Libertarian Party Of Santa Cruz
contact:
Bill Anderson
Email: Patrick.Dugan@lpsantacruz.com
4310 Capitola Road
Capitola, CA 95010
Phone:  831.476.9753

171035

Libertarians call federal worker pay gap 'appalling'

      WASHINGTON - Recent data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis show that federal government workers get compensation, on average, more than twice as high as private-sector workers. That gap has expanded dramatically over the last decade. Libertarian Party Chair Mark Hinkle released the following statement today:

      "The numbers are appalling. In 2009, the average private-sector worker received $61,051 in total compensation, but the average federal government worker received $123,049. There is no excuse for this enormous, and growing, compensation gap.

      "I guess you just can't beat a federal job. Very high pay, unbelievable benefits, extremely generous retirement plans, and near-perfect job security.

      "And those retirement plans are often unfunded pensions, which will have to be paid by taxing our children and grandchildren, who never had the opportunity to vote when they were created.

      "Apparently wishing to add insult to injury, government employee union reps have claimed that federal workers are entitled to their sky-high compensation because they are more educated and skilled than the rest of us. I have had many personal experiences with federal employees that indicate the exact opposite.

      "The problem is that federal worker compensation is not set by the free market -- it's set by government fiat, which causes it to be artificially generous. Another factor is the monopoly government employee unions, which are able to extort that compensation up to even higher levels.

      "One sure sign that federal employees are overpaid is that they never quit. Tad DeHaven of the Cato Institute has noted, '...in 2009, private sector employees quit at a rate that was more than eight times higher than federal employees.... This indicates that federal employees recognize that the generous combination of wages, benefits,and job security is hard to match in the private sector, so they stay put.'

      "Libertarians support minimum government and maximum freedom. Unfortunately, federal employees have incentives to make government bigger, which makes us less free. With government employment paying more than the private sector, the rational self-interest of many workers will drive them to seek employment with the federal government.

      "That's a formula for disaster.

      "Libertarians want productive people working in the private sector to build our economy, not working for the government and hurting our economy.

      "I would like to see an across-the-board pay cut for all federal workers. That would reduce federal spending, reduce the deficit, and reduce the insult to American private-sector workers. It also just might encourage some federal government employees to quit their jobs and seek more productive work in the private sector."

      For more information, or to arrange an interview, call LP Executive Director Wes Benedict at 202-333-0008 ext. 222.

      The LP is America's third-largest political party, founded in 1971. The Libertarian Party stands for free markets and civil liberties. You can find more information on the Libertarian Party at our website

Wes Benedict, Executive Director

posted by Gayle Noble

Charlie Daniels' View of the Obama Presidency

      After being in the music business for 52 years it's just about all I know anything at all about--and in keeping with my admittedly narrow knowledge--I would like to draw an analogy concerning the Obama administration, viewing things from my vantage point.

      Ok, let's say you pick out the finest symphony conductor in the world, add the greatest singer and seven or so of the finest classical musicians on the planet.

      You get them together backstage and say, "Alright, there are twenty thousand fans out front, standing room only, expectations are off the charts, they are looking for the best show they've ever seen.

      Now the curtain goes up in five minutes, the sound has been checked out, the lights set and everything is perfect, the stage is set for the greatest show the world has ever seen.

      Now get there and knock 'em out guys! They're a all with you; you're all superstars in their eyes. Go show 'em how it's done.

      Oh, there's only been one change... Tonight you have to do your show playing songs you've never played and you'll have to improvise. There's no sheet music. You'll just have to jam."

      Can you imagine the panic backstage?

      You see, some of the very finest musicians on earth can't jam a lick. I remember a few years ago when I had a couple of young fiddle players come on stage with me and play "The South's Gonna Do It Again."

      They had learned the parts I'd played on the record, arrangement, lead lines and all and played it perfectly note for note.

      Everything was going swimmingly until I decided to leave the arrangement and jam for a while. When I turned to one of them and told them to take a solo the kid was as lost as a baby sheep in a hail storm.

      They had no more idea about improvising than they did about how to build a spaceship.

      "The South's Gonna Do It Again" is a simple twelve bar blues song that any musician from any garage band would be able to take a solo on, but even though these kids were extremely talented and played what they knew perfectly, when it came to jammin, they were totally lost. They had just never learned to do it.

