White House Faking Rape Statistics?

This entire thing is about galvanizing the Dems' primary voting bloc: women. That is all it's about. For right or wrong, the party of the president is considered the principal party responsible for the country's state, even if they do not have a majority in either house of the Congress. Not a fair thing, but historically, the American voter has focused his/her scorn on the president's party when times have been bad regardless of any other factors. However it is rare that a president is of Party A and Party B holds majorities in both houses of the Congress. At least it has been this way since US senators and the president became directly elected by the people and not appointed or voted into office by electors or state assemblies/legislatures.

So these days, if the president is a Dem, it's a fair bet at least one house of the Congress will be controlled by the Dems. And indeed, that is what is true today. However in this case, it's the House controlled by the Dems and the Senate by the GOP, but in both cases only by the slimmest majorities. The people at large are failing to provide either body a clear mandate by electing one of the two parties firmly into a solid majority. So naturally, what do they start doing? Fighting, complaining, and in frustration, getting less done than people with "A" type personalities like to see done (and most if not all people who can make it into the US Congress as senators and representatives are pretty durned likely to fall on the "A" type personality side of the scale). As much as I am annoyed with our Congress, I also feel sorry for them. "Here, you won the election. Congratulations. Now go wait. Yes, wait. Wait 'til the people actually give your party a real majority so you can get something done. Until then, you can deal with constituent complaints about garbage collection and corrupt local police chiefs, or better yet, the nutter who keeps calling your district office to warn you that Her Imperial Majesty, the Queen of Zebulon, is getting ready to attack the Dairy Queen down the road from him because she is jealous that a pretender has taken the title "Queen" and will not be mollified by repeated offers of endless free sundaes and ice cream cones in 36 flavors with all the toppings Her Imperial Majesty may desire -- an offer he has transmitted through the steel divining rods he takes with him everywhere which he says he can also use to communicate with Her Imperial Majesty's High Minister of State and Intergalactic Affairs. And he insists the entire fleet is parked just on the other side of Jupiter and that's why NASA can't pick them up. But he's sent them enough emails about it and called them literally hundreds of times. And if that isn't enough to keep you busy, some frigging paparazzo has it in for you and can't seem to let up on the fact that your teenage daughter has been to rehab now three times and he has the pictures to prove it -- and he's selling them to the NY Post for only $500, just to make you suffer. But that's for starters."

Yeah, would just love to be in the Congress these days.

Still, there are three things I really think they have a lot to answer for, and could be doing something about, but are not. *Ahem*...&ltMount soapbox&gt...

1. Limiting the dragnet on citizens' communications so that yes, really, only people who actually behave in ways that would "cause a reasonable man to be suspicious that criminal activity is afoot" actually get investigated.

Want to spy on communications outside the US? Go ahead! That's called good-old-fashioned *espionage*, and 'tis been the right of nations to spy on one another now for literally thousands of years, friend or foe alike. Difference now is, technology allows us to spy on ordinary people in other countries instead of having to send some 007 type in undercover to find stuff out. But if in 1750 governments could have done what we can do now, they would have. Problem is, this technology when used domestically, especially when communications are between people inside the US and there is no reason to believe the party or parties have criminal intentions of any kind, then that's a serious problem as far as I am concerned. And even if the police believe there might be a plot to commit a crime happening, gee, shouldn't they be going to a judge to get a warrant unless if they sincerely believe that to do so it would cause the loss of vital evidence or place people in danger? Instead of taking principled stands for our defining rights and freedoms, they've caved. They held committee meetings and decided to do nothing. As they say in the UK: "Bloody bad show."

2. Jobs. Yeah, jobs. You know, the things so many people used to have before... so many stopped having them. Now I know that in a capitalist society, even a modified one like ours, there are boom/bust cycles. Even Karl Marx wrote about this back in 1847 in "Wage Labor and Capital" and he was right about capitalism at least in the sense that it naturally tends to have up- and downsides as a consequence of the behavior of the players in the economic system. Think of your typical suburban northeastern US setting: the deer in local forests soon realize that animal predators and "those funny-looking 2-legged creatures with those loud mysterious sticks that seem to be able to kill us from across the field" don't go near the habitations of their fellow 2-legged creatures and even more exciting, none of them ever uses one of those mysterious bad sticks on you when you are near to them. So they stay around the big block-things the funny 2-legged creatures live in. And in the spring, the does have their fawns. And the fawns and does are safe because no one tries to kill them. They learn to cross roads even with those scary fast things the 2-legged creatures get inside of rushing by, but they're easier to get away from than the loud, bad death-sticks. So overall, the deer do well. And they eat well, too. For a time. Since being in a suburban environment means more limited food sources as compared to living in a forest, eventually the deer population outgrows its safe haven. Some may leave to go live in the woods and take their chances. But others won't. And in any case, when winter comes-- there isn't enough food to go around. Maybe there was in the fall, just barely, for the deer still in suburbia; but winter comes, and what happens? 25% of the previously fat-and-happy Bambis die of exposure and/or starvation.

