The Georgia Governor's Race

I will be glad when the midterms are over. I'm so sick of the political ads that try to best each other in the amount of mud they sling. The bad thing about most elections these days is that neither candidate is a good fit for the job. It's just whoever climbed to the top of the pile and got their party's blessing to run. Why not let 2 or 3 candidates from each party run? Why should it boil down to a playoff system? This ain't baseball, it's hiring the people who directly affect our security and general well-being.

That being said, look at the Georgia governor's race. Barnes vs. Deal.

Roy Barnes has already been governor once. His platform is the usual: more funding for education, green technology, and rural economic development. He also wants to bring back the property tax reduction Sonny Perdue got rid of. I'm not sure how this will be paid for but that's a typical Democrat for you. One of his most well-known accomplishments as our former governor was getting the state flag changed. To me, this is the typical way of getting the focus of real problems to move to extraneous stuff that doesn't really change our paychecks. He is also against showing a picture ID when voting. I think that if you have to show an ID to buy beer and cigarettes, why not voting. It's a lot more important than beer and cigarettes!

Nathan Deal got his start as a Democrat senator, switching parties 4 months into his second term. His last re-election was had by winning the race in a time when the people were fed up with Democrats, not by any personal virtue. He got into an ethics scuffle over pushing on some legislation that would directly affect a business he owned. He resigned his seat before the Ethics Committee could fully investigate him. He basically has the same goals as Barnes, but that's all bullcrap anyway. They just say what they think we want to hear. By the way, he voted for Clinton's impeachment, which in itself was set up to be a distraction from the real issues of the day. I'm a bit nervous about him being governor because he sort of resembles Larry Hagman when he played J.R. Ewing on "Dallas".

So, we're down to the lesser of the 2 evils, which is the way it always plays out. It's a shame when the lesser criminal is the one everyone picks (sometimes).

What has Congress done for us lately?

The current sitting Congress is patting itself on the back, claiming to be the most productive session since 1966, and complaining that the voters don't appreciate that fact. 1966 was when Medicare and Medicaid were created. There is a list on Yahoo! outlining their accomplishments that follows. Be aware that I am paraphrasing on the list and some of my opinions may not necessarily be based on actual fact (isn't that how the news works anyway?)
1. Making college loans more affordable
For who? The only way to do this is to come up with a way to get a job after college that pays more than minimum wage so you don't have to live with your parents for 10 years.
2. Cash for clunkers
We as taxpayers had the opportunity to pay $4500 each for 690,000 Ford Explorers that were subsequently crushed.
3. New consumer protections in the credit card industry
They did make some inroads into the screwing over that we put up with on a daily basis by the banks. Unfortunately, the banks seem to be one step ahead of Congress. Oh, the latest round of credit card rules do not apply to business credit cards. Who thought that up?
4. Making it easier for women to challenge pay discrimination
No opinion here. I'm sure somewhere in this country, some guy is making more than some woman doing the same job.
5. Increasing federal regulation of tobacco products
How much more regulating can you do? It's already almost to the point of needing a prescription to buy cigarettes. At that point, we will then need to decide whether we want tobacco or weed!
6. Cracking down on waste in Pentagon weapons acquisition
I busted out laughing when I saw this one. How do you gauge cracking down percentages when waste is over 50%? Weapons spending is one of the biggest pork-barrels in DC.
7. Making attacks based on sexual orientation a federal hate crime
They should have done this years ago but at least it's done now.
8. Giving businesses tax incentives to hire unemployed workers
Too bad there aren't tax incentives for us under-employed workers who took giant pay cuts 2 years ago with no end in sight.
9. Tax credits for first-time homeowners
All this did was continue the process of buying a house without putting any real money into it, which is what caused most of the recession to start with, along with the added benefit of costing taxpayers billions.
Of course, there is the whole healthcare revamp, which I haven't seen any evidence of yet, as well as the stimulus package, which all Republicans are claiming as failed in their election ads. How do they know it failed? What would have happened if there wasn't one?

Spinning the numbers

I watched Clark Howard on HNN the other day and he was reporting about Toys-R-Us opening "popup" stores (in malls, I guess) for the holidays and how they would be hiring 10,000 people to work in these stores. I got to thinking of how our leaders would spin something like that. "Oh, we created 10,000 jobs!" Don't mention that those jobs are only for 2 months. By the way, I think Toys-R-Us sells mostly crap. I tried to return something without the receipt once, and they said they could only give me credit for the lowest advertised price within the last 6 months. Turns out, the product I was trying to return (because it was a piece of crap), was offered free if some other product was purchased. So, it was only worth $0!

Speaking of jobs, when they announce that unemployment numbers went down it might just be because someone's unemployment ran out but they still can't find a job. But hey, Toys-R-Us is hiring! The downside is that if they have a choice between a brand new college degree and an older, more experienced non-grad, they will pick the younger one every time. That's why common sense has disappeared in the marketplace.

Back to numbers. Economists are bitching about the halt in foreclosures by the leading mortgage lenders. Less foreclosures mean less sales as the houses sit in limbo. What is so stupid about the whole thing is that a bank foreclosure counts as a home sale. So, if home sales are up in November, it could be just because foreclosures are up. How does that make any sense? It's just the way our leaders spin the news.

This just in! The courts in Vladivostok, Russia just seized a woman's pig for payment of a debt. She owes a bank $432 and a court survey determined that the piglet was her most valuable possession. I'd hate to see what her house looks like!

Chicken wings and other things

We will occasionally get some chicken wings somewhere, and they will invariably piss me off because of what they call a wing. When you're paying 5 or 6 bucks for 12 wings, getting one of those skinny little middle wing things at 50 cents just doesn't make it worth it. I think the whole wing should be the wing but some bean counter decided that it could be considered 2 separate pieces. KFC does it all the time. They are the only ones I know that get 10 pieces out of one chicken. By the way, 1.5 quart ice cream and 7 lb bags of ice also piss me off.
The other night, I saw a commercial on TV for Lunesta, a sleeping drug. They go through all the bull about side effects and then state the following: "It is not fully understood how Lunesta works". What!?! Millions of dollars spent by egghead doctors and scientists and they don't know how it puts you to sleep? And the FDA approved it? How do you suppose the hearings went to get the drug approved? Did they just stand there and say "Uh, we don't know how it does it but it does" while scratching their heads? No wonder there is a potential 4 hour erection waiting for somene somewhere!