Dr. Krauthammer Does Not Approve of This Message

Here's an that my father has repeatedly sent me over the years.

This message's viral spread has been pretty long-standing.  I'll let the opinions expressed in it stand for themselves - however, they are the opinions of a viral email author, and are not the opinions of Dr. Krauthammer.  I know this because Dr. Krauthammer said so himself.

So, in the end, this is a standard, anonymous right-wing rant.  Read it if you want.

Our future on the line?????? 

No matter your own view, this information is based on facts where we are. The future for our grandchildren...... Fast Facts About Dr. Charles Krauthammer , MD 

 Born: March 13, 1950   

Birthplace: New York City, New York

Raised in Montreal, Canada 

Attended Mc Gill University and Harvard Medical School 

1972 diving accident left him paralyzed from the neck on down. 

Directed psychiatric research for the Carter administration 

Began writing career in 1981 with The New Republic 

Helped develop the "Reagan Doctrine" in the 80's 

Appointed to Presidential Council on Bioethics in 2002                              

Dr. Krauthammer is frequently on the Fox News Channel. He is an M.D., a lawyer and is paralyzed from the neck down. A friend went to hear Charles Krauthammer . He listened with 25 others in a closed room. What he says here, is NOT 2nd-hand but 1st. The ramifications are staggering for us, our children and their children. 
Last Monday was a profound evening, Dr. Charles Krauthammer spoke to the Center for the American Experiment.. He is a brilliant intellectual, seasoned & articulate. He is forthright and careful in his analysis, and never resorts to emotions or personal insults. He is NOT a fear monger nor an extremist in his comments and views . He is a fiscal conservative, and has received a Pulitzer Prize for writing. He is a frequent contributor to Fox News and writes weekly for the   Washington Post.The entire room was held spellbound during his talk. I have summarized his comments, as we are living in uncharted waters economically and internationally.Even 2 Dems at my table agreed with everything he said!  If you feel like forwarding this to those who are open minded and have not drunk the Kool-Aid, feel free.... 


Summary of his comments:
1. Mr. Obama is a very intellectual, charming individual. He is not to be underestimated. He is a cool customer who doesn't show his emotions. It's very hard to know what's behind the mask.The taking down of the Clinton dynasty was an amazing accomplishment. The Clintons still do not understand what hit them. Obama was in the perfect place at the perfect time. 

2. Obama has political skills comparable to Reagan and Clinton . He has a way of making you think he's on your side, agreeing with your position, while doing the opposite. Pay no attention to what he SAYS; rather, watch what he DOES! 

3.Obama has a ruthless quest for power. He did not come to   Washington to make something out of himself, but rather to change everything, including dismantling capitalism. He can't be straightforward on his ambitions, as the public would not go along. He has a heavy hand, and wants to level the playing field with income redistribution and punishment to the achievers of society. He would like to model the USA to Great Britain or Canada .  

4. His three main goals are to control ENERGY, PUBLIC EDUCATION, and NATIONAL HEALTHCARE by the Federal government.He doesn't care about the auto or financial services industries, but got them as an early bonus. The cap and trade will add costs to everything and stifle growth. Paying for FREE college education is his goal. Most scary is his healthcare program, because if you make it FREE and add 46,000,000 people to a Medicare-type single-payer system, the costs will go through the roof. The only way to control costs is with massive RATIONING of services, like in   Canada . God forbid! 

5.He has surrounded himself with mostly far-left academic types. No one around him has ever even run a candy store. But they are going to try and run the auto, financial, banking and other industries. This obviously can't work in the long run. Obama is not a socialist; rather he's a far-left secular progressive bent on nothing short of revolution. He ran as a moderate, but will govern from the hard left. Again, watch what he does, not what he says. 

