Indiana House Democrats end cowardly trek to Illinois

The Indiana House Democrats have decided to return to Indiana to do the jobs they were elected to do.

I truly hope that the Republicans did not cave in on a bunch of agenda items to get the Democrats to come home and do their jobs.

Does anyone reading this blog plan on voting for any of these cowardly fools who just returned from Illinois?  If you do plan on voting for them; please let us know why…

Mike

President Obama and Libya…

As the readers of this blog know I am not a big fan of the United States expanding its “empire” though needless foreign conflicts.  I believe that if we are going to fight someone then Congress should declare war.

I oppose Republicans who start needless conflicts and I oppose Democrats who start needless conflicts.  My opinion does not change depending on which Party is in power.

I opposed the invasion of Iraq.  I do not think we should have invaded Iraq and I want us to bring all of our troops home now.  I do not think we should spend a nickel on Iraq.  Iraq needs to stand on its own.

I opposed our adventures in Afghanistan as well.  I think we should immediately pull all of our forces out of this country and bring them home.  We should not spend a nickel on Afghanistan.  Afghanistan needs to stand on its own.

I oppose our forces being used in Libya as well.  I oppose this conflict for a large number of reasons:

  Read more

Nuclear accident in Japan

As many of you know I worked in nuclear power plants for eight years.  I spent six years in the USN where I was a Reactor Operator on a nuclear powered submarine (The USS Pintado, SSN 672) stationed out of Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.  After getting out of the USN I spent a couple of years as a power plant operator at the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power station in Nebraska. 

I got out of the nuclear power generation industry for two main reasons:

  1. I did not feel that the future of nuclear power was positive in the US, we have not built a new nuclear power plant in decades.
  2. I was tired of working rotating shift work.  I was tired for over two years and my body just did not adjust to rotating shifts very well.

I got out of nuclear power for good in 1997.  I have never regretted that career choice; not even for a moment. 

The events unfolding in the Japanese nuclear power plants are astonishing.  I honestly never thought that something of this magnitude would happen in a country as advanced as Japan. 

No one yet knows the exact scope of the disaster; however, it is going to be worse than anything since Chernobyl…  It is very unlikely that this disaster will be as bad as Chernobyl was…

There are about 50 power plant workers who have stayed to work at the reactors.   These workers all volunteered to remain at the facility and all of them are heroes.  These workers have accurate dosimetry and know exactly how much radiation they are getting.  I expect many of them to die due to the radiation they are receiving.

President Bush and President Obama both wanted to see new nuclear power plants built in this country.  After the Japanese disaster that is NOT going to happen.  Due to this disaster no nuclear power plants will be built in the US for the foreseeable future.

My heart goes out the the fifty nuclear power plant workers who remained at the plant and to their families!

Mike Sylvester

Indiana Politics

Unfortunately for Hoosiers the State Legislature has been taken hostage by the minority Democrats in the Indiana House.  These Democrats have run away because they lost the last election and the majority Republicans are passing legislation they feel is appropriate.

If the Indiana House Democrats were smart they would have stayed in Indiana and made a big deal about voting against these proposals and then they would have made these issues a big deal during the next set of elections… 

Alas, they knew they would get outvoted and so ran away like spoiled brats…

I imagine the Democrats will pay for this blunder at the polls in the next couple of elections.  I also think there may be some backlash against Democrats that were not involved all across Indiana.  For example I think this debacle could effect several local races; three in particular.

I think that Democrats Karen Goldner and John Shoaff may get fewer votes due to this even though they were not involved at all.  I am not sure if either one has taken a public stance on this issue.  I also think this could effect our upcoming Mayoral race.

Karen Goldner is currently my City Council representative.  I voted for Karen last time because the person she was running against had been on City Council way too long.  I doubt that I will vote for Karen this year because I expect a conservative will win the Republican primary and I will vote for that conservative.  That being said, if Karen supports the Democrats who ran to Illinois then I may well monetarily support her opponent and help them try to defeat her.

