Cutting the Deficit

Currently a number of Republicans are offering proposals and amendments to cut the Federal deficit. Hopefully they will proceed in a logical and rational fashion instead of the typical ill thought out reactionary method whereby they treat the symptoms and not the root cause.

Let’s examine one of their most likely targets, the Federal employee. Federal employees make a politically tempting target. They are frequently bashed as incompetent and overpaid. But are they really overpaid and are they really incompetent? The fact say no to both

A woefully deficient study by James Sherk of the Heritage Foundation concludes Federal Employees are grossly overpaid – yet the study is flawed so badly as to be useless. For example, it purports to take numerous variables in effect but conveniently ignores the most salient variable – company size. Company size easily explains about 10-15 percent of total salary. He also takes extreme (i.e. worst case) examples and passes them as the norm. Using his logic, people would be in extreme danger of death from drinking water. The average person may not know there have been several deaths from drinking excessive amounts of water (excessive intake of water flushes out critical water soluble vitamins and minerals). And people can drown in less than a quarter of a cup of water (by inhaling it through their nose). Now how often do you read about deaths from excessive water intake or drowning in small quantities of water? Sure they happen but they are extremely rare – about as rare as the ridiculous examples Sherk provides.

If you are interested in personally evaluating whether or not Federal employees are overpaid I invite you to read my prior column on this matter. In fact, you can research this matter easily using the same method I did. It only takes a couple of hours – but is highly enlightening. Simply search Federal jobs in a certain area then compare the salaries to equivalent salaries for private sector employees with same experience using salary.com. The results do not match those of the Heritage Foundation.

Keep in mind that the Federal employee is constrained by the woefully inane laws Congress passes. They are then further constrained by ridiculous interpretations of these laws. They are required (mandated) to use arcane, antiquated budgeting systems that respond at the speed of glaciers melting to changes. Worse, the budgeting process is complex and difficult to understand.

So if Congress is truly serious about cutting the budget they should first review existing laws and eliminate those laws that are antiquated or duplicative. Then cut those that are high cost and low value. They should then greatly simplify those laws that are ridiculously complex or whose benefits are grossly out of balance with their cost of compliance.

This would be a thoughtful and intelligent way to proceed. It would take time and effort while improving productivity across the USA by reducing burdens on businesses and government agencies. It would also reduce compliance monitoring by federal agencies and the number of court cases and insurance costs.

But the proposed approach (which would provide real, tangible, and positive benefits) has little chance of being implemented unless constituents insist. The proposed approach would deprive politicians (especially career politicians) of their sound-bites the partisan political live by and the dinosaur media demand.

Taxes - Radical Innovation

Democrats want to raise your taxes (by letting the Bush era tax cuts expire) while Republicans want to keep your taxes the same or lower them by keeping the Bush tax cuts. Democrats argue that raising taxes is necessary to cut the debt. Republicans argue that cutting taxes will increase jobs and cut the deficit since all tax cuts have resulted in increased revenue.

Here is a novel idea. Instead of cutting taxes or raising taxes let’s optimize taxes. That is, let’s figure out what tax rates produce the most income without removing incentives to work and earn money. And lets implement a tax rate that encourages folks to make more money.

How many times have you heard somebody (usually in the service sector) say they did not want to work overtime because “the government gets all of it any way.” That should never be in the vocabulary of Americans.

We need a tax structure that encourages success instead of penalizing it. The worker should be saying “I’ll gladly work that overtime” or “Hey if I take on a part-time job or start a small business I’ll just make (and keep) more money.”

What say yea? Makes sense doesn’t it? An optimized tax system that encourages you to make more money! That is novel, innovative, and certain to create more jobs and get folks working while also cutting the debt.

Mortgages and Economics

Houses are in foreclosure and more are heading that way it seems. At this point most writers begin providing a history of events leading to home owner woes – but they generally fail to get the story right. The woes are due to three things – people buying too much house and engaging in speculation, too many people taking variable rate mortgages with teaser rates and the sudden increase in the price of oil. The last item probably had the largest impact because this is what caused our economy to crash – but that would take a series of writings to explain and I digress.

One thing that can be done to help our economy and home owners both is to make it more affordable for people to refinance their homes. The cost of an appraisal is now about $400 - $450. Why? New banking rules (thanks Congress and President Obama) increased the complexity of banks getting appraisals. But here is the rub. An appraisal shouldn’t be this expensive unless there has been a major change to the property. Besides, if you get two appraisals they are likely to differ by several percent points. A common five percent difference is $10,000 on a $200,000 property.