6. Obama doesn't really see himself as President of the United States , but more as a ruler over the world..He sees himself above it all, trying to orchestrate & coordinate various countries and their agendas. He sees moral equivalency in all cultures. His apology tour in Germany and England was a prime example of how he sees America , as an imperialist nation that has been arrogant, rather than a great noble nation that has at times made errors. This is the first President ever who has chastised our allies and appeased our enemies! 

7. He is now handing out goodies. He hopes that the bill (and pain) will not come due until after he is reelected in 2012. He would like to blame all problems on Bush from the past, and hopefully his successor in the future. He has a huge ego, and Dr. Krauthammer believes he is a narcissist. 

8.. Republicans are in the wilderness for a while, but will emerge strong. Republicans are pining for another Reagan , but there will never be another like him. Krauthammer believes Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty & Bobby Jindahl (except for his terrible speech in February) are the future of the party. Newt Gingrich is brilliant, but has baggage. Sarah Palin is sincere and intelligent, but needs to really be seriously boning up on facts and info if she is to be a serious candidate in the future... We need to return to the party of lower taxes, smaller government, personal responsibility, strong national defense, and state's rights. 

9. The current level of spending is irresponsible and outrageous. We are spending trillions that we don't have.. This could lead to hyperinflation, depression or worse. No country has ever spent themselves into prosperity. The media is giving Obama, Reid and Pelosi a pass because they love their agenda. But eventually the bill will come due and people will realize the huge bailouts didn't work, nor will the stimulus package.These were trillion-dollar payoffs to Obama's allies, unions and the Congress to placate the left, so he can get support for # 4 above. 

10. The election was over in mid-September when Lehman brothers failed, fear and panic swept in, we had an unpopular President, and the war was grinding on indefinitely without a clear outcome. The people are in pain, and the mantra of change caused people to act emotionally. Any Dem would have won this election, it was surprising it was as close as it was. 

11. In 2012, if the unemployment rate is over 10%, Republicans will be swept back into power. If it's under 8%, the Dems continue to roll. If it's between 8-10%, it will be a dog fight. It will all be about the economy. I hope this gets you really thinking about what's happening in Washington and Congress. 

There is a left-wing revolution going on, according to Krauthammer, and he encourages us to keep the faith and join the loyal resistance. The work will be hard, but we're right on most issues and can reclaim our country, before it's far too late.Do yourself a long term favor, send this to all who will listen to an intelligent assessment of the big picture. All our futures and children's futures depend on our good understanding of what is really going on in DC, and our action pursuant to that understanding!! It really is up to each of us to take individual action!! Start with educating your friends and neighbors!!!

Read My Lips: There's No Tax Here.

Whenever a Democrat runs for political office, it seems like there's an automatic reaction:  "If you elect him, he'll raise your taxes!"


Well, here's one viral email that's told us how it already happened.  Even when it didn't.

Subject: FW: HR4646...read this!!!



Snopes says it is true, http://www.snopes.com/politics/taxes/debtfree.asp
HR4646...read this!!!
On January 1st 2012, the government is requiring everyone to have direct deposit for SS checks. 

WONDER WHY? - A 1% tax on all bank transactions HR 4646
Watch for this AFTER November elections; remember this BEFORE you VOTE in case you think Obama's looking out for your best interest. 

FORWARD THIS TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW!
ANOTHER NEW OBAMA TAX SLIPPED IN WHILE WE WERE ASLEEP. 

Checked this on Snopes; it's true! Check out HR 4646. 

President Obama's finance team is recommending a one percent (1%) transaction fee (TAX). Obama's plan is to sneak it in after the November elections to keep it under the radar. 

This is a 1% tax on all transactions at any financial institution - banks, credit unions, savings and loans, etc. Any deposit you make, or even a transfer within your account, will have a 1% tax charged. ~If your paycheck or your social security or whatever is direct deposit, it will get a 1% tax charged for the transaction. 

~If your paycheck is $1000, then you will pay Obama $10 just for the privilege of depositing your paycheck in your bank. Even if you hand carry your paycheck or any check into your bank for a deposit, 1% tax will be charged. 

