Fourth of July solution to budget problem

Happy Fourth of July!

Enjoy this video of an errant bottle rocket solving the nation's budget problem.

Happy Independence Day!

It was on this date 233 years ago that the United States was born. On July 2, 1776, the congress, in closed session, approved the resolution of independence.

John Adams thought today would be the day that Americans would celebrate independence based on that vote. On July 3, 1776, in a letter to his wife Abigail, Adams wrote, "The second day of July, 1776, will be the most  memorable epoch in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forever more."

Of course, public opinion is sometimes hard to predict. From the very beginning, Americans chose to celebrate independence on July 4, the date shown on the Declaration of Independence.

However, regardless of the date, we need to remember the ideas behind the Declaration of Independence. We were declaring ourselves independent of overbearing government. It marked the beginning of the greatest experiment in self-government in history. The ideas expressed, while not new, were still profound. It set in motion the idea that humans are capable of, and by right should, govern themselves and that the citizens, not subjects, should be free to pursue their dreams, wants and desires so long as they do not interfere in the rights of others to do the same.

Somehow, along the way, we have forgotten that. Our Framers would be aghast of how overbearing today's government has become. And it becomes larger and more intrusive by the day.

Hopefully, Americans will take this Independence Day to reflect on what it really means and how relevant, especially today, the words of the Declaration of Independence are and make a renewed effort of returning our government to our founding ideals.

An uncertain future in Iraq should not sway U.S. departure

This photograph by Khalid Mohammed of The Associated Press shows a jubilant crowd in the streets of Baghdad, Iraq, on Monday, celebrating the U.S. military's departure from the nation's major urban centers. In addition, fireworks colored Baghdad's skyline and thousands of people attended a party in a city park where singers performed patriotic songs.

The departure of U.S. forces is a small step toward the ultimate goal of leaving Iraq by the end of 2011, which is still a longtime away.

The reaction by Iraqis, however, is telling. It shatters the Bush administration's contention that the Iraqis wanted us there and saw the Americans as liberators.

In fact, they wanted us so there so badly that the day we left their major cities, they created a national holiday. If we were truly liberators rather than invaders and occupiers, would they have not made a national holiday for the day Saddam Hussein was deposed?

Still, the move is a good one, though the schedule for complete withdrawal is excessively slow.

I am not completely confident, however, that this is a permanent withdrawal. It is easy to see how a few bombings could be an excuse by the United States to move back into the cities, especially if the current regime is threatened.

However, that should not be our concern. The United States has done all it can and more than it should have to prop up the Iraqi government. Time to let the bird fly the coop, so to speak.

If Iraq falls into civil war, then so be it. Let the people of Iraq determine the nation's destiny. It is not for us to enforce peace in Iraq.

As Christopher A. Preble of the Cato Institute said, "For decades, the United States has been in the business of doing for other governments what they should be doing for themselves. Now would be a good time to start to change this pattern.

"Iraq is a test case for this change. Nothing that happens there should divert us from a new course."

[COLUMN] Time to consider congressional term limits

Even before Barack Obama was sworn in as president of the United States, one of the very first bills the Democrats introduced in the new Congress was one to repeal the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution, which limits presidents to two terms.

After all, when your messiah is elected you cannot have that annoying Constitution prevent him from staying in power.

To be fair, U.S. Rep. José E. Serrano has introduced the bill at the beginning of every Congress since Bill Clinton was president. In fact, many similar bills have been introduced in Congresses dating back to 1956, shortly after the amendment's ratification.

There are some strong arguments against term limits for presidents and that is part of the reason it has bipartisan appeal, though this most recent bill has yet to attract any co-sponsors and will likely die in committee.

Perhaps the strongest argument against presidential term limits is the loss of the people to decide at the ballot box whether the president should continue in power. In other words, the argument goes, it is undemocratic. Term limits, as U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, once said, demonstrate "a fundamental lack of faith in the common sense and good judgment of the voters."

While a good argument on the face, it crumbles under real scrutiny.

Barack Obama to save the day!

Another great video from my friends at JibJab!

