaming everything on Bush to blaming it on Romney, as though Obama's four-year stint in the White House left no trace.

But I don't know anyone who anticipated that Democrats would be desperate enough to start blaming the unelected Romney for Obama's failures.

Of course the real culprit behind the foreign policy debacle in Libya and Egypt is not Romney but Obama. It was Obama's State Department that failed to adequately secure the breached embassies ahead of 9/11, despite warnings of attacks; failed to deploy Marines to secure the premises; released from Gitmo a detainee involved in the attacks; fell all over themselves to issue apologies for Americans' trampling on Muslim sensibilities; harassed the director of the trailer for making the video, Pastor Terry Jones for promoting it, and Google and YouTube for hosting it; and spent four years denying that America stands for any particular virtues that are superior to those of any other country.

Mitt Romney's Libya statement-like his 47% "gaffe" earlier this week-provided a badly needed kick in the pants to a nation accustomed to four years of Obama. Romney's clarification of the situation in Libya and Egypt constituted the proverbial wakeup call: "The first step in realizing our country is weak under Obama is realizing we have a problem."

But who will Democrats blame Obama's failures on for the next four years if Romney loses?

Previously published in modified form at Red Alert Politics

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Covenant of Ulster Parades - We Take a Step Back to See Orange Marches for What They Really Are

100 years ago today 500,000 people in Ulster signed a pledge to resist the imposition of home rule for Ireland, by force of arms if necessary. It seems odd today that the British government was on the side of Irish nationalists but at the time that was the case, it was the common folk of Ulster that didn't want Irish home rule. But what does it mean to be a member of the Orange Order today and why do they like to parade?

For anyone but Ulster Protestants these parades are confusing. To nationalists they are insulting, intimidating and misunderstood. To anyone not from Ireland they are just strange. But to Ulster Protestants these parades and the organisations that go with them are central to their culture. They are a connection to the past, an assertion of identity and a source of strength in a world that seems 'out to get' them.

Over the past 30 years Ulster Unionists have seen their power, dominance and control of Northern Ireland taken from them as part of the peace process. Nobody in their right mind would say that this is a bad thing, equality is largely a reality today and long may it continue. However to a working class unionist, it feels like they have suffered an unrelenting string of humiliations and that everything 'goes to them', meaning of course the nationalist community.

I will resist the urge to launch into a full diatribe about the need for tribalism in our evolutionary past, however we should state that human beings are tribal. We need to feel part of a larger whole, and it helps to have an opposing tribe to cement this.

These marches are unionist mutual grooming, a reaffirmation of the tribe and their shared strength in a world that has them locked in a siege mentality. Put yourself in the position of a young, possibly unemployed, man from Belfast. You're once proud community and culture has been eroded by your enemies who you are told you must respect. Wouldn't it feel good to march alongside your brothers in arms and to publicly state your pride in your history?

It will take many years but we hope that one day these feeling will subside on all sides, and that the marches can be seen as an expression of Irish history and the culture of many of the islands inhabitants without out causing insult to anyone else.

This article was brought to you by Richard Hamilton of Whole Story News.

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The World's Soundest Ponzi Scheme

Can Social Security, which is on a steepening glide path toward insolvency, be described as "structurally sound?"

According to President Obama, the answer is yes - and I think Obama, like most of his fellow Democrats, believes it. Most Republicans do not, but since saying so puts the onus on them to say exactly what they would do about it (always a politically dicey exercise), they tend not to talk too much about it at all.

I thought the contrast was one of the most illustrative points to come out of the first presidential debate between Obama and his challenger, Mitt Romney.

Setting aside assessments about who "won" or "lost" the debate (and there was a remarkable consensus that Romney outperformed Obama), the president, intentionally or otherwise, clearly illustrated the differences in the two sides' approaches to entitlement reform. Democrats see Social Security as a social contract in which each generation assumes responsibility to provide for the one that came before it. Republicans see Social Security as both an empty promise and an unfair obligation that older generations seek to foist upon their children and grandchildren.

So I believe the president meant it when he said "Social Security is structurally sound. It's going to have to be tweaked the way it was by Ronald Reagan and Democratic Speaker Tip O'Neill. But [... ] the basic structure is sound." (1)

He was talking about the Reagan-era National Commission on Social Security Reform, headed by Alan Greenspan, who later became a household name as chairman of the Federal Reserve. The commission's approach was to gradually raise the retirement age from 65 to 67, to increase the self-employment tax and allow for partial taxation of benefits to upper income retirees, and to expand Social Security's coverage (and, more importantly, its income from payroll taxes) to include federal civilian and nonprofit organization employees. These are the sort of tweaks that, presumably, the president has in mind for the future.

In reality, Social Security is an unfunded promise, despite the accounting gimmick of a having its own trust fund. Taxes paid by today's workers are used to cover the benefits of today's retirees. The government is not putting aside any of the taxes that today's workers pay to fund their own future benefits.

From Obama's point of view, this state of affairs is not a problem in and of itself, because Social Security's struggles are, to him, fundamentally a function of its social obligation. Today's younger workers are taking care of their parents; in turn, their children (many of whom are, as yet, unborn) will one day take care of them.

Unfortunately, the math on this theory doesn't work, as the Social Security trustees point out regularly. In their yearly report this spring, the Board of Trustees announced that the combined trust funds are currently projected to run out in 2033. Most 2012 college graduates will be in their early 40s then. The new deadline is three years sooner than the one the trustees predicted in last year's report.

But Obama wants to rely on tweaks to keep Social Security afloat. Doing so will inevitably mean today's young workers will retire later and pay higher taxes in order to cover the government's promises. The trustees say that, after 2033, the program's income will cover about 75 percent of promised benefits. The extra 25 percent will have to come from workers in the form of higher taxes, retirees in the form of lower benefits, or both.

For Republicans, rather than a fundamentally sound plan that faces social problems, Social Security is an inter-generational Ponzi scheme. What happens if today's workers don't have enough children? Or if those children don't have enough jobs? Or if those jobs don't pay enough to support the promised benefits for long-lived baby boomers then still collecting their checks, let alone for the Gen Xers and millennials eventually retiring behind them?