Next is the mortgage tax (think of this as a “sales” tax). If you take out a new mortgage in Brevard County, the taxes are one percent of the total value of the mortgage. If you refinance an existing mortgage (one you already paid the tax upon) you pay the tax again. This one feature alone frequently makes refinancing uneconomical. Simply refinancing a $200,000 balance will cost you $2,000 in just taxes.

Rates are at historical lows. With good credit you can refinance into a 30 year mortgage and get a rate under five percent – maybe as low as 4.5 percent. A 6.5 percent mortgage on a $200,000 loan has a monthly payment of $1264.14. The same mortgage at 4.5 percent has a $1013.37 payment. That reduction would help struggling families.

Unfortunately, to get that 25 reduction in monthly payments one must refinance – which is almost as painful (and expensive) as buying a new home. Refinancing means new closing costs, new title searches, paying mortgage taxes, buying a new appraisal, and more. All of these add thousands to the cost of refinancing – and frequently make refinancing uneconomical. The question is, why all the pain? Refinancing a car is easy, simple, quick, and rather painless usually. Why is refinancing a house so expensive?

Most home loans are standardized. And a loan is just a contract. Therefore there is actually no reason a bank and a home owner could not agree to simply lower the interest rate and make a modification to the existing contract instead of destroying and remaking a new contract (i.e. totally refinancing). The laws just make this painful (and non-profitable for closing companies, attorneys, loan officers, and counties and states).

One thing Brevard County and Florida can do to help its home-owners is to either reduce its mortgage tax rate or set up a tiered tax rate whereby the seller pays a reduced rate to refinance the existing loan balance (say 0.1 percent) and pays the full one percent on any additional money borrowed. This would make it easier to refinance mortgages and greatly help home-owners – and our economy. And it is the right thing to do.

Under Attack

If you follow the news at all you know that President Obama has sicced Attorney General Eric Holder on Arizona for daring to pass a law that makes being in the state of Arizona illegally a crime. Now think about that for a moment. The President of these United States (has joined with Mexico and) attacked (in the courts) one of these fifty United States for daring to make it illegal to be in that state if you did not legally enter the USA or if you have stayed beyond the time you are legally allowed to be in the USA.

Now that is bad enough right? I mean the President of the USA siding with a foreign government to sue one of the fifty states he is elected to represent and protect. This is an unheard of act during my life time.

This unprecedented action is astonishing (to say the least). But in the immortal words of Billy Mays “BUT WAIT” there’s more! President Obama has now filed suit via Eric Holder against Arizona Community Colleges because – are you ready for this – because “non-citizen job applicants were required to present green cards.” Yes, folks, that’s right. Because Arizona Community Colleges tried to follow the law and require non citizens to prove they had the right to work in the USA Eric Holder is suing the colleges. And yes, one of the primary reasons for this lawsuit is that one Zainul Singaporewalla, (a non-native permanent US resident) was asked to show his green card and could not.

Okay, I hear some of you yelling (okay thinking) that the college engaged in discrimination! You are almost right, there is discrimination going on here but (as I shall explain later) it is not the type discrimination you are thinking. There is this little known law (well, little know if you exclude every single green card holder and their spouse) that mandates green cardholder have their green card upon their person at all times. Read that again. Green card holders are required by law to have their green card with them at all times. But wait, there’s more! It is also illegal for the Arizona Community College (or any employer) to hire illegal aliens (or illegal immigrants or undocumented aliens or undocumented immigrants or misplaced citizens of other countries or… you get the drift).

Remember that discrimination thing I mentioned earlier. Let me now explain why President Obama and Eric Holder are both guilty of discrimination. There is this other little know law that prohibits selective enforcement of the laws. Yet that is precisely what we have here. President Obama via his surrogate Eric Holder is suing the Arizona colleges. Yet they are not filing criminal charges against Zainul Singaporewalla for violating the federal law that mandates he will keep his green card on his person at all times. Seems like this is pretty clear discrimination and pretty clear selective enforcement and a crystal clear violation of the federal law.

Maybe Arizona will say enough is enough and file a counter suit against Holder and President Obama for selective enforcement of the law (and failure to protect the state of Arizona from illegal immigrants), Now that would be an interesting case – and I would love to read the response by Holder and his crony Justice Dept to this clear allegation of misfeasance and discrimination.

Much Ado about a Mosque

Much ado is being made over an Imam wanting to build a mosque near Ground Zero in New York. Talk show hosts, the President, and even the Senate Majority leader are all discussing it. Invariably they discuss this as a First Amendment issue. Even the action flick hero Chuck Norris has weighed in on the argument. Unfortunately they are all wrong.

