The business of race and sex

From the 12 July 2010 Greater Niagara Newspapers

THE BUSINESS OF RACE AND SEX
By Bob Confer

Over six months into the current session, both houses and the Governor were still at an impasse over advancing the legislation necessary to make ends meet. Yet, amidst that mess and the related financial nightmare, they still found time to play politics and pass bills that give advantages and accommodations to minority and women-owned business enterprises (MWBEs). In a press report dated July 2, the Senate boasted of new rules that would ensure so-called fairness in contracting, emphasize the supposed importance of sex and race in state procurement functions and grant privilege to MWBEs when delving into the state’s Small Business Revolving Loan Fund.

It’s obvious that the Senate and Assembly must still think we’re living in the 1960s, back when the significant social changes brought about by the civil rights and women’s lib movements may have fostered a temporary need for MWBE legislation to aid in accessing the markets. Those days are long gone. The legislators need only look amongst their ranks to see that played out: We have a black governor (Paterson) and Senate leader (John Sampson) in our state while, nationally, a woman is third in charge (Nancy Pelosi), another ran for vice-president in the last election (Sarah Palin) and, above all, we have an president in Barack Obama who is one-half African American.

Those advances in social understanding, and the widespread acceptance of leaders who may look different than the “old white guys” of days gone by (something readily apparent in the private sector as well), show that America’s days as a heavily sexist and racist nation are behind us. Despite that, the government still advances MWBE legislation, an insult to the concept of fairness, the very thing the lawmakers promote.

Let’s start with the concept of government lending. The Senate is rewording the language of the taxpayer-funded loan program to focus on women and minorities based on the assumption that they have had difficulty in accessing traditional credit markets. It makes one wonder if the legislature has picked up a newspaper in the past two years. Because of the global financial collapse, everyone has had problems acquiring loans. It has nothing to do with skin tone and everything to do with the business. And, it’s the concept of business the Senators obviously don’t understand: What if a white male has an extraordinary idea that would solve the energy crisis and he can’t get a loan because the state would prefer to give it to a female who wants to open a gift shop? It’s a far-fetched example, but it shows the disconnect.

Next, there’s the matter of government purchasing. The resultant impairment – not betterment – of fairness via MWBE rules ends up hurting the working class as a whole by granting preference to certain companies. Because a woman is at the helm of a contracting firm, does that make her firm any more worthwhile than the next? In most cases the make-up of her workforce is no different in terms of diversity than that of a company owned by a white male. Then, what if she is awarded a contract based on her sex yet pays her workers a sub-standard wage and benefits? Who wins?

What about a firm owned by a white male that employs an above average number of minorities? If MWBE laws are all about diversity and equality, shouldn’t his firm get as fair a shake as (if not preference over) a minority-owned firm that employs an average or below average population of minorities? I quite often think of this when participating in the bidding process for projects for the government and larger corporations (which have fallen into the government’s trap). Judging by the questionnaires we must fill out, it’s obvious that ownership is, frankly, a little too Caucasian and manly to get a fair consideration, even though our minority employment is typically 12 to 15 percent, well above the non-white population in Niagara County (10 percent) and, especially, our home base of North Tonawanda (2.1 percent).

If the government wanted fairness and diversity to actually mean something, they should focus on factors such as that. But, I don’t want them to. The government should stop using racism and sexism to beat perceived racism and sexism and let everyone - man, woman, white, black – fairly bid on contracts and see them rewarded to businesses based solely on free market ideals (simply put: quality, price and service) and not for the skin tone or reproductive organs of their owners.

Handguns and privacy

From the 05 July 2010 Greater Niagara Newspapers

HANDGUNS AND PRIVACY
By Bob Confer

Based on the numerous columns that I’ve written about the Second Amendment and the natural right to self-defense it’s pretty obvious to the reader that I pack heat. I’m a firm believer in being prepared to protect myself and others from any threat, man or beast. A lot of people are. But, they don’t have columns in which to expound on that belief and most of them try to keep their feelings about handguns close to the vest. To those folks, possessing a firearm is their business and no one else’s.

