Gen·o·cide [jen-uh-sahyd]: A noun. The deliberate ans systematic extermination of a national, racial, political, or CULTURAL GROUP. Since Mr. Obama has taken office it seems he has pinpointed the elderly as the means to balance his budget. Or should I say slant things to his pet projects. What do you do if you want to spend money you don’t have. You eliminate things you don’t need. Divert that money to what you want. That my friends is just what Mr. Obama has done. First on his agenda was to bail out his buddies in the banking, and manufacturing industries. (Rich helping Rich get Richer). To do this he refused to admit the costs of living rises (Medicinal, Utilities, and yes gasoline) . He even wants to change the formula for figuring these costs, because he says they project a false and higher cost of living than is a true cost of living . Therefore not giving the elderly the raises they deserved, since he has been in office. To subsidize his buddies, the elderly have, by not getting a raise for 2 years. Has amounted to between $45 and $90 trillion dollars. That more than paid the trillions given to the bail out effort. These people have paid into this account for 40 to 50 years. It is not their fault the Government gave that money to other Government agencies. (Which fail to pay it back. let alone pay interest). merely a mismanagement of funds. Some of you will think the amount paid in does not equal the amount paid out….HOWEVER… Let us not forget the INTEREST which this money had been properly invested. How many of the people who have paid in never receive a check, because of death. Or just drop out of the system. How much of this money is being spent on people who never paid in a cent. How about planning our own retirement income. I did this. I invested the maximum I could. Two years later it was all gone. My company shut the doors, Not my fault. Due to EMERGENCIES, and the need to get by until I could find another job, (which has been 3 years now). I have no money. The barter system works fairly good but I still have to do without a lot, So you see that doesn’t help either. So how does this relate to GENOCIDE? By denying the elderly people the money needed to exist on. The poverty level is $10,890 a year. If I were to be on Social Security now I would be getting about $13,800 a year. But as of now I would have about $1392 a year subtracted before I get my check for MEDICARE, Which I have also been paying for all my working life. That takes me to $12,408, a year. Now let us not forget we need a supplement insurance. This cost is around $125 a month (according to friends paying it). This is another $1500 gone. Leaving us with $10,908. This puts you at just $18 above poverty level. Now subtract a conservative average of $600 a month for rent or mortgage. There goes $7200. Let’s see, that takes us to $3708 dollars to pay utilities, and buy food, house or renter insurance, life insurance and let’s not forget MEDICINE, Car insurance if we are lucky enough to have one. But then you would not be able to put gas in it. And let’s not forget we have to pay SALES tax on everything. Including our utilities. It seems that Mr. Obama’s plan is eliminate the elderly as quickly as possible. After all they are a drain on his economy. Genocide or what. I see it as an attempt to eliminate the elderly. That Is How I See It. How many people do we have die of starvation or heat, or just plain a lack of compassion by our leaders. more than between find merely find find Views: 180
Tag: Gasoline
How Expensive Can OTC Medicine Be?
While recently killing time in a local Wal*Mart store. I happened by a middle of the aisle display for abreva. (A cold sore medicine). I remember we once used a product called campo-pehnique, (sorry if I misspelled that), which cam in a small bottle and worked just fine. As I remember it cost just a little more than a stick of chap stick. I was really shocked to see a “discounted on sale” price of $15.12 for a little tube containing .07 oz. I ‘m sure it is a very good product, but come on….$15.12 for 7 hundredths of an ounce. Talk about the price of bottle water being high at about 89 cents (in our area) for a 20 oz bottle. Think gas is high at $3.79 9/10 a gallon. Let’s look at this abreva cost. As you know I am not very good at math so this is just as an example. I think it takes 700 of these tubes to make a full ounce, If I am wrong you can do the following computation with the correct number. Take the sale price, $15.12 per .07 oz X 700 =$10,584.00 an ounce. Note abreva is sold I believe by net wt. So comparing to water or gas we would have to figure the net weight for an ounce of either. For example we know FLUID oz is a measure of volume, and net wt oz is a measure a measure of WEIGHT. The ounce is still an ounce, it takes 16 oz to make a pound. A gallon of water weighs approximately 8.34 pounds. So we are now comparing weight to weight. This means 133.44 oz to a gallon. Now take the $10,584.oo an ounce for abreva, times th3 133.44 oz in a gallon of water. Guess what that would bring the cost of of a gallon of water to $141,232,8.96.oo. A 20 oz bottle of water would cost $11,769.41. So who can complain about 89 cents for a 20 oz bottle of water? It is but a drop in the bucket. If you want to figure this for gasoline. Gasoline varies from about 5-6 pounds, so for our sake here we will use the more prominent estimate of 6 pounds per gallon. means about 96 ounces. 96 ounces times $10,584.oo = (appx) $1,016,064.oo So I ask you is abreva really worth the price you pay? I suppose the answer is yes, if it does what you want of it. But comparatively It appears to me to be WAAAY overpriced. That Is How I See It. more than Views: 171
