About: Mike Sylvester
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Posts by Mike Sylvester:
US Marines and three Afghan corpses
1/12/12 @ 6:32 pm
Pretty much everyone has seen a video that supposedly (and likely) shows four US marines in combat gear unzipping their pants and “relieving themselves” on the Afghan three corpses. The video was likely taken by a fifth marine.
War is Hell. Young men do stupid things when people have been trying to kill them. That is the way things work. There is nothing pretty about war and the toll it takes on those involved.
The marines involved should not have done what they did. It was flat out inappropriate. Even dumber was taking a video of their actions.
That being said this is not a heinous act that will stain the US military. It is a stupid action done by a few US marines in a war zone. They are fighting in a country that is often hostile to them and combat is very stressful.
Mike
Filed Under Featured, National Politics | 3 Comments
Republican Presidential Primary
1/8/12 @ 3:31 pm
The Republican primary has been a roller coaster. I truly think the rise and fall of so many candidates is historic.
I think there are only four candidates who really have any chance of winning: Romney (Most likely), Santorum (Unlikely), Gingrich (would take a miracle), and Paul (would take a miracle).
Out of those four I would vote for Paul. Paul is not perfect; however, his views align best with mine out of these four. My order of preference is: Paul, Romney, Santorum, and last Gingrich.
I can vote for Paul or Romney in 2012. If the Republicans candidate is Santorum or Gingrich I am not sure what I will do; I would likely vote third party.
Gingrich is way too liberal for me. His personal life is a mess and I do not want a serial womanizer as President of the United States.
Santorum is a big government Republican on fiscal matters. He seems to want to enlarge the US military and use it oven more often.
Where do you stand?
Mike
Filed Under Featured, National Politics | 15 Comments
Payroll Tax Cut and the idiots in Washington DC
12/19/11 @ 9:01 pm
I generally like gridlock in DC because that means the idiots in Washington DC are not passing laws that will damage our country. The problem is now that our country is deeply in debt and has a large number of problems that truly need addressed gridlock is not working out so well.
And I have news for Democrats and Republicans alike; each major Political Party is AT LEAST 40% responsible for these problems.
The Reps and Dems agreed to a stupid plan last December to “TEMPORARILY” reduce the amount of social security taxes that employees pay into the system for 2011 only. This lowered the employee portion of the tax from 6.2% of wages to 4.2% of wages up to the annual cap. This was stupid for many reasons including:
- Social Security is already on an unsustainable fiscal path. The Federal Government dropped another IOU into the system that will have to be paid back by A Federal Government that is already over 15 trillion dollars in the red.
- This change was enacted in December and so the affected Government agencies all had to scramble to deal with this last minute change to the laws. The same is true for the private sector and employers and their payroll providers.
- The change was of course temporary…
- The main problem is it creates new rules that there is not enough time left to implement. This new change to the law will not be implemented properly by many employers and many Government agencies IF it is even enacted into law by the Republicans in the House which I doubt.
- The House Republicans do not want to pass it this way.
- It is temporary and kicks the problem down the road.
Filed Under Featured, National Politics | 3 Comments
President 2012
12/1/11 @ 6:13 pm
Who do you currently support for President in 2012 and why?
I am unimpressed with the field. I obviously will note vote for President Obama; he has been a disaster.
On the Republican side my current thoughts are:
- Huntsman is too moderate for me.
- I have always liked Ron Paul and he will likely get my vote.
- Mitt Romney flip flops too much for me and is too moderate as well.
- Bachmann just does not trip my trigger.
- Santorum is a conservative; however, he is just not an impressive figure.
- Gingrich is the smartest guy on the stage; however, I dislike his personal baggage nor do I trust him.
- Perry has truly embarrassed himself.
- Herman Cain is not ready for prime time and he may well be a liar.
Filed Under Featured, National Politics | 35 Comments
More Congressional idiocy is coming…
11/28/11 @ 6:46 am
One of the dumbest things that Democrats and Republicans alike have done is they have made much of the tax code temporary. They do this because it allows them to act like future budget deficits are lower than they actually are. It is basically dishonest accounting…
Since the “Super Committee” failed; Congress will have to deal with several of the temporary aspects of the current tax code. The truth of the matter is Congress was hoping the “Super Committee” would handle some of this for them… Unfortunately for everyone Congress keeps doing this in December of the year before the tax changes will take place.
THIS IS ABSURD.
The political grandstanding and partisan fighting will be immense in the next four weeks. Congress has failed to pass a lot of required legislation (again) and will struggle to get it all done. Lets look at some of the items that are to be resolved this year; please realize there will be even more to deal with NEXT year due to the supposed expiration of the Bush Tax Cuts.
