WHERE’S THE TRUTH?

GOOD MORNING WORLD

I was riding home from Costco the other day and listening to talk radio and Rush Limbaugh said, “How do you know if it is true?”  I said right out loud, “I was going to write about that tomorrow.”  Do not think Rush heard me.  By the way before you ignore me due to my listening choices you might want to check out how often this man has been correct in his voiced opinions.

How do we know what is truth anymore?  Does everyone really lie?  Sadly a lot of people do.  I only trust what I can hear if the speaker is saying the words and those I double check.  For instance Nancy Pelosi did tell us ‘we had to pass it before we could read it’.  Truly what kind of logic is that?

Our President has been caught in multiple lies and still is the President.  In fact he was voted back into office despite the lies he told.  I hear you out there “what lies?”

1- we could keep our healthcare – we cannot if an employer does not offer it

2- there were no ‘death panels’ – there will be non- medical people deciding whether we need a treatment

3- it would save us money – it is going to cost anywhere from $2500 up per family

4- he said it would not pay for abortions – it does

5- he called them terrorists from the beginning – he did not specifically for over 14 days

Enough?

Sen. Harry Reid accused Mitt Romney of not paying taxes.  He ‘heard it from a reliable source’.  Romney documented paying millions in taxes.

Wasserman-Schultz lied during the DNC about who intervened to get God back in the platform.  Stephanie Cutter lied. I documented that at the time as well as other lies.

I watched Bill Clinton lie.  I watched Martha Stewart lie.  I watched Richard Nixon lie.  I watched TV anchors lie.  I am sure that probably others have lied as well and I just did not see them do it.  I am documenting what I have seen.  How can anyone believe anything that is happening now?  How can we know what is true?

Our current President sold the world on green energy and it has cost us financially.  Solyndra lost money went bankrupt and now has billions in refuse of which it needs to dispose itself.   Other green energy business have gone out of business costing America.  The green energy cars have been a flop despite the amount of monies spent on them.  He told us this was the way to a better world.  He told us again in the State of the Union.  Is this true?  It wasn’t for Solyndra so why are we listening again?

During the most recent campaign the Republicans lied as well as documented by Robert Reich in an opinion piece.  http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/reich/article/How-Republicans-reinforce-campaign-of-lies-3850026.php

I do not understand why people do this in this day and age of the computer as they can easily be fact-check or reviewed to find the truth.  The thing is we are getting to be like the boy who called ‘wolf’.  When do we believe?  Who do we believe? Hillary Clinton said all Bill’s problems were from a vast right wing conspiracy.  Are conspiracy theories how things are running?  Is everything a conspiracy?  Is there no clarity?  I do not see it.  Our truths are being clouded until it is almost hard to know what is real.  That is a bad place to be I judge.

This past week an ex-cop from California, Christopher Dorner, is a hero to some as he believes he has been wronged by the Police Department.  So he kills police officers?  This makes him a hero?  Is this not a little warped?

The Pope has announced he will step down on February 28th.  An interesting decision in modern times.  Already some are asking if he is doing this to escape situations that exist in the Vatican.  How do we know?  Can we not trust that he has prayed and decided this is the direction God wants him to take?

Finally we hear that Hillary Clinton called someone the night of the attack in Benghazi.  This truth, if it is from Leon Panetta, puts a whole new spin on her words “What difference, at this point, does it make?”

There are those that say and try to show that the Newtown massacre did not happen.  I saw some of the videos and it can leave one asking questions.  Are the facts real or distorted?  Where is Walter Cronkite the one news man we trusted for years?

Where is truth in our news?  Is there none?

Yesterday I spoke about honesty and truth and came up with the Merriam definition.

TRUTH

1a archaic : fidelity, constancy

b : sincerity in action, character, and utterance

2a (1) : the state of being the case : fact (2) : the body of real things, events, and facts : actuality (3) often capitalized : a transcendent fundamental or spiritual reality

b : a judgment, proposition, or idea that is true or accepted as true <truths of thermodynamics>

c : the body of true statements and propositions

3a : the property (as of a statement) of being in accord with fact or reality

b chiefly British : true 2

c : fidelity to an original or to a standard

4capitalized Christian Science : god

— in truth

: in accordance with fact : actually

Examples of TRUTH

At some point you have to face the simple truth that we failed.