During the same debate, Romney said that the country's deficit is "a moral issue." (1) He meant that it is not only impractical, but immoral for today's older adults to leave their children with tens of trillions of dollars in federal debt and, at the same time, to refuse to fix Social Security in any way that would make the program self-sustaining - or, alternately, to take the plunge and make it the welfare program in name that it always has been in practice.

For the second year in a row, Social Security benefit payouts have exceeded the program's income through tax revenue, thanks to the temporary cut in the FICA tax. The government only "balances" the program with fictitious interest, which is really just a pile of governmental IOUs. Those IOUs are not very useful when it comes time to pay benefits to retirees who expect them. The gap between today's FICA tax receipts and today's retirement benefit payments is being plugged by money that the Treasury is borrowing, mostly from foreign countries and the Federal Reserve.

To Obama and his party, Social Security can never go broke, and hence it is fundamentally sound. His generation (which is also mine) has paid for our parents' retirement; our children can be counted upon to pay for ours. If such reciprocity doesn't actually work, just tweak it. Their theory is that with enough tweaks, Social Security can continue to be the most structurally sound Ponzi scheme in the world.

Source:

1) The New York Times, "Transcript of the First Presidential Debate"

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Republican Class Wars

Over the last four years, Republicans have been accusing President Obama and Congressional Democrats of practicing class wars. I have not seen that; I do however know of a much uglier war of the sort that has been fomented by Reagan Republicans for the last 30 years. That war is of course against "liberal elites."

If one is to practice demagoguery, one must direct people's attention against someone who is at a higher place in society than are they. And while the Marxist directs that attention against businessmen, the Reagan Republican directs it against scientists, journalists and artists. In both cases a great wrong is done. And since the Republican-fomented class wars are much more prevalent in America than are the Marxist ones, it is these that need to be scrutinized the most.

These class wars are making it hard for the people at their receiving end to do their job; the result of that is disastrous to America. Science is at the root of all technology, which means that it is at the root of all prosperity, and without it capitalism would be nothing more than exchange of basic commodities at the level it was in Medieval Persia. Journalists inform people about what is happening in the world, and if they aren't allowed to do so truthfully then the public is blind. As for arts, these are the flowering of civilization, its gift to the world and the thing from which it derives its name; and good art continues to exist long after all of one's contemporaries are dead. All of these are very important pursuits, and attacking these pursuits is ruinous to the country.

Is the Marxist class warrior better than the Republican one? No; but the problem is as follows. The Republicans keep falsely accusing Democrats of practicing class wars when they are themselves guilty of practicing them to a much greater extent. And while there are places in the world in which the Marxist class wars are still taking place, America is not one of those places. Instead America has seen Republican wars against the more successful people of Democratic persuasion, to grave detriment to America and to needless suffering inflicted upon all sorts of good people in America and elsewhere in the world.

So whenever a Republican starts accusing Obama or anyone else of practicing class wars, let it be remembered who is behind real class wars in America. It is not Obama, and it is not the Democrats. It is Reagan Republicans that have caused the worst class wars on American soil, and America has suffered as a result.

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The Potential in All of Us

I found a story on American Public Media's Marketplace fascinating. The interview discussed a recent paper by researchers at Stanford and Harvard that reveal that employers are more interested in what you may accomplish that what you already have. Essentially, people want to believe in the promise of what someone has to offer more than they are convinced by the power of what they have already done.

This is a fundamental concept I have been teaching for the past two decades of my leadership work-what we believe we can create, we will.

George Stephanopoulos hadn't hosted a Sunday news program until he did it, no man (for the moment) has served as president until he starts the job, as is true for everyone-you haven't done it until you have done it. So the belief that you aren't capable of doing a job just because you don't have prior experience turns out to not only be a self-defeating belief, it is the one that will stop potential employers from seeing your promise and hiring you!

Too many people fall into the trap of thinking they are only as good as their previous experiences and if that were true how would anyone do anything new or different?

Living the leadership choice is how I teach people to see their talents, skills and passion in a way that allows them to live into their full potential, to move toward fresh experiences and to climb to new heights. They are successful not because they have already done exactly what they aspire to do, rather because the combination of accumulated expertise combined with their passion for doing something innovative makes them uniquely qualified to do it. The key to success is seeing who you truly are and effectively communicating it to others-so that they can see it in you and provide you the opportunity and support to make it a reality.

Leadership is not about becoming something you are not-it is about being the best of who you are already. It doesn't matter if you are unemployed, a recent graduate or a seasoned professional yearning for fresh challenges, the key to creating what you want is to believe that you can and to demonstrate it by owning the qualities you already possess. It is this formula that makes success not only probable, but also possible.

Being yourself and expressing to others what you want to do is the only way to make lead the life you want to live. Being a leader in your life is giving yourself the opportunity to dream it and then taking action to make it a reality.

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Underhanded Politics In Presidential Elections Considered - Case Study

We have rules in our society for corporations which state that you cannot lay someone off unless you give them a 60 day notice (Warren Act) that you might lay them off in advance. This allows them to make changes in their life, perhaps get their finances in order, or even look for a new job. Most workers applaud this new rule because it helps them from an unexpected layoff. Those are the rules, and every corporation must follow them.

Recently, there was a company which was getting ready to issue the 60 day notices and they were a defense contractor. The automatic cuts to the Pentagon budget were approaching very quickly and the Republicans and Democrats had made no effort to stop it. The defense company had no choice but to issue the layoff notices, fearing that it would have to drastically cut its workforce if the government was to stop buying their products and services.

There was an interesting article in the Business Journal Newspaper on September 28, 2012. And another one in Dark Government online the same day titled; "Obama Administration Asking Contractors Again, 'Don't Issue Layoff Notices'," which stated;

"The Obama administration issued new guidance intended for defense contractors Friday afternoon, reiterating the administration's position that the companies should not be issuing layoff notices over sequestration. The Labor Department issued guidance in July saying it would be "inappropriate" for contractors to issue notices of potential layoffs tied to sequestration cuts."

A few days later, the Obama Administration and their lawyers guaranteed the defense contractor that they would give them a waiver to the 60 day layoff notice rule, and pay any workers laid off their severance pay for any of the days between the 60 day layoff rule and when they were actually let go in case they were unable to get new government contracts. Now then, I have a problem with this, because now we are playing politics with the rules and regulations, allowing one company a waiver, because the president and his administration didn't want any negative news (massive layoffs) in the newspaper in a swing state, namely; Virginia outside Washington DC.

