How the Republicans can win in 2024 (part 1)

It would appear that no one fools with blogs these days. I haven't updated this one in over five years, in fact, and no one has noticed (I didn't even realize that sad fact until a few moments ago). So, it's safe to say that I can rant to a nonexistent audience. Fair enough.

So, the 2022 midterms are over and what have we learned? We know that Joe Biden is about as popular as anal warts (have a look at his pitiful approval rating over at 538 if you want proof) so it would seem the GOP was poised to crush Democrats in the midterms, right?

Well, that didn't happen.

Why?

Simply put, it appears that certain voters hate Republicans enough to vote for anyone running against them. There are two races that stand as evidence of that -- the senate race in Pennsylvania and the governor's race in Arizona.

Now, Pennsylvania was particularly eye-opening. While it's true that Republican Mehmet Oz isn't a great candidate, he ran against John Fetterman -- a shuffling goon with brain damage who has trouble forming a complete sentence. Does anyone believe that voters enthusiastically lined up to vote for a lummox who is more likely to show up in a hoodie and drool on the Senate floor than introduce any meaningful legislation for the people of Pennsylvania?

Nope. They didn't vote for Fetterman -- they voted against Oz.

As for Arizona, Republican Kari Lake faced off against Democrat Katie Hobbs. That is a particularly revealing race because Lake is an intelligent, well spoken individual while Hobbs is analogous to the color tan -- she's not particularly offensive, but she's not terribly bright or engaging, either. To make matters worse, she gives of a "cat lady" vibe and her voice is like nails on a blackboard. It's hard to believe that people would actually go out and vote for her -- people simply chose to vote against Lake.

It's safe to say that Republicans have an image problem that cost them the midterms and could cost them the presidency in 2024 unless they make some changes. And, yes -- I, the great Hawg, am here to advise the GOP on a few things it can do to appeal to voters and stop losing to horrible candidates like Fetterman and Hobbs. I'll do this in several parts and will add posts when I damn well feel like it.

Step 1: Get Rid of Trump

Don't get me wrong. I voted for Trump twice. If he gets the nomination in 2024, I'll vote for him for president. However, sticking with the Trumpster is a great way to see that Joe Biden or one of his surrogates wins the presidency in 2024. I've had enough of high gas prices, inflation, reckless spending and the other maladies inflicted on the international embarrassment that is Joe Biden. So, no thanks.

Here's the thing about Trump -- his approval was almost as bad as Biden's. That is just a fact and one can easily compare numbers on the aforementioned 538. Sticking with the guy is a recipe for failure. Consider this -- Democrats realize how much Americans hate Biden and there are calls for him to not run in 2024. Why on earth would the GOP rally behind a candidate who is almost as hated as the slug that is in the White House right now? That just makes no sense.

Want more proof of the public's negative reaction to Trump? He endorsed Mehmet Oz who -- as I've discussed -- lost to a lunkhead. He also endorsed Lake who, yes, struggled with the personification of the color tan. There are races around the nation where Trump was more of a hindrance than a help. Just look them up and one thing becomes clear -- the red wave was stopped and Trump was the dam.

I'll argue all day long that Trump was a better president than Biden. However, that doesn't matter. The Democrats have painted him as an insurrection-promoting fascist and that has worked for them. After all, all the Democrats couldn't tout their successes during the midterms because their haven't been any -- they could, however, declare that "Democracy was on the ballot" and that nonsense worked.

Hillary Clinton is a bitter old crone

I was reading this article earlier this evening in which the author reported that prominent Democrats weren't yet endorsing Hillary Clinton.

Is there anyone out there who really wonders why people aren't lining up to support Clinton? The answer is pretty simple -- the woman is a bitter, old crone with about as much personality as a table. Think of it -- the woman has no emotional warmth, she cackles rather than laughs and one really doesn't have to use too much imagination to imagine her trying to coax children into her gingerbread house so she can toss them in an oven.

Clinton had better hope people stop their analysis of her right about the time they decide she is an old crone because a further examination of her is even less flattering. What has she achieved, really, other than endure her husband and his philandering ways instead of shooting him? Not much. She failed as a secretary of state, her attempts to reform healthcare in the 1990s failed and were treated more like the busy work her husband gave her to shut her up for a year or so and her time as a New York senator didn't generate anything of note.

So, she's having trouble getting prominent Democrats excited. That's no shock. She'll probably have trouble getting voters excited, and I can't help but think she's about to find a way to win the Democratic presidential nomination only to get whipped like a rented mule by Donald Trump and whomever he picks as a running mate.

I have just one request of the old crone -- never step foot in my beloved Arkansas again. She cultivated a reputation for hating all of us unworthy rubes in the Natural State when she was forced to live here, so sticking to more "enlightened" areas should be a breeze for her.

Why I'm voting for Trump and you should consider it, too

Yeah, I know. Donald Trump is as blunt as a crowbar and, by this point, may have said something to offend a majority of people in the United States.

But, so what?

Here's the thing about Trump -- love him or hate him, he could lay the template for politicians to follow in the future. That is, ultimately, a good thing.

Why? Think about how the political process works right now. Special interests buy and sell elected officials who are supposed to be representing us voters and the result has been the wreck of a government that we have right now. Banks darn near bankrupted the country through irresponsible lending a few years ago and they had enough pull to convince the government to bail them out. That's right -- they ran through our money and got more from the government thanks to their influence. That's just great.

Want another example? How about bankruptcy reform? Citibank managed to buy some legislation that Bill Clinton had the good sense to veto twice, only to have George W. Bush rubber stamp that horrible reform legislation as soon as it hit his desk. The result? It's a lot harder to file for a Chapter 7 bankruptcy than it was before 2005, meaning consumers get dumped into Chapter 13 cases and wind up paying back a lot of their debt.

That sounds like a good thing until you realize that credit card companies such as Citibank lost a lot of unsecured debt in Chapter 7. That was the reason, the credit card industry told us, that interest rates were so high. Advancing credit to everyone with a pulse, seemingly, was risky. You'll notice that the reform that the credit card industry bought shoved more money in their pockets but interest rates haven't dropped. And, of course, their reckless lending practices continue unabated. In other words, they are as irresponsible as they were before bankruptcy reform, but they're making more money and are hitting consumers as hard as ever.

You can thank lobbying for that sad state of affairs and a whole lot more. Heck, we can't even address terrorism in rational ways anymore because groups like the Council on American-Islamic Relations will get bent out of shape and there's a group that has been amassing power like crazy as of late.

But, what does all of this have to do with Donald Trump? He is the one candidate out there who has a shot of winning and isn't in the pockets of a bunch of special interests who think the government exists to get stuff for them. I'd rather have a loudmouth who shoots from the hip like Trump than a puppet like Jeb Bush or Hillary Clinton any day of the week.

