I want to get up in front of the cameras at the White House press room today and say this:

“When Christopher Lane was first shot I said that this could have been my son. Another way of saying that is Christopher Lane could have been me 35 years ago. When you think about why in our country at least there is a lot of pain around what happened here I think it is important to recognize that the country is looking at this issue through a set of experiences and a history that doesn’t go away.”

Regards, Pete Weldon
americanstance.org

I recently read over the 2012 audit report for a town in New Jersey where I own some property.

It was interesting to note that the actuarial firm calculating their OPEBs (other post employment benefits – liability) notes that health benefits granted by union contract to the town’s employees and retirees will exceed the “Cadillac” plan threshold in Obamacare resulting in an excise tax that will need to be paid. Under Obamacare this tax is to be paid by the insurer, in this case the township (a.k.a., the taxpayers) on behalf of the insured retirees.

The actuarial firm assumes the township will not only pay the excise tax but will also gross it up for income tax purposes and make an additional payment to the insured retirees as the excise tax paid by the township will be imputed income to the insured retirees. This is of course insane but will be a big issue coming before state and local government as Obamacare becomes reality. (The town in question has yet to formalize a policy on the “Cadillac” excise tax or gross up.)

Will the public employee unions throughout the US insist that taxpayers pony up to pay the excise tax on their “Cadillac” health plans and gross it up, or ask Mr, Obama for a waiver? (Here’s a clue – neither course of action will prove politically acceptable.)

Do you know people in the private sector who have “Cadillac” health care plans and who will have their employer reimburse them for any excise tax due under Obamacare or additionally pay for the tax gross up of excise tax reimbursements?

As the realities of Obamacare become real the need to repeal the law will become clear even to public employee unions.

Regards, Pete Weldon
americanstance.org

Remember Chuck Colson? He had a saying mounted on the wall in his White House office that read, “When you have them by the balls their hearts and minds will follow.” Charming.

Today we have a White House with pseudo Chuck Colson’s who insist their motives are pure. To them, government is so obviously the answer to all our problems that only the ignorant would complain about following their lead. They pass laws, issue regulatory edicts, co-opt and extort private industry, manipulate the media, and buy votes with handouts to impose their ideology. Another saying, this time from that dear sage Woody Allen goes, “When you are sure you are right you will have a moral obligation to impose your will upon those who disagree with you.” Hmmmm…

Both Mr. Colson (see: Nixon) and Mr. Obama approach their problem of compliance with different words but identical actions, seeking to compel compliance with their beliefs through law, regulation, and the bald application of political power.

At the other extreme from the Obama administration we have groups certain their ideology founded in religious faith is similarly worthy of imposition. If you look closely it is difficult to distinguish some at the far end of the Christian religious right from Islamic extremists who would impose Sharia law if they had political power. There is no meaningful distinction between the political implications of imposing one or another ideology, whether religious or political. Imposition defines authoritarianism in all its forms, overwhelming the American principles of individual liberty and limited government. This is why freedom is never free but available to our children only if we are willing to fight to obtain and keep it.

When you combine the use of government to impose a particular ideology with the ability of government to print and borrow virtually limitless amounts of money to enable and enforce the imposition, you have our Federal government today; confused, misdirected, and incompetent.

As at the founding of America, the hope of the world is freedom from imposition. Let us focus here as we seek to replace the imposers with those who will enforce our freedom and expect us responsible for our actions as individuals.

An excerpt from Thomas Jefferson’s first inaugural address in 1801:

All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression. Let us, then, fellow-citizens, unite with one heart and one mind. Let us restore to social intercourse that harmony and affection without which liberty and even life itself are but dreary things. And let us reflect that, having banished from our land that religious intolerance under which mankind so long bled and suffered, we have yet gained little if we countenance a political intolerance as despotic, as wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody persecutions.

Regards, Pete Weldon
americanstance.org

I respect the morality that says a pregnancy is a life. I also respect the morality that says a woman has a right to choose abortion. The controversy involves whether our laws should enforce absolutism at either extreme, no abortions under any circumstances or abortions under every circumstance.

Up to a point, each woman assumes responsibility for her actions, whether accepting the consequences of a life she may bring into the world, or the consequences of ending that possibility for her own reasons. I would support only some of those reasons but in the end, every woman lives with the consequences of her decision and should have access to a safe abortion, up to a point.

The point of “up to a point” is that no one can successfully argue that a mother who kills an infant under any circumstances is not responsible for murder. Such accepted morality requires there be a point at which every fetus is a life, for if not aborted after that point, is virtually certain to become an infant outside the womb.

There is a point at which a woman has a right to chose and a point at which a moral community has an obligation to intervene.

The media and political class continue to exploit both extremes of the abortion issue because the extremes are useful to sell eyeballs to advertisers and attract campaign contributions from those at the extremes.

It is time to get to and stick with the point.

We are going broke and have given limitless power to a federal government subject to a constitution whose purpose is assure that power instead resides with the individual.

The point is that we should not allow anyone promoting social extremes to change the subject. First and foremost, we need to remain focused on re-establishing limited government, individual freedom and personal responsibility.

Regards, Pete Weldon
americanstance.org