Unfortunately, something transpired in June that trampled over their rights to both gun ownership and privacy, all in one fell swoop. A website, posted anonymously of course, came about at www.whospackingny.com that featured a series of databases listing the names and addresses of all registered handgun owners in New York State. Following a public uproar - and no doubt a flurry of hate mail and legal threats – the website has since changed and is now a clearinghouse of information about various penal codes hosted by the Buffalo Criminal Law Center, a take-off of the University at Buffalo’s Law School. It is unknown to this writer as to whether the BCLC is the original host or the whospackingny URL is being redirected to the BCLC site.

When it was up and running, whospackingny.com allowed the visitor to not only search a user-friendly database but it also permitted downloading of the complete data set in Excel format. So, even though the information is not readily accessible to the masses for the time being (who knows if the website will rear its ugly head again), it’s still out there someplace. I’ll guarantee there are thousands of people who saved the file to their hard drives, information that can be shared by email or a whospackingny copycat.

The lists can easily end up in the hands of the wrong people, causing serious harm. It is feared by many that violent criminals like drug pushers and gang members who are in turf wars and need to be equipped will use it to find a home that has handguns within it, observe that address, and break into it when the homeowners are gone, all in an effort to steal the weapons. The database makes it so simple to commit such an egregious act as it hand feeds prospects to thugs.

There’s also the media-and-left-induced stigma that comes with gun ownership that will only be exacerbated by the availability of records. We live in an era in which guns are foolishly feared rather than respected and many individuals nosy enough to peruse the list might overreact and turn on their neighbors, friends, and family, choosing not to go to a gun owner’s house or send their kids there for fear that the weapon makes that abode or the registered user a danger. Folks on the other side of the guns and privacy issue like the access to the data just for that reason.

When the website was live, the webmaster attempted to deflect responsibility for his or her actions by stating that the handgun registrations are public record. That’s a rather poor justification for sharing what was once though secret, but it does beg the question: Who’s more at fault, he who publishes such information on the web or the government entities which allow such information to be public record?

I’ll go with the latter. New York is one of only a few states in which gun ownership is considered fair game for prying eyes. The law needs to be changed to prevent its availability to the public. It can be done. It has been done. Case in point, even though taxpayers pay for some 4 million New Yorkers to be on Medicaid, we are not allowed to know who they are or where they live although the case could be made that such information should be public record as the state is taking from the rights of an individual (the right to property/happiness) to grant privilege to another. One should know how their public monies are being used. Gun ownership doesn’t fall into such a category. You don’t intrude on anyone’s rights by possessing a weapon. Despite what Albany may believe, gun ownership does not make you a threat to the common good.

That said, please take the time to call or write your Assemblyperson and Senator. Get them to push for legislation that would make your ownership of weapon secret, just as you thought it was and just as you know it should be.

Government is not God

From the 28 June 2010 Lockport Union Sun and Journal (Lockport, NY)

GOVERNMENT IS NOT GOD
By Bob Confer

Over the course of British Petroleum’s oil leak many people came down hard on President Obama, wondering when the federal government might save the day. As politely as they could, he and his Administration consistently provided the right response, letting everyone know that the disaster was of BP’s doing and only BP had the resources and know-how to stop the leak.

It was ironic, if not entertaining, that a President known for thinking the federal government has implausibly vast power admitted, though discretely, that there is a limit to its abilities. That should be a lesson to all: Government is not God. It was never intended, nor is it equipped, to handle every disaster – natural or man-made – that comes our way.

Similarly, it should not be called upon (prayed to, if you will) to provide for the day-to-day accommodations of life like an income, a home, and health care. Those niceties should not be given to anyone; rather, they should be achieved and acquired by everyone on their own. The federal government, in its proper purpose, is supposed to provide the environment in which people can strive for those things. It is supposed to recognize and ensure the rights to life, liberty and property and provide the oversight to make sure one’s collection of rights are not infringed by others, whether the others are fellow citizens, corporations, or the government itself.

It should be noted that the latter of the three entities is not held to the same standards as the other two. Government has broken the covenant known as the Constitution and it allows itself to intrude on the rights of its citizenry by stealing from taxpayers in order to fund its adopted role of God, one in which it physically provides the income, food, and home to those who can’t or, in most cases, won’t.