Now it has become a big political football because the Republicans are crying foul, and rightfully so, while the Democrats are saying that the defense contractor wanted to purposely do this to help defeat President Obama in the 2012 November 6 election. If a presidential administration is willing to give waivers to some companies, while making other companies follow the rules, then in essence they are helping some companies break the rules that everyone else has to follow. Not to mention the fact that it was a Democratic congressperson that brought forth the bill, making layoff notices a requirement, in the first place.

To me, this is just one more underhanded move in presidential politics, and it smacks of crony capitalism, abuse of power, and using presidential executive orders and the oval office as a tool of intimidation. That's not the country I signed up for, and that is not the country that promises equality under the law. I am quite concerned and deeply troubled, and this sort of behavior isn't good enough not for my country. I hope you feel the same, and then vote appropriately.

Lance Winslow has launched a new provocative series of eBooks on Political Concepts. Lance Winslow is a retired Founder of a Nationwide Franchise Chain, and now runs the Online Think Tank; http://www.worldthinktank.net/

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2012 Republican Ethics

Since the late 1970s I have followed political candidates and each party's platform with a personal blend of inquisitiveness, awe and learning. I began my political fascination in the Democratic camp under Jimmy Carter, switched to the Republican side under Ronald Reagan and back to the Democratic platform when Bill Clinton came into the picture. During Clinton's presidency I changed my affiliation of record to "Independent" as I saw strong candidates on both sides of the political arena that had something worthwhile to offer.

I wanted to know what each candidate's vision, values, candor, sincerity, track record, "personability" and aura of "presidentialism" traits were firsthand. In my years of political enthrallment I would watch each political party's entire convention. I saw teamwork, support, guidance and revelation in the political discourse on both sides. I studied every candidate and made informed decisions of my own accord instead of following the public consensus of what I regarded as an uninformed majority. Too many people know very little but they speak it fluently. Politics can be grand. It has weeded out the weak candidates and given the public a means to identify our leader(s). Government is after all... for the people.

2012 however, has redefined what political leadership is, or can be. The Republican Party (RP) once touted that they were part of the "Moral Majority" implying that they had God on their side and would only do the right things. In August 2004 for example, on CBS's 60 Minutes, President George W. Bush was asked "Before declaring war on Iraq, did you consult with your father (ex-President George H. W. Bush)?" Bush replied, "No. I consulted with a higher Father."

Today, the RP carries an intangible air of superiority. The platform resonates with such banners as "kill abortion with forced vaginal probe ultrasounds," marriage sanctity definitions, medicare reductions, repeal of medical care for ALL Americans (i.e.- Obamacare) and protection for the wealthy from modest taxation to build America whole again. Their basic arithmetic however does not add up. Because Republican members blend faith into the mix with their rhetoric they imply that God continues to be somehow on their side and the enemies are Democrats who are weakening the genetic pool of America.

Misguided, uninformed "moral" arguments are pervasive in our daily discourse cloaked with fear and confusion BUT in 30 years of following the political landscape I have never witnessed so much incompetence, racism and blatant lies in the political debate, primarily from Republicans. Newt Gingrich wants to replace janitors with the students themselves in our elementary schools, and even colonize the moon!? Herman Cain's excuses his lack of world knowledge because he is a "leader not a reader?" Mitt Romney discounts the 47% of Americans who reap rewards earned in Social Security benefits, veteran benefits or unemployment benefits and frowns on those who earn subsistence income that is below the thresholds of Federal tax liability. Grand Cayman accounts, China investments, off-shoring, reckless war mongering rhetoric, Veteran oversight errors, self-deportation suggestions, company closures and tax relief for the wealthy paint Romney as a flip flopping puppet of the elite that cannot run a campaign, let alone a country.

Deceptive ads from Romney, American Crossroads aka Karl Rove and the RP are considered "acceptable" as long as they are anti-Obama; turning a blind eye to ethical competition casts a deep shadow on the integrity of the candidates. Rush Limbaugh diatribes insult the intellect to earn a buck. John Boehner's criticism of President Obama for his "lack of focus" on the economy ring hollow when he has the House of Representatives debating whether "In God We Trust" should be our national motto, Paul Ryan's claim for political clout that a GM plant that shut down in Janesville, WI (his hometown) should be blamed on Obama when he knows Obama was not President at the time are just a few examples of falsehoods and misinformation campaigns. To add more insult to the American intellect, Fox News and Sean Hannity for example, surreptitiously combine protest footage between the Spring and Fall to imply "big problems in Washington" and then recant saying it was "an inadvertent mistake."

Mitch McConnell, Senate Minority leader, has stated that his top priority is NOT rebuilding the economy but rather to "make Obama a one-term President." Broad-based "objectionism," for the sake of hate, using the American people as pawns, is not leadership. Sarah Palin and Michelle Bachman combine eloquent charm with vitriol to mask truth. This is the highest office in the nation, a Presidential race, which demands honesty, the facts and a sound plan!

It is clear that many in the GOP (aka RP) have lost their moral compass and must now contend with Romney's touted "rolling calamity" campaign. Taking a position that is opposite of your opponent just because it will "differentiate" you from the competition is no sound strategy. Where is the substance?!The fact that both ex-President's Bush could have endorsed Romney in person at the Republican National Convention, yet they abstained, tells a story by itself. Jindal, Christie and Santorum surrogates have seemingly abandoned their front-runner. If only Wishy-Washy Republicans could "etch-a-sketch" themselves into new leaders maybe we could start to have earnest discussion with individuals who have the intellect, desire, forthrightness, ability and desire to really move our collective America into the future... TOGETHER!

Enrique Ruiz, CDE, CM, MBA, PgMP
http://www.americasdiversityleader.com/

Enrique Ruiz (Rick) is President of PositivePsyche.Biz Corp. His global expertise spans commercial, defense and IT industries on two continents. He has a successful track record of building diverse, dynamic and multicultural teams with workforces up to 15,000 strong. He is a Hispanic-American that has lived in 3 countries and worked in four. He is fluent in Spanish, studied other languages and engaged in several faiths. He has published several books and provides consulting, training and speaking services on leadership, program management and diversity management.