~You receive a $5,000 stock dividend from your broker, Obama takes $50 just to allow you to deposit that check in the bank. 

~If you take $1,000 cash to deposit at your bank, 1% tax will be charged.
Mind you, this is from the man who promised that, if you make under $250,000 per year, you will not see one penny of new tax. Keep your eyes and ears open, you will be amazed at what you learn about this guy's under-the-table moves to increase the number of ways you are taxed. 

Oh, and by the way, if you receive a refund from the IRS next year and you have it direct deposited or you walk in to deposit that check, you guessed it. You will pay a 1% charge of that money just for putting it in your bank. Remember, any money, cash, check or whatever, no matter where it came from, you will pay a 1% fee if you put it in the bank. 

Some will say, oh well, it's just 1%. Are you kidding me? It's a 1% tax increase across the board. Remember, once the tax is there, they can also raise it at will. And if anyone protests, they will just say, "Oh, that's not really a tax, it's a user fee"! Think this is no big deal? Go back and look at the transactions you made from on year's banking statements. Then add the total of all those transactions and deduct 1%. Still think it's no big deal? 

"A government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take away everything you have." - Barry Goldwater

Okay, Snopes did say that this is a "mixture of true and false information".

Here's the list of what's true about this email:

• HR4646 existed.
• And that's about it.

HR4646 is not a law.  It was a bill before congress, introduced by Representative Fattah.  It was referred to House Ways and Means committee, where the chairman never brought the bill up for consideration.

Nor was HR4646 new legislation.  He's introduced the same bill as HR1601, HR2130, and HR1703.  And this year, he's submitted it as HR1125.


So far, he's never found a single congressman to cosponsor this bill.  And no other national politician has has  endorsed any version of this bill.  Including President Obama.  Or anyone in the Obama administration.


So, it's not a law.  And that means that you won't be hit by this proposed tax.


But even if hell froze over and HR1125 passed, this bill wouldn't be a tax increase - this tax would replace the Federal Income Tax.


Overall, the email attention that this bill has obtained seems almost comical.


That is - until you realize that people will write and call congressional staffers to overturn this law - even when it never passed.  This takes up a lot of congressional manpower, time, and energy.


Congressional staffers don't work for free.  How much do you think you're paying in order for them to respond to these silly viral emails?

How hard will YOU lobby to get your $118 back?

After a lot of hand-wringing, congress has finally agreed to raising the debt ceiling, and passing $2.4 billion in cuts to the federal budget.

But not all tax hawks are happy.  They see easy ways to make further cuts.

Well, they're easy until you actually sit down and think about them.

Here's one viral email:

U N B E L I E V A B L E ! ! Read and scroll all the way to the bottom. What is wrong with us??
How they vote in the United Nations: 

Below are the actual voting records of various Islamic States which are recorded in both the US State Department and United Nations records:  

Kuwait votes against the United States 67% of the time 
Qatar votes against the United States 67% of the time 
Morocco votes against the United States 70% of the time 
United Arab Emirates votes against the U. S. 70% of the time. 
Jordan votes against the United States 71% of the time. 
Tunisia votes against the United States 71% of the time. 
Saudi Arabia votes against the United States 73% of the time.
Yemen votes against the United States 74% of the time. 
Algeria votes against the United States 74% of the time. 
Oman votes against the United States 74% of the time.
Sudan votes against the United States 75% of the time.
Pakistan votes against the United States 75% of the time.
Libya votes against the United States 76% of the time. 
Egypt votes against the United States 79% of the time.
Lebanon votes against the United States 80% of the time. 
India votes against the United States 81% of the time. 
Syria votes against the United States 84% of the time. 
Mauritania votes against the United States 87% of the time.  

U S Foreign Aid to those that hate us:
Egypt, for example, after voting 79% of the time against the United States,still receives $2 billion annually in US Foreign Aid.