One could argue that some forms of public assistance have their place, temporarily serving those who are facing a bump in the road, like the loss of a job. They just may, but in most cases such programs don’t work as intended for there are more "abusers" than there are "users". In many cases, assistance isn’t temporary in nature. Instead, it remains quite permanent, a lifestyle that becomes accepted as the norm by the recipients and their offspring. It becomes a religion, in which their God, Uncle Sam, puts a roof over their heads and food on their table with no exertion of their own energy. If they can survive just by asking their Great One, why would they have it any other way?

What’s interesting about this is the fact that those who actually worship a god would never commit such an egregious act against him. Christians, for example, never demand that their God fills their bellies or give them homes. No, their relationship is one of give and take. They ask - not demand - that He provide the means necessary to achieve what they want in life, while at the same time knowing they have a responsibility to be moral and hard-working. They know that the rewards they seek are earned through countless personal sacrifices and are never given, and if they are given to them without the application of faith and work they know there may be a little bit of evil involved.

And there is an evil that exists with the worship of Government. There is nothing moral about a lifetime of public assistance. It is sinful - no matter if the reader’s morality is based in religion or reason - to have an individual provide for another through forced benevolence. The government is also more Devil than God as an outcome of its actions. The dependency it creates amongst its worshippers strips them of their humanity and devolves their existence, minimizing the potential greatness that every human being possesses at birth. They lack the ability to reason, the most basic understanding of self-preservation, and the sense of community that all come from self-reliance, individualism and the pursuit of life’s blessings.

We need to put an end to this religion of government and come to grips with the fact that it is not a god, nor should we ever expect to be. Thinking that it is one is ruining our society and constricting the further development and betterment of Mankind.

Capitalism is saving the economy

From the 21 June 2010 Lockport Union Sun and Journal (Lockport, NY)

CAPITALISM IS SAVING THE ECONOMY
By Bob Confer

My coworkers and I hit a rough spot when the recession really gained steam in September of 2008. For a 6-month period we worked only 3 or 4 days a week because the demand for our and our customer’s products had tanked as consumers tightened their purse strings.

Since then, we’ve been doing quite well at the factory. Our workforce is the largest it’s ever been, we’ve expanded on 3 occasions and many of our molding machines are booked solid for months. We’re really busy.

We’re not alone. Many manufacturers, from local neighborhood machine shops to some of the largest factories in North America, are seeing the same. I’ve personally heard and read many stories of American plants seeing noticeable gains in orders and output. More than just anecdotal in nature, the statistics show this growth, too, as indicated in recent reports from the Institute for Supply Management, the Department of Commerce and regional branches of the Federal Reserve.

The Obama Administration and Congress have been taking credit for manufacturing’s rebound, relentlessly tossing out the predictable "the stimulus is working" comments. Unfortunately, the press and a good percentage of our populace blindly fall lock-step into believing such prattle.

Manufacturing’s return has absolutely nothing to do with the various stimuli and other government intrusions into the marketplace and everything to do with good old-fashioned capitalism.

I see that happening at Confer Plastics. Had we and our clients sat still, this newfound activity never would have happened. Some of our long-held product lines are still down versus their 2006 highs because consumers are still unwilling or unable to make certain discretionary purchases. But, more than making up for their losses, our growth can be attributed to 2 factors that are capitalist in nature: One, the acquisition of new customers for whom we make a variety of new custom-made goods and, two, existing customers investing in new assets and expanding their product offerings. I’ve had other manufacturers make similar claims about their clientele, even going so far as to say that new projects that seemed dead for a handful of years are finally being given the green light to proceed.

Those companies are making such investments not because the economy is healthy, but because it is down and shows no signs of an immediate return to the way things used to be. They haven’t the faith in Washington’s economic policy or the rest of the world’s financial health. They know that we’re in a down economy for the long haul (kind of like a new norm) and they understand that if they want to increase their revenues (reaching either their old levels or new, higher ones) instead of just getting by at markedly-decreased revenues and profits, they’ll have to claim market share or create new markets. Therefore, they are doing the entrepreneurial thing and spending so they can at once beat-up on their competitors and win new customers. It’s risky, yes, but if they didn’t do it they’d be positioning themselves for either long-term mediocrity or failure.