And the fact that the establishment Republicans hate Trump so much makes me like the man even more. Want to know why GOP leadership dislikes Trump so much? Because he can't be bought and that terrifies them. If you want to see the lengths they'll go to to deny him the Republican nomination, just read this Washington Examiner article and pay particular attention to how little special interests care about what's good for the country or for us poor slobs who happen to live here.

And, then, ask yourself one question -- what's more offensive? A loudmouth who says what he thinks or a politician who panders to you for your vote but will jump whichever way his donors pull his strings? Love Trump or hate him, wouldn't it be great if he kicked off a trend in which what we voters want actually mattered to people who beg us for our votes?

Trump for president? Why not?

Ever since Donald Trump announced that he was running for president, he's faced ridicule, predictions that the country will fall to pieces if he gets in office and all sorts of nonsense.

Here's the thing -- at this point, I figure about the only thing we can expect from the government is sheer entertainment. And, Trump is nothing if not entertaining.

Am I voting for the man? You'd better believe it. Has The Hawg lost his mind? I don't think so, but I'll let the two or three people who will actually read this nonsense decide for themselves.

The first thing you have to realize is that we voters have almost no power left thanks to lobbyists and a Supreme Court that seems content to let people buy influence at every level of government. Face it, junior. Your government doesn't give a damn about you, me or the guy next door. Our elected officials are more interested in what people will pay them to vote for instead of what is actually good for the nation.

In this environment, anyone who is interested in the government doing anything worthwhile is in for bitter disappointment. That being the case, why not go for someone who is simply entertaining? If the government will continue to take our money and not listen to us, at least we can have someone in the White House who will say outrageous things and keep things interesting. Honestly, entertainment is about all that we can expect anymore.

And, perhaps an entertaining government rather than an efficient, helpful one is about all we deserve. Think about it -- the past two presidents have gotten put in office because voters are more interested in spite than effective leadership. That's right. Bush voters wanted to irritate Democrats and angry Democrats responded by putting Obama in office. And those two, awful presidents were each granted two terms The only way to explain why such horrid leaders lasted so long is that their supporters were more interested in the "spite factor" than actual ideas or leadership qualities.

Why not, then, vote for someone who will be more entertaining than goofy and spiteful? Trump, then, might be a step up.

So, come on, folks. Join me in my decision to vote for Trump. You know you want to.

What Republicans can learn from John Kerry

Ah, good ole John Kerry. He is the poster child for how to absolutely blow an election.

Why is he relevant in 2012? The Republican presidential nominee will be in roughly the same position as Kerry was in 2004 and may well fall into the same trap as the failed Democrat.

Let’s go back to 2004. The Democrats were in a great position to take the White House. George W. Bush was a controversial president who appeared to be losing popularity on a daily basis. The economy was a concern, government spending had alarmed more than a few people and Bush was largely responsible for getting the nation involved in a war in Iraq that wasn’t exactly going well and was becoming very unpopular.

The Democrats, in short, were in a position to topple Bush and they may have done that with a strong candidate. Instead of a great candidate, however, the Democrats nominated John Kerry.

Kerry’s campaign slogan should have been, “Vote for me because I’m not George Bush.” Kerry ran around the nation griping about Bush. He boldly promised to not ever be George Bush, in fact, and appeared confident that was enough to become president.

Kerry failed. His biggest problem, it seems, is that Kerry spent most of his time trying to convince people to not vote for Bush instead of giving them reasons to vote for him. Americans are, arguably, more interested in voting for something they believe in rather than simply voting against something they don’t.

Think about it. We’ve seen that play out time and time again. I’ve been voting in presidential elections since 1988 and have rarely voted for a candidate – I’ve voted against plenty of them, however. I’m reminded of the Bill Clinton-Bob Dole election back in 1996 when a friend of mine returned from the polls. He said he held his nose and “did the right” thing by voting against Clinton, but was none to happy with Dole.

Here in 2012, the Republican who gets the nomination will likely be tempted to gripe about Obama. Yes, he can talk about the rotten economy and the failed stimulus spending. And, make no mistake – Obama’s stimulus packages have been horrible failures. The point of stimulus spending is to help create jobs so that the tax base will increase and the government will get back the money spent on stimulating the economy. When those jobs aren’t created, the government has effectively thrown a bunch of money out the window.

The temptation to complain about Obama and his policies is certainly there as this president is a magnet for controversy. There’s everything from the remarkably odd decision to block the Keystone XL pipeline (thus potentially causing that oil to wind up in China) to healthcare reform to, well, playing a bunch of golf.

I’d wager the Republican nominee who focuses on Obama’s controversial decisions will fail miserably in the upcoming election. Sure, pointing out Obama’s faults is fair enough, but a successful candidacy is built on outlining policies that are attractive to voters. Giving voters something to believe in and support is far more effective than simply telling them that voting for Candidate X is less dangerous than voting for Candidate Y.

Obama clearly did that in 2008 with his “hope and change” message as well as the “yes we can” slogan (I still think he swiped that from Bob the Builder, but it worked). Obama had a lot of enthusiastic support from people inspired by his campaign while John McCain simply did not. The outcome of that election was predictable, wasn’t it?

Republicans should take that lesson to heart. Voters had rather vote for a candidate they like then against one they don’t.

If you’re going to criticize Obama, get your facts straight

Here’s a scenario to ponder.

A talking head on a television network reports that there’s some language buried in the new health care legislation that will impose a 3.8 percent national tax on the sale of all new homes.

Since I’m a public relations guy in the real estate industry, I start getting calls from people who correctly point out that will absolutely kill the still recovering real estate industry. While such a move would certainly be devastating, there’s a problem here – the aforementioned talking head got her facts wrong.

What is actually buried in the healthcare legislation is a 3.8 percent tax on capital gains from the sale of homes. For individuals, that means that gains of over $250,000 (and $500,000 for couples) will be taxed 3.8 percent. In other words, most people won’t have to worry about the tax at all.

While I’m fundamentally opposed to new taxes (particularly at a time when the economy is garbage), there’s a huge difference between the tax as it was wrongly reported and the actual tax at hand. If you’re going to criticize Barack Obama, get your facts straight.

There are plenty of things coming out of Washington to get mad about these days. Why, then, do people seem to be going out of their way to make up things to criticize?

Griping about proposals that don’t exist is counterproductive – it makes Obama’s detractors look less than credible. That’s not the kind of thing we need going on now as we’ve got an opportunity to put a lot of Republicans in Congress.

What’s the best way to spoil the Republicans chances in November? Running around frightening people based on false information would do it – a dumb tactic when there are so many legitimate issues to discuss.

Casinos – just what we need in Arkansas

Michael Wasserman needs to stay in Texas and keep the hell out of my state.

Who is Michael Wasserman? He’s this fellow who keeps trying to get the voters of my beloved Arkansas to grant him a monopoly so he can build casinos all over the damned place.

