Certainly, there are myriad factors as to what causes inflation to occur. Do presidents have a role? Most certainly they do, although they do not necessarily directly impact inflation, fiscal and other policies absolutely do. So, how can we tell Biden is the man behind the inflation we have now?
More Opinion by The Springboard
Bringing back American manufacturing is critical to American society in more ways than just economic ones. In order for America to succeed it needs the ability to make things, not only for the stability and good jobs it provides, but for national security as well.
Sunday, December 22, 2024
Considering Dividend Income as the Fed Lowers Rates
Certainly, there are myriad factors as to what causes inflation to occur. Do presidents have a role? Most certainly they do, although they do not necessarily directly impact inflation, fiscal and other policies absolutely do. So, how can we tell Biden is the man behind the inflation we have now?
Saturday, December 21, 2024
Student Loan Forgiveness Was a Misguided Initiative Anyway
Despite reassurances, the mystery of the drones over New York and New Jersey has imaginations running wild. Until we have some answers, it's anyone's guess why they are there and what they are up to, leaving growing public concern and speculation.
Tuesday, December 17, 2024
We're Missing the Mark on Mass Shootings: The Same Will Be True in the Madison, Wisconsin Case
For instance, President Joe Biden wasted no time to seize the opportunity to advocate once again for stricter gun control laws. One has to question the relevance considering the shooter in this case that happened in Madison, Wisconsin was a 15-year old girl who, by current law, cannot even legally obtain a firearm.
What law would have prevented her from getting access to a gun?
And of course, it's likely that calls for tighter regulations will intensify in the coming weeks following this tragic event that left three people dead, including the shooter, and many more injured. To me, that is as much a part of the tragedy as the event itself.
As controversial as it may be to say this, and this is something I have been saying for a long time, guns are not the issue, and if we ever want real solutions, we need to set the guns aside in order to get to the bottom of it.
Lack of religion isn't the issue either, as this Wisconsin school shooting clearly suggests. It happened at a private Christian school, and one would presume not only were the parents religious, at least the shooter was exposed to a religious upbringing.
Of course, the details are quite slim here. The shooter took her own life and so she can't tell us what motivated her to do the shooting which left one teacher and a fellow student dead. But one would presume that there was likely some bullying going on.
What it comes down to most of the time for me is the mental health issue coupled with what I see as the rampant misdiagnosis of fake illnesses doctors can prescribe dugs for. Kids today are more medicated than ever for all sorts of things like learning disabilities to hyperactivity and anxiety.
In other words, everything is a disease now that must be treated with some sort of drug. And who knows what the real effects of these drugs are considering kids are still in their developing stages of life. Whatever they put in their bodies determines how they grow and what they grow into, and while I am no medical professional, I think that thought stands to reason.
Are guns an issue? Sure. I think we can all agree that guns make it easier to carry out these acts. But to say they are the problem is too easy. And the more we focus on that, the less likely we will be able to get at the root and have any impact on stopping these things from happening.
When I say people are missing things before these things happen, what I am referring to are the signs. Because I am sure there are always signs. The parents miss them. The administrators and teachers miss them. Everyone misses them and then when something does happen the only thing we focus on are the guns that do the consequential damage of what we missed in the end.
Was this girl on medications for anything? We don't know. Was she bullied? We don't know. Even still, at least in the case of bullying, how did we get to where we are now where the final decision is to kill people? Bullying has been occurring since the beginning of time, but while shootings are a regular occurrence these days, it's still a relatively new thing.
You can argue that's because access to guns is easier. But is it really? As I said before, for decades we have enacted more laws than ever to make it harder to obtain guns. Sure, it is still easy for the most part. But the point is that we have more laws on the books than ever and equally, we have more shootings than ever.
So, the question becomes, if the stricter laws haven't prevented or slowed these shootings down, but rather, since new laws were enacted shootings actually increased, what are we missing not only before a shooting event occurs, but what are we missing in finding the solutions to them?
It's yet another tragic event that will only go down as that. Something we can reflect on. Something we can point to when we discuss the need for more control over powerful weapons. But what it will accomplish in terms of getting down to what causes these things?
It will accomplish nothing at all because we will continue to miss the point. Meanwhile, the next shooter is simply waiting their turn.
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© 2024 Jim Bauer
Tuesday, December 3, 2024
Johnstown, New York Building Inspector Jeff Persch Says, "It's Unfortunate people have a 1st Amendment right."
Monday, December 2, 2024
Sifting Through the Implications of Biden's Pardon Decision
Saturday, November 30, 2024
Don't Underestimate Trump's Plan to Kill Higher Prices: He Knows Exactly What He's Doing
Friday, November 15, 2024
Whoopi's Wealth and You: A Tale of Two Worlds
Friday, November 8, 2024
Celebrities vs. the Real World: The Illusion
Monday, November 4, 2024
DEI Initiatives are a Fool's Game
If the question comes up, "Why do you not have any transgendered (name your job title)?" the answer should be simple. "We hire the most qualified individuals to perform jobs based on criteria that is the same for everyone. If we do not have any transgendered people in that job now it is because from the pool of candidates, none were more qualified than who we ultimately hired."