They are realizing the potential of such projects only with the help of the producers, be it their in-house operations or those of custom manufacturers like our company. New products, especially those that are supposed to be much different than the offerings of the competition, require ingenuity in design, production and final assembly. In most cases, that requires expenditures in intellect and development by the manufacturer and, quite often, investment in new assets (like machinery) and new personnel.

So, as you see, it’s capitalism - investment, assumption of risk, and the resultant technological and operational ingenuity - that’s driving growth in manufacturing and therefore our economy. As one business tries to do outdo the other, each one ends up putting money towards marketing, new assets and personnel, which requires manufacturers to do the same, which then increases final output for the client and the manufacturer and also has a measurable impact on the businesses that serve those market transactions (shippers, box and skid makers and materials and tool suppliers). The myriad workers impacted by that massive business cycle then have money to spend (and they do) and, as a result, economic activity presses forward.

Capitalism, the fervor to beat the competition and make your company and your life better, is a good thing – a great thing – and it’s what’s best for what ails our economy.

Education must have local control

From the 14 June 2010 Greater Niagara Newspapers

EDUCATION MUST HAVE LOCAL CONTROL
By Bob Confer

Imagine if we made a national policy whereby every college had to meet a set of guidelines that determined what their students should know upon graduation. Every college in the country would have to alter its educational model to ensure that that its output was consistent with that of all other institutions of higher learning and that their graduates should be able to pass a standardized testing system.

If we did something so utterly foolish we would destine our country for irreparable harm. What makes our university system so effective is the ability of each college to tailor its programs to the abilities of its professors, the availability of assets and the quality of its students, collectively and individually. That approach to education would be gone. The goals set by some bureaucratic agency would force a dumbing-down of our nation, with the universities that currently produce some of our brightest minds (like MIT, Harvard, and UB) turning out students whose qualifications are no different than those of what today rank among the lowest-quality colleges.

What’s so befuddling when pondering collegiate consistency is this: If it’s so stupid of an idea, then why do we apply it to public schools?

Our schools used to be as interesting and productive as our colleges. Educators were allowed to educate and had the freedom to do so as they, their school boards and their pupils’ parents saw fit. They were able to apply their knowledge of their specialty areas to methods of teaching that worked best with the students who lived in the school district. Because of that, for a good portion of the 20th Century America’s secondary schools dominated global rankings. Students were challenged to be the best they could be and they were.

But, things are different today. Our schools are lacking in freedom. The people who best know the subjects and students (the teachers), the people who have their finger on the pulse of the community (the school boards), and the people who understand what’s best for their kids (the parents) are all left out of the equation. They are restricted to the point of enslavement by a higher power. They must do as they are told and cannot do as they should. Elected officials and powerful agencies in state capitols and Washington, DC, dictate what must be taught and how it should be taught. Education has been standardized by individuals who truly don’t know the subjects or how to work with children.

This movement away from what works snowballed with the creation of the Department of Education in 1979 by the Carter Administration. Over the years, the DOE – with help from Congress - has become adventurous in its application of universalization (No Child Left Behind, for example), much of which is tied to the threat/reward of funding to the states and, therefore, the local districts. Due to greed and the misguided belief that the federal government can do wrong, the states have willingly jumped on the standardization bandwagon.

You see this in spades in New York where, in just the last decade, participation in Regents Exams (a system that is poor by design) went from being voluntary to compulsory. Historically, it was used as a means to separate the brightest students from the “average” students, supposedly nourishing their brains and setting the bar for their college careers. Thanks to the desegregation of the students based on abilities, along with teaching to the test (made weaker to accommodate lower performance), standardized curricula have led to standardized (read “sub-standard”) students.

All across the US, students are being forced to master tests and not subjects. Because of that approach, American students now rank 21st in science and 25th in math. It’s a huge step down from where we used to be. Actually, it’s an embarrassment.

Things will only get worse. Earlier this month, 48 states announced the development of the Common Core State Standards that they plan to institute in hopes of making a homogenous national education system. Many power-brokers are excited about this. But, if you really care about education and the future of America, you should get sick to your stomach over the CCST. It will only advance the ongoing erosion of our schools.

The best way – really the only way – to improve ours schools is to get back to local control: Let the teachers teach. Then, the students will learn.