Same thing kind of happens with capitalism. A market exists for a product/service and there's profit to be had, so as many people with an entrepreneurial spirit as can go into it, especially if it's a market that interests them. (Love to fly kites? Magically, making and selling/flying kites now fetches $100/hr.? DREAM JOB!) And as many such people get into it as can will do so until, as Adam Smith wrote in "The Wealth of Nations", the profit margin falls to 0. (Well, he actually wrote that in a "perfectly-competitive" market wherein buyers and sellers have "perfect knowledge" of the goods, the other sellers, and the other buyers, the margin falls to 0. But I have noticed that even without there being perfect knowledge on the players' parts, frequently margins for sellers are not only 0, but often lower. That's why perhaps so many businesses fail.) So it should be no surprise that for example, if there is a demand for auto-detailing in a population, and lots of people go into it, they will eventually be operating at the narrowest of profit margins unless some of them are doing a much better job than the others. Then of course they will out-compete the competition and get more business, and be able to charge more for their superior work product. But let's assume none of them can do the other any better. They operate for awhile at 0 margin until what happens? Any profit they made in the past and kept as savings is used up. They need to start letting people go, or maybe close shop. Assuming all of them have 5 employees and attract the same number of customers, are they likely to pretty much go belly-up at around the same time, all other things being equal? Yes. Suddenly, bust. All those employees now out of a job and as for your car, you can't get it detailed locally anymore.

All the above is meant to say: "Yes, I get it. You have to take the good with the bad. If you want a society wherein people can become well-off by starting businesses, taking risks, assuming leadership positions and responsibility, you have to accept there will be down-times."

I get it.

But what happens when the gov't is so involved with business that they can practically control the big-picture results of what used to be market-based outcomes? How do they do this? For one, huge subsidization of all manner of industries. The $ for those subsidies comes from the taxpayer, both personal and business taxpayers, or in the form of ("PRESTO!") new currency created out of thin air. Then there's laws passed based on lobbyist influence that often include a quid pro quo of some kind that cause some players to be favored over others. Just read the wording of some laws that create special conditions around tax benefits. Example: "All companies that employ more than 10,000 people full-time and have offices in Europe and 90% of whose corporate income is derived from the sale of tiddly-winks play-sets shall be required to pay corporate income tax on the first $10.45 and not on income beyond that amount." Yeah, that wasn't a fix in action. Only one company in the world fits that description. Wonder how *that* law got in the 10,000-page "Super Giant Omnibus 'Suuu-eeeee!' Pork Fat Bill of (Fill-In-Any-Year-Here)"? I can guess.

But as for jobs, look how the gov't seems to go after promoting some kinds of jobs (i.e., supporting some kinds of industries) while allowing others to fend alone or be driven out of business by the advantage they give to another industry -- even if the new industry's products are not in high demand. People today say this about "green energy" industries that are the darling of our current president. But don't let that fool you. This has been going on for years and years, across numerous Congresses and White House occupants.

So if the gov't has so much influence, as it does, over laws creating and relieving debt burdens on businesses and citizens (Affordable Care Act, anyone?), and can foster opportunities for entry into some industries by underwriting people's training (with our tax dollars, or better yet, by more magically-appearing-by-keystroke currency) for skills in demand in those industries, etc., then why aren't they doing a helluva lot more to get our hugely under-employed 20-somethings into the job market and also helping people who have been laid off through no fault of their own to get new job skills that are relevant to today's market needs?

Again, "Bad show."

3. Public debt. And deficit spending. All in all, a level of financial recklessness to keep pace with the nastiness of the toxic mortgage bonds of not-so-long-ago.