Granted, there will still likely be backlash. "That's just an easy way to get out from under your bigotry," some might accuse them of. But isn't it bigotry to even have DEI in the first place? Think about it. What does it say to someone who gets hired just because they happen to be gay, black, Mexican or transgendered?
Were it not for our DEI program, you'd never have been able to succeed in getting this job on your own.
So, now it is admirable and respectable to be chosen for a job to serve as a token for the company to wave around rather than because the job was actually earned? How degrading. At least it would be to me. I would think it would be to most people.
Of course, the reality is that DEI initiatives are unpopular, and companies are finally starting to understand this, which is why many have pulled back their initiatives. Companies like Ford and Target and Anheuser-Busch for example.
For one thing, it serves no purpose for the business to hire unqualified people, and it alienates customers. So, it's really a lose-lose situation. Of course, any company now has to quietly walk back from their initiatives since they are afraid of back lash from the other side, even though the largest customer base will be from conservatives who will applaud pulling away from DEI.
It's another reason why businesses should always avoid treading into political waters. Their purpose is to sell stuff, and in order to be successful at doing that, they need to simply do things that sell products. All the other stuff is not conducive to good business and should be avoided.
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© 2024 Jim Bauer
Saturday, November 2, 2024
The Next Market Run Could Last 20 Years: Here's Why I Think So
Wednesday, October 30, 2024
Ford's Long Road: Why its Consistency Keeps me Invested
Tuesday, October 22, 2024
There You Go Again, myLot: Can You Ever Just Stop Being Mean to Members?
Saturday, October 19, 2024
Well, What Do We Have Here? The FCC, CBS and Kamala Harris
Thursday, October 17, 2024
The Brett Baier and Kamala Harris Interview: My Final Take
He didn't do that. He challenged her on claims. He presented her former and current positions and gave her the opportunity to explain the contrast. He presented polling outlining voter sentiment on a variety of issues that are not favorable to Kamala Harris on the economy, the border and other issues and point blankly asked her why, if she has a better path forward, the majority of the American people seem to be indicating they disagree with her.
Look, I am going to give Kamala Harris at least some credit for sitting down with Brett Baier. She easily could have said no, and I am sure that she was prepared to be in an interview situation that would be unlike anything that she would ordinarily be accustomed to.
But she didn't pass the smell test. She didn't answer the questions, and I think a lot of her combativeness during the interview was more to stall it, present less time for real questions, and control the interview than to display a sense of command.
What she ultimately did was spend the bulk of the interview taking shots at Donald Trump and dismissing the dismal results of the administration she was part of for the past four years, taking no responsibility, acknowledging no mistakes, yet at the same time trying to distance herself from Joe Biden.
As you would expect, Harris was armed with an arsenal of talking points, and she wanted to get them all out in rapid-fire as best she could.
In the end, I don't think the interview did any good for the Kamala Harris campaign, but at the same time I am not sure if this close to the election, it changes any minds either. But it did present a glaring example of why a Kamala Harris presidency poses more danger to the American people than she wants to claim a Trump administration would be.
Again, we have results to go by. We have Trump's first four years, and we have Biden's last four years, and she is correct to point out that there is a stark contrast between the two choices, only all of the problems that have happened in the last four years were partially under her command.
Over and over again she lobbed accusations against Trump about the dangers he poses, from threats to democracy to weaponizing the military against the American people, yet at the same time completely dismissing the fact that 79% of the American people in polls say that we are headed in the wrong direction as a country.
That's her problem to own and explain, by the way, because Trump wasn't there to steer the country anywhere. And actually, Harris' attempt at an answer to the question why was actually a bit bizarre, if you ask me. "It's Trump's rhetoric for the past decade," she tried to assert. But as Brett pointed out, "You were in the White House. Not Trump."
The bottom line is that we are in the final throes of this election. I think we have all the information we, as voters, need in order to make a final decision. I tend to believe that decision is Trump. But of course, it's hard to tell when the media seems to want to point us in a different direction.
Like I have said before, I think any popularity or lead Harris has ever had has largely been driven by media spin much more than voter sentiment. Will the race be close? Who knows? It shouldn't be. But again, who knows?
All in all, I am going to give Brett Baier a thumbs up for a hard hitting, on point interview that I think touched on key issues and questions that gave us a better picture of the real Kamala Harris, unfettered by the usual media drooling over her or the left that we are used to.
We got to hear the right questions asked, and the American people got to see her unable to answer them with any conceivable substance. The left wing media will of course say Brett attacked Kamala Harris or was rude to her. But I'll just say that's because he didn't ask her what her favorite color is or what she plans to serve on her table at Thanksgiving.
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© 2024 Jim Bauer
READ ALL OF THE TAKES ON THE BRETT BAIER INTERVIEW WITH KAMALA HARRIS
Take One: Brett Baier and Kamala Harris on the Border
Take Two: Brett Baier Puts Kamala Harris Into a Deer In Headlights Mode with Immigration Question
Take Three: Brett Baier Continues to Lock Kamala Harris Up on the Economy and Her Campaign Slogan
Brett Baier Continues to Lock Kamala Harris Up on the Economy and Her Campaign Slogan
What? Where have you been?