Congress passed the Alternative Minimum Tax in 1969 to ensure less than 50 families (The very rich) paid more in income taxes. Congress failed to index the AMT with inflation and so more and more Americans are effected by it every year. Every year Congress decides to “patch” the AMT because they do not want it to effect as many Americans as it otherwise would. In 1970 the AMT effected 20,000 tax returns. In 2011 (And it was “patched” in 2011) it effected four million Americans. If it is NOT patched in the next few weeks it will cause about 34 million American households to pay higher taxes due to the AMT in 2012. This tax will engulf both the middle classed and the rich. The one year cost to “patch” the AMT for 2012 is 85 billion dollars.
In difficult economic times Congress has enacted an extension of unemployment benefits to states with high unemployment. The current extension expires at the end of January of 2012. If this extension does not occur about three million Americans (mainly the long term unemployed) will lose benefits in February. The cost of a one year extension is 49 billion dollars.
In 2011 President Obama with cooperation from both Parties passed an ill advised employee payroll tax cut. This payroll tax cut caused Americans to pay 112 billion less in Social Security taxes than they otherwise would. The Federal Government then put an IOU in the Social Security system and promised to pay it back to Social Security in the future. President Obama now wants to increase the size of the employee payroll tax cut. The 2011 version decreased the payroll tax from 6.2% to 4.2%. President Obama now wants to further lower it to 3.1% for 2012. This will put more money in the pockets of payroll workers; however, the Federal Government has to drop another IOU into the Social Security Trust Fund. This will cost 175 billion dollars for 2012.
President Obama now wants to forgive half of the portion the employers match towards social security and medicare on the first five million in payroll. This will save employers money and again the Federal Government will drop another IOU into the Social Security Trust Fund. This will cost 58 billion for 2012.
There are a lot of tax provisions that expire on 12/31/11. This package is called the “tax extenders” package. The cost of this is about 83 billion for 2012 alone.
Congress has promised to cut Medicare payments to doctors by 30% for the last several years. Then in December they panic and decide not to do it for another year. The cost of the “Doc Fix” is 22 billion for 2012 alone.
Congress keeps allowing businesses to depreciate equipment faster. They mistakenly think this causes businesses to buy more equipment. It may have caused this effect the first year or two; however, it has been going on for well over a decade now and businesses expect it. The cost of this is 21 Billion for 2012 alone.
Luckily the Bush tax cuts do not expire next month; otherwise the fighting would be far worse…
In summary here are the temporary provisions the Reps and Dems need to agree upon:
- AMT, 85 billion (BOTH parties want to patch this)
- Extended Unemployment, 49 billion (Democrats want this big time; Republicans kind of want it)
- Expanded Employee Payroll tax cut, 175 billion (President Obama and Democrats want this, Republicans have been less interested in this which is surprising with their ant-tax mania)
- Employer payroll tax cut, 59 billion (President Obama wants this and I think both sides will want this)
- Tax extenders, 83 billion (Both sides want this)
- Doc Fix, 22 billion (Both sides want this)
- Accelerated Depreciation, 21 billion (Republicans want this big time; Democrats pretty much want it to).
Filed Under Featured, National Politics | 1 Comment
Super Committee Idiocy put into perspective
11/27/11 @ 8:02 pm
The United States of America is on an unsustainable path. The morons in Washington DC (Both Parties) spend all of their time trying to get re-elected rather than fix problems.
No rational person can look at the amount of debt the United States has and the size of its annual budget deficits and think that this path is sustainable. This year and last year the United States Federal Government borrowed 40 cents of every dollar it spent…
The Congress formed a “Super Committee” of six Democrats and six Republicans. This committee was given the simple task of finding 1.2 trillion dollars of deficit reduction over the next almost ten years…
Lets assume they just want to solve the problem with spending cuts. Currently the Congressional Budget Office projects that Federal spending will grow by about 5.8% per year for the foreseeable future. This is 100% INSANE.
If the “Super Committee” wanted to generate 1.2 trillion dollars in deficit savings all it had to do was to limit the increase in spending to about 3.8% per year. This SHOULD be easy… Really easy…
Instead they bickered with each other and accomplished nothing. It is no wonder Congress has an approval rating of 9%. I hope that America gets fed up with both Parties and send a lot of new people to Congress next November…
Mike Sylvester
Filed Under Featured, National Politics | Leave a Comment
Idiots in DC
11/22/11 @ 6:23 pm
Congress has passed one small portion of the massive spending bill (The American Jobs Act) that President Obama wanted to use earlier this year to try to “create” jobs.
This small portion of the bill was passed with almost unanimous support. It is amazing that a bill so stupid can become law so easily.
