STATES’ BLIGHTS

This effects everyone who pays state or local taxes- please read.   It's time to cut out welfare. . . for corporations, billionaire owned sportsball franchises and studio financed blockbuster films.  You have probably never heard of G. Brint Ryan, but his job is to get as many tax dollars into the hands of corporations as he possibly can. He's very good at his job too, even going so far as to suing his own clients for lost income he could have earned had they  gone after incentives that for whatever reason they decided not to pursue.

    All of these for profit endeavours are able to make such outrageous deals because no governor wants be the one who ’lost jobs’ or ‘didn’t bring jobs.’  It’s come a long way since a few tax breaks would do the trick.  With every state willing to give up tax revenues for jobs the really competitive states had to sweeten the pot a little more. Soon companies wanted free land for their building sites, and they got it. The next logical step was to have infrastructure brought to their sites free of charge.  So roads, power grids, sewer systems, and emergency services began to be provided at the tax payers expense.  Not enough to sate corporate greed, now they demand free buildings  and of course moving expenses. With everything provided, all that was left was outright extortion demanding cash payments, under threat of moving elsewhere, pitting states against each other in bidding wars to see who can sell out their taxpaying middle class the fastest.

    Since most of these companies don’t have to pay taxes, they don’t need to report earnings making it almost impossible to tell exactly what states are giving up. In some cases it is estimated that states are giving up $100,000 in tax revenue per job created that only pays workers between $20 - $40,000.  Taxpayers are having to buy their own jobs. These corporate windfalls never make it down to the employees who live in the states that pay for them, they are kept at the top for executives and investors. States are paying more per job than the jobs could possibly create in tax revenue, it would be cheaper to pay workers to stay at home. If you tried to blackmail a state like this you would probably go to jail. They can’t tax the poor, they have nothing. Tax the rich and their corporations and they will simply move, so no going there.  That just leaves the working class to pay the taxes for everyone,

Sportsball franchises are another source of usury against the state.  The Charlotte city council failed to get General assembly support to raise taxes to help finance renovations at Panther's Bank of America stadium. But fear not, they will still get millions in tax revenues for the upgrades. As usual, they claim the money is needed to keep the team from relocating. Which is a lie, The Panthers aren't going anywhere, they couldn't get the kind of loyal fan support they enjoy here. Bank of America's name is scrawled all over the stadium, so let them pay for it.

   What really rips me is that people will complain loudly about the poor getting a sustenance from the government yet it seems that you can hardly find a anyone who is outraged that billionaire owned businesses and sportsball teams get huge sums of our tax dollars. I would rather buy every poor family in the state a brand new Mercedes Benz than give one dime to these sportsball teams or owners. They are effectively private clubs for the enjoyment of the upper middle and rich classes, priced out of reach of  average families.  To take a family of four to one of these sportsball competitions costs about as much as a three day weekend at a local beach, making it impractical for a few hours entertainment. Even then God forbid it isn't a sell-out because if it isn't, the game is blacked out from television –the most insulting part of it all, preventing them from even seeing an event that they are forced to subsidize.

    Movie studios have jumped on this American bandwagon of cash. New York City paid large sums of money to the makers of “Wall Street 2”.  Even though there was no chance of them going anywhere else. I mean really, are going to film a movie about Wall Street in Toronto? I don’t think so. There is no ‘trickle down here either. Extra money is considered just that –extra. It is kept by the studios, producers, and actors, nothing goes to the stagehands, electricians, caterers or wardrobe people.

HEALTHSCARE DEFLATE

    I can't believe that after the Affordable Healthcare Act was passed, then upheld on challenge by The Supreme Court, and Obama was re-elected running on the fact of this accomplishment, Republicans are still talking about repealing Obamacare. First of all, as the "Christian" party shouldn't they be happy that many more people will have access to healthcare? You know, all that "love thy neighbor" and "do unto others"... junk? Being as predictable as they are I feel I can go ahead and speak for them. I imagine they would say something like "Well, we would like that too, but this isn't the way to do it"  and then add the tried and true "we need to slow this down and study it carefully" and my favorite; "We need to repeal and replace Obamacare."  Knowing of course it would stop just with repealing and somehow never get around to the replacing. Surprise!

    What I say to that is; "Too damn bad!" It's not like this is something new.  unaffordable healthcare has been a known problem for at least sixty years, and they've refused to do anything about it. They have blocked, slowed, or sent it to committee to die a slow death every time it has come up. They have had decades to come up with their own plan to get coverage for the poor but have refused to do anything at all.