He tried to get proposals on ballots back in 2006 and 2009 that would allow his company – and only his company – to set up casinos in Arkansas. Neither proposal made it to the ballot.

Now he’s back with a new proposal that would allow him to put up his sleazy little casinos in Boone, Crittenden, Garland, Jefferson, Miller, Pulaski and Sebastian counties. In other words, he wants voters to allow him to set up some mini Pottersvilles and lining his Longhorn pockets with our cash.

To hell with Wasserman and greedy little gnats like him.

I’ll admit up front that I hate casinos. In my mind, the only good casino is one that is empty, on fire and not covered by insurance. I don’t want them in Arkansas any more than I want the two current state-sanctioned gambling dens in Arkansas – Oaklawn (horse racing and a bunch of things that look like casino games but aren’t classified as such) in Hot Springs and Southland Greyhound Park (which has more of those casino lookalike games) in West Memphis. If you want to throw your money away, go blow it at one of those two filthy eyesores or (better yet) send it to me.

Yes, I’m simply opposed to casinos as I don’t want to live within 200 miles of one of the nasty things. However, my objection to Wasserman goes beyond moral concerns – as much as I detest casinos, the idea of giving someone a state-sanctioned monopoly so he can run one is simply ludicrous.

Why should Wasserman have the right to operate a profitable business when no one else can? If we’re going to let him show up in Arkansas and open one, how can we exclude the next guy or the one after that? How can we – as Arkansans – possibly allow a situation to exist where a guy can build a business that is absolutely free of competition?

If the people of this state won’t casinos, then let’s allow the things. Don’t just allow one guy to come in, build seven of them and not let anyone else compete. The way I see it, we either allow casinos or we don’t – monopolies are nasty and we ought not have them sanctioned by state law.

And, yes, that means that Oaklawn and Southland ought to be forced out of existence or forced to deal with the prospect of (gasp!) having to deal with competitors for a change.

Wasserman will, apparently, start his “Let Me Rape You, Arkansas” tour soon by trying to get enough signatures on petitions to put his self-serving proposal on the ballot. I do hope Wasserman and his flunkies get a chilly reception from my fellow Arkansans.

Ding f’in dong!

Well, it’s official – U.S. Rep. Vic Snyder (D-Ark.) has called it quits.

That’s right, after virtually ignoring a heck of a lot of voters in his district for years, Snyder won’t seek reelection this year. Perhaps his voters in Little Rock will miss his rambling, mustache-mumbling speeches and “what the hell is he thinking?” voting record, but I feel relatively certain that some of us in the more “unsophisticated” parts of his district won’t miss the man one bit.

Yes, the Second District does include Pulaski County, which touts the highest population in the state as it includes Little Rock, our capitol city – but the man rarely showed signs there were some voters rushing around in other parts of his district. While Snyder may have been a darling with the alleged elite in Little Rock (well, as elite as a group can be in Arkansas, at least), I’ve wondered one thing since the man lurched his way into Congress in 1996 – what does he have to offer us yokels in Saline, Conway, Faulkner, Perry, Van Buren, White and Yell counties?

Not a whole lot, apparently. A poll released Thursday showed that Snyder was trailing Republican challenger Tim Griffin by quite a bit and was headed for trouble after carrying water for the Democrats in the health care reform debate.

So Snyder is out of the race and I can’t say I’m stunned. He was about to face some angry voters in this year’s election cycle and he knew it.

Oddly, this can’t come as great news to Griffin as he’s got money and public outrage on his side while Snyder had, well, some well-connected friends in Little Rock. If the Democrats come up with a strong candidate then we might be looking at a horserace in the 2nd District instead of the butt whipping we hoped to see Griffin (or anyone, for that matter) inflict on Snyder.

Whatever the result, at least Snyder will be gone and that’s good news. We’ll be better represented by just about any Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Green or Constitutionalist who can manage to get enough support to actually win the office. Hell, we’d be better represented by a rat terrier, a Folger’s coffee can or a sock monkey when you get down to it.

The wise optometrist tackles the issue of health care

My little brother is an optometrist, so you’d better believe he’s got an interest in the healthcare debate that’s raging across the country right now.

Now, my brother is the bright one in the family. Want proof? He’s an optometrist who makes a good living by contributing something to society (good eyesight) while I’m a public relations guy who doesn’t contribute one damned thing. When he comes up with a good idea it’s worth hearing.

In a nutshell, my brother has noticed that we’ve been spending a lot of time talking about health insurance reform rather than true health care reform. The whole issue boils down to dollars and cents – the goal appears to be to both make health care more affordable and get insurance to people who need it.

Those two expenses – the costs of health care and insurance – are rather intertwined. There’s a school of thought out there that suggests that dropping health care costs will make insurance more affordable.

With that in mind, here’s my brother’s idea – simply pass legislation that will allow medical providers the option of offering a discount to people who pay for services up front. That’s a simple suggestion, to be sure, but it could well achieve quite a bit.

Could doctors already do that? Well, not really. Just ask a medical provider who’s tried to get away with charging two separate prices for identical procedures when Medicare is involved. If a doctor wants to collect, say, $100 for an office visit, he might charge $300 in hopes of collecting that much from Medicare or Medicaid. And you’d better believe there will be hell to pay if that Medicare patient or someone carrying private insurance is charged $300 while someone who is paying at the time of service is charged $100.

What happens? Everyone gets charged $300 and health care costs have magically risen. My brother’s suggestion, then, is to break that cycle by allowing doctors the freedom to discount their fees if they so choose.

What follows from that? You’d better believe that health insurance providers – both public and private – start figuring out how to pay up front in order to avoid paying higher costs after services are rendered and insurance forms are filed. In theory, then, health care costs have just dropped and insurance rates ought to drop, too (if, of course, competition among them is allowed and encouraged – that’s another discussion for another time, however).

The question, of course, is would doctors choose to offer a discount. My brother seems to think so – he’d rather accept, say, $50 for an office visit rather than charge $200 and deal with the headaches of filing a bunch of insurance forms. Other doctors would, hopefully, feel the same way.

There’s a good reason to think they might. If doctors like my brother charged $50 up front for a visit, you’d better believe they’d see their businesses boom while others charging $200 for the same thing would watch their patients vanish. That’s called competition – something we used to value here in the United States.

While such market-based solutions may seem quaint in this day and age where the government is invited to poke around in our private affairs, such an idea may gain some traction with the public. Who do you trust more to do something about increasing medical costs? Insurance companies, the federal government or physicians?

Seeing how I detest both Congress and the medical insurance industry, I’d be inclined to listen to what physicians have to say about health care costs. Oddly, it appears that group is rarely consulted in the current debate.

Against all logic, health care debate advances

After a drama-filled week, the Democrats bought enough votes (60) to move the health care debate forward.