The bill basically does two things:
The first involves a 3% with-holding tax for contractors. This silly law was passed in 2005. It was so unpopular that Congress decided to implement it starting on January 1st, 2013. Basically the 2005 law would have forced governments to with-hold 3% from all payments to contractors if those payments were $10,000 or more. This silly law did NOT increase taxes; instead it just forced the Government to with-hold tax that the contractor would have gotten credit for paying. The final IRS regulations just came out earlier this year and this was going to be a complicated system that did not raise taxes; instead it just added more paperwork. I am glad it was repealed. It NEVER should have been passed in the first place. As long as contractors file tax returns they will be reporting their income tax due and then the IRS needs to ensure they pay them. A better law would be to require governments to ensure that anyone they do business with is current on all applicable taxes prior to doing business with them.
The second involves giving employers large credits for hiring veterans. Basically this expands the Working Opportunity Tax Credit (WOTC) program. The WOTC is a program that gave employers a tax credit of up to $2400 for hiring ex felons, certain disabled people, certain people on Welfare, etc. The WOTC is a STUPID program that should be immediately stopped. The Federal Government has no business paying employers to hire one group of people over another group of people. I feel that hiring one group of people over another group of people is discrimination.
The expansion of the WOTC makes it so that employers get:
- Up to $2400 (Must pay $6000 in wages to get this) if they employ a veteran who collected unemployment benefits for at least four weeks in the prior year.
- Up to $4800 (Must pay $12,000 in wages to get this) if they employ a veteran who is disabled and was discharged within the last 12 months.
- Up to $5600 (Must pay $14,000 in wages to get this) if they employ a veteran who collected unemployment benefits for at least 26 weeks in the prior year.
- Up to $9600 (Must pay $24,000 in wages to get this) if they employ a disabled veteran who collected unemployment benefits for at least 26 weeks in the prior year.
Filed Under Featured, National Politics | 1 Comment
I detest vandals
11/15/11 @ 8:16 pm
On Election night (Last Tuesday) someone destroyed the mailboxes of two of my neighbors and I. Further I had four reflectors in my driveway and they destroyed those as well. They likely used a baseball bat or something similar.
I have no idea who did it; however, it was likely teen aged kids. They had to have destroyed my property between about 11PM and maybe 5 AM Wednesday morning.
I have no idea why people destroy other people’s property for no reason. It is senseless and ignorant. I wonder why their parents let them roam around late at night?
Then a couple of nights later some lady put her car in my ditch. She pulled into my driveway at night to turn around. I have a pretty nasty ditch on both sides of my driveway a few feet away from the street. I always mark it with reflectors; however, some idiots destroyed my reflectors a few days before and I had not yet replaced them.
She had to call a tow truck who pulled her out of that ditch in about an hour…
I hate vandals…
Mike
Filed Under Featured, Uncategorized | 3 Comments
Fort Wayne City Elections 2011
11/12/11 @ 5:44 pm
The City elections are done and over. I have to imagine the vast majority of us are glad that they are over. The 2011 election was the nastiest local election I can remember. Several Democrats ran negative campaigns as did Republican Paula Hughes. The two major candidates for Mayor both ran despicable campaigns.
In an earlier post I discussed which six candidates would win of the six positions I could vote for. I was right about all six winners and except for the Clerk’s race my breakdown of the votes was very close.
I voted for three of the six winning candidates.
There are several surprising takes from this election:
- I am still shocked that Mayor Henry ran a campaign that was so distasteful, negative and dishonest.
- I am also surprised that several Democrats ran negative ads.
- The most surprising take for me is turnout. Up until the 2007 election turnout for City races has been between 36% and 42% which is terrible. In 2007, at least partially due to the indictment of Matt Kelty, turnout was a dismal 33%. This year turnout was only 26%. This truly saddens me and means our elected officials are being selected by a smaller and smaller group of people.
- I was also surprised that Mr. Shoaff barely retained his at large seat. He was almost beat by Friestroffer. I truly thought Shoaff would come in second place fairly easily rather then barely in third place.
There are a couple of encouraging things from the 2011 City elections:
- They are over.
- The voting totals clearly show that a large number of voters did not vote entirely along party lines and I am glad to see it. Further I hope this trend continues. It is absurd to think that all of the members of any one party are always the best candidates in the race.
Filed Under City Council, Featured, Local Politics | Leave a Comment
I voted early this afternoon at Precinct 299
11/8/11 @ 5:49 pm
I vote up at Agape Church on Lima Road. I voted around 2:30 PM and the polls were empty; as expected. 2:30 PM is normally a time when the polls are empty.
The only person handing out literature was one person handing out literature for Paula Hughes…
In the primary Paula Hughes mobilized a lot of people and had a large number of volunteers…
Mike