    So they have absolutely no right to complain when the people got tired of waiting and elected some one with a backbone who wasn't afraid so shove universal care down their obstructionist throats. They had their chance to do something, anything, and they blew it. So too little too late repugnantcans!

    They declare it won't work without trying it, or anything else for that matter. Here's a novel idea, since it has been passed, partially implemented, and upheld by the courts, How about we give it a chance and see what happens? I'm sure it isn't perfect but lets give it a year and see how it performs. Then at the end of a year we review it.  We keep what is working, and change what isn't working as well, then give it another year or two- and review it again, keeping even more of it while continuing to fix the rest. maybe in a few years we will have a really good plan. Almost anything would be better than the nothing you have offered.

THE PAPAL CHASE

  The election for the new Pope is set to start next Tuesday. This will be the third Papal selection that I can remember,  and all i can think of is "Are you sure you want to do that?"  The last guy just quit maybe you should try out being Pope free for a bit, see how you like it.  It's bad enough to have so many politicians trying to run your secular life but to hand over your relationship with the Almighty and subject yourself to the whims of some old guy who believes himself to be infallible seems to be, well, a fallacy..

   Of course the entire concept of organized religion has made little sense to me. To have layers of ranks and bureaucracy between you and your personal God- well only humans could screw up something so simple as how you commune with the creator. That's why I've always been an admirer of George Fox, founder of the Quaker movement (but not Quaker oats) His revolutionary concept was to have no authorities in the church at all. No Preacher or Pastors, no Deacons, no Bishops or Cardinals, and definitely no Pope.  The idea being that there was no one better qualified to define what form your relationship with God should take or be, than you yourself. That each of us is able to commune with God in our own way and in our own time, that we are all capable of hearing the voice of God in the still quiet moments of reflection. To that end Quaker worship consists of no sermons only quiet meditation.  However anyone is welcome to stand and say something if they feel compelled to, or have reached some sort of an epiphany.

   although this has begun to change in some communities with the addition of sermons, to which I say what's the point of being a Quaker in the first place if you're going to do things like every other church?

   The Quaker philosophy makes much more sense to me than the hierarchies of a regimented "organized" religion. Why anyone would turn to another human being for answers about God, who is capable of speaking for himself to any one of us at any time loses me completely. What can a Steven Furtick or Pope John Paul whatever tell me that God itself could not?  Sure someone can go to college, study the Bible or other religious books all their lives and be experts in the scriptures. But truth be told, I haven't much faith in the bible either. There are some great and profound things in those ancient pages but a lot of it seems to me to be just some people trying to tell other people how they should live, a kind of "God told me to tell you..." type of thing to get people who ordinarily wouldn't- to listen to them. Even more of it containing stories that simply defy belief from the very beginning.  And some clearly written by a people who at the time had no concept of the nature of the Earth, the solar system or of space. 

   Does it make sense that God would say, after interacting with us for centuries, "I'm going away now- but I'm going to pick out thousands of people to speak for me while I'm gone.  Most of these people will be social misfits and outcasts- people to whom you normally wouldn't give the time of day to. But now they will have dominion over you and how you live. Also, (and here is the good part) I'm not going to stop any other nut who may claim to speak for me but doesn't and is only trying to con you for their own personal gain. Now it will be up to you to figure out which one is which- but be careful- if you chose wrong you will have to burn in hell forever simply because you loved me (or thought you were loving me) the wrong way."

    I have often wondered about this, Can you sincerely love a God out of a fear of the consequence of the most painful and horrifying punishment man could imagine without it breeding even a hint of resentment? Are you a better person if you do right and sacrifice only because you are afraid of the alternative, rather than the belief that it is simply the right thing to do? Why would an intelligent, omnipotent God want your worship or love under such duress in the first place? Why wouldn't he want your love simply because it's what you wanted to do? Why want to be worshiped at all for that matter? To tell the truth, I've never been all that clear on what worshiping something even involved or meant. Why punish those who didn't love you when you could teach them instead? If the goal is to become better people, wouldn't learning a better way work more effectively  than torment?  Why not just let those who don't love you go their own way, without repercussions? Maybe separating yourself from God and the rest of humanity through negative behavior is its own punishment.

Maybe I'm nowhere near smart enough to begin to understand any of this but I assume we all have a conscience for a reason.