The joy of owning a business

From the 07 June 2010 Greater Niagara Newspapers

THE JOY OF OWNING A BUSINESS
By Bob Confer

Owning a business comes with a lot of risk. Just a few of the things that keep entrepreneurs up at night are: Will we survive the Recession? Will I have to layoff anyone and if so who? What can we do to retain and attract new customers? How much debt should we carry? How much credit should we extend to our clients? How do we beat our competition?

Those questions are the tip of the iceberg. There are many more to be asked and most remain unanswered for incredible lengths of time, gnawing at your gut and prematurely graying your hair.

Many people who don’t have an ownership role know this and ask, “Why would someone ever want to own a company?”

Well, despite all of the stresses and stressors that come with the responsibility, I wouldn’t want to live my life any other way. There’s something to be said about the philosophical and emotional rewards that come with being an active participant in our great free-market system, something that is made possible and best achieved in this great country of ours. The joys are a plenty, but they can all be boiled down to the American Dream being played out before my eyes.

It was the Dream of my Grandfather to start his own company and I take pride in extending to future generations what he and my dad begat. A creative man who toiled in the labs and factories of a fledgling plastics industry in the 1950s and 1960s, Grandfather wanted to break the bounds of conformity and have the freedom to develop new technologies and applications. So, he literally bet the farm on his endeavor and he and my dad started the company in 1973. In the years since, their American Dream has been realized, the company providing a means to think and act creatively and freely, manufacturing goods while providing a living for 170 families.

It’s rewarding to see those coworkers achieve their own American Dreams. Many of them work hard and save wisely, affording them the chance to, depending on what stage they are at in the lives, savor their personal pursuits and interests, buy their cars and homes, raise a family, help put their kids through college and tend to their grandchildren. Working diligently, they live an old fashioned American life, reaping the benefits of their efforts while not having everything handed to them by the government. It’s an awesome feeling to know that we’re a productive bunch of workers who live comfortably while actually making things, a true rarity in today’s service-and-government-heavy economy.

And it’s those things that we make that further our client’s version of the American Dream. It’s such a great feeling to think that someone came to us with something that was no more than an idea that we transformed into an honest-to-goodness object, like kayaks being enjoyed by a vacationing family or docks being used by armed forces to protect waterways the world over. Everywhere you look there may be something we designed, molded, assembled, and shipped. There’s a serious “wow factor” that comes with that, just as there is with thinking about how that product helped our client achieve his Dream while he, too, is employing people and helping them to achieve theirs…just as we are to our suppliers and vendors who are realizing their Dreams, too.

Owning a business comes with its heartaches (emotional and even physical), that’s for sure. But, above all, it can be exciting, exhilarating and totally rewarding. You end most days knowing you and your team accomplished something special. Nothing this side of getting married and having kids is as fulfilling as making a go at it and experiencing those constant victories – both large and small – that come with working with others to make your products or deliver your services.

If running your own company is something that’s always crossed your mind, do it…you won’t regret it!

Gun rights should know no borders

From the 31 May 2010 Lockport Union Sun and Journal (Lockport, NY)

GUN RIGHTS SHOULD KNOW NO BORDERS
By Bob Confer

Last year the U.S. Senate voted to defeat a promising gun rights provision. Introduced by Senator John Thune, it would have granted national reciprocity for concealed-carry permits, requiring all states that allow concealed firearms to honor those permits of other states. A majority of the senators — 58 in total — voted in favor of the amendment. Another 39 did not and the bill saw defeat as this tally put the measure 2 votes short of the 60 required for passage by Senate rules.

The 39 "no" votes got a lot of help from an organization called the Mayors Against Illegal Guns Coalition, which, prior to the vote, claimed, "…(recognizing concealed-carry permits) would threaten the safety of our police officers, by making it far more difficult for them to separate law-abiding gun owners from common criminals."

That statement, in one form or another, is a misguided talking point commonly used by gun-control advocates. They fail to see that it recognizes only a distinct minority of our population (the police) who are granted special privilege to carry guns while the average citizen cannot. That selectivity begs the question: why should their safety be any more important than that of every one of us; shouldn’t the average citizen also be empowered to deal with the common criminal in issues of self-defense? Unfortunately, in many states, we are not. Taking away our guns has, ironically, granted a special privilege to lawbreakers as well. The predators have the distinct advantage of being armed while their prey is not.

