Barry K Moritz

To all those who have observed the lack of postings in the last months:  I (regretfully) deferred to what appeared a rising awareness of the tyrannical activities of Congress (defined for now as the trashing of the Constitution of the United States in favor of political power and personal opportunities).   I witnessed the rise of the Tea Parties (hopefully soon to become one integrated and proactive organization to remove elected representatives who do not listen to their constituents).  And I happily viewed the increasing public awareness and viewing of programs such as that by Glenn Beck, who has, perhaps, done more than most to educate the American public about the realities of out-of-control spending and the attempt by the progressives to turn our nation into a socialist republic.

Recent news – such as Senator Chris Dodd’s recent announcement about removing himself from future candidacy, the poor poll performance of Harry Reid, and the election results in Virginia and New Jersey – further encouraged me to remain quiet as the American system of representative government hopefully began to repair itself.

Yet the Democrats in both the House and the Senate remain more loyal supporters of their party than patriots who value and protect our nation.  They are using OUR money to bribe Senators to vote against the wishes of their constituents – a clear violation of the equal treatment of all states by the Federal government not to mention a violation of other laws.  They have claimed their intent is to bend down the cost curve of medical care, yet their actions accomplish just the opposite – and they refuse to acknowledge that truth.  They have attempted to legislate natural law (i.e., the laws of physics and chemistry) in their pursuit of complete political control through so-called “cap and trade” energy legislation, which ensures an even steeper decline in our nation’s ability to compete internationally and which ignores the reality of currently affordable technology.  On this subject they are therefore showing themselves to be immune to logic, truth, economics, and science.

Future postings will also explore the inanities and politicization of environmental science the Democrats claim as unequivocal truth – as well as the lies and misrepresentations of the health care legislation.  Add to this idiocy less-publicized attempts to capture votes from people with questionable voting credentials (i.e., the bowing to the very labor unions who not only count ‘undocumented workers’  among their membership and therefore steal jobs from US citizens,  but who have been instrumental in forcing manufacturing jobs overseas),  the inability to distinguish war from civil criminality, subversion of the First Amendment via FCC regulation,  and the executive branch power grab involving the declaration of carbon dioxide – an atmospheric gas produced every time we exhale and one required for life on this planet – as a ‘pollutant.’

The Republicans, although not as active in their actions to destroy our economy and the nation still remain “The party of NO” without clear or insightful programs that offer an ALTERNATIVE to the historically unsuccessful attempts by the Democrats to install larger and more tyrannical government.  For that reason alone, they are also guilty of inexcusably poor performance in their jobs.  At the VERY least they should be exercising the skills of their attorneys (if they have any, because the trial lawyers have been supporting the Democrats in refusing to consider tort reform related to medical care-giving) and bringing cases to the Supreme Court citing violations of the Tenth Amendment as well as other Constitutional limitations on government power.

As elections are less than eleven months away, it is now time to once again take fingers to keys and add postings to this blog.  I shall be doing so in the near future.  I can only hope that all thinking Americans will NOT do as I have done (i.e., sit back and watch) but will re-energize their attempts to shrink our government to its proper size, bring spending under control, and institute plans to bring more manufacturing and truly wealth producing jobs back into our nation.

The first step is to ensure that all incumbents (no matter whether they are actively destroying this nation or simply going along because it benefits them personally) be removed from office.

Let’s roll.

KEEP YOUR NOSES OUT OF WHERE THEY DON’T BELONG

Congress has NEVER run a successful business and had absolutely no excuse for sticking its nose into a housing market about which it had no understanding whatsoever. What they THOUGHT they were doing was making housing available to the less economically advantaged citizens. What they actually DID was to trigger a recession.

Here’s how it started: The poor record of many low income public housing projects in the past led Congress to try to achieve its goal by making mortgages overly cheap. This created the artificial housing demand that caused the huge escalations in the price of housing (supply and demand, right?). Thanks to the natural law of unintended consequences, Congress actually ensured that the price of housing was once again beyond the reach of those who they believed their actions would benefit.