Jordan votes 71% against the United StatesAnd receives $192,814,000 annually in US Foreign Aid.

Pakistan votes 75% against the United StatesReceives $6,721,000,000 annually in US Foreign Aid.

India votes 81% against the United StatesReceives $143,699,000 annually.

WHY?WHO IN THE HECK STARTEDTHIS AND WHY?THEY ACTUALLY BITE THE HAND THAT FEEDS THEM.
Perhaps it is time to get out of the UN and give the tax savings back to the American workers who are having to skimp and sacrifice to pay the taxes. 
Pass this along to every taxpaying citizen you know.

Of course, when complicated statistics are involved, it's always best to check them.

In the case of these countries' voting records, the viral email author doesn't explain his methodology.  Fortunately for us, Snopes made an attempt to compile the statistics.  Fortunately for our email author, they come to similar results, for roll-call votes.  Most "votes", however, are not by roll call (making it impossible to determine who voted with and against the United States), or are voted in by consent (where no one objects).  So, when someone says, "This country has voted against us x% of the time", they're only counting the most contentious issues, for which a roll call was ordered.  Not that it's unusual to disagree with the United States on the most contentious issues - allied countries such as England and France vote against us about 40% of the time.

Now, as for the notion that we should "get out of the U.N. and give the tax savings back to the American Workers"?  Well, our foreign aid to these countries isn't set by the U.N.  They're decided by congress and approved by the president.

And, quite frankly, when even our allies, in the most contentious issues, are voting against us 40% of the time, it's probably in our best interest to be able to cast veto votes in the United Nations.  A power that we'd lose if we left.  A lesson that the U.S.S.R. once learned the hard way.

And if we explicitly tied our foreign aid to U.N. votes... well, I'd hate to see how that would "spin" against us.

But let's take a look at some of these foreign aid figures:

For Egypt - Yes, we are paying two billion dollars annually in aid.  However, the vast majority of this is military aid.  In exchange for this aid, the United States is getting priority passage through the Suez Canal.  And, unofficially, when we're Egypt's biggest arms dealer, the Egyptians have a very good reason to maintain a peaceful relationship with Israel.

In Pakistan - again, most of the money is for military aid.  In exchange, they've pledged to support our actions in the region.  And, as their support has weakened, so has our aid.

And, in Jordan, we're seeing the same trend.  Most of the assistance is military.  With the expectation that they'll maintain peaceful relationships with Israel, that they will provide logistic support to our efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that they will make efforts to stop militants from attacking Israel.

Now, the wisdom of these schemes are certainly areas of reasonable debate.

"But," our viral emailer writes, "American workers are forced to scrimp and sacrifice to pay" for these programs.

Well, let's take a look.

The IRS says that, in 2009, they processed 144,103,375 individual tax returns.  In 2007, they processed 14,752 corporate returns, and 3,989,893 S-Corporation returns.  And, in 2008, they processed 3,146,006 returns for partnerships.  In total: 151,254,026 entities filed income tax returns.

Okay, not every person or entity filing income tax returns will be required to pay taxes.  Let's suppose that only half of them do.  That would create 75,627,013 taxpayers.

So, if you divide the costs of foreign aid to Egypt, Jordan, and Pakistan amongst that tax base - these efforts are costing an average of $118 per taxpayer.

I never said that military hardware was cheap.  But it's not bankrupting too many taxpayers.

Want welfare? Pee in the cup.

Okay, here's one that looks new to me.  And it's an interesting idea.  But I'm not sure whether the author really thought the ramifications through.

TO PEE OR NOT TO PEE...              

I  have a job. 

I work, they pay me.

I  pay my taxes & the government distributes my taxes as it sees fit.

In order to get that paycheck, in my case, I am required to pass a random urine test (with which I have no problem).

What I do have a problem with is the distribution of my taxes to people who don't have to pass a urine test.
So, here is my question: Shouldn't one have to pass a urine test to get a welfare check because I have to pass one to earn it for them?