Granting pistol-permit reciprocity could easily be deemed a necessity because, unfortunately, evil can be found everywhere in our country, and we are a very mobile people who, not of our own deliberate doing, have the potential to find ourselves in some unpleasant situations during our travels for business or pleasure. Typically, the vacationer, the truck driver, and the businessman are all unfamiliar with the far-flung cities to which they travel. One wrong turn or innocent stroll into a crime-ridden locale could easily put them into harm’s way. Under such circumstances, Thune’s amendment would have given these travelers much-needed peace of mind while enhancing their ability to exercise their natural right to self-defense.

Our Founding Fathers, even back in the 1700s, knew that tempering of this right could occur, so they added the Bill of Rights to the Constitution, ensuring that the loss of certain rights would never occur. Among them was the Second Amendment, which says: "The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

Some of the senators who voted against the Thune’s concept said it broke another amendment, the Tenth, which noted that powers not delegated to the United States belong to the states themselves. It was quite the turning of tables, because those who evoked the Tenth Amendment in this case are typically the officials who defy it through the unabated expansion of the federal government.

While mentioning the Tenth Amendment, the anti-gun crowd failed to look further into the Constitution. In application, the Fourteenth Amendment has required that the states recognize the Bill of Rights within their realm of governance, meaning that the Thune Amendment would have had legs because it negates the overbearing rule of any state that has a concealed-carry permitting process because such a process infringes on one’s Second Amendment rights.

Despite the Fourteenth Amendment's passage in 1868, the Second Amendment has yet to be incorporated into the Fourteenth because the Supreme Court has declined to hear any cases that would do so. The Thune Amendment’s passage would have finally forced the court’s hand in this matter and, based on past rulings, the right to carry would have to be recognized as a universal right.

Unfortunately, it never got far enough to be tested. But, what happened with the vote does give those who believe in the right to protect themselves and their families some hope for the future. A bill that was so close to fruition (2 votes short) deserves another look next year after the House and Senate are cleaned out this November. That said, gun rights activists need to keep national reciprocity on their radar and push hard for its passage. Only then will we be able to claim the right to freely — and safely — move about the United States of America.

The reality of Obama's WNY visit

From the 24 May 2010 Greater Niagara Newspapers

THE REALITY OF OBAMA’S WNY VISIT
By Bob Confer

Like a majority of Western New Yorkers, I listened intently to President Obama’s visit as it was broadcast on the local media outlets. Being a small business owner, I was very interested in what he had to say about the private sector since it appeared to be the sole reason for his trip (well, besides throwing a bone to Senator Gillibrand and giving her some much-needed name recognition by accepting her invitation). I thought the speech might have turned into one of those few times when I actually agree with him.

But, alas, I was let down.

Unlike most star-struck locals I was able to digest the content of his speech and look past the highly-publicized hysteria over the crass “hottie” comment and his choice of Duff’s chicken wings. Only in WNY could the President’s lunch be the lead-in to news coverage. And, people wonder why our local economy has been a mess for decades: When it comes to government we focus on unimportant inanity.

It was about half-way through Obama’s monologue that I was thinking the tide might be turning. He said something that I’ve been saying for years: “…government is not the true engine of job creation and economic growth in this country. Businesses are. Especially small businesses...” He followed that up by saying, “Government can’t guarantee a company’s success, but it can knock down the barriers that prevent small business owners…” It was there that he inserted one of his patented pauses. For that second I was getting excited, thinking he might finish the sentence with, “...from growing their businesses”, followed by a focus on taking down those government-made barriers that business owners find so oppressive (high taxes, over-regulation, etc.). But, instead, he burst my bubble and ended his thought with “…from getting loans or investing in the future.” He proceeded to speak at length about the importance of federally-guaranteed SBA loans in helping companies manage their inventory, pay workers or expand their facilities.

Many would find fault in that emphasis, rightly assuming that the role of financing the private sector is solely the responsibility of the private sector. The federal government should not be in the business of helping to extend loans to new and growing businesses and having the taxpayers assume their risk. It’s up to banks to do that alone.