The final holdout was our own Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) Another holdout -- Sen. Mary Landrieu -- sold her vote for hard, cold cash. It doesn't appear that Lincoln got a thing for voting to move the bill into the debate state.

That's too bad. Landrieu can at least claim she sold out in exchange for $100 million (at least) in federal dollars for her district. Lincoln is left saying she voted to debate a bill she's against so that the Senate can have the opportunity to change it and stuff. Or something like that. She could have at least held out for a few bucks for Arkansas, a cool car or something else of value.

The concern here, of course, is that the latest Rasmussen poll shows that only 38 percent of the country supports the current bill. The bill has already passed the House in spite of the fact an awful lot of congressmen have claimed they are against it and wouldn't vote for final passage if the bill is similar to the one they voted to pass.

Work your way through that logic if you dare. Meanwhile, senators like Lincoln are currently using similar logic, meaning that it's not altogether impossible to suspect the very senators and representatives claiming to oppose this thing will eventually pass it.

It's worth pointing out that the Landrieu example stands as evidence that votes are totally for sale on this bill and proponents of the bill are more than happy to buy them. We saw the same thing with that dreadful bankruptcy reform a few years ago (the credit card industry spent millions buying votes for that piece of slop) and that does appear to be the way business is done these days (just ask General Motors). Shameful. These folks can be bought and it doesn't matter one whit what the people who elected them want.

How did our Arkansas congressional delegation fare? Not surprisingly, that mustache-mumbling Rep. Vic Snyder (D-2nd Dist.) voted to pass the bill in Congress. Rep. Marion Berry (D-1st Dist.) somewhat surprisingly followed suit. Rep. John Boozman (R-4th Dist.) voted "no" as did Rep. Mike Ross (D-3rd Dist.)

In the Senate, Sen. Mark Pryor joined Lincoln in voting to move the bill to debate. That's no surprise, really -- Pryor would vote for legislation authorizing nun beating if the Democrat leadership told him it was a good idea. Rumor has it the man had an original thought 30 years ago and decided he didn't much like it.

It appears there may be some merit to what the Republicans opposing this bill said -- voting to move it to debate is really a vote to pass the bill. These folks are for sale, seem to disregard what their constituents want and are amazingly prone to pressure from leadership. The American public might not want this bill but, by God, we may get it. How's that for representative government?

Blanche Lincoln in trouble?

Here’s one of those stories that actually concerns me a bit. According to a recent poll, U.S. Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) enjoys a miserable 36 percent approval rating in this state.

Uh, Lincoln’s got an election coming up next year. The poll numbers can’t be good news for her.

Now, I’m a Republican so I should view that as good news, right? Actually, I’m not so sure.

Let me explain. First of all, Lincoln is a hell of a lot better than our other senator, Mark Pryor. He epitomizes the phrase “empty suit” and apparently believes that he is representing his party simply by voting the way the national Democrats want him to on each and every issue.

Lincoln, by contrast, is more than a bit different. I headed to Washington, D.C., back in 2006 with the organization I work for (they howl every time I mention them on this little blog, so they’ll remain nameless) and we were concerned about some health care legislation that died on the Senate floor. We asked both Pryor and Lincoln why they voted against the bill.

Pryor danced around the issue for awhile, claimed we didn’t have a health care bill allowing small businesses to join together and take advantage of the group rates large corporations enjoy because the Republicans were being unfair. Yes, it was all the fault of the Republicans, see, that the bill failed – they wouldn’t let the Democrats add any amendments and blah, blah, bloppity blah. Pryor’s whining and finger pointing are, sadly, commonplace. His father was equally mealy-mouthed and unimpressive as a U.S. senator.

When we asked Lincoln the same question, she looked us square in the eyes and said, “I didn’t vote for it because it’s a bad bill.” She then outlined what she thought a better bill would be and laid out her position very well. While we didn’t agree with her, she at least had the gumption to explain her vote and why she didn’t like the legislation at issue rather than blaming the Republicans and taking no responsibility for her vote. I can respect that.

Lincoln has, over the years, has demonstrated that she does have the interest of her constituents at heart and has typically attempted to listen to what we say instead of just following the party line. In short, I like the woman and I’ve voted for her twice.

Now, here’s the problem with her being in a potential rotten spot right before the November elections. I might feel a bit better about things if the Republicans could field a top notch candidate against her. However, there are nine Republicans (as of this writing) who may or may not run in the primaries and they range from trouble making gadflies to quality candidates that are a bit unknown.

If we were just talking about a straight-up race against the Republican primary winner and Lincoln, than that’s one thing. Hey, I’d love to see Gilbert Baker (who seems to change his mind daily about running) or Tom Cotton jump in the race and wind up in the Senate.

Ah, but we may not be talking about a race against Lincoln at all. No, State Sen. Bob Johnson (D-Bigelow) may run against Lincoln in the primaries. Given this state’s knack of voting for Republicans in presidential elections and sticking with Democrats in congressional races (out of our six-member congressional delegation, only one of them is a Republican), that worries me.

Frankly, Johnson sucks. Let’s look at some of the things he’s done that I absolutely detest:

* He sponsored legislation in 2005 allowing Hot Springs and West Memphis to hold elections allowing electronic games at those city’s race tracks (horse in the case of Hot Springs, greyhounds in the case of West Memphis). Those machines were approved, thus allowing us to continue the odd practice of allowing gambling in two cities but no other ones in Arkansas. Either ban it completely or let everyone have it. There’s no sense in allowing two groups to hold a monopoly and allowing them to make it more profitable by coming up with new ways to rip off the public is appalling.

* Also in 2005 (a banner year for Johnson, seemingly), he sponsored legislation that would allow Deltic Timber to to stick a housing development in the watershed of Lake Maumelle. The problem with that, of course, is that Lake Maumelle is central Arkansas’ primary water source. What the hell? Why back something that will clearly lead to more pollution of drinking water in the area? That effort – fortunately – failed.

* In 2006, he was in the middle of a controversy in the Arkansas Supreme Court. Justices found the Legislature’s method of providing funding for local projects violated the state constitution and pointed to Johnson’s $400,000 appropriate for road projects in Bigelow (his hometown) as a particularly glaring example of how the system was broken. Uh, Bigelow has about 300 people in it. What was that $400,000 used for and what kind of road project costs that much in Bigelow?

* Johnson backed that blasted cigarette tax last year to pay for a statewide trauma system (necessary) and a lot of other health-related stuff (probably not necessary). That measure passed and I’ve always had an objection to it. We voted to hold a statewide lottery that will generate cash for college scholarships. If, indeed, the money that is used for those scholarships now is replaced by lottery revenue, why not take that surplus and use it for a trauma system? He may call himself a conservative Democrat, but he’s sure as hell not a fiscal conservative. We could use a few of those right now.

