How to get back on track - Part I

---by Dave Buhlman

The American economy and spirit are on the decline. This is to be expected after all of the maneuvering in the political and social realms over the past fifty years. Government has grown at a rapid pace and the acknowledged public debt exceeds $9 trillion, a number hard for most of us to fathom. Experts tell us that when unfunded liabilities, such as Social Security, Medicare, and pensions are added in, the debt is more than $60 trillion, a number even more difficult to grasp. Many people are worried about how to pay for gas at the pump, and how they will pay to heat their homes next fall and winter. Thus we are threatened at very basic levels, places where we never thought would be a concern. The stock market is tumbling, and dragging down the retirement plans of many with it. Is life in America about to become, “nasty, brutish and short”, as one philosopher put it?

These times call for innovative ideas, new ways to approach how things are run, but these are sorely lacking in the papers and speeches of the nominees of the two parties. We need to look at how we got to this point, where the tragedy began, and fix the bad things that brought us to this dark place. The candidates hawk a number of ideas, but they all amount to either putting a band aid on a cancerous sore, or building upon the failed past policies that resulted in a shaky America in the summer of 2008. They may want to present other approaches, but are concerned that the power elite will withdraw their support because of them, so they stay quiet in order to continue on their quest for the power of the presidency by “attacking” their adversary. Watching this “gotcha” game has become tedious and tiring after having endured it since I first voted in a presidential election. That was 1972, when Nixon took forty-nine states and McGovern took only one, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

Given the dearth of original thinking from those quarters, I humbly offer the following as a way to get us back on track.

First, nationalize the privately-owned Federal Reserve Bank with the aim of eliminating it and turning its functions over to the US Treasury where they belong.. This bank is not federal and there are no reserves, so even the name is a misnomer. As part of this effort, start on the road back to the gold standard to end the killing inflation caused by our current fiat money system, which is backed only by a belief that the dollar has value. Belief can be a fleeting emotion, while gold has intrinsic value in and of itself. Let’s stop the hidden robbery of our pocketbooks caused by deflating the value of the few dollars most of us hold for the ever shortening period between when we get it and when we pay our bills.

Second, repudiate the NAFTA and GATT treaties, and all others like them. Such treaties have benefitted foreigners, and a small cadre of the connected here, while devastating American industries and causing a severe loss of good jobs in America.

On illegal immigration, when politicians recommend giving illegal immigrants amnesty, citizenship and public benefits, they should not be engaged in debate, but arrested for treason or sedition. We would not hesitate to do this is if they suggested giving the Northwest to mainland China. At a minimum, they should be ignored and ushered from the political stage as the dangerous lunatics they are. Both Obama and McCain are for giving it all to illegal immigrants at the expense of ordinary Americans, although McCain has flipped and flopped all over the place on this. But we remember McCain-Kennedy, John. We remember.

Foreign policy has been run by the elites such that it is completely foreign to the well being of regular Americans, especially those called to fight and die in civil/tribal wars of other countries. While remaining wide open to trade and commerce with all nations, tell them they’re on their own when it comes to Americans dying for the nuttiness that plagues too many places in the world. We will, by all means, arm those who are oppressed so that they can defend themselves. For example, had we done this with the Kurds in the early 1980s, Saddam Hussein wouldn’t have gone on his murdering spree in Kurdish areas. Tyrants are cowards at heart, as are they that they send to do their bidding, so shooting back at them really works. Another avenue of semi-intervention is the president issuing Letters of Marque and Reprisal, as described in the US Constitution. This was done in the 1800s to tame the Barbary Pirates. With Letters, the president puts a price on the head of a bad guy and private entities, such as retired special forces guys join together to get the bad guy and collect the price on his head. They may die in the effort, but it’s their choice. This is a big difference from being forced to fight, as many have been in my lifetime, God bless them.

In the next installment, the rest of the program will be presented.

Dave Buhlman is a former New Hampshire State Representative.