His speech might have been meaningful in California or Nevada where many banks folded due to the collapse of the housing markets in those states, thus creating some lending fear and causing more businesses to lean on the SBA. But, it was extremely odd (if not incredibly poor planning by his staff) to push his government loan message in WNY. Buffalo-Niagara is the cradle of M&T and First Niagara Banks, two lenders that weathered the recession like no other. First Niagara has been expanding like it’s going out of style and M&T has been a very strong performer, one that was literally forced by the feds to take TARP funds. With solid, major players like that in the Buffalo market the SBA message isn’t so important.

The speech made evident that Obama’s brand of economic theory has some holes in it. He went on and on about the importance of capital being available to businesses and that its easy access would allow the economy to flourish. That’s not the case. Sure, money helps, but having all the money in the world available for borrowing is no good if the entrepreneur has no reason to borrow it and/or no ability to pay it back. He or she will only borrow money if it is known that the economy is active enough to induce existing and potential customers to spend their income – or credit - on the products or services of the company in question. Based on what’s been happening in the local/national/global economies since the close of 2007 the consumer demand just isn’t there, whether the consumer is an individual or a business. Businesses aren’t being prevented from borrowing. They just haven’t had the need to do so. That’s something that my banker has said time and again since the Great Recession began. He’s said his bank has the money and nobody wants it.

Supply and demand (Economics 101) is something that Obama needs to understand and obviously doesn’t based on the message of this speech and others. If he actually walked the walk and dedicated his agenda to his thought that businesses are the engine of job creation he would trim our government and not expand it every chance he gets. Then and only then can our economy grow.

Uncle Sam: Drug Lord

From the 17 May 2010 Greater Niagara Newspapers

UNCLE SAM: DRUG LORD
By Bob Confer

Many people were shocked when last week it was announced that US Army personnel have enrolled in substance abuse counseling for the use of opiates at record rates. This family of drugs, which includes morphine and heroin, has caused the number of counseled personnel to rise from 89 in 2004 to 529 in 2009.

According to the US Army the rise in counseling may be attributable to painkillers related to previous deployments or maybe even increased admission of abuse. Both claims are implausible, especially the latter, as it’s foolish to believe that in 5 years soldiers have become nearly 500 percent more likely to report an addiction to just one type of drug.

The truth of the matter is the Army spin doctors won’t tell us that use/abuse is up because of where the soldiers are and what they are being directed to do.

The spike in counseling coincides with the threefold increase in the number of personnel deployed to Afghanistan. It just so happens that Afghanistan is the world’s Garden of Eden for opium. In 2007, over 93 percent of all cultivated opiates originated in Afghanistan. A quarter of all farmland in the Helmand province alone is dedicated to opium poppies and the trade – controlled by the Taliban - supports 1.4 million households in Afghanistan. By Afghan standards the financial yield per acre is impressive: An opium farmer can earn $500 to $1,500 per acre and that’s after he has paid back his seed loan to the Taliban and paid the Taliban a 10 percent cut of his profits. If he were to grow wheat (which requires more work and more water unlike the drought-resistant poppy) his earnings would be about $320 per acre.

In their occupation of Afghanistan our forces have taken a hands-off approach to the opium farms. Whereas they would destroy them in the Western Hemisphere, they leave them alone in the East. The catch-phrase in the military is that they “tolerate” opium production. They say they do so because it’s the main livelihood for a majority of the Afghan farmers and were they to take away their cash crop and force them to take down their standard of living a few notches the Afghans would rebel and turn on all attempts to free (read “Westernize”) their society. Things are so out of whack that our soldiers have even been directed to guard numerous poppy fields with their lives. They are, in essence, fighting to keep heroin flowing to the United States or, as the statistics show, into their veins. These are things that our young soldiers definitely didn’t sign-up to do. To many of them, the guarding of the plants is morally and/or logically reprehensible. But, they must do as they are told.

This protection of the poppies proves that if anyone needs counseling it’s Uncle Sam as he seems to be suffering not from drug problems but rather from schizophrenia. On one hand, while abroad, our government enables and empowers the growth and distribution of opiates from the world’s Number One source. And then back home, it turns on its own people and incarcerates recreational drug users in droves, people who use the very drugs that were grown before our soldier’s eyes.