* A few years ago when Republican Mike Huckabee was governor, Johnson – yet again – proved he loves spending those taxpayer dollars. He backed the governor’s plan to float $1 billion in bonds to pay for road repairs, see – a notion that infuriated a lot of us Republicans who’d like to see the government cut spending rather than increasing it and taking on more debt.

Again, Lincoln’s weak position in the polls may turn out to be a blessing if we get a strong Republican running for her Senate seat. However, I could well see a situation where that Johnson character gets in office and continues his spendthrift, pork-barreling ways on a national level.

He claims to be a conservative, rebel Democrat who is hard to define. That’s a bunch of nonsense as he’s fairly easy to define. If a project involves spending taxpayer dollars, you can bet he’ll be there pushing for it.

I think I’d prefer to see Lincoln have another term if Johnson is the alternative, honestly. I may not always agree with Lincoln, but I do like her and believe she’s looking out for the best interests of her constituents. I’m not quite sure what that Johnson character would do.

Health care reform? What happened to this plan?

The news was – as usual – full of the latest information about the health care debate that’s been raging for, oh, at least a few months now.

It seems the Obama administration is backing off the so-called public option – that would put the government in competition with private health insurance agencies – and is looking into setting up a private system of health care cooperatives that work like electric co-ops.

Or, maybe not.

What I’ve been wondering for awhile now is what happened to the Small Business Health Options Plan (SHOP) that was all the rage a year ago. Actually, I first heard about that plan in about 2001 when John Boozman – a Republican congressman from Arkansas’ 3rd District – talked about an early version of it during a meeting at the famed Catfish Hole in Fayetteville, Ark.

Under the terms of that plan, small businesses would be able to band together in statewide or national pools and obtain group health insurance rates that larger corporations currently enjoy. The idea, of course, was that such pooling would bring down health insurance costs and make plans affordable to even businesses with one employee.

A plan that would accomplish just that went before Congress in 2006 and was defeated in the Senate. At the time, senators from Arkansas said that the problem with the bill was that the Republicans blocked any attempts to add amendments to the Senate bill, thus prohibiting members from addressing the very real concerns they had about the legislation. Fair enough.

Last year, U.S. Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) was in Arkansas drumming up support for the legislation, which appeared in the Senate as S.2759 with a companion bill in the House as H.R.5918. After hearing of bipartisan support and support from such heavy hitters as the National Association of Realtors and the National Federation of Independent Business, both bills got stuck in committee and apparently perished there.

Perhaps it’s no coincidence that all the noise over SHOP died almost completely as soon as it was obvious that Obama whipped Hillary Clinton in the primaries and became the Democrats’ presidential nominee. Still, one has to wonder what happened to all that support for SHOP and why aren’t we hearing a peep about it these days?

We’re talking about a piece of legislation that had been worked on for at least seven years and was full of tax incentives for small businesses that offered health care insurance to employees. It was a mature bill and one that appeared to have a solid chance of becoming law. We’re talking about a piece of legislation in which both Democrats and Republicans had the chance to put in provisions they liked and raise hell about parts of the plan they didn’t like. Support was lined up from the private sector and attempts were made to address the concerns of the insurance industry.

All that work, seemingly, has been tossed aside in favor of a plan that just looks rushed and has certainly caused plenty of divided public opinion and hurt feelings.

Here’s the point to all this rambling – the ideas behind SHOP started to form back in the 1990s when Hillary Clinton’s attempt to reform health care failed completely. How did we get to the point when we threw over a mature, comprehensive bill in favor of “the next big thing?”

Furthermore, where the hell are those members of Congress who rallied behind SHOP and why aren’t they saying a thing about the legislation now? If the Obama plan fails, what do our representatives say to the people that SHOP could have helped?

This is the kind of thing that just drives me nuts

The newspapers in Arkansas have been buzzing as of late – U.S. Sen Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) was quoted as saying unruly demonstrations at town hall meetings are un-American.

Lincoln later retracted her remark and I’m willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. I’ve voted for her and she has – for the most part – done right by my state and is generally receptive to ideas that fall outside the accepted canon of the Democrats (it’s a pity we can’t say the same about our other senator and that mumbling, mustached congressman from the 2nd District).

What I do take exception to, however, is the notion that people raising hell about what Barack Obama and his ilk are trying to do are somehow un-American. Apparently, that “patriotic dissent” that the left loved to howl about during the Bush years is only acceptable in certain instances (i.e., when a Democrat isn’t in power).

In this latest round of pooh-poohing, we’ve heard a lot about the “manufactured dissent” that the right has engaged in to cause trouble at town hall meetings. We’ve heard about how the extreme right is keeping the uneducated masses in a state of fear when it comes to healthcare reform through exaggerations, half-truths and outright lies.

In short, the right is being blasted to bits for using the same tactics that MoveOn.org celebrates and brags about proudly. The very idea that one group of organized rabble-rousers is patriotic while another one is un-American would be laughable if we didn’t have so many people willing to advance that notion.

I can’t say I agreed with a lot of the shenanigans from the left that we had to put up with during the Bush years, but they certainly had every right in the world to make their views known. It is an extreme example of hypocrisy for some of those same people – folks who were so vocal about how their protests were born of a love for their country – are the very ones declaring that howling conservatives are un-American.

It is more distressing to hear that very sentiment advanced by a U.S. senator. Sure she took her comment back, but one can’t help but wonder how many in her party think the same way.

Foreclosed – a few words about my Wordless Wednesday entry

Yes, it seems like just yesterday (in fact it was just yesterday) when I submitted the photo on the left as my Wordless Wednesday entry.

I didn’t take that photo or come up with the nifty “speech bubble,” but I had to share the picture. Why? I make my living as a public relations guy (I prefer the term “media cat” but that hasn’t caught on) and have heard a lot about foreclosures over the past couple of years.

That photo was sent to me by a fellow in my office (the technology cat, to be precise) as he’s heard a lot about foreclosures, too.

There are a couple of things about the foreclosures topic that are worth mentioning. For one thing, we’ve had our share of those things in Arkansas, but our troubles have been few compared to a lot of other states. One of the primary reasons for our good fortune in that regard has to do with the conservative nature of our lending institutions.

The National Association of Realtors tells us that the majority of foreclosures involve subprime mortgages. A lot of banks in this state simply refused to deal with those mortgages, so we’ve not had as many defaults as some other areas. Arvest – the largest bank in Arkansas – is one of those that simply refused to deal with subprime mortgages.

Second, I’m sick to death of the bickering over whether Republicans or Democrats are to blame for the collapse of the subprime mortgage market. The simply truth is that this mess has been brewing for 30 years and both political parties had a hand in it.