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A Non-Satanic "New World Order"

It has been stated that, while the conservative elites want a global economy, the liberal ones want a global government. The latter is regarded as being a threat to freedom and sovereignty. I would like to propose an arrangement that is no threat to either of these things and that not only does not result in "a brave new world" or any other totalitarian scenario but enhances liberty and benefit for every person involved.

I propose these two conditions: Each place having the right to its own institutions and its own character; and a free flux of people among the places so that they can find the place that works for them. That way, freedom will be upheld at both the national and the individual levels. Each country will be able to define its character and institutions; and individuals will be able to move around the world to find a country to which they are the most suited.

This is, to a limited extent, the status quo already; and I want to see it taken to a greater extent. Right now, moving among the countries is a possibility for only some people. It should be a possibility for everyone. The more this is the possibility, the greater the benefit at every level. If a country insists on being nasty to its people, then this arrangement will allow people to get out of the country and to continue getting out of the country until the country changes its ways. If a country chooses to be good to its people, then this arrangement will result in more people getting into the country. And this will result in people benefiting everywhere, in countries that choose to be good to their people winning, and in all countries being incentivized to treat their people right.

The positive achieved will be twofold. One is that people will have real freedom - meaning, a real choice of lifestyles - a choice which they will find expressed by different institutions and different cultures in different places in the world. The other is that the governments and the non-government powers in the countries of the world will be put under competitive pressure to treat their people right. And this will benefit people at every level, resulting both in greater choice for them and in better conditions for them in every country. A regime that is horrible to the people will not be able to survive for long in such a situation. All countries will have a very present and very real incentive to have a good government and to treat their people right.

While there are people who howl about the "Satanic New World Order conspiracy," this is in no way satanic nor is this a threat to anyone's sovereignty. This is a real-world way to maximize liberty and well-being. Each place would get to have its own character and institutions; and people would be free to move between places to find a place that works for them. And in this mix, it is the countries that treat their people the best that would come out winners, and all other countries would be put under competitive pressure to improve how they treat their citizens (or, otherwise, they would see their citizens leave in large numbers and see their country weakened as a result).

The world will continue to exist; the question is, in what form. Any world order that is created will be binding on its participants. I put it forth that a world in which there is both national sovereignty and individual freedom of movement will result in both freedom and benefit being maximized. Each place will have its own character; people will be free to find a place that works best for them; and every country and every government will be put under competitive pressure to be good to its people, resulting in people benefiting all across the board.

In this model, we can see maximum liberty and maximal benefit. Each country decides its identity; each person decides which country's identity is most appropriate to themselves. The countries that treat their people right get to grow in size and power, while the other countries are made to improve the way they treat the people if they want to keep their people. The best of ideas behind America get to shape political reality. And the world order created is the same one that has created the American federal system, but applied on a larger scale and to greater global effect.

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Do You Stand Firm Upon Your Convictions? Movie Review of Last Ounce of Courage

Conviction is standing firm in what you believe, even in the face of ridicule and persecution. Imprisonment is being afraid to stand up for what you believe in for fear of ridicule and persecution.

My husband, John and I, went to see the movie, Last Ounce of Courage, this afternoon. It's a faith-based, independent film and we went to see it for a few different reasons. One reason we went to see the movie was for the entertainment value in seeing an inspirational, faith-based movie. It's nice to watch a movie where there is no profanity or other promiscuous behavior... and it's a decent, intriguing movie as far as movies go.

Another, even more important, reason we went to see Last Ounce of Courage was that if we want to see more faith-based movies produced, then we need to support the ones that actually are shown in theaters. The more people that go to the theaters to see these inspirational movies, the more revenue they make and then more movies-of good caliber-will be made.

The final reason that we went to watch this movie was for the message it promoted. The movie tells the story of a teenage boy whose father was a soldier who died. The boy and his mother come back home fourteen years later and there is a time of reconnecting with the boy and his grandfather.

So where does the theme of freedom come into play? The boy's grandfather is the town Mayor, who decides it's time to start standing up for his convictions again... especially after he is prompted to by his teenage grandson. The storyline unfolds and freedom of speech and religion is fought for as they try to restore the true meaning of Christmas and the right to have a cross with the words: Jesus Saves, written on it and displayed on the town mission-after someone tried to have them take the cross down.

How much do you value your Freedom of Speech? "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

I believe that everyone has a right to his or her own opinion and that he or she can speak that opinion freely ~ that's the beauty of FREEDOM of SPEECH. I love this country and love my God and want to make a difference in this world, even if it's only something small like expressing my thoughts and ideas in writing.

That's why I vote now ~ because I can and because I need to. If I don't vote, who will? That's the mindset we need to have. Just imagine if we ALL said oh my vote doesn't count and no one went to the polls. What message does that send to the Government? It says that you can have carte blanche and ram down any laws into our throats that you want to. Isn't it time for a voting revolution? Yes, I did mean revolution, but a peaceful one that takes us back to the principles of our Founding Fathers. Isn't it time to get back to the Constitution?

Regardless of whether or not you and I believe the same thing, it doesn't matter. That's the FREEDOM of living in this great country. No one can tell you how to live your life in the pursuit of happiness ~ no one can tell you what religion to practice or to believe or not believe in God ~ no one can stop your peaceable assemblies ~ no one can stop you from petitioning the Government for a redress of grievances, even if they think you're only "astroturf" and not a real grassroots movement.

I'm preaching to myself here, too-now is the time to make a difference and start contacting our leaders in Government and sharing our thoughts on how we want this Country to get back to what our Founding Fathers set it out to be... a Country of people who believed that God is head of this land.

What is God asking you to speak up for today?

Joanne Troppello is an author of romantic suspense novels http://joannetroppello.weebly.com/blog.html. She is married and loves spending time with her husband and family. Joanne and her husband, John own and operate Mustard Seed Marketing Group, LLC http://www.mustardseedmarketinggroup.com/ and they are Empower Network affiliate members. They are network marketing coaches who teach that you don't have to be an SEO guru or a social media specialist to make their system work for you. That's the beauty of it. Just blog daily and the results will speak for themselves. Follow the three simple, basic principles of blogging daily, sharing with others and daily educating yourself and you'll be linked with one of the most trafficked blogs, with the highest conversion rate of leads to sales to money.