This is only the beginning of the full story, which has been reported extensively, and which ended with the collapse of the housing market. But in case you don’t know the facts, here’s a brief summary:

Most of the large number of new risky mortgages were ‘packaged’ into “mortgage-backed securities” by two government-sponsored organizations – Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. These securities were then sold in the financial marketplace. The Congressional committees responsible for overseeing the operation were the Senate Banking Committee and the House Financial Services Committee. These committees were headed by Congressman Barney Frank and Senator Chris Dodd after the Democrats took over Congress in 2006. Because of the risk perceived by investors in buying these securities, a whole new financial product – the ‘credit default swap’ came into being. This derivative product served to allow buyers of the packaged mortgages to ‘hedge’ their investment by essentially buying insurance for the market price of the mortgage packages. They were highly profitable because of the huge leverage they provided. In case you forgot, one of the prime reasons for the magnitude of the great depression was the overleveraging of investments on Wall Street.

Several people – particularly Senator John Sununu, Senator John McCain, and President George W. Bush – warned for years about the excesses of the unregulated mortgage derivative market and the operations at Fannie and Freddie. They were ignored by Dodd and Frank. Frank specifically denied the potential of any financial risk right up to the housing bubble collapse and personally derailed efforts to introduce the suggested regulations.  In fact, Frank and his cohorts pushed Fannie and Freddie to take on even greater risk – urging even more loans be made to people who wouldn’t qualify for traditional bank financing. As the Wall Street Journal noted, Frank and Co. pressured regulators to ease the banks’ capital requirements. With the aid of the so-called ‘community organizing’ outfit ACORN , banks were similarly coerced to make riskier loans. Taxpayers were now responsible for any capital shortfall.

Then the spit hit the fan. Defaults began accumulating on the risky mortgages. Fannie and Freddie were bailed out with taxpayer money. Regulations requiring banks to value their assets at current market value (known as ‘mark to market’) resulted in huge bank PAPER losses and those that underwrote the credit default swaps (e.g., AIG) didn’t have the free capital to cover the policy payouts. The whole house of over-leveraged and unregulated instruments (thanks to Congressional sleeze-balls like Frank and Dodd and the inexplicable lack of attention by the SEC) teetered, and the taxpayer was suddenly faced with having to come up with more than $700 BILLION just to avoid complete economic collapse.

Of course, NOBODY in Congress accepted any responsibility. Instead, the party of Frank, Dodd, and Schumer accused President Bush of being responsible for the lack of regulation. The public, which obviously lacks a basic education about its own Constitution, bought the fairy tale – despite the fact that the Constitution clearly proscribes that regulation must be based upon and derived from law. It is Congress who creates law, not the President. Unfortunately, nobody in candidate John McCain’s political party was able to communicate this fact to the electorate. That was one reason why the party lost virtually all power in Washington. Thank you, major media!

It is unfortunate that those Americans who were the recipients of taxpayer gifts no longer have their homes. But it is criminal that the tumbling real estate values and job losses cost many perfectly innocent homeowners their homes too. And it is criminal that nearly every taxpayer (i.e., the 60% of the Americans who pay income taxes) and especially retirees (and near retirees), who had worked a lifetime to build retirement nest eggs, took huge financial loses – some to the point where they are no longer able to provide for themselves. Dodd, Frank, and Co. got off Scott-free. Even better. Look up the major contributors to Dodd’s and Frank’s campaigns (hint: you’ll see Freddie and Fannie). And while the private sector is shedding jobs at an alarming rate, the government is increasing its payroll (up 15% in the last three months, with an AVERAGE pay of $75,000 should the anticipated pay raise be passed in the near future). Socialism anybody?

All this happened because of a government that serves only its own members’ interests; a government that dabbles in finance and industry and markets about which they know nothing; and one that passes laws that almost never accomplish their stated intent. And now, the new administration has placed its hands in the cookie jar of the automotive industry and left the taxpayer holding the bag for $TRILLIONS! All for securing votes and because the public lacks understanding of the Constitution – thanks to a poor educational system controlled by the new President’s party. But this time the government is running roughshod over existing law on bankruptcies – overturning decades of laws that would allow investors to estimate the risks of their investments. Is this the death of capitalism in America? Or will the law prevail to punish those officials who have over-reached the limits of their Constitutional powers?

More insight to follow at a later date. Use the interim wisely by studying up on the Constitution. And DO NOT let ANY of those incumbents return to office!

If there were ever a question of which Washington legislator most deserves to be deprived of another term, one who most deserves recall for manufacturing defects and for ignoring time-between-overhaul checkups on sanity, there can be only one answer to that question:

Madame Pelosi

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.

This radioactive ‘madame’ of the Congress is one of the most deserving. She would be a toxic asset except for the fact that she is no asset at all. And to think that she stands third in line behind the glib but substance-less President and the bozo who has perpetual foot-in-mouth disease…. Read the rest of this entry »