Yes, back in 1977 the Jimmy Carter administration pushed through the Community Reinvestment Act to encourage more relaxed credit standards so as to make it easier for people to take out mortgages. The thought was that poor folks and minorities were being discriminated against by banks that wouldn’t give the money. Equity, seemingly, demanded a remedy.

Some of that risky lending, as you might recall, was a contributor to the savings and loan crisis that beat the hell out of the financial system from the mid-1980s through the early 1990s. Rather than learn from the mistakes made, Bill Clinton announced in 1999 that everyone has the right to own a home and his administration pushed through measures that further relaxed lending standards for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Jump forward to the first term of the George W. Bush administration and you may recall that the only thing going well in the economy was the housing market. In an attempt to keep that rolling, lending standards were relaxed a bit further. They might not have been actively pushed for Bush, but you’d better believe his administration didn’t have much motivation to say “boo” about the alarmingly lax standards.

The key to the whole mess, of course, is the mortgage backed securities market. A mortgage backed security is exactly what it sounds like – an instrument that behaves like a bond and is backed by mortgages.

For awhile, investors lined up in droves to buy those things. Local banks generally didn’t have much call to scrutinize loan applications to closely – all they knew was that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would guarantee those mortgages. Meanwhile, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac could simply dump those loans on the mortgage backed security market and everything would be dandy.

Well, it didn’t turn out so dandy, did it? When you float a bunch of risky mortgages out there with terms that are too much for borrowers to bear, you wind up with a lot of foreclosures. Some of the mortgages being written just a few years ago were downright odd. We’re talking about thing like mortgages on which borrowers paid interest only for a period of a few years. When those few years ran, borrowers had to pay both interest and principal and simply couldn’t afford mortgage payments that went up by hundreds of dollars overnight. Adjustable rate mortgages often contained such unfavorable terms (i.e., locked in at a low rate for a few years then the mortgage would float) and we saw a lot of foreclosures from that end, too.

So a lot of the subprime mess was brought on by government interference and downright greed on the part of a lot of the financial industry. Borrowers, too, jumped in over their heads and were convinced the could sell their homes for a profit before the unfavorable terms of their subprime mortgages took hold. As we’ve seen, that was just not a safe bet – housing values plummeted due to overbuilding, downward pressure on prices, a souring economy and a host of other problems.

Oh, and here’s more great news – default rates on prime mortgages have increased dramatically this year according to the Federal Reserve. Great.

The good news here is that banks seemed to have learned a thing or two over the past couple of years. They’re looking hard at credit reports and are generally insisting on down payments from people wanting to take out mortgages. It’s worth mentioning that Arvest – and a lot of other banks that didn’t take any bailout money – had those policies in place for years.

Perhaps other lenders – and the federal government – can learn a thing or two about the value of conservative lending and taking as few risks with investors’ money as possible.

This post is part of the oh-so-dandy Tell Me Thursday event. Bump the link to find out more about Tell Me Thursday!

Lou Holtz for Congress? Heck yeah!

Here’s some news that ought to make any Arkansan proud – Lou Holtz might run for a seat in Congress.

You heard me right – he may run as a Republican and challenge central Florida incumbent U.S. Rep. Suzanne Kosmas, a Democrat.

For those of you unfamiliar with Holtz, he was the head coach of the Arkansas Razorbacks until he was run out of this state by a pack of morons in 1983. He went to a little college called Notre Dame in 1986 and led the Irish to a national championship in 1986.

I’m all for Holtz for at least a couple of reasons. For one thing, the man is a hoot. I have said – time and time again – that we ought to be electing better leaders to national offices. The American public doesn’t seem to interested in that as evidenced by the rotten candidates that have run for president since Ronald Reagan left office (yeah, the Democrats and Republicans have both scraped the bottom of the barrel for candidates since 1988).

Seriously, folks. The last presidential election featured a grumpy old man who didn’t seem to know what he really wanted to achieve and a fellow who stole his campaign slogan from Bob the Builder. We quit worrying about quality candidates and responsible government years ago.

Yes, you could expect Holtz to always be up to something wacky and popping off about this, that and the other. Holtz has a big mouth and it often gets him in trouble. If we can’t expect much from government, then we can at least be entertained, right?

My view of politics is – I realize – cynical as can be. I explain my point of view to people by relating a story from my days as a student. When I was a freshman at Hendrix College in scenic Conway, Ark., I was ironing a shirt in my dorm room (I have always hated ironing). I heard a knock at the door, yelled “come in!” and a fellow wearing a coat and tie entered.

“Hi!” he enthused as he handed me a pamphlet. “I’m blah-blah and I’m running for student council! I would really appreciate your vote.”

“You really want my vote?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Then get in here and iron my shirt.”

“I’m not going to iron your shirt!”

“Then I’m not going to vote for you.”

The poor slob looked like he wanted to say something but just couldn’t manage it. He wandered off in a huff, leaving me with my ironing and a great story that I’ve been telling for over 20 years now.

Here’s the point – if I would have gotten that guy to iron my shirt, I would have received more benefit from an elected official than most people receive in their lives.

If we can’t expect the government to do much, then there’s nothing wrong with voting for someone who could at least make political news interesting. Yes, I’d expect his speeches from the House floor to be littered with all sorts of sports analogies.

“It’s third and long, but we’re not giving up,” Holtz might say. “We’ve hit the two minute warning but I know we’re mounting a comeback that will be one for the books.”

Another reason I like Holtz is that he might actually get something done. The man is a loose cannon who says what he means and isn’t afraid to back down from a fight. Compared to that mealy-mouthed Vic Snyder who represents Arkansas’ Second District (my district, sadly) in the House, a hell-raising, straight shooter like Holtz would be a refreshing change of pace.

Snyder mumbles the party line through his mustache while Holtz tends to get angry and yell what’s on his mind. Of course, Holtz’s tendency to disregard the consequences of his words might be the thing that would cost him enough votes to keep him out of Congress. That would be a shame.

Now, I know a lot of people like to talk about experience when it comes to politics these days. The notion, of course, is that someone who hasn’t served in an elected office just isn’t as effective as someone who has.

That’s a bunch of crap. Look here – Holtz managed to lead the Razorbacks to a stunning victory over the Oklahoma Sooners in the 1978 Orange Bowl, has a national title under his belt and is in the College Football Hall of Fame. He’s achieved more than 95 percent of the careerists in the House or the Senate. That’s good enough for me.

I like this notion of Holtz running for office so much I might just make a contribution even though he’d be representing Florida rather than Arkansas. You want change? Just put Holtz in office and you’ll see some change.

What the hell is the government up to now?

I ran across a little fact the other day that has just bugged the hell out of me since then.

I was writing a story about interest rates for a small newspaper in Little Rock. It seems they’ve popped up over 5 percent and that has slowed down both sales and refinances. My task, of course, was to find out why mortgage rates are rising.