Trump has talked about the devastating blow to American families that inflation has caused. He has talked about the border. He has talked about the economy. And he has talked about the need to reduce high prices at the gas pump.
"Donald Trump has no plans," she kept saying.
Only the reality is that Trump has had plans all along, including many of which he had already implemented during his first four years. Policies and plans that were mostly effective and worked, by the way, no matter how badly Harris wants to convince the American people they didn't.
Brett asked her specifically regarding the economy, "Why do you think most people say they trust Donald Trump more than you when it comes to the economy?" And once again she skirted the question, instead bashing Trump as well as citing Nobel laureates and the Wall Street Journal as sources to say, "They trust our plan."
Which is essentially, the same plan the Biden administration was wanting to pursue—Harris is really just an extension of that even if she somehow wants to try to separate herself from it, while at the same time telling The View she wouldn't change anything the Biden administration did during their four years in office.
Again, am I the only one completely confused here?
I go back to what I have said before. Who was in office these past four years? Was it Donald Trump? Or was it Joe Biden and Kamala Harris? She acknowledges we have all these challenges and problems that need to be fixed. But it wasn't Trump who was in the White House when they happened and now, she's the one with the better ideas to get us out of it?
Brett asked her another very poignant question about her saying over and over again that her presidency would turn the page. "You've been vice president for the past four years. What are you turning the page from?"
Where I find her "answer" is remarkable is how she framed it, basically trying to suggest we are needing to get away from divisiveness, pointing fingers and passing blame, and trying to take people down instead of lifting them up.
Wait a minute. Would that be like accusing a political opponent of crimes? Of insurrections? Of trying to jail him? Of having wall to wall endless negative coverage comparing Donald Trump to Marxists and fascists and Adolph Hitler himself?
She says Donald Trump's rhetoric instills fear in people's minds. So, what does saying that he will become a dictator, wanting to use federal law enforcement agencies to jail dissenters, take down democracy or whatever other evil plans he supposedly has—all of which are patently untrue, by the way—do to not instill fear in people's minds?
She is basically saying that we need to turn the page ahead against all the things her administration has been front and center of for the past four years, orchestrating all along.
At the end of the day, the fact is, Harris has nothing new to offer the American people and she's trying as hard as she can to erase the last four years and somehow pin all of America's woes on Trump. There's no other way of putting it.
The question is, who's really buying it?
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© 2024 Jim Bauer
READ ALL THE TAKES ON THE BRETT BAIER INTERVIEW WITH KAMALA HARRIS
Take One: Brett Baier and Kamala Harris on the Border
Take Two: Brett Baier Puts Kamala Harris Into Deer in Headlights Mode with Immigration Question
Take Four: The Brett Baier and Kamala Harris Interview: My Final Take
Brett Baier Puts Kamala Into a Deer in Headlights Mode with Immigration Question
"There's a lot of people that look back at what you said in 2019 when you first ran for president," Brett began. He reminded her that she supported allowing immigrants who were in the country illegally to apply for driver's licenses, that she supported free tuition for illegals at universities, as well as offering illegals free healthcare.
"Listen," Kamala Harris said, almost seeming irritated by the question by her body language. "That was five years ago."
She went on to convey her regard for the law and asserted she didn't advocate for these things while she was vice president. But of course, we all must remember, she was the vice president. Biden would have had to sign off on these things, and I contend even for him, these ideas would have been considered far too radical to take seriously.
Because of course, they are radical, and I think most Americans, including many Democrats, would be opposed to them.
She basically tried to throw out the notion that she would ever go back to her former position. But it was Brett's follow up question that was the gotcha moment. "If that's the case, you chose a running mate, Tim Walz, Governor of Minnesota, who signed those very things into state law. So, do you support that?"
Her pause was nearly 3-seconds long, which may not seem like a very long time. But clearly, she was taken aback by the question and immediately the wheels were spinning in her head. One could have pictured a sudden appearance of Will Robinson's robot in "Lost in Space" entering the frame warning, "Danger! Danger!"
The problem with her ultimate answer is the same as is the problem she has with most of her answers. She didn't answer it. She said her and Tim Walz are committed to following federal law. Yet clearly, Tim Walz had different interests as governor. So, which is it? She changed her position on the position and now Tim Walz has too?
How much more confused can the American people be made trying to figure out what Harris is actually for or against? Why didn't she condemn Walz' law or have further comment on it? Will she now, if elected, go to the courts to ask to challenge Walz' law on the grounds that it violates federal law? And will Walz, who enacted it, now side with her in the challenge?
Does this make sense to anyone?
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© 2024 Jim Bauer
READ ALL THE TAKES ON THE BRETT BAIER INTERVIEW WITH KAMALA HARRIS
Take One: Brett Baier and Kamala Harris on the Border
Take Three: Brett Baier Continues to Lock Kamala Harris Up on the Economy and Her Campaign Slogan
Take Four: The Brett Baier and Kamala Harris Interview: My Final Take