A trillion here, a trillion there, and eventually, you're talking serious change. How much higher can the US national debt go? I think there is no limit. I think we can keep writing ourselves debt notes and IOUs until the cows come home. Some of why is because a good chunk of our public debt, ~30%, is in fact owed to ourselves. It was created by one part of the gov't borrowing money from the people, et al., via the selling of bonds and then giving that money to another part of the gov't so they could do what they do. And what other part(s)of the gov't have been getting a lot of that money that the gov't received by selling US treasuries? Answer: Social Security. Another ~13% is owned by the US Federal Reserve itself. Think of that. For all practical purposes, the Fed controls the US money supply. Now the Chairman (soon to be Chairwoman) of the Fed supposedly has to take direction from POTUS. But the head of the Fed is appointed and approved by the Congress, not POTUS, though the law says POTUS does the nominating. And get this: thereafter, the Fed chief cannot be removed for his or her over policy decisions. We're stuck with them until their term of office is up or they get caught doing something *really* nasty.

So when the Fed buys treasuries, what is that like? It's like taking money from your left pocket and putting it into you right pocket, but because you did this, it is supposed to mean the $ is more valuable than if you hadn't done so b/c you have shown everyone around you that *you* like having it. But really, you already had it, so that was already known. Yet somehow, when the Fed does this, it's OK. If it were any other entity doing this, the feds (the "other feds", as in, the FBI) would cart them off -- eventually -- if they stepped on the wrong toes, anyway. And to make matters worse, by shifting the money from one pocket to another, you then get the right to demand from yourself a dividend (a.k.a. "interest") on your own money. Should be no surprise then that the Fed uses such phrases as "quantitative easing" deliberately to obscure what is happening. For this and a myriad of other reasons, it's also no wonder the Fed is sometimes called "The Creature from Jekyll Island".

But this whole downward spiral can be stopped by our Congressoids deciding they are less interested in re-election and more interested in changing America's very unhealthy dependence on borrowed money. We're borrowing from ourselves and also other countries, thereby decreasing our nation's autonomy, as money always comes with strings attached. And eventually, the house of cards will come crashing down. Instead of acting for the better interests of their fellow countrymen, what do they do? Nada.

Now I have only discussed the three things that seem to me to be of expansive relevancy to everyone in America. There are so many other things I could list here too, and also just of more general interest, not even to mention the many matters that ought to be getting more attention that have to do with the rights of men and of fathers.

Sometimes when I look at the things occupying the podium time of our elected officials, esp. POTUS, and what they are *not* talking about, I am gob-smacked. But when your voter approval rating is lower than the belly of a pregnant snake, and your entire political party is rushing to make sure none of them are photographed anywhere near you, and there's a very good chance that your party could lose the one house in the Congress it at least has managerial control over (i.e., the Speaker of the House is a Dem), then well, you'll say anything to make people forget about the following in addition to what I listed above: the increasingly bad international image/credibility of the country due to your inability to follow through on promises and otherwise to do what you say you'd do, the botched roll-out of what was supposed to be the magnum opus for your presidency (need I mention it by name?), the broken promises to voters about said would-be magnum opus ("You can keep your health insurance!", "Your health insurance rates won't go up!", "It's FREE!", etc.), the other broken promises around ending US involvement in seemingly endless overseas wars, repealing/extensively modifying legislation many Americans were not very comfortable with (i.e., the USA Patriot Act), closing the off-shore military base ("Gitmo") that is used to torture terrorist and would-be terrorist criminal suspects and also POWs captured in other countries, etc., etc. Oh yeah, did I forget about the total bugger-up around the defense of the only diplomatic mission we had left in Libya? You know, the one in Benghazi? The one no one in your administration wants to talk about? Not your (now former) Sec'y of State, not you, not anyone? "Ooops, accident. Sorry. He died a hero's death. Yeah, we knew the place was under attack but for whatever reason, we were not on top of it. Sorry. Can we move on now?" (I didn't forget about it, but apparently, others already have. Just ask them, they won't know what you're talking about. Such others include but are not limited to: Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.)

To make sure as much as possible the terrifying does not happen in November, you can be 100% certain our current president with his sidekick, "VAWA Joe", will say *anything* to get voters thinking about anything other than any of the foregoing. If this means trying to get as many women as possible voting for Dems in Nov. by setting fire to men in effigy day and night, they will do so. Hell, if they could ensure they could at least keep the House in 2014 by dressing up as squirrels and running through DuPont Circle at sundown hollering "FISH!" every 15 seconds and stopping only occasionally to roll around on the ground squealing like the GEICO commercial pig ("Weeeeeee!"), they'd do it every chance they could right up til when the polls close.