Cash for Clunkers; Part Deux

I recently heard that the US Postal Service is offering a $15,000 incentive to Postal Workers to get them to leave the service. It's like the "Cash for Clunkers" campaign, where the Service would get rid of the highest paid tier of workers, those that have been there for quite a while, and are near retirement age A $15K boot out the door would be a good thing for many of the dedicated skilled employees, but it should be based on performance, nothing else. Reward the people who have been breaking their backs to move America's mail! It's the least the Postal Service could do to thank the dwindling workforce of clerks who really care about doing a good job.

And that brings me to the "clunkers" part. Over the years, the Postal Service has been hiring more and more people who do as little as possible. They take no pride in their work, because the dedicated employees have to do it for them. There are no workplace rules, nor time studies in place to stop these people from clocking in, and hiding the rest of the day. Supervision has their hands full with the task of data entry, filling in countless forms, reports, and other useless drivel. They seldom look away from the computer screen. This opens the door for goofing off! Imagine employees that swipe in at the beginning of the day, and walk back out the door to go to work at another job! It happens in the larger facilities!

In my former office, we had a man who came from another office to fill a vacant position. This position involved being stationed in a remote mailing plant, with no supervision. While the Postmaster was trusting the man to do his job, the employee was out fishing for the better part of the day, and only came back when he was paged by the employees of the plant! This went on for months, and he was finally replaced by another man who did much the same thing. Instead of fishing, he would work in his sister's store, or sell real estate!

The list goes on, and this was only one office out of the whole system! Why would we reward people who refuse to work? And why isn't there supervision to weed out the useless people and process them out of the service?

Seeing these "clunkers" get rewarded for their non-service just shows what a real mess the Postal Service is in!

Pay(n) in the Butt!

There's an old saying that there are only two things in life that you can't change, death and taxes. From the moment we get a few coins in our little hands, there has been some form of government wanting to take a share, be it local, county, state, or federal. We were brought up believing that it's a citizen's duty to pay taxes in order to keep the country running (and spending). It seem that there is a tax on nearly everything that affects one's life, from food taxes, to utility taxes, and on and on.The political mindset is that you never think about the tax when you see the price on the shelf. Only when you get the final bill does it appear, making the cost of your purchase higher. Then it's too late , and you resign yourself to pay it.



What got me thinking about this occurred on one of my many trips to fix my computer a few weeks back. I pulled up the the little strip mall shop where I bought it, and had to park in front of the convenience store next door. There in the window was a sign advertising cigarettes for $49.99 per carton. Since I quit smoking years ago, I hadn't kept up with the costs, but I remember that the unbelievable sum of $5\carton is one thing that drove us to quit back then!

They say the high taxes on cigarettes are meant to be a deterrent to smoking. If you don't like the tax, then quit. This means that the tax is strictly meant as a punishment! It's unthinkable that taxes are used to take money away for no other reason than to punish someone!



Not a smoker? Then how about the tax on soft drinks that San Francisco want's to implement (or already has in place)? If memory serves me correctly, it's something like 35%! All this to force people to stop drinking sweetened sodas. What on earth does this have to do with anything? I can understand that a tobacco tax might apply because of health concerns due to second hand smoke, but soda pop?



Worse yet, there's a number of nutjobs in Washington who want an extra gas tax, in order to punish us for driving older, less fuell efficient vehicles. Many people live paycheck to paycheck in this country, and to screw them with higher gas prices is just plain wrong. The price of automobiles has left many people no other alternative but to continue to drive older cars and trucks. Many new cars cost more than a full year's salary, so if a person has a car that runs, and is paid for, why should they be punished?



The list goes on and on, from utility taxes, personal property taxes, (punishment for having stuff!) and food taxes (you eat, therefore we tax!). It takes a huge bite out of a person's income. What amazes me is that the Washington elite have no idea how much strain these little swipes at our income put on the family budget. If they don't like a product we consume, is that really any of their business?

It's time to leave the consumer alone, and have at least a few things that we enjoy!


Life's too short, and in the end, when we die, it seems that there's taxes on that too!

Tune in, Turn on, and Drop Out!

