First off T2 Thank you for your service. You can't blame the unions for everything. And I believe with all the low paying, lousy jobs that are around now and the way employers are taking advantage of their employees, they'll be back. I was a member of the Machinist Union for around 15 years. I was a Shop Steward for around six years so I got to see how it all worked. My shop went down south for cheaper labor LOL. Now it's India, China, Mexico, Viet Nam you name it.
When I was a kid I worked for a trucking company. You know the union so I won't mention the name. They were corrupt as you can get. They used two million dollars of our Health and Welfare money to bribe some congressman to vote for longer driving hours for truckers. Our business agents got caught, the Feds closed down our local and the reps went to prison. Not the Congressmen in question.

Don't fool yourself, the conservatives are just as corrupt as the liberals. Big business got huge tax breaks and still shipped our jobs overseas. Our last President had no leadership capabilities either and we had him for eight years. It's not just the politicians spending, it's the American People's own selfishness and sense of entitlement that's a huge problem too as well as two parties unwilling to bend for the other for the good of the people. If they screw with Social Security and Medicare without a backup plan, I think they'll be some sort of revolution. I've paid into it for over 35 years and for the past 20 years I've been self employed so I have to match my own. I thought the Republicans and Teabaggers were riding into town to save the day. So far I'm not impressed. Where's all the jobs? Where's the master plan?

All I can say don't vote strictly on party. Trust no one.

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Life...... It's sexually transmitted and always fatal

My (personal) fix :

Invest the money from the capture and killing of Hussein/Bin Laden.

Demand funds spent on sending troops to protect other countries.

Get all of Bulgers' money (all 3 of them!) and invest it.

Combine the Homeland Security agency and several others and get rid of the deadwood.
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It's just insane that the CEO of Oracle (Larry Ellison) worth almost 85 million pays
less taxes than his lowest tier branch secretary!!!

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Being able to play and enjoy music is a gift that's often taken for granted.

Don't leave home without it!

If we got rid of all the dead wood, who would run the store?

It's pretty funny when a bunch of musicians have better ideas the the government. Maybe we should start the musicians party.

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Life...... It's sexually transmitted and always fatal

Getting warmer......



Arjay

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"Here's why reliability is job one: A great sounding amp that breaks down goes from being a favorite piece of gear to a useless piece of crap in less time than it takes to read this sentence." -- BRUCE ZINKY

musicians party,

The Boss as president, he is the Boss after all
Lady GaGa, Secretary of State
Ted Nugent, Secretary of Defence

Of course the U.S. will have a plan in place by the deadline. The problem
is that it won't be a good one unless you're very wealthy and/or own a
successful multi-million dollar business.

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Being able to play and enjoy music is a gift that's often taken for granted.

Don't leave home without it!

+1!

Just ask Bill Gates, Jeffrey Imelt, Steve Forbes, Warren Buffet and George Soros.



Arjay

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"Here's why reliability is job one: A great sounding amp that breaks down goes from being a favorite piece of gear to a useless piece of crap in less time than it takes to read this sentence." -- BRUCE ZINKY

The offshore labour costs are pretty much emminent, you will find this will happen anyway, it's happening all over the world not just America. Times are changing, so the thing to do in this scenario is go along with the change.

People are allways unhappy with politicians, but nothing is ever done untill the vote is cast. Unless there is an uprising or a revolution per se, but we all know nothing will happen. It will be business as usual.

From what I can see is exactly what Ceri said, USA will loose it's rating, the dollar value will fall. Obama proclaims to have killed bin laden, instigating troops to return home. He will win win the next election, I can see it already. One thing that cracks me up about him, is that he is about to sign off a free trade agreement with NZ, which given this time, is an incredibly stupid thing to do. That sure is going to harm the local agricultural & meat markets for a start.

My advice to those who don't like what is happening, relocate. it's the only way to get away from it

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Supro thanks, it means alot that some people actually appreciate my and others service...although that is not why I chose to serve. And you make a few good points, even though I disagree with you about them, we can discuss things here rationally.

I disagree about our last President, he showed MAJOR Leadership by doing what he did without worrying about the political ramifications. Our current President has showed absolutly NO credible leadership on a single front...heck he even took credit for getting OBL, he only took a crack at him because of all the ground work laid down by his predecessor and some damn fine military execution that if left up to him, we would NOT have.
I did leave out one major point though that it seems we might agree on...We need to take back our country from the Career Politicians by DEMANDING Congressional Term Limits, so that those corrupt organizations (including most Unions) can't use that corrupt power. Lets face it they use that power to corrupt politicians who after four or five terms have amased such power in congress they have the ability to twist arms via thier committee chairmanship to which and what gets into legislation!

T2

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What time is it? It's Fender Time.

It's not that were a bunch of musicians it's that were the American people just like all the rest, and the American people have collectively always been in touch with reality. If wee the American people Vote intelligently we can make the changes that this country needs to survive another 200 years. A good place to start would be to vote in TERM LIMETS on all elected and appointed officials. that way we would get a transfusion of new blood every term. and Pay them the same money they were making on the outside. It would be like serving in the military for a while.
----Danny,

Danny +1 but you pulled out a little too early, in order to serve in CONGRESS you MUST First Serve in the Active MILTIARY to be Eligeable to serve further. Then you might understand what it means to actually work for a living! But you are certainly on the right track!!!

T2

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What time is it? It's Fender Time.

Time to stop spending more then they have. Just think they want more allowable debt and Obama Care has not even started! Who paying for that? Is Obama and his friends going to just pull that money out of the Hat.
We need to repeal Obama Care and come up with Tort reform for Medical industry and help lower the cost. Look at why an Aspirin cost $100 and $1200.+ a night for a bed.

It cost 1.5 billion just to bring a drug to the market. Many drugs that don't make it cost 800 million avg. just to reach phase one of FDA trials to find they can not. Then companies have to worry about large class action suits over side effects that don't show up for twenty years. Forget about the good effect and outcomes that far out number those.
And some wonder about the cost?

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The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.

Thomas Jefferson

Many don't realize the Government pays almost the same amount of money on Healthcare as it does on Defense and on top of that Government employee pensions is just a little behind as the third costliest program. Welfare is the forth at about 60% of the Defense cost followed by interest cost on the debt at number five. Nothing else comes close to these budgets.

1. Defense
2. Healthcare (For now but thats about to change, Who knows where the money is going to come from?
3. Pensions ( For our hard working Government employees including Congress!)
4. Welfare
5.Debt interest
6. Education ( Been a Failure)
7. Transportation
8. Protection ( Police,Fire, Courts, Prisons)
9. General Government (Legislative and Executive cost + general services)
10. All other less then 3%

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The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.

Thomas Jefferson

+ foreign aid ?????

Foreign aid is difficult to calculate because much of it is folded into other programs and initiatives to conceal both the amount(s) and the recipient(s). In 1988 the "official" figure was about $38B, with a little over half of that going to Israel. However, a number of other "off the books" grants that year totaled roughly $47B. These giveaways fell under the purview of agencies as diverse as the FDA, NIH, CDC, Departments of Education, Commerce, and Labor, and the IMF. Thus, we may never know the extent to which US taxpayers lined the pockets of the world's banana-republic tyrants and pisspot dictators in order to further the nebulous-and-parochial interests of the nation's bureaucrats.

Arjay

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"Here's why reliability is job one: A great sounding amp that breaks down goes from being a favorite piece of gear to a useless piece of crap in less time than it takes to read this sentence." -- BRUCE ZINKY