Manufacturing Homeless

Yesterday, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder signed a 4-year lifetime limit on cash welfare benefits for Michigan residents. According to Michigan’s Department of Human Services, on October 1 over 29,000 children will be affected by the new regulation. On a side note, Michigan’s unemployment currently stands at 10.9% which is the third worse in the nation. Of course this number does not take into account people who have exhausted unemployment benefits or those who are underemployed. Trust me when I say, the situation in Michigan is much worse.

I am not going to talk about the stereotypes that conservatives give to people on welfare. I would rather discuss solutions. There is no easy solution to the welfare issue. What I will say is that simply throwing money at a problem rarely makes it go away. There are two ways to make certain that the cost of welfare is as low as possible. First, there needs to be jobs to apply for. You don’t cut off the oxygen until a person can breathe by themselves. Secondly, you need to train people to do the jobs. Not just random training, but specific useful training in areas of need. Until these two standards are met, Governor Snyder has no business limiting lifetime limits on welfare benefits.

I have written countless times to members of Congress about potential job creating ideas. Unfortunately, conservatives believe that the federal and state governments should not be spending money to stimulate the economy. Instead, they just keep providing tax breaks to businesses that simply hoard their profits. If you want more jobs let’s start with the following: Create mass transit systems in every city (linked to suburbs) with a population over 500,000 people. Create high speed trains to allow people to affordably travel between major cities. Expand the Department of Education in order to repair schools, hire a lot more teachers (to reduce class size), pay teachers more money and provide an equal and high level of education to every child in this country.

As for the concerns about those who actually are on a “free ride”, there is a simple answer. Require a certain amount of volunteer hours in order to get aid. The volunteers could beautify neighborhoods, assist local homeless shelters or help out in schools. In addition to the benefits reaped by the community, the welfare recipient will feel good about their contributions and may even make new connections that could lead to permanent work.

Yes, I do believe that welfare recipients should be monitored to ensure that they are not taking advantage of the system. You might even be surprised to hear that I don’t mind mandatory drug testing for welfare recipients. However, let’s stop focusing on the victims as the problem and let’s start trying to fix the real issues facing this country. I would like to end this entry with a final thought. A large amount of the items we purchase were made in China (hell, I just found out that the mushrooms I buy were made in China). Isn’t it time to discuss the problem that companies in the U.S. simply cannot compete with the prices offered by companies who manufacture products overseas. Shouldn’t we be looking to level the playing field?


Orbson Going Postal: The U.S. Postal Service is about to go bankrupt. Still delivering 6 days a week? Yeah, really smart people we have in government.

Orbson’s Not Tripping: Scientists say that dolphin’s “talk like humans”. Thank Orbson! I was beginning to think someone had dropped some Ecstasy in my Absinthe during my last visit to Seaworld. Now I know the dolphins really were talking to me!

Orbson at the Oscar’s: Eddie Murphy is hosting the next Academy Awards. I was really hoping for Neil Patrick Harris. Still, it should be fun listening to Eddie say “*bleep* *bleepity* *bleep* Kate Winslet, *bleepity* bleepity* bleep* *bleep*”

Debt Ceilings, Pennies and Stupid People

I started writing a blog dealing with the debt ceiling debate before I realized nobody probably cares. Sorry, it is on my mind, thus it is the topic of the day. Now, I could probably sum up my views in a brief 15 page position paper. Rather than bore you with endless financial ramblings, I’ll try to break down my thoughts in a more concise way. Congress, this is a non issue! Raise the damn thing like you are planning to do anyway and stop the political grandstanding. Yes, it sucks to have to borrow even more money and sink even further into debt. Now you know what it’s like for millions of American families every day. The facts are simple. There are bills that must be paid and an arbitrary debt ceiling that’s more illusion than reality. So get off your corrupt asses and just raise the damn thing. Or better yet, trash it all together. Then, keep standing up and start making the hard decisions to get this country fiscally responsible again.

As you probably guessed, I am expecting a call from my buddy Barrack any day now. The reason? Nobody knows common sense better than Orbson Rice. A lot of American zombies/citizens hear the word economy and their eyes roll back into their heads and they race off toward the nearest TV set to watch Jersey Shore. Look people, it is not that complicated. When something doesn’t work, fix it or get rid of it. What would Orbson recommend? Here are a few starting points:

First, stop making pennies! They cost more to produce then they are worth. Yes, I know it will be hard to live without those wondrous coins. How often do I come home after a long day only to find my bliss by rolling around naked on a bed of pennies. Oh I will miss you little coin but I am sorry, you’re pointless! No, this will not make a huge impact on the deficit but it just gets my panties in a bunch that this obvious money sucker continues to live on.

Secondly, close all of the extraneous post offices and shave a day or two off of deliveries. Oh shit, what about my Netflix? What am I going to do without my DVDs everyday? Read? Workout? Communicate with others? The horror… the horror…. The facts here are simple. Americans are using the post office significantly less than they were 10 years ago. Still, they've only raised postage by 10 cents and have kept far to many post offices open. Less money coming in + higher expenses = bankrupt. In 2010, the U.S. Post Office was more than $8 billion in the hole. Also, please raise the cost of a first class stamp to an even $1. See, it even helps gets rid of those damn pennies! Why do we get so annoyed when stamps raise a few cents? Think about it. We spend $5 at Hallmark for a folded piece of paper but don’t want to spend a single dollar to pay for someone to travel thousands of miles away to hand deliver it to our love ones? Now isn’t that just plain silly.

“We the people” want all of these great services like uhm the Post Office, public education, Social Security, Medicare and universal health care. Great! We should have them, we need them, but we also need to pay for them. I realize that half of this country lives in La La Land where the biggest problems are those damned homosexuals trying to get married and that black muslim president who was born in some Middle Eastern cave. But the rest of us, you know, those of us who are not crazy religious nutjobs, actually want to solve real problems with real solutions. Our government should provide the basic services needed for us to pursue “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. The citizens should pay the required taxes to afford those programs. All of the citizens, including big business and the ultra rich. Did you know that the richest 400 people in this country earned something like 10 times as much this past year as they did 10 years ago? How much do they pay in taxes? More than 10 percentage points less. They hire lobbyists, pundits and a “news” network to create fear using nonsensical issues to keep the sheep scared while they take turns anal raping the middle class. Enough is enough, it’s time to turn around and let us pitch for a while.

So Congress, listen to the wisdom that is Orbson. If I have financial questions I speak to my broker or a financial manager not a politician. Call in the economists, give them the budget, the tax code and some beer and let them figure this out. By the way, this is not purely a Democrat v Republican issue, though of course I have no problem trashing Republicans. This is a Congress issue, which means this is a people issue. We need to pay more attention or the next thing we know a former beauty queen who knows foreign policy because she can see Russia from her front porch will be running for Vice President. Oh shit….

Relevant Songs - "Billionaire" - Travie McCoy featuring Bruno Mars and "Price Tag" by Jessie J





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