Their explanation was simpler but came closer to the truth.

The article explains the truth about global warming.

A reporter soon discovered the truth.

Do you swear to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth?

Her story contains a grain of truth but also lots of exaggeration.

There is a word we need to understand truth with exaggeration or spin?  Where is the whole truth and nothing but the truth?  When are real reporters going to go back to digging to find the truths?

I am eagerly waiting and until that day will be searching TV, newspapers and the web to find truth.

…..ONWARD TO MORE MISADVENTURE…

TIRADE TUESDAY ON TAX RETURNS

GOOD MORNING WORLD

The headline for the weekend was all about Harry Reid calling for Mitt Romney to provide more tax returns.  Sen. Reid did this from the floor of the Senate where he enjoys immunity and could make an unsubstantiated claim that he had heard that Mr. Romney paid no taxes for the last ten years.  Mr. Romney in a speech said this was not true and called for Sen. Reid to put up or shut up.  The head of the RNC this weekend called Harry Reid a ‘dirty liar.’  Are we having fun yet?  I decided to do a little looking on my own to find some facts.

Fact number 1 that to run for President of the United States of America you have to be 35 and a natural born citizen. 

Fact number 2 is you have to file intent with the Federal Election Commission.  They have a Candidate Registration Tool Kit handy and ready for you.  The paperwork alone would stop many people.  You have to fill financial disclosure forms.  These forms looked to be like the liability and assets forms we fill out when we buy a house or take out any loan.  There are other ‘Tool Kits’ for PACS and others that will help with your campaign.

Fact number 3 and perhaps the most pertinent to this post is that no candidate is required to present his tax returns to run for President.  In fact according to the Tax History Project at http://www.taxhistory.org/www/website.nsf/web/presidentialtaxreturns:

Individual income tax returns — including those of public figures — are private information, protected by law from unauthorized disclosure. Indeed, the Internal Revenue Service is barred from releasing any taxpayer information whatsoever, except to authorized agencies and individuals.

 Like all other citizens, U.S. presidents enjoy this protection of their privacy. Since the early 1970s, however, most presidents have chosen to release their returns publicly. In the hope of making this information more widely available, the Tax History Project at Tax Analysts has compiled an archive of presidential tax returns.

From what I gathered a lot of the disclosure of tax info came after Vice-President Spiro Agnew ran into trouble with his taxes and was replaced.  In the past few years many Presidents have released multiple returns.  Three or more were the norm.  HOWEVER, President Gerald Ford only released a summary of the last few years of his taxes.

Mitt Romney has released all of his 2010 taxes.  This includes taxes for (again from the Tax History Project):

Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney
2010 | 2011
Ann Romney
2010
Ann and Mitt Romney Family Trust
2010
Tyler Charitable Foundation
2010

He said he will submit his 2011 when they are complete.  That is sufficient for me as a voter.  I am not reading them.  I file long form for us and that takes multiple pages.  Cannot imagine the paperwork required for the Romney’s with all their interests.  Once all is said and done and the Romney’s took all the deductions that they are legally allowed they may not have paid many taxes.  Change the tax laws do not penalize people who use it. 

The other part of this is if Mitt Romney had not filed nor paid taxes in ten years do you not think he would be in jail or at least in court?  The IRS went after Wesley Snipes and Willie Nelson.  Would they not go after the Romney’s?  

Paying taxes aside, the Romney’s certainly give away much of their wealth.  He gave away his whole inheritance from his father.

As for Harry Reid, “Shame on you.”  The Senators are called to fill out personal financial disclosure forms.  Harry Reid has filled these out and not submitted tax returns.  This form I believe is similar to the financial disclosure that Presidential candidates are required to fill out in the ‘Tool Kit’.

I have to agree with some of the news that I have read on this issue that seem to believe that Reid is just blowing smoke.  No one from the Democratic Party has affirmed his innuendo as fact.  The Presidential spokesman, Jay Carney sidestepped it with saying that the reporters knew Harry Reid.  Is making a statement that cannot be proved like yelling ‘Fire’ in a movie theater when there is none? 