I should point out that it’s ridiculous to claim that any interest rate below 6 percent is high on a 30-year, fixed mortgage. Still, rates hovered between 4 and 5 percent for so many months that people got used to it.

Here’s the thing about those low interest rates – they are primarily the result of the Federal Reserve buying up mortgage backed securities on the secondary market. Now, mortgage backed securities are exactly what they sound like – you take a bunch of mortgages, package up that debt and sell it to investors. They behave rather like bonds.

On the day after Thanksgiving, the Federal Reserve announced it was essentially guaranteeing $500 billion in mortgage backed securities. The hope, of course, was that investors would then regard those securities as safer investors and buy them. Because the yields would drop, interest rates would fall and people would be motivated to purchase homes.

Additionally, buying up and guaranteeing those loans would give more capital to banks which would, in turn, lend money to people seeking mortgages.

That plan worked. Sort of. Mortgage rates dropped and capital started flowing a bit more freely. Ultimately, however, people started refinancing like crazy at low interest rates, thus flooding the market with more debt.

So, we’ve got far more mortgage backed securities out there than investors are willing to buy. Naturally, then, the yields on them have increased and that has caused interest rates to rise a bit.

Bear in mind, too, that the current mortgage rates are terribly artificial. According to the Mortgage Bankers Association of Arkansas, the Fed is buying $20 to $40 billion worth of mortgage backed securities per month.

A lot of that money has been borrowed from our good friends in China, of course. That causes a whole set of problems I won’t bother examining now. However, it should be said that being heavily in debt to your ideological enemy is a terrible idea.

The question, of course, is what happens when the Fed starts buying up those securities? Interest rates will likely go through the roof, of course, thus causing all kinds of problems.

What’s fascinating about all of this is that an alternative plan that makes a whole lot of sense (and may have cost less) has been watered down horribly. A couple of years ago, the National Association of Realtors suggested that the housing market would be helped considerably if the government gave a $15,000, non-refundable tax credit to everyone who purchased a home.

What we got was a $7,500, refundable tax credit to first time homebuyers last year. This year, of course, that credit was extended through Nov. 30, was raised to $8,000 and is non-refundable. The hope of a $15,000 credit for everyone is back before Congress, but who knows how that will do?

In other words, we’ve opted for a very expensive plan that artificially decreases interest rates and, obviously, can’t last forever. Had the government opted for a $15,000 tax credit to every homebuyer, it goes without saying that sales would have gone through the roof and the desired economic boost would have been in the works.

Further, people receiving $15,000 from the government after filing their 2009 tax returns would have provided an additional economic boost by purchasing things. Expensive things like cars (which would have certainly helped the struggling U.S. auto industry).

I can’t help but wonder why on earth that plan didn’t gain more traction. It couldn’t have cost more than we’ve already spent in an attempt to help the housing market. Furthermore, it may have actually been more effective.

So, what’s the deal? Are the feds afraid to turn that much money over to individuals? Are they afraid we’d just be “foolish” and save it?

The whole thing is confusing. Meanwhile, we’re spending billions trying to keep interest rates low. What kind of hell will be unleashed when the government stops spending that money?

What the hell?

Well, well, well -- more bizarre news out of Washington.

What a surprise.

Of course, President Barack Obama announced some new mileage and emissions standards today that raise a ton of questions. Well, a lot of Americans will get around to pondering those questions after the fun of laughingly waving at SUV and pickup truck owners with Obama stickers on them wears off, at least.

Essentially, we're looking at some pretty stringent fuel economy requirements by 2016 -- 39 MPG on average for cars and 30 MPG on average for SUVs and pickup trucks. The thought, of course, is that car manufacturers will have to come up with vehicles that are smaller, lighter and more efficient.

What's the problem with that? Those of us who have been doing the "right" thing all along will be the ones getting penalized. Hey, my vehicle of choice -- a Toyota Matrix -- is classified as a small SUV and, as such, would meet that 30 MPG average requirement. Why do I drive a Matrix? Because I choose to do so and I've always gone for smaller, more efficient cars (they're cheap, reliable and I can run them to death without feeling any guilt). Obama's lackeys have predicted that cars will cost an average of $1,300 more due to the new regulations. So, I'll buy the kind of vehicle I was going to buy anyway and I'll get to pay more for it. What a bargain.

And let's not forget that we are undoubtedly looking a higher taxes due to the insane bailouts pushed for by both George W. Bush and Obama. Why on earth, then, would the government purposefully go out of its way to make vehicles more expensive, too?

Further, I can't help but think we're being set up in a way. If we look at the history of the American automotive industry, we'll see the big three tend to face major problems when big, gas-guzzling vehicles fall out of favor with the public. Yet, the Big 3 appear to be on board with Obama's latest plan.

Why? Why on earth would they be in support of a plan that seems to push them closer to extinction? A logical answer might be that we're cooking up some protectionism through which tariffs would be slapped on cars made by companies based outside of the U.S. in order to help American companies become more competitive.

That answer makes a lot of sense, really, when you consider the Japanese are far ahead of the Americans on Hybrid technology and GM seems intent on finding a market for its Volt. Let's see -- it will cost $35,000 to $40,000 whereas a base model Prius costs $22,000 and a fully loaded one sells for $27,000. The Prius is a proven vehicle whereas the highly experimental Volt is, well, not. Further, the Volt is one of those weird "plug it into a wall socket" vehicles manufactured by a company that tends to make garbage when out of its comfort zone (remember the Oldsmobile Omega, the Chevy Cavalier and the Chevy Vega?) How do you make the Volt viable in that atmosphere? How do you convince Americans to shell out up to $40,000 on a vehicle that might turn out to be yet another lemon? The answer is simple -- tax the living hell out of the Prius and artificially inflate the price of it. You'd better believe the same government that has spent billions of dollars bailing out GM would be more than willing to blatantly interfere in the free market and rip off consumers on that level.

Hey, a pimp will take some measures to protect his whores, right?

South Bend cops too gentle

I was reading a story about President Barack Obama's stop at Notre Dame during his Hopes and Dreams '09 tour and couldn't help but feel a little let down by the light treatment the pesky protesters received.

According to an AP story, one of the people resisting Obama's odd appearance at a Catholic university is Norma McCorvey, the plaintiff identified as "Roe" in the Roe V. Wade Supreme Court decision that made abortion legal.

It seems that McCorvey is now one of those anti-abortion types and she went to protest Saint Obama with the intent of getting tossed in jail. However, she said the security hired to keep protesters in line in South Bend, Ind., were downright gentle with her. A cop, seemingly, allowed her to chance to walk away from the scene instead of whopping her upside the head and tossing her in a paddy wagon.

"I didn't know why he just kind of gently moved me away. So I'm like, maybe this isn't the right time," McCorvey said.

I'm downright shocked by all of this. Here in Arkansas, people who opposed Bill Clinton had to put up with some real threats.