Cost Of Entertainment On Rise
I just read where Disney World is increasing the price of a day pass. Admittedly it may not be a big increase. I really don’t know. I once won a 3 day stay there, which included flying down, and back, with a room and continental breakfast. I told them to give it to someone who would go. It would take about a $million to get to Florida. Well I might go for $100,000.oo. I was there once. Drove 18 hours to get there, After reaching our destination, I stayed 5 hours and came back home. Worst place I have ever been. Exception might have been Camp Eagle. But that is another story. It may just be in my blood. My Dad went there to visit my Uncles who moved down there. He hated it too. My son went to college there one year. He is a little more lenient than my Dad or me. He will go there for a day or two to visit friends. But back to the rise in costs for Disney World. Now it isn’t just Disney World, it seems most amusement parks are raising their prices. We all know sometimes a price increase has to come along. As employee’s need raises, and employee benefit cost raise. So I’m not really knocking them for the price increase. However, when you think about the overall cost for someone like me to go as a family of four, it really is quite pricey. Assume it is still the 1800 miles I traveled the last time. (There wasn’t Interstates all the way, so went by U.S. Highways), I think a good estimate for cars now is 26 mpg average. So round trip of 3600 miles, figure gas cost now about $3.50 a gallon, equals about $485.oo. Entry at $80.oo time 4 equals $320.oo. Now we are at $805.oo. Even for me 1800 miles is too much for a one day trip. Figure, driving the interstates, it is at least a 2 day drive. Thus we end up with at least 10 meals each for the round trip. Even eating at Burger King, we are looking at $200.oo for food, and that is not counting any drinks or snacks you have while on the road. Two overnight stays at a motel, (one going, and one coming home), that’s at least another $300.oo. I don’t know if Disney World charges to park there, I have been to some Amusement parks that do. But most don’t. So I’ll assume Disney doesn’t. Now we are at $1300.oo and just getting in the gate. Assuming, (again), you and your children spend what we spent the last time I took my family, which was several years ago, on drinks and food and souvenirs we’ll ad another $100.oo. Up to $1400.00 now. And let’s face it how much are you really going to get to see or do in one day? I know most of you are probably thinking WOW! that’s not bad. I suppose not but after driving 12 hours a day, for 2 days to get there, and 12 hours, a day for 2 days to come home. (Let’s not forgetting listening to the children and wife all that time while trying to keep your mind on driving), is it really worth it? Again probably yes, just to see the kid’s having fun. But for me that is more than I make each month. AND I still have my house payment, utilities, food, auto expenses, etc. But don’t worry, even if I could afford it I wouldn’t go. Disneyland in California would be another thing. That Is How I See It. have been just getting Views: 125
Oil Company Subsidies
Obama wants to end oil company subsidies. This sort of makes sense, as these subsidies are meant to promote domestic drilling and exploration. Which we know they don’t do, at least not aggressively. These subsidies amount to billions of dollars. But, what happens if they do remove the subsidy. The greedy oil companies will just raise our cost at the pump to make up for loss. Is there any way for the consumer to win. I don’t see any, and keep it a free enterprise. We can’t cut back on our use, because they will raise the price to maintain their profits, which would be lost because of less sales. We can’t use more, because they will raise their prices due to demand. I guess they just have us all “over the OIL barrel”. That Is How I See It. Views: 405
GAS Supply and Demand
There has been much said about the rising cost of gasoline. When I had my first gas station, gas was 32 cents a gallon. Diesel was a side product of gasoline production, and I sold it for 16 cents a gallon. Now this by product costs more than gasoline. WHY? You have heard the stories about the crazy people driving up the cost of oil. People who know nothing about the oil business paying more than the oil is worth (for future profits). This is what I have learned. Like all business, the oil companies are in it for the profit. PROFIT is what they are getting. Posting unusually high profit margins every quarter. Every quarter the profit margin gets higher. Why is this. We the consumer let them jab us at every turn. While it is true the uneducated oil buyer is doing his share to raise the cost of oil, the Oil companies, do their share too. What are the oil companies doing? A simple thing called SUPPLY AND DEMAND. They are controlling the supply end of it. Currently the big Oil Companies are operating at approximately 80% of capacity. (Artificially; as I see it; decreasing the supply). What else are they doing, you ask. They are exporting more oil products to foreign countries. Our American oil companies are supplying probably more diesel fuel to the African Continent than we use here in the USA. I don’t know what these other countries are paying. But I would bet it is like our medical companies, who sell medicine to other countries for less than we have to pay. Again USA pays other countries benefit. That Is How I See It. more than Views: 117