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US Election 2012 - Mitt Romney's "Lehman" Moment?

Besides picking Alaska's Governor Sarah Palin for his vice-president, there was a key and decisive moment on John McCain's campaign in 2008. It was in September, when the unexpected and surprising default of Lehman Brothers was announced. The Arizona Senator commented by saying that the base of the American Economy are solid. Barack Obama had a different approach and point of view, criticizing the irresponsibility of Wall Street. That was the moment that the American Electors decided which of the 2 candidates "deserved" to be at the White House for the next 4 years.

Yesterday, several Republicans noted that Romney's comments about Obama's Administration response to the unexpected e surprising attack to the United States diplomatic mission at Benghazi and the United States embassy in Cairo, as his "Lehman moment".

The declarations of the ex-Massachusetts governor, which accused the President of apologizing in America's name and insinuated a subservience to the Islamic regime, were immediately criticized by both sides of the political spectrum, diplomatic body and public opinion. The Republican candidate disrespected the deal of not campaigning on the September 11th memorial and ignored the tradition of not using National Tragedies to try and score political points.

But worst for Mitt Romney is that he decided to speak before knowing all the facts and in the end e made a wrong declaration of what happened at Libya and Egypt and Washington's reaction.

Under pressure, Romney made another mistake. Instead of correcting the mistake, he reaffirmed what he said earlier and his former critics. President Obama didn't waste any time noting that Romney likes to shoot first and then aiming. Questioned about the eventual irresponsibility of the Republican candidate, the President answered that the answer will be given by the American people.

Now that the Foreign Policy is the main issue for debate, it seems that Mitt Romney's aspirations to the White House are becoming thinner. Focusing just on the Economic side of the Obama's run seems to be a strategy that has to be reviewed if the Republicans want to be back to the White House after the 2012 Election. The October 3rd debate between the two candidates would be the perfect moment for Mitt Romney to put Obama under pressure on issues like Foreign Policy and Health for example, but the problem is that it seems that the Republican candidate doesn't feel at ease when speaking about these subjects.

Time to wait and see what the next weeks bring...

For more info, polls, news and much more check out http://uspresidential2012.blogspot.com/

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Barack Obama's Demolition of America

This is probably the first time in history that a bad economy has worked in favor of a president. It seems, no matter which way the unemployment figures go, very little negatively impacts Barack Obama's polls.

Excerpts from the following two articles inadvertently give some insight into this:

Heritage Foundation, September 7, 2010: "One in Six Americans Receives Government Assistance:"

"Fifty million [people] are on Medicaid, a record high and a whopping 17 percent increase since December 2007. Food stamp enrollment has climbed nearly 50 percent since 2008 [the year Obama won the election] and now stands at 40 million, or one in seven people. Ten million Americans receive unemployment benefits, and 4.4 million get direct cash assistance, an 18 percent increase from two years ago.

"And these are the numbers from only four of the more than 70 welfare programs funded by the federal government."

Two years later - InfoWars.com, August 9, 2012: "More Than 100 Million Americans Are On Welfare:"

"According to the Survey of Income and Program Participation conducted by the U.S. Census, well over 100 million Americans are enrolled in at least one welfare program run by the federal government."

That's 1 out of 3. That is, the number of people on public assistance more than doubled in only two years.

How does this help Obama? Well, in better economic times, many people who were out of work would rather get back to work than remain on public assistance for one simple reason; their jobs paid better.

Things today are different. The job market has so deteriorated that many people on public assistance are more afraid of losing their assistance than they are of not finding a job; because many of them have already long given up on finding a job, or finding a job that pays enough for them to get off public assistance.

So, when you have a president who is constantly promising to give you some one else's money ("spreading the wealth") and offering you easy access to public assistance, the natural response, under such dire circumstances, is to welcome such assistance with open arms. And the worse the economy gets, and the greater the increase in the number of people becoming dependent on public assistance, the greater the support for the candidate people perceive as most likely to help them maintain their public assistance.

I spoke to one woman who said she did not care for Barack Obama but planned on voting for him because she didn't want to lose her government benefits. What some people don't seem to realize is that a president with a greater economic sense than Barack Obama (Mitt Romney, for example), could greatly improve the economy, creating a plethora of jobs, thereby eliminating the need for many people to require public assistance. But that's besides the point.

The point is that the distressing economic situation we're in at the moment may not be an accident. There may be more than Barack Obama's incompetence at play here. It's beginning to look more like our sharp economic downturn during the Obama presidency may have been deliberately orchestrated from the start.

Many of the economic hardships thrust upon the U.S. by Obama -- from excessive business regulations to oil-drilling restrictions to tax increases -- was, I'm convinced, a deliberate prelude to eventually handing out easy government assistance, which, in turn, would prompt voters, out of necessity, to vote for Obama.

If this is so, the Obama presidency, without having created any significant new products or services to stimulate the economy, could be the biggest ponzi scheme in history; people are being given billions of dollars in assistance from a stagnant economy that's already in the red. This ponzi scheme is likely to blow up long after the 2012 elections. You'd think a president would recognize this. I believe Obama does.

Every vote for Barack Obama is, in my opinion, another nail in the coffin of America, as we know it. If this is all just too mind boggling for you to accept, perhaps you should just ask yourself a simple question: If Obama couldn't fix the mess (allegedly) left by George W. Bush, what are the chances of him fixing the even greater mess left by himself? Probably between slim and nil.

Josh Greenberger is the author of the book "The V-Bang", which addresses the following issues:

How did the universe begin?

Where did all the matter in the universe come from?

Why is the universe expanding faster and faster?

Galaxies are spinning too fast for their size.
Why aren't they flying apart?

Space is teeming with particles that pop in and out of existence.
Where do they come from?

The V-Bang is the only treatise that answers all of the above in one comprehensive theory. It's available on Amazon.com, BarnesNoble. The Bang: How The Universe Began

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How Important Are Presidential Debates?

Almost immediately after he claimed the Republican Party's presidential nomination, Mitt Romney retreated to a Vermont hideaway to begin preparing for the three debates in the race ahead of him.

I suspect that when the histories of this year's campaign are written, much will be made of that fact.