Perhaps here Nancy Pelosi may be right.  She said you have to pass it to read it so would that not translate to – let’s elect Mitt Romney then we can see his taxes?  This tax stuff is just smoke indeed! 

…..ONWARD TO MORE MISADVENTURE…

 

 

 

LEGISLATION/LEADERSHIP

 

GOOD MORNING WORLD

When our children were little they had a show called ‘Schoolhouse Rock’ that would send information and snippets about our government across the airways. Anyone remember this:

I’m just a bill.
Yes, I’m only a bill.
And I’m sitting here on Capitol Hill.
Well, it’s a long, long journey
To the capital city.
It’s a long, long wait
While I’m sitting in committee,
But I know I’ll be a law someday
At least I hope and pray that I will,
But today I am still just a bill.

If you remember the tune you are old like me!!!  The picture accompanying this little ditty is a rolled up piece of paper with a ribbon on it.  The cartoon character proceeds to tell the Boy in the piece that a lawmaker comes up with an idea and writes a bill.  Then it shows them arguing over it and the Boy comments on that.  The Bill, the name of the paper roll character, answer that he is lucky as most bills do not get this far they die in committee.  Then Bill says it looks like he is going to live so he goes to the House of Representatives.  If the House votes to keep him the bill then goes to the Senate he tells the Boy and the arguing and discussing begins again.  Bill then explains that if he passes the Senate he still may not make it pass the President’s veto.  Very informative for the kiddos and even their mother though I knew this from history.

So then the question arises – why are the Republicans being blamed for the stalling that is going on inWashingtonD.C.  Our President had a super majority – that is both houses of Congress held a Democrat majority – for the first two years of his administration and could have passed anything he wanted if all the Democrats were on board with it.  As of 2010 the Republicans have a majority in the House.  The Senate still remains a Democrat majority.  Perhaps we need to go a little further to understand.

What the Bill did not go into is the fact that nothing comes to the floor of either house of Congress unless it is put on the agenda.  The agenda is set by the Speaker of the House or the Majority Leader in the Senate.  Any bill that makes it to the floor in the House and passes may be stopped in the Senate if it never gets on the agenda.  In the case of the Congress that is sitting at this time Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada is in charge of setting the agenda for the Senate.  For a bill to move anywhere it needs to be on the agenda.  Once the bill gets to the Senate floor discussion and hopefully compromise occurs.  If discussion leads to a yes consensus then the bill goes back through the whole process House and Senate for a final approval on that which was previously reached.  If it does not reach consensus it is dead on the Senate floor.

The Speaker of the House, Rep John Boehner, is in charge of setting the agenda there.  He has spoken over and over again about 30 bills that the House has passed and Sen. Reid refuses to put on the agenda for the Senate.  There seems to be a disagreement about the number and the Democrats say they have taken up three so the number is 27.  Regardless, how can anything get done if there is no discussion?  Sen. Reid has not brought a budget to the floor of the Senate in three years.  The Republicans forced him to bring President Obama’s 2012 Budget to a vote.  It was defeated 99-0 after the House had defeated it 414-0.  The movement of much of our Congress seems to be stalled in the Senate.  While the Republicans do not have a majority,  they do have a tool called a filibuster that can stall and stop Senate business.

 On top of all of this is the further question of leadership.  It is my understanding that a good leader gets his people together on a regular basis and listens and guides and empowers.  Does not a good leader help bring information forward and guide people to see each others points?  Are we seeing that from our President?  Are we so polarized that we cannot see each others points.  We do not necessarily have to agree.  We can listen and look for ways to compromise if we meet.  When was the last time he met with the leaders of Congress?  Aren’t  these meetings supposed to happen on a regular basis for the good of our country?  In the last few days our President has issued an executive guideline to alter arrest procedures of Homeland Security and invoked executive privilege on document sour Congress wants.  How can the Republicans be faulted?  Is it the House’ fault?  They are having committee meetings.  They are passing bills?  How can they be at fault if the Democrats under the guidance of Sen. Reid are not doing the work required of them?  The question then remains who are the obstructionists at this time?  Perhaps I am missing some big part of the understanding of how our government works?  Perhaps it needs to work together?

 …..ONWARD TO MORE MISADVENTURE…