What could account for this hypocrisy, this dedicated effort to play both side of the fence in regard to the drug trade? It’s definitely not national security. Are overseas terror regimes so dangerous to Americans that we’re better off by sacrificing our citizens through a drug war that arrests 1.9 million of them per year? No. It’s probably money driving this whole thing. It’s blatantly obvious someone is profiting from this two-sided affair, and it’s not the American taxpayers who are funding the wars on terror and drugs. It’s the opium farmers and traders in Afghanistan who export $64 billion of the substance every year. It’s our own government (and the industrial complex and contractors that feed it) which spends an average of $34.9 billion per year on the Afghan occupation. It’s our federal and state governments who combined blow $50 billion annually on the drug war.

You can’t help but look at this mess through the eyes of a conspiracy theorist because it just doesn’t add up. By doing what it’s doing in the Middle East and in Middle America, the federal government is both drug lord and drug buster, fashioning a self-perpetuating war on drugs.

MINIMIZING DISSENT

From the 10 May 2010 Greater Niagara Newspapers

MINIMIZING DISSENT
By Bob Confer

Michael Bloomberg may be a billionaire and the mayor of New York City, but that doesn’t mean he can’t say some stupid things. In an interview held last week with Katie Couric of CBS News he speculated on the make-up of the mastermind behind the attempted car bombing of Times Square. Despite his city once being horrifically attacked by Islamic extremists, he said the car bomber was "homegrown, maybe a mentally deranged person or someone with a political agenda that doesn't like the health care bill or something." It was announced within minutes of the close of that news broadcast that the perpetrator was nothing of the sort. The suspect is Faisal Shahzad, a Muslim who was born in and was heading back to Pakistan.

To confidently assume that the bomber was a government critic – a Tea Party type of person - shows what Bloomberg and countless other elected officials think about the American citizenry. In their eyes, those who are critical of the government are deranged (and therefore can’t be taken seriously) and/or one step away from inflicting violence upon their fellow citizens and their government. Many politicians are guilty of thinking this way, from town halls to state houses to the White House.

Our past two presidents perfectly exemplify this rapidly growing disrespect that our government has for those critical of it. The role of the presidency is supposed to be something above such politicking and posturing, but, alas, Bush and Obama have made it acceptable to throw barbs at dissenters and viciously label them as anti-American and anti-human. Bush played that card ad naseum, he and his cronies painting those against the Patriot Act and other similar atrocities as classless individualists who value the trivialness of self over the supposed well-being of everyone else. Obama has followed suit, saying the same about those who are against bailouts, health care, and climate legislation.

The mainstream media, specifically at the national level, helps push this whole thing along. Katie Couric of course had nothing to say in response to Bloomberg’s outlandish comment. Anyone worth their salt as a reporter would have asked him to expound on it or broach the greater possibility of the suspect being a Muslim. She and her ilk also give Obama a free pass with his constant derision of naysayers and folks of the Right mindset (half the US population mind you) by at once fawning over his agenda and his methods. Also, the press is somehow influenced into splitting its priorities: They spew relentless negative coverage of peaceful Tea Party demonstrations yet haven’t touched the countless illegal immigrant protests that are a real threat to America, full of known lawbreakers who actually threaten – and commit - violence against our country and its legal citizens.

Tactics such as these have been used by the ruling class for as long as we’ve been a nation, though not in the volume and relentlessness that it is today. What accounts for this ever-growing purposeful silencing by minimization? It’s definitely because the government feels more threatened than ever before. In just the past ten years the Internet has made it extremely easy for people across the nation to connect with and educate one another on the goings-on in their communities and in Washington. And, not only is our electorate now more educated, but they’re a lot angrier, too. Just look at what’s fed their rage since the turn of the century: Domestic spying, 2 wars, inflation, higher energy costs, clean energy fiascos, a debilitating recession, trillions in giveaways to Wall Street, a public sector that won’t make sacrifices, new and higher taxes, and much more.

We have just cause to be mad and we have the right to do something about it. So, if you are a dissenter – which I hope you are - don’t be discouraged by those in power who look to silence you. Keep yourself informed on the issues. Keep complaining. Keep introducing new ideas. Above all, keep up the fight...somebody has to.