If Romney wins, and particularly if the debates are seen as a turning point in the campaign, his approach will be vindicated. He will be seen as the methodical, data-driven businessman who translated his success from commerce to politics.

But if Romney loses, his focus on debate preparation will be viewed as a strategic miscalculation, akin to a football coach who keeps his best players off the field for three quarters to avoid injury and fatigue, planning to win the game with a late rally. It's a strategy that could work, but that probably won't.

Romney was focused on, or possibly obsessed with, these debates for a long time - even before the GOP convention in August. He was reported to have begun his training back in early summer.

Clearly, Romney believes these debates can help put him in the White House. Let's ask ourselves the question Romney has probably asked: How much did past presidential debates matter? Let's also ask the question Romney should have asked, but probably didn't: how much past presidential debates have mattered to candidates like Romney.

On at least three occasions, televised debates have been seen, in hindsight, as crucial to a challenger's successful campaign. The first and most famous was in 1960, when John F. Kennedy - young, inexperienced and, significant at the time, Catholic - went up against Richard Nixon, the two-term vice president and presumed political heir to war hero Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Pollsters tell us that many Americans who heard the debate via radio thought Nixon performed better. But those who watched on television saw a haggard, perspiring vice president next to a handsome, confident young senator who seemed at least equally at home on the debate stage, and presumably on the world stage, as his competitor. After months of the Obama campaign trying to portray Romney as unqualified for the position he seeks, Romney probably longs for some of that Kennedy magic.

But Romney is not Kennedy, and more significantly, Obama is not Nixon. Obama will look and sound as good as Romney, at least if you disregard the content of his words. Moreover, his attacks on Romney have only partly been about Romney's experience; Obama has generally focused on Romney's successful background and privileged upbringing. I doubt it ever occurred to Nixon, a man of humble origins, to attack Kennedy's family wealth and his father's stewardship of his political career. Such attacks would not have gone over especially well in Republican circles anyway.

Kennedy was a charming man and a skilled communicator. The camera played to his strengths and revealed Nixon's relative weakness. Romney cannot expect to replicate that advantage.

In 1976, Gerald Ford committed one of the most famous gaffes in debate history by asserting that the Soviet Union did not dominate its fellow Warsaw Pact countries in Eastern Europe. He made this point about Yugoslavia, which was not a Warsaw Pact country; about Romania, which was a member, but had a mercurial leader who often went his own way within the maneuvering room Moscow allowed; and also about Poland, a country that was directly under the Soviet thumb - and which was well-known to a large Polish-American community.

Ford's brain freeze came just eight years after the Soviets and their reluctant allies had marched into a liberalizing Czechoslovakia, and just 20 years after Soviet tanks rolled through the streets of Budapest. The haunting broadcast of the Hungarian rebels' fruitless pleas for Western help was still practically ringing in our ears. ("This is Hungary calling. This is Hungary calling. The last remaining station. We are requesting you to send us immediate aid, in the form of parachute troops over the trans-Danubian promises. For the sake of God, let freedom help Hungary!")(1)

Without uttering a word, Jimmy Carter was able to present himself as the man better prepared to confront the Soviets at the height of the Cold War, and he went on to win the election.

But was the debate responsible for Carter's win? Illinois is home, then and now, to America's largest Polish population, and Chicago had a powerful Democratic machine - but Ford won Illinois anyway. He also won his native Michigan, along with Connecticut, New Jersey, the three northern New England states, and - except for Texas and Hawaii - every state from the Great Plains westward, including California. Carter defeated Ford by taking key industrial states, including New York, Pennsylvania and Ohio, and by winning the entire South except for Virginia. Mississippi put Carter over the top in the Electoral College. It's not likely that Southern voters were voting against Ford because of their deep concern for Poland; it's much more likely that Carter won the South because he was a peanut farmer, and former governor, from Georgia.

Ford's gaffe, as it turned out, mattered much more to pundits than to actual voters.

Ronald Reagan is probably the role model Romney is looking toward most directly. His closing speech in the final 1980 debate was also seen as a major turning point in the campaign.

But, like Kennedy, Reagan was a skilled communicator, a man of casual warmth and charm that came across naturally on camera. Romney, data-driven and detail-oriented, is more like Carter than Reagan in temperament, though not in approach. Romney may suffer the fate Nixon suffered: His words may have more substance, but the words will matter less than the image.

Finally, there is one debate Romney may not have considered but should have. In 1988, an intellectual former Massachusetts governor by the name of Michael Dukakis was asked whether he would want the death penalty for someone who had hypothetically raped and murdered Dukakis' wife, Kitty.

Dukakis, a Democrat who opposed the death penalty, said he would not. It was a coherent and correct answer to an unfair question, but it may have convinced voters that Dukakis was a man whose mind was a stranger to his heart. A better response would have been for Dukakis to tell his questioner, CNN's Bernard Shaw, that of course he would want the death penalty in that situation, which is why a civilized legal system should not allow capital punishment, which is more about vengeance than justice.

Vice President George H.W. Bush, the pseudo-incumbent with a long resume, who favored the death penalty, went on to defeat Dukakis that year.

The Obama campaign has labored for months to define Romney as a self-interested plutocrat, unaware of, or unconcerned by, the conditions in which ordinary Americans live. The antidote for that is for Romney himself to tell Americans how his policies would make their lives better than Obama's have; to explain that his wealth gives him the freedom to run for office and give to charity in order to enrich the lives of others; and to admit that he just cannot get enthused by junk-food slogans such as "hope" and "change" and "forward." That makes him a boring guy, for which he can apologize, but he can and should ask voters to consider whether it also makes him the guy they want to put in charge.

Romney is asking a lot if he expects voters to derive all this from his performance in three televised debates, in lieu of weeks on the campaign trail. History suggests that the strategy might work, but the odds are that it won't.

Source:

1) BBC, "Remembering the Hungarian Uprising of 1956 (audio)"

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The Presidential Election - A Season of Fantasy, Falsehood and Fabrication

I'd have to give the edge in the presidential debate to Mitt Romney. Of course it is easier to play offense than defense in such a contest. The president, who himself ran on a platform of hope and change in 2008 has, in four years, succeeded at getting more people to hope for change.

