Nov 7, 2008

"NO MORE BUSH*T", and we can all be thankful for that!

Someone Has To Pay the Debt for Reaganomics III, Thank God We Avoided Reagan IV: John McCain!


How long will it take for Republicans to realize, I wonder, that someone will have to and have had to pay the bills for ‘borrow and spend Republican administrations’? Forgive me fellow ministers, but one of the best bumper stickers that I ever saw read as follows: NO MORE BUSH*T!


Two days ago, the day following the 2008 General Election, I stopped in at a local retail establishment where I overhead an exchange between the cashier and a customer who was leaving the store. The cashier, an Asian woman, proudly proclaimed that she had voted for President-Elect Senator Obama. The customer responded as he proceeded to walk out of the door, ‘and now our taxes will go up’!

It occurred to me that nothing has been learned by Republicans at the termination of either Reagan I, II or III ,(and we barely missed Reaganism IV with John McCain), borrow and spend, leveraged buyout, trickle down candidacies! President George H.W. Bush presided over the second installment, and his son George H. Bush presided over the third installment.

I was thinking back to when Bush 41 ran against Ronald Reagan two decades ago. Before becoming his Vice Presidential running mate, he described Reaganomics as voodoo economics, however, although he was forced to capitulate in order to be Reagan's running mate. Whether his mind actually changed or not, we will never know.

However, we do know that during the initial part of his first term as President, he recognized that something had to be done given that the nation’s economy was spiraling out of control because before coming to his sense, he had grudgingly adhered to the economic policies of his failed predecessor.

During the latter portion of his administration, George H.W. Bush recognized that America’s debt could no longer be deferred or ignored. He also changed his mind with respect to his previously strong admonition to: read my lips, there will be no new taxes! Bush 41 recognized that America’s bills had to be paid. His change of course, caused him the support of his dubious party and a second term as President. Republicans were against anyone, even one of their own who believed in 'paying the bills'!

None of these gentlemen and I say that loosely, would run their households in the manner that they ran America’s financial system; perhaps their wives had and have been in charge of their household budgets all the time. Can you imagine a household where the heads of the family would simply continue to spend and borrow, and never pay their bills, hoping that their wages would continue to rise commensurately along with spending? Essentially that is why Bush 41 referred to Reaganomics as ‘voodoo economics’. Reagan believed in spending and deferring the debt!

Would you believe that two decades later, Republicans still do not want to pay the bills? Republicans only want to profit from the economy. My answer to the gentleman who proceeded to walk out of the store and others like him is simply this, of course the Democrats have to raise taxes, someone has to pay the enormous bills that are left over from another Republican Administration.

The Republican Governor of California, also known as the Governator has finally acquiesced. In a statement made yesterday to the public, he explained that taxes will have to be raised in order to deal with California's staggering 11 billion dollar budget deficit. What, is the Governator behaving like a Democrat? It is about time. If Republicans don't want to pay the bills, the answer and the solution is simple, stop spending!

Republicans made a fortune off of squeezing the American economy for personal profit, and along with the tax cuts that many of them received -they came out on top, but at the same time the economy is in the tank.

My brother sent me quotation which is apropos for what is taking place in America has been taking place for some time. It was taken from a paper written by Alexander Tyler (ca.1770) entitled, Moral Decline and its Effect On the Collapse of Nations. It reads as follows:

A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can exist until the voters discover they can vote themselves largess from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising them the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy…!

And that is what has essentially taken place under the leadership of the last 3 Republican administrations. Once George H.W. Bush left office, Bill Clinton had to come in and suspend the voodoo economics systems of his predecessor and raise revenues in order to pay off the outstanding debts that were left behind as a result of 3 terms of Republican leadership.

Converseley, when Bill Clinton left office, country was left with a budget surplus that incoming George H. Bush scuttled. And to boot, during the Clinton Administration the majority of America’s citizenry fared better, the country fared better, and no one complained about paying taxes, except Republicans.