Please understand, I  have no problem with helping people get back on their feet.  I do, on the other hand, have a problem with helping someone sitting on their butt - doing drugs while I work.

Can you imagine how much money each state would save if people had to pass a urine test to get a public assistance check?
I guess we could call  the  program "URINE OR YOU'RE OUT"!

Pass this along if you agree or simply delete if you don't.  Hope you all will pass it along, though.
Something has to change in this country - AND  SOON!
 
P.S.  Just a thought, but all politicians should have to pass a urine test too!

On the surface, it seems pretty fair - most workplaces require their employees to take drug tests, why shouldn't welfare recipients?  But it doesn't really think itself through...

Why Does a Fast Food Cashier Need a Drug Test?
It seems like not too long ago, workplace drug testing was a pretty rare thing.  Generally, workplaces' interest in their employees' lifestyle has been pretty limited.  When someone comes to work regularly, does a good job, and doesn't create problems, it's bad business for a company to cause friction by creating rules about what they should and shouldn't do when they're off the clock.  Especially if it doesn't affect their work.

Now, if a fast food cashier comes to work intoxicated, yells at customers, and can't keep his cash drawer straight?  That would have been the time that the workplace intervened.  Until a few years ago.  Is it because workplaces suddenly decided to become good corporate citizens and help the government fight it's war on drugs?

Probably not.  There are some recent trends that have made drug testing a wise business decision.

I can't name them all, but probably one of the biggest drivers of this policy is the cost of providing healthcare. After all, one of the most expensive aspects of keeping an employee in the United States is the cost of their healthcare insurance.  Companies are always looking for ways to reduce their insurance costs.  Insurers, competing for companies' business, try to develop lower-cost products.

This forces healthcare companies to look for a way to reduce the expense of insuring a pool of employees.  When you've got a working-age population, one of the biggest expenses are the effects of drug use - either in providing drug treatment, treating "accidents" that occur under the influence, or the medical effects of their use.  So, they can offer workplaces a good deal - if the workplace provides a $75/per person drug screen, and decides not to hire folks who turn up positive, they have a lower risk pool.  It costs less to insure such a population, and the healthcare company can pass some of the savings to the employer.  It's a win/win situation for everyone.  Except for the folks who have trouble getting a job - but maybe they'll have more motivation to seek treatment?

Does this make sense in Welfare?
Now, let's look at this writer's statement, "Can you imagine how much money each state would save if people had to pass a urine test to get a public assistance check?"

Although it's good business for employers to avoid employing folks who have positive drug screens, government assistance programs don't have the luxury of being able to refuse "hiring" someone onto their rolls.  It's designed to be a safety-net program, in order to provide appropriate rehabilitative services and temporary support to folks who can't find employment.  Now, we can argue about how such programs can be made more effective, but few are arguing that we should abandon these programs altogether.  Including the author of this email.

Businesses can afford to drug-test their employees, because insurance savings outweigh the cost of testing.  Businesses have the option of refusing to hire - an action that costs them nearly nothing.  However, when the government has a welfare recipient with a positive drug screen, their options are pretty limited.  They could:

• Call the prosecutors, and charge violators with the crimes they've committed.  Costing a lot of money.  And even more, if we send folks to jail.  And even more, when folks start asking the constitutional question of whether this is an illegal search.
• Require substance users to go to substance abuse treatment in order to recieve further services.  This would require a huge expansion of our government's capacity to treat such folks, costing a lot of money.  Granted, the government might save a little of that money, initially, upon a minority of folks who would refuse treatment (and their welfare checks).  But most of these folks would probably start "surviving" by breaking the law.  And we'd end up paying that way again.  And, of course, some disgruntled folks will probably still make a consititutional claim that the government is carrying out illegal searches.

In short?  This "money-saver" will probably cost more money than it saves.  A lot more.
It might be worth it.  But I think that's where reasonable debate must begin.