Both candidates want people to believe they can in fact change things for the better. But real, substantive change is nowhere in the offing. The election season fantasy we so enjoy is not how life works.

Every four years the presidential election cycle treats Americans to a spectacle of fantasy, falsehood and fabrication. This is an opportunity for supposedly rational and intelligent people to entertain the notion of Santa Claus - a mythically powerful person who fulfills dreams - coming to the rescue. We just wake up on inauguration morning and our something for nothing fantasy is realized - stockings are stuffed, presents abound, and peace, love and joy reign. Appealing isn't it? The truth is, however, Christmas morning celebrations are not the product of a mysterious individual swooping around the globe bearing gifts, it is the work of countless people giving of themselves so that others might benefit. This is how life works.

Both Barack Obama and Mitt Romney seem like decent, caring men who genuinely want to do good. The question is, do they believe what they are saying? I ask this not as a test of authenticity and faith in the vision they present, but rather to ascertain whether they have the practical knowledge and knowhow to do what they say. A determined demeanor and appealing rhetoric are an incomplete formula for success. A strong, productive, free and prosperous America sounds great, but making that happen will take more than a flight of fancy. Real work is involved. The status quo would have to change in a big way and changing the status quo, one that benefits so many, is a daunting prospect.

Politicians operate from a basis of fantasy, falsehood and fabrication because we, the people, are children at heart. We want to believe in super heroes and easy, instantaneous change. We have deluded ourselves for so long, we have come to expect that by casting a ballot we can generate a new reality. Politicians have learned to tell people what they want to hear despite the facts, because we want to believe someone else has the power - someone can in fact change things. By relying on them, the salesman asking for a vote, I won't have to do anything. I won't have to confront the bitter facts. I won't have to assume responsibility for the mess. And I won't have to make the difficult choices and take the necessary, painful steps to right the course.

The truth is a presidential candidate will not, and cannot, do the vast majority of things he claims he absolutely will do. Hope in awe-inspiring rhetoric allows for a fleeting flight of imagination that someone else can change my life for the better. After all they are clamoring unceasingly to be given the chance - all I need do is allow them the opportunity. This election season dance nurtures the expectation that we're not, nor do we need to be, responsible - someone else can and will take care of us. Unerringly the dance ends poorly - as this election cycle will prove - because that just isn't how life works.

Real change comes from one place only. If we want to change our circumstances and our world we have to change ourselves. Despite all the political promises to the contrary, that is how life works.

Scott F. Paradis, author of "Success 101 How Life Works - Know the Rules, Play to Win" and "Warriors, Diplomats, Heroes, Why America's Army Succeeds - Lessons for Business and Life" focuses on the fundamental principles of leadership and success; http://success101workshop.com/

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What I Learned From the Debate

In looking at the forest of the second Presidential debate and not the trees, here is what I saw:

1. Americans don't want government interfering in their lives and yet they want to know how the next President is going to help them go to college, lower gas prices and find a job.

2. It is now acceptable to say anything to "get elected" and the public is not going to hold officials accountable as long as it doesn't impact them directly.

3. That being President means you are responsible for everything that goes wrong within the government and have no part in what goes right-even in the face of a status quo that encourages animosity and disdain from the other branches of government, not cooperation.

So the first thought that occurs to me is why would any sane person want this job? The second is how are any of these issues going to be successfully addressed until the American people come to terms with their own cognitive dissonance around our relationship with government?

In this Presidential election as in many of the other down ballot races this year the choice has become a vote the between either the philosophy of allowing a free market profit motive to drive society or a government centric vision that views itself as the final authority. In the battle to ensure each side's worldview reigns supreme have we lost site of insanity of the arguments they are making? And what about us-as voters in a democracy are we going to take responsibility for our fuzzy thinking and allow our elected officials to lead in a way that will actually address the issues we face or rather do we prefer they simply tell us what we want to hear?

Some specific examples:

· Governor Romney repeatedly pointed to high gas prices, high unemployment high cost of education as a failure of the Obama administration and he asserted as President he would do better. Yet according to his philosophy, all these things really ought to be up to the free market to determine. If people are willing to pay $5 a gallon for gas and the suppliers can make a profit so be it. If this puts a crimp on family budgets, work harder and figure out how to make more money, this is an individual issue and not one that should be clouded by government intervention. In his pursuit of the presidency he postures as if he believes this is an issue in which he should have a role.

· President Obama spent much of his time defending his record of the past four years as if he alone is able to move much of anything forward without Congressional cooperation. The posturing of incumbent Presidents that they alone have made something happen is absurd-both to my previous point that it is much easier to cast blame towards them and to the idea that nothing can be truly implemented without bipartisan support. President Obama needs to level with the American people about the enormous limitations of governing in a politically toxic environment and he needs to substantially revamp his approach to this challenge if he is to serve a second term.

· In the town hall debate format the third player in this election gets a small role-the public. If these undecided voters are a reflection of the greater electorate is there any wonder why we have the problems we have? Where is their leadership? So many of the questions come from a place of being totally unempowered and looking up to these powerful men to solve these problems for them. Regardless of your partisan sympathies no government, no business, no one is going to do for you what you are unwilling to do for yourself. Ultimately it is up to each person to determine their quality of life, to create it and not look to someone else to do it for them. In addition, it is up to each of us to hold our elected officials accountable for their leadership in creating a partnership that fosters growth and doesn't impede it.

In working with hundreds of people to improve their leadership efficacy I know that what people want for themselves and for others is to be happy, fulfilled, secure and free to do what they love. Yet somehow in the evolution of our democracy we have become convinced that there is only one way to get there and we must crush those who believe otherwise. This is not only absurd; it is diminishing our ability to create what we want for our society and ourselves. If we are to move forward it is time to look in the mirror and become the leader we want to see in the world.

Being President is not the only way to solve problems-in fact; it is one of the slowest avenues to change. If you see something that you want changed in your life or in your community-ask yourself what YOU can do to be a part of the solution and then GO DO IT. As each person takes greater responsibility for putting their talents, skills and passion into the world real, change occurs. When this happens in greater numbers it won't matter if it is a business or government or as Democrats or Republicans-in fact when individual leadership blossoms who is President will matter a whole lot less and who you are as a leader will matter a whole lot more.