State Looks to Raise Gas Tax
Our state. like most states, is looking for more money. With our unemployment above 9%. Where do you go. The solution they think of is raising GAS TAX. Earlier our Government was telling us to combat high prices drive less. Then we had the clunker thing. (All that accomplished was taking many a vehicle the lower income people could afford to buy and do necessary travel), out of service. Now Our State Servants, have an attitude of: if we need money add taxes, or increase taxes, or somehow get the people pay for it. An Aside here. I just looked and our Servants in the state capital make in excess of $30,000 a year for about 2 months of service. Not bad for a part time job. Any way now with less gas sales due to the economy, and as I see it Price Gouging by the greedy oil companies. Price in our state is now, as I write, is $3.55 9/10 a gallon for regular. We pay sales tax on gas at the rate of 7% (supposedly pre-tax STATE and Federal), we don’t know for sure as it is figured in at the pump. We presently pay 18% a gallon State tax. With 18.4% Federal tax. I’m not a mathematician so I won’t TAX my brain to figure out what the untaxed price of gasoline is. Just guessing total tax Federal what 65 cents, a gal. and about the same for State. That takes the price to what about $2.25 per gal. which would make us paying about 15 cents per gallon sales tax. Hmmm. Looks to me like the Government is making more per gallon than the dealer. So right now it appears that our State government is making about 80 cents a gallon from taxes. That with no expenses. I say no expenses but the dealer gets maybe a penny or two for collecting the sales tax. Will our state be satisfied making $1.00 a gallon. That would be about a 20 cent hike in taxes. Like I said our state likes taxes. You pay tax on everything you buy, rent, use, sell, earn, we even pay sales tax on every game we bowl. Use less gas. Pay more taxes per gallon. Combat greedy oil companies use less gas, they raise their price so they can live the high life at our expense. To me we taxpayers are in a no win situation. Government and Oil Companies are going to maintain their profits plus, regardless of the hardship it brings the people. Perhaps the hardest people hit by this is the people out of work and the retired person who has lost his savings due to the economy. For these people it is like locking them in their homes. Limited income will only stretch so far. When gas prices rise, so do prices of food, and about everything else. The increased cost of production and transportation has to be absorbed somewhere, (we the consumers). Oh and a bonus for the STATE increased price means more sales tax money. That Is How I See It. Views: 144
Gas Prices
Try as we might, the consumer can never figure when to buy gasoline. I play this game every week. Do I fill up Monday or wait for Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, or is Sunday going to give me the best price. Whatever day I pick I the price will go down the next day. But I have an SUV, a Pickup truck. a sports car, and a motorcycle. (Don’t misunderstand my truck is 23 years old, My SUV is 16, my sports car was a gift for me to fix, and occupy my time, and the motorcycle was given to me by a friend who at age 77 decided it was time to quit riding). So I buy gas on one day then go back the next with the other 3 vehicles. (I at least can save a little money on 3 out of 4 vehicles). The gas companies have conspired to raise the price of gas to $3.00 a gallon ever since they reached $2.00. They drove to get the price to $2.00 ever since they attained $1.00. They always have an excuse. We didn’t produce enough gas. Crude oil prices are up. (which I feel they control to an extent). We had an oil spill. The demand for gas is too high. The gas demand is too low. And my favorite. It’s a Holiday. Whatever other reason they can think of. It is always “NOT MY FAULT” with them. A year or two ago our government was saying “we must curb our driving habits to cut down on gas consumption. Then when they realized the loss of tax revenue from our driving less,; using less gas. They wanted to raise our gas tax if we didn’t pick up our usage. We are in a catch 22. Not all us are able to go out and buy the electric cars that government is pushing. (They really don’t look that safe to me.) For city driving they may be okay, For those of us who live in a rural area and have to drive 50 plus miles to reach a city big enough to support charging stations. Retirees? Sometime they purchase one last car as they retire, knowing they can’t afford new car payments, taxes, plate fees, and insurance on a new car. Gasoline companies your days are numbered keep raising prices and you force people to switch to electric cars, bicycles, motorcycles, mopeds. We once had steam cars and they could get us from point A to point B quite effectively. Horses worked pretty good for a long time. I could see a time when mini cities will spring up with all the things people will need can be shopped, bought and delivered to my house. The bygone (in some areas) trolley car can be revived to take people to anywhere they want within the mini city. That Is How I See It. Views: 134