Like father, like son and like Reagan? George H. Bush, the leader of the Bushtanistas, will leave the nation with a half-trillion dollar debt, and a staggering budget deficit that is even larger; it will be approximately 1 Trillion dollars.

The first order of business for the next president, President-Elect Obama Hussein will be to raise taxes off the incredible deficit and all of the debts that America will have incurred, to include the bailout, that will be left behind by Republicans who enriched themselves off of the American treasury and market system. Republicans simply put, are not fiscally responsible!

And what else is truly sad about all of this is that just like Clinton and any other sound minded politician or household family budgeter who knows that you have to pay your bills, another Democrat President will be accused of raising American’s taxes, even though he was not responsible for incurring the debts! The latter won’t have the luxury of taking office and ignoring the country’s indebtedness, or to continue to the practice of borrow and spend.

Just as Bill Clinton had to do, our new president will have to clean up the Republican mess, that won't go away by employing Reagan-style 'voodoo economics'.

Thank God that the American voters are smarter than the Republicans who typically run for office and continue to employ the same old already debunked dribble and methods. John McCain and the next group of Americans ought to have learned that after 3 failed Republican Presidential candidacies and Reaganomics, that the overwhelming majority of the American people are willing to pay their debts.

Again, Republicans ought to learn to do the same. And if they won’t pay their debts, then for heaven’s sake and for the sake of the American people, if you ever get into office again and I hope that you won't, please stop incurring debts that someone else in likely a Democratic Administration will have to pay off for you~

Love, Peace & Grace
Rev. C. Solomon


Addenda: Corruption under the cover of government is nothing new: Here are a few noteworthy biblical quotations that apply.

Eccl. 5:8 If thou seest the oppression of the poor, and violent perverting of judgment and justice in a province, marvel not at the matter: for he that is higher than the highest regardeth; and there be higher than they.

Moreover the profit of the earth is for all…


He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver; nor he that loveth abundance with increase…!

Ps. 94:20 Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with them, which frameth Mischief by a Law?


These two sets of scriptures explain by and large the problems that we have had with Republican Administrations, and the ones who ran these governments, they are greedy, never satisfied and to willing to manipulate the offices that they serve in and the Law in order to accomplish their venal objectives. That spirit lives on in the Republican Party! I pray that Reaganism, along with greed, selfishness, and deception is finally dead!

We must remember that this attitude was apparent at the onset and later at the establishment of this nation when a group of white men decided to found a nation on a flawed premise that favored them; the premise being that they reserved the right to earn as much as that wanted through land-confiscation, indenturing and enslaving other people, forcing them to do the work, and this group of men would retain all of the profits and at the same time resist taxation!

Both Republican American Presidents, CEO's and other government officials, continue this venal aim until this day! Neither of these individuals want to pay a just wage, and at all costs they do everything that they can to avoid paying their fair share.

Rush [Limpball] said it best a decade or so ago: You people can raise our taxes, however, we will still have our limousines, our swimming pools...! My response was then as it now, EXACTLY Rush, so would you stop whining?

Let us all pray that Reaganism, Voodoo economics, Republican neo-fascism are all elements of the past! BTW, has anyone heard from Bill Kristol of late? If not, is there any wonder why. So much for the New Project for an American Century, Kristol an his ilk, helped to get America off on the wrong footing in the 21st Century!

1 comment:

Rev. C. Solomon said...

I continue to reflect on the irresponsibility of Republican and Democratic crossover voters, including religious and non-religious alike; the ones who were responsbile for voting 2-term President George Bush and his sycophants into office in the first place.

Just consider the condition of America and the world right now? The damage that they have done is incalculable. The question that remains is, how long will it take to repair the damage?

Is the inchoate Senator from Illinois, a man who followed in the footsteps of his predecessor from the Illinois legislature, the inchoate senator and president, Abraham Lincoln, the man for the job? Time will tell, however, I suspect that it will take more than a human agent and his cabinet to accomplish the feat!