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Are You Ready to Shout for Solutions!

In today's world, we see that the core principles, like the "Liberty" and "Secure Life," seem to have become antiquated catchphrases and no one seems to address or speak about them openly and widely. However, now we have the power of the internet, this provides various platforms to speak up straightly about the issues that erode our nation and future. Now, there are forums available online that people can take part in actively and cry out for a fresh perspective and take a strong stand virtually for real changes.

Such energetic conversations build up a new vision in people - by expressing views openly and spill out some fresh ideas to save the erosion of our core principles and exploding deficits. Our nation might get disturbed by tough times, may be because we haven't spoken up to describe, define, and design our future properly. Nevertheless, it is never too late to roll back and regain our ultimate freedom and power to decide how our country's politics affect our future generations. We as people can set the nation's record straight by expressing our views vibrantly and vigorously in various active online forums.

We can talk and discuss about a common vision that ensures our country's security and prosperity as a whole and eschew all traditional and regional boundaries and become as one strong voice online. We can continue to speak now openly and break up those traditional conversations to push the envelope of our ideals and dreams in a new and enduring direction.

Such online forums can literally be virtual playgrounds for us to be just ourselves and settle the crumbling scores swiftly. We no longer have to compromise or fall for petty political bickering or empty shells of hope. In fact, we can continue to shout our views effectively with dignity and fairness to achieve justice and get a fresh perspective about the government and its objectives.

We no longer have to become victims of vain political blathering just to win our votes with vain promises. We can all stand up and shout for our right to have a better nation with practical and realistic solutions. There's a popular belief that the minute you decide to settle for less than you actually deserve, you start getting even less than you actually settled for!

We no longer have to settle silently, as we have the power to speak and speak right about our country's politics and issues that surround it to shape a better nation. Let us talk and transform our nation!

As former chairman of the Republican National Committee (RNC), Michael Steele was charged with revitalizing the Republican Party. He is an expert on political strategy, fund-raising, PACs, and election reform. For more details visit http://www.steeleforum.com/

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Help! They Are Swimming - And Speaking French!

Local elections are coming up soon in Belgium. As always local elections have turned into quasi-national elections and in Belgium this means the continued existence of the country is called into question once more.

According to a recent poll commissioned by various Belgian newspapers and broadcasters the N-VA remains the largest party in Flanders. With 36.7% of voters in Flanders expressing their intention to vote for Bart De Wever's Flemish ultra-nationalist party and a further 11.1% of votes intended for Vlaams Belang (the Flemish neo-fascists), nearly 50% of the Flemish population favours separatist parties.

Traditional Flemish parties such as the Christian Democrats (CD&V), the Liberals (Open VLD) and the Socialists (SP-A) together would collect only just above 38% of the Flemish vote.

Ultra-nationalism and separatism have firmly taken root in Flemish politics. Whereas the ridiculously convoluted intricacies of the Belgian political system often give the impression of a complex situation, it acts as a very handy fog screen behind which the nationalists can hide and blur the argument in order to seem less virulently selfish and, ultimately, fascist.

Because despite all these technicalities, the nationalist rhetoric boils down to the following:

- "Eigen volk eerst!" (Our people first!) - Flanders is financially better off and no longer wants to share with people who do not speak their language or are from different backgrounds. Solidarity has irrevocably left the house.

- "We were there first!" - Flemish nationalists tie ethnic nationalism to territorial nationalism and hence claim territory in the name of the Flemish people who were "there" first at the expense of other cultures. A quasi-sacred quality is sought in the nation and in the popular memories it evokes and requires the establishment of a mass, public culture based on common values and traditions of the population.

- "Fear of the other" - Flemish nationalists are scared of people who are not like them and ultimately fear that their "nation" and culture are not resilient enough to handle outside influences from other cultures. Xenophobia bears the hallmarks of a weak culture constructed on a myth.

The following are just a few examples of how Flemish nationalism is actively discriminating against other people:

- The Flemish "Wooncode" requests that persons seeking public or social housing, in Flanders, prove their knowledge in Dutch. They will otherwise be turned down.

- The Flemish are calling on all French-speaking inhabitants of Flemish towns and cities to integrate, including those people who have lived their entire lives in mainly French-speaking municipalities. The NVA insists for French speaking Belgians that live on Flemish territory to prove their "level of integration". If found insufficient, they should be obliged to take Flemish classes and courses fostering greater integration.

- In Overijse, close to Brussels, a slogan hangs above the swimming pool with the words "ik zwem, jij zwemt, wij zwemmen, in het Nederlands" (I swim, you swim, we swim, in Dutch). This is a variation on the ubiquitous "ik speel, jij speelt, wij spelen, in het Nederlands" (I play, you play, we play, in Dutch), an initiative of the province of Flemish Brabant that saw the distribution of 350 banners to decorate playgrounds encouraging kids to speak Dutch. 32 municipalities rushed to acquire such banners.

- The Flemish sports association, Bloso, controlled by the Flemish government, runs sports activities and camps. But Bloso also says that children who do not speak or understand Flemish can be sent home without a refund.

- A rather legalistic technical issue has resulted in the Flemish refusal to appoint three French mayors democratically elected on the outskirts of Brussels for non-compliance with the use of languages.

- In some towns the public libraries are required to be provided with 80% of books in Dutch, although French-speaking citizens make up the majority.

- In yet other places in Flanders, inhabitants are obliged to know the Dutch language to be able to acquire a property or land.

- Convocation letters to invite citizens to vote can only be sent out in Dutch even in municipalities where the majority of citizens are French speaking.

The list continues, but perhaps the label "non-violent fascism" is not out of place to describe the evolution of Flemish politics. And if polls are anything to go by, the upcoming local elections are only going to make matters worse. After all, it is a well-known fact that scared people are very dangerous when in group.

Arnaud Houdmont wrote this article about Flemish nationalism. Arnaud is a co-founder of Wazi Project,a quarterly online subscription magazine tackling current sociological, political, economic and cultural challenges through the analysis of socio-political trends, critical commentary and comparison of mainstream thinking with cutting-edge approaches. Arnaud has written articles on nationalism, religion, welfare society and other social and political topics that are in need of rethinking.

Wazi Project, the magazine: http://www.waziproject.com/

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