      To me the presidency is kind of like jammin'. You have to roll with the flow, improvise, adapt to the moment, pick up on what's going on and deal with it.

      Our president has never had to jam, he's always had the sheet music in front of him and he's never had to play a note somebody else had not written for him.

      One of the biggest mistakes President Obama made when he came in office was to surround himself with a bunch of players who had never jammed either. None of them have ever had any practical experience in the real world.

      In essence, they are a bunch of paper tigers, they do an incredible job of spending other people's money and sneaking legislation through the back door, but out in the real world, where there are no scripts,down where the rubber meets the road there is probably not a person in the bunch who could change a flat tire, much less deal with the complex problems America faces.

      The only thing Obama has done with any problem that has arisen is to throw money at it, and in truth, that's sadly all he knows how to do. When it comes to dealing with things that money alone won't fix like busted oil pipes at the bottom of the ocean or solving the problems on our southern borders he's lost and all those around him are lost.

      The Obama cabinet is the most inept bunch imaginable. When people have only viewed the world from the top of an ivory tower they don't react very well when it's time to get their hands dirty.

      Obama 's people can't even accept real world concepts of the dangerous situations we're dealing with. Eric Holder wanting to try terrorists in civilian courts, in New York City of all places is nothing less than naive arrogance.

      Janet Napolitano's gross inexperience in dealing with security matters is going to end up costing this country dearly.

      Putting an unqualified person who has never even been a judge on the bench of the highest court in the land, for nothing more than her political leanings is insanity.

      Everywhere you look you see eggheads with nothing more than a college degree to qualify them for the sensitive jobs they hold.

      I'm just wondering how long it will take for a majority of the people in this country to realize that the wheel that steers the direction of this nation is in the hands of people who have no idea how to get from point a to point b without a roadmap and that roadmap just doesn't exist. Every trip is different.

      I see disaster looming on the not too distant horizon, financial disaster, increasing danger from terrorist attack, unabated violence in the streets and an arrogant and unmanageable illegal alien population.

      It's coming folks and Obama and his band are still in the dressing room looking for the sheet music.

      They just can't jam.

      What do you think?

      Pray for our troops, and for our country.

      God Bless America

Charlie Daniels
Copyright ©  The Charlie Daniels Band

posted by Gayle Noble
reference http://www.charliedaniels.com/soapbox-2010/soapbox-2010-0531.htm

ObamaCare Would Not Be Improved By Including Alternative Health Care

      We think that ObamaCare is currently an even greater threat to an unusually long healthy life than the FDA — and we have spent a large fortune of our own money suing the FDA on health freedom issues.

      We are dismayed that some of those who believe they support freedom of choice in their health decisions would be willing to support ObamaCare — the exact opposite of freedom of choice — if it were altered to include (e.g., to pay for) alternative health care, including dietary supplements and herbal supplements.

      What those folks don’t realize is that adding alternative health care to the ObamaCare healthcare takeover would mean that alternative medicine would also be taken over. No more would there be a relatively free market in dietary and herbal supplements, where companies can offer a large diversity of different products, allowing even small groups of consumers to buy what they prefer. No more would there be frequent new life enhancing and life saving products and alternative medical procedures.

      The government would decide on a one-size-fits-all basis what can be offered (e.g., what ObamaCare will pay for) and, thus, determine the contents and dosages of those relatively few supplements they would allow you to get under ObamaCare. This may benefit a few very large companies (such as those of Big Pharma) that will be delighted to take taxpayers’ money from the government to supply government stipulated supplements. But to the vast majority of consumers of dietary and herbal supplements, as well as to most (perhaps all) small, medium, and even large sized supplement companies and alternative medical practices, it will spell the end of alternative medicine as we have known it.

      Do not be fooled. ObamaCare is going to have a very negative impact on the development and availability of conventional medicines, and the same would be true for alternative medicine, including dietary and herbal supplements if they were to be included in ObamaCare. ObamaCare will make you an offer that you can’t refuse . . .

      If Obamacare includes alternative medicine and supplements, any alternative medical practice or product that does not obtain government approval will be deemed felony health care fraud.

Your fellow freedom fighters,
Durk Pearson and Sandy Shaw

If your browser does not support java script, but it lies,you not only won't get a menu, you
won't see the link for the alternate menu. You will need to disable java script in your
browser preferences. Then a click for menu will appear in the upper left hand corner.