This is not a First Amendment matter. Here is exactly what the First Amendment states:

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

I challenge the reader (or any reader) to identify where the First Amendment prohibits or grants the right to build a mosque near Ground Zero. Nothing in the First Amendment addresses the siting or building of a mosque. Nor does the First Amendment (by any rational reading) prohibit Congress or New York from prohibiting the construction of a mosque within x city blocks of Ground Zero. It is well established that zoning rules may prohibit certain types of establishments from locating at certain areas.

Clearly this is not a First Amendment issue. It is, however, a Fifth Amendment issue. The Fifth Amendment states that: “No person shall be…...deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.” Prohibiting the mosque could reasonably (and should be) deemed an illegal action based upon the Fifth Amendment’s prohibition against the taking of private property.

The owners of the property have every legal right to build a mosque on their property as there are no laws prohibiting that land at that location. That said, do not confuse a legal right with a moral right or an ethical right or even what is right. Nor should a legal right be confused with understanding, compassion, or similar emotions.

If this monument to an attack by Muslim extremists (i.e. the mosque) is built near Ground Zero then the Imams and all Muslims in America that do not now speak out against this insensitive act do forever forfeit their rights to any future claim regarding a lack of sensitivity or understanding or any other emotional related actions taken by others against them due to their religion or beliefs. Thus if families of the 9/11 victims chose to (in the words of Neal Boortz and one of his callers) encircle the mosque with BBQ joints and nude bars and similar then the Muslims and Imans have absolutely no standing to complain about a lack of sensitivity or infringement upon their right to worship.

Make no mistake, this is a monument to an attack by extremist - it is not an attempt to build understanding or a bridge to anyone.

Democrat Walk-Around-Money

Talk about vote buying and walk-around money! The Democratic party is now pushing a $26,000,000,000 bill to keep 140,000 of its primary voters (teachers and other union members) employed.

Let’s assume for a minute that there will actually be 140,000 teachers and other union members employed. Yes, yes, I know, not a single one of the “stimulus” or “jobs” bills passed by the Democrats has come close to providing as many jobs as they claim. But let’s assume they get this one right (yes, yes, I know, it would be an absolute miracle but lets just pretend for the moment). This works out to $185,000 per vote – er, sorry, I mean per job. This equates to about $125 per hour of work!

No wonder the USA is in debt and sinking rapidly. And no wonder the union keeps voting for Democrats - I mean $125 per hour is one tremendous salary for teachers. . . or almost anyone else in the lower, middle, or upper middle class.

There are few things more daunting and difficult to over come than allegations of racism. Calling someone, anyone, of any age, or any group or organization “racist” should require proof positive to back up the allegation. This charge is so serious and so damaging that alleging racism without even a shred of proof should carry consequences – serious consequences. Anyone knowingly use the charge falsely to harm others should be penalized and severely. This is true even if those they seek to harm are “public figures.”

Take for example Spencer Ackerman of the Washington Independent. When Fox news broke the sordid story of Jeremiah Wright during the 2008 Presidential campaign Ham wrote that “Ackerman of the Washington Independent urged his colleagues to deflect attention from Obama’s relationship with Wright by changing the subject. Pick one of Obama’s conservative critics, Ackerman wrote, ‘Fred Barnes, Karl Rove, who cares — and call them racists.’”

This is not journalism. This is not politics. Nor is it misinformation or freedom of speech. This is not even unethical, sleazy slander. This is worse by far. It is clearly and unarguably a deadly assault upon the character and career of the victim. This false charge has totally destroyed careers, lives and livelihoods. Want proof? Just ask Imus. Or maybe ask Jimmy the Greek's heirs.

Spencer Ackerman clearly urged his colleagues to engage in illegal and unethical profiling. Where are the mainstream media? Why are the airwaves not filled with outrage at this attempt at character assassination by Ackerman? Why was this only “leaked” and not broadcast by the numerous liberal “journalists” that had access to his post? Are they not accessories to this urging of criminal conduct?

The false charges of racism should be punished far more severely than most simple violations of civil rights. A person denied access to a restaurant can go across the street to another. A person denied a room in a hotel can go to another hotel. A person stigmatized wrongfully as a racist suffers enormous loss of friendship, associations, jobs, income, and more. And they can not just go across the street to another place.

It is time for everyone to unite against this travesty of justice. I am not calling for another law – but yes, I am calling for modifying existing law to make falsely alleging racism (especially with absolutely no reasonable proof) a crime as painful for the false alleger as it is for the falsely accused victim. Maybe falsely accusing a person of racism should be considered a hate crime – for that is certainly is a crime of hatred.