[COLUMN] No more government 'solutions' for health care

Invariably, whenever I argue with some weak-minded liberal (I know, redundant) about health care and why it is a profoundly ignorant and potentially dangerous idea to let the government take over, i.e., socialized medicine, I am given some bleeding-heart sob story about the number of uninsured in the country.

Turns out, however, that argument is a straw man and it is time to put it to rest, thanks to Dr. Mark J. Perry, a professor of economics at the University of Michigan. On his Carpe Diem blog (http://mjperry.blogspot.com/), Perry quickly dispatched this liberal argument.

In 2007, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that 45.6 million people were without health insurance. One argument against the figure is that many of those people are only temporarily without health insurance. While the figure remains fairly steady, the actual people without insurance changes often.

However, another argument, the one put forth by Perry, is that a large number of those people are voluntarily without health insurance.

For example, of that 45.6 million people, the Census Bureau said that 9.1 million, or 20 percent, were living in a household earning more than $75,000 per year. Certainly, the vast majority of those 9.1 million people could afford health insurance if they wanted it.

An additional 8.5 million, or 18.6 percent, were living in a household earning between $50,000 and $74,999 a year. Many of those people could also afford health insurance.

That means nearly 40 percent of those 45.6 million people are living in households that could afford health insurance.

In fact, only 13.5 million, or 29.7 percent, are living in households earning less than $25,000 per year.

The problem seems quite a bit less pervasive when you break those numbers down.

Open letter to Barack Obama

This is a letter written by Lou Pritchett, a former vice president at Procter & Gamble, to The New York Times.

As of Thursday, the Times has not published this letter, but it has been making the rounds on the Internet.

Snopes and other hoax-watching sites have confired this is a legitimate letter written by Pritchett. It states succinctly what many Americans are feeling these days.

I thought I would share it:

AN OPEN LETTER TO PRESIDENT OBAMA

By Lou Pritchett

Dear President Obama:

You are the thirteenth President under whom I have lived and unlike any of the others, you truly scare me. 

You scare me because after months of exposure, I know nothing about you. 

You scare me because I do not know how you paid for your expensive Ivy League education and your upscale lifestyle and housing with no visible signs of support. 

You scare me because you did not spend the formative years of youth growing up in America and culturally you are not an American. 

Irony found in Italian soccer loss

On Thursday the world champion national team lost to the Egyptian national team in a Confederations Cup match. The loss was considered an upset as the Italian team was expected to win.

I mention this because I found it ironic that it occurred on the 194th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo, where another Italian, Napoleon Bonaparte (he was born on Corsica to a family of Italian nobility) was defeated in his final quest to regain power.

Yes, I am a history geek. I can't help it.

What's wrong with being self-insured?

One of the arguments often put forth by advocates of socialized medicine or some other government solution to "fix" the U.S. health care system is that 45.6 million Americans were reported to have no insurance in 2007, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

However, Dr. Mark J. Perry, an economist at the University of Michigan, quickly deflates that argument with the above chart.

Perry points out, as the chart above shows, that 17.6 million of those Americans make more than $50,000 per year with 9.1 million making more than $75,000 per year. It could be safely assumed that the vast majority of those 17.6 million Americans could afford health insurance if they wanted it. As Dr. Perry asks, "What's wrong with being self-insured?"

Indeed.

Read Dr. Perry's insightful comments on his Carpe Diem blog here.

Dehaven wrong. Increasing taxes a profoundly stupid idea

I didn't realize how naïve Lima businessman Tim DeHaven was.

DeHaven gathered leaders from Allen County agencies that lost all of their funding during budget cuts earlier this year.

The group then decided the best thing for the people of Allen County would be a 0.5 percent tax increase.

That is ludicrous!

The very last thing government should do in times of economic difficulty is to raise taxes. It would only serve to further hamper the economy.

Furthermore, DeHaven actually believes that once the tax is implemented we will be able to get the tax rescinded after the economy picks up.

Unbelievable.

The perfect example of that would be the 3 percent excise tax on long-distance service the government implemented in 1898 to fund the Spanish-American War. It was not rescinded until 2006, more than a century later!