We got hooted at by Clinton's "truth squads" when getting anywhere near a polling place when Bill was running against Sheffield Nelson during the 1990 gubernatorial election. The homeless in downtown Little Rock are gathered up and shipped off to God knows where (I think that's somewhere in south Little Rock) when the former president is in town visiting that double-wide trailer that serves as the Clinton presidential library.

And do you think University of Arkansas students were allowed to display the enemy's campaign propaganda when Clinton visted the college during the 1992 and 1996 presidential campaigns? Hell no! There's nothing like the threat of expulsion or the levying of some form of nonsense criminal charge to keep the pesky dissenters in line, is there?

Again, I'm disappointed that those South Bend cops simply refuse to be brutal to the protesters who dare show up and complain about that saintly Obama character. It seems certain that some protesters will get arrested, but where's the inhumane abuse in that? An arrest just lasts for a bit, but some scars inflicted by thugs wearing jackboots last forever.

How the hell does this happen?

You've got to give it to Iran -- when they go out and put a nut in charge, they don't mess around.

That President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (hereinafter referred to as "Jed" because I don't want to type "Ahmadinejad" again) is a piece of work, isn't he? I won't get too deep into the merits of the U.S. entering negotiations with a man who's crazier than a sack of rabid weasels too much because that topic has been beaten to death.

I can't help but point out, however, that he seems to be consulting a Magic 8-Ball when it comes to foreign policy, however. How else can you explain the actions of a fellow who's talking about conciliation with the U.S. when he's not tossing racist remarks out at a U.N. anti-racism conference or his government is tossing journalists in jail?

How conciliatory can this cat be? Is compromise even possible when you're dealing with a guy who's ape-shit crazy? Should the U.S. even trust this fellow when he says the sky is blue?

Again, Jed's sanity and trustworthiness has been questioned for years and I won't bother hashing through all of that again. Here's my question, however. Let's say you're the guy who gets to plan the U.N. anti-racism conference. You've got world leaders in Geneva for a week to talk about racism and (ideally) how to get rid of it.

At what point do you think, "Hey, let's let ol' Jed speak before any other government officials. That's a great idea!"

Wasn't it obvious that Jed would open his fat yap and ruin the whole event for everyone? Did someone think he'd back off the Jews this one time and play nice? Did Jed even understand that the conference wasn't designed to promote racism? So that one week conference ended pretty early as a bunch of ambassadors walked out of the thing in disgust before the event even got off the ground.

Honestly, how the hell does stuff like this happen? No wonder the world's a mess.

Entrecard

Raise your hand if you're completely confused by the stuff that Entrecard is up to these days. Yeah, that's what I thought.

Your old friend, The Hawg, is rather at a loss. My traffic has dropped quite a bit, my ad rates are low and a lot of Entrecard members just seem irate. Frankly, I'm starting to wonder if that whole site is worth the trouble anymore.

I'll recap the events of the past few weeks for those asking "huh?" and "what?" out there. Entrecard, once upon a time, was based on the simple idea that people would get credit for visiting members' sites and could purchase "ads" with those credits. People were happy and there was much rejoicing.

Ah, but sites can't function forever without money, seemingly, so the Enterecard folks got the idea to start selling paid ads. The only problem, of course, is that the paid ads knock out the ads purchased with Entrecard credits half the time. This has caused much grumbling and strife -- that healthy Entrecard traffic has slowed down and even blogs like this one that don't accept paid ads are watching their ad rates dwindle.

There's enough grumbling out there, in fact, to cause people to look for other sources of traffic. I've been doing a bit of that and have found some luck with BlogExplosion and I'm hoping to get a bit of traffic from Facebook.

I've run across some great blogs on Entrecard and will likely spend some days dropping cards, some days not giving a damn and some days just dropping cards on blogs I like. I'm having trouble staying too serious about the site, however, and the old days of dropping 300 cards have ended.

Frankly, that's probably for the best -- I'd rather linger around and read blogs than do a bunch of reciprocal dropping, anyway.

Don't mess with Texas

Things seem to get odder every day in this great republic.

The latest bit of oddness involves a story I read on CNN in which Texas Gov. Rick Perry said secession is possible. That's right -- the governor of Texas, while addressing an angry "tea party crowd" in Austin on Wednesday -- said his state might one day get fed up and secede from the Union should the federal government not change its ways.

Of course, Perry didn't suggest such a possibility is likely, but he did say such a thing could come to pass. That's a hell of a notion folks.

When you add to that notion a tongue-in-cheek column in WorldNetDaily column in which none other than the great Chuck Norris suggested he may run for president of Texas, you've got a heck of a hypothetical scenario, don't you? Just imagine waking up one morning, opening up the newspaper and reading that Texas had seceded from the Union and had elected Walker, Texas Ranger as its president.

Incredible, huh? Would the newly-liberated country still be called Texas or would her people switch the name of the new republic to The Nation of Awesome (and insist that it always be printed in a bold font)? What impact would an independent Texas have on the rest of the nation? Would more states follow suit and declare their independence? Would other states join The Nation of Awesome and form a new confederacy or would some states declare independence and form their own sovereign countries (if so, my vote for the new name of Arkansas is Hawgland)? Would Norris and his military start attacking and annexing states on the Texas borders? The possibilities are endless.

If Texas secedes and elects Norris as president, I might have to abandon my beloved Arkansas and go help out The Nation of Awesome. Of course, any government led by Norris would have at least two cabinet positions dedicated to maintaining law and order in extreme and entertaining ways. I'm not sure who would be picked to be the Secretary of Kicking Ass, but I'd want the title of Secretary of Taking Names. Yes, we could run around The Nation of Awesome kicking ass and taking names and that activity would, no doubt, keep us very busy.

Seriously, however, I do love the state of Texas and regard it as second on only my native Arkansas as the best state in the union. My wife and I both have a lot of family down there and Texas is, well, different. How different? Back in 2001, the popular thing for states to do was to ban smoking in whatever areas were deemed "public." What were they arguing over in Texas at the time? Whether it should be against the law for passengers to drink alcohol in moving cars.

And, just go look at some businesses in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. I've often noticed that some of them will have both a Texas flag and a U.S. flag out front -- every now and again, you'll notice the Texas flag is just a little bit larger and is flown just a bit higher than the United States one.

Of course, I doubt Texas will secede from the Union. That was tried by a few states in the South once upon a time and things didn't turn out too well for the rebels. Of course, with the U.S. military out policing the world...

Still, news out of Texas is often fun. The little CNN item about secession is no exception.

A bit of an apology

You good folks may have noticed a lot of paid posts as of late. For some reason, I've been getting sent a lot of opportunities to take those and I'm not good about turning down money. I'm sure my good fortune won't last long, so please be patient.

Before you know it, I'll be back to the same old rotten posts that I've always written.