I ALWAYS vote for John Shoaff.  He is an excellenet member of City Council.  I will be asking him his view on the House Democrats.  If he supports them running away to Illinois I MAY not vote for him in the upcoming election.  John Shoaff is an excellent member of City Council and while there are Republicans I would support over him; they are few and far between.

I will NOT be voting for Mayor Henry in the upcoming election unless his opponent is just “awful” irregardless of his stance on this issue.

Mike

A very good place for the City Light $’s

Bob Caylor on Thursday in the News-Sentinel wrote a news report, “Design work approved for $25M pump”.  He reported that the Fort Wayne Board of Works had approved the final design work on the second most expensive part of the work required under the consent decree that the city negotiated with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency signed in 2006.  The total estimated construction cost of this part of the work is estimated to be $25 million.  

Members of the Legacy Fort Wayne Task Force, Mayor Tom Henry, and the Fort Wayne Common Council Members need to move toward approving the use of the required funds from the Fort Wayne Community Trust Fund to pay for this part of the project.  Why?  Well, for, starts the source of this fund was the investment made by City Utilities back when City Light was run by them.  And the funds for this investment came from the City Light rate-payers - NOT from any taxes!  So for once let’s use funds generated in the past to pay for a required improvement to our city - instead of expensive bonding  that pushes the costs onto our kids and grandkids !! 

Now I’m sure that someone is going to say that the feds will be paying for a portion of this - well who do the feds get this money from??   Of course it’s us, the taxpayers!   And with the inflation we are going to see due to the Federal Reserve’s printing of money, any savings that we have are going to buy much, much less in the near future.

Renaissance Pointe

The News-Sentinel had a story about Renaissance Pointe on the front page of yesterday’s newspaper.  This story is a great example of how almost eleven million dollars will be wasted at Renaissance Pointe.

First consider the following facts:

  1. The US housing bubble burst in 2008. 
  2. There are currently millions of empty homes in the United States.
  3. Property prices in the US are currently relatively low; especially for houses at the lower end of the scale.

Apparently the State of Indiana, through the Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority, has “approved ten million dollars of tax credits that will allow the construction of 66 rent-to-own homes in Renaissance Pointe.”  Further the City of Wayne’s Housing and Neighborhood Development Services will contribute another $640,000 to the project.  The City hopes that 66 homes in the $130,000 - $150,000 range will be built.

So here is there plan in a nutshell:

  1. The State of Indiana will contribute $10,000,000 of tax credits in order to get the 66 homes built.  Note a $1 tax credit forgives a taxpayer from paying $1 in Indiana taxes.  So basically Indiana is forgiving $10,000,000 of future tax revenue in order to build these 66 homes.
  2. The City of Wayne’s Housing and Neighborhood Development Services will contribute $640,000 to the project.

In essence the taxpayers will pay $10,640,000 for these 66 houses to be built

The City currently hopes that 66 homes will be built with an average cost of $140,000.  Simple math shows that about $9,240,000 worth of houses will be built. 

Once the houses are built they will be rented to low income residents of Fort Wayne who otherwise could not afford to buy a $140,000 house.  According to the story the 66 families that will eventually be selected to participate in this program will then rent the houses for FIFTEEN years.  Then after fifteen years it is hoped that the low income families will still be in residence, that their credit will be much improved, and that they will turn around and buy these rent-to-own homes. 

It is hard to believe that ANYONE is dumb enough to think this is a good plan; however, our country (and especially our Government) is full of such idiots.

Is a new house that is built at a cost of $140,000 really a “low income” house? 

This is a complete WASTE of taxpayer dollars.

Does ANYONE reading this post think that this project is a good use of taxpayer dollars?  Heck, I wonder if even Kevin Knuth could support something this ridiculous…

I seriously think that each and every government affordable housing program in the United States should be cancelled.  That would save us tens of billions of dollars.

If families do not have the financial means to buy a house they should rent instead.

Did we learn anything from the housing bust of 2008?

Mike