Ha! I've finally gotten a computer that's co-operating with me....at least for a while, anyway.


Right now, I'm still stewing over the fuss about the President speaking to the school children today. Some nutcases are calling this speech "an attempt to advance a political agenda". What, encouraging someone to get an education is a bad thing? All of this is being fed by the Right Wing media, the same ones that claimed the President "is a Muslum", or "he's a socialist".
This malarky is being devoured by simple minded people, who treat it as the gospel truth. These same people never question what they hear, they only obey. That's the scary thing here. Nazi Germany was ruled by fear. Any one different was singled out, there were no other opinions allowed, and anyone who spoke against the party, was punished. Sound familiar?
This is the same thing going on right now! Make the people fearful, so they only follow you, and what you say. Any other opinions, of facts for that matter are "lies". It's a scary thing that's happening, an intense effort to poison the minds of people.

Take for example the "Tea Partys" that have taken place lately. All the blame for our current woes is heaped at the President's feet. Why? He didn't get us into this mess. Where were these asshats during the past 8 years, when all the spending, lying, and torturing were going on? Once again, it's just a thinly veiled attempt to frighten people into believing that our current President is some sort of "Socialist Monster" that wants to enslave us!

It's time for some clear thinking here in America, and stop the wingnuts from bullshitting the news, instead of truthfully reporting it

Hell, if I ran the country, Fox News would be off the air! And, any parent that kept their child home today because of what they heard , would have those children taken away and deprogrammed!

To quote the late Frank Zappa: "If your kids knew how really lame you were, they'd murder you in your sleep". A little harsh, perhaps, but it sums it all up!

Farewell, Dell!

My old Dell computer is facing it's final voyage. She's been a good old girl, and has served loyally for the past couple of years. However, the fact that she had a compact platform, with no case fan, and only the power supply for ventilation, has done her in. Alas, she's making that last walk through the "Silicone Valley of Death".
I guess that's the reason for this rant. Back in the day, computers pretty much followed a standard principle. If you ain't IBM, then copy them, and call yourself an "IBM Clone". It worked for a number of years, with nearly all computers performing to the same standard.

Commodore, on the other hand, was the "People's Car" of the computer age.
We had numerous Commodore PC's, and they all used the same software, and produced the same results. There were no upgrades to the processors, and no real OS. In those days, you had to learn at least Basic programming language to make the computer do what you wanted it to do. For those of us with these computers, it was an experience that few people today understand. To have the ability to program your own computer was considered just short of witchcraft by some. Mind you, this was Basic language, but the what you could do with it made you cooler than most. Better yet, they boasted a whopping 64K of ram!!

Fast forward 10 years, and the "PC Clones" were now real players. The Commodores were left in the dust; the new machines running a new OS called Windows 3.1. We bought a Packard Bell computer back then with an unheard of 20 Megabyte hard drive! The salesman told us that "there's no way you'll ever fill this thing up!" Of course, it was quickly outdated, and we had to get faster, and faster units to keep up with the software available. Windows as well, kept producing newer and newer versions of it's operating system, forcing us to keep up.

I guess that time marches on, but why not just write software for the masses again? Why do we have to buy a new computer every time something new comes out, as our old one won't run it?

Old Dell ran Windows XP, and I checked to see if she'd run Vista, but it was a no-go. She was too old and slow to keep up in the new environment. I did as many upgrades as I could, but, alas, she didn't want to play anymore. I replaced her with a Systemax "White Box" system, from 19?? It's faster than the old girl, but the video card is "stone age". Once again, I'm in upgrade mode!

And so, I have to ask, when will the computer industry slow down, and let us catch up? Old Dell is tired, and she's a hell of a lot younger than I am!

A final postscript...the Systemax has also died, replaced by another white box computer!

Hemp for Victory!

I wasn't surprised when yet another plot of marijuana was found over in Marion County. The debate over this leafy hero, or demon, has raged for years.
While we hear of all the reasons it's bad, from being called a "gateway" drug, to dire warnings about health risks, we forget that hemp has been around for centuries, and our government urged people to grow it during WWII !

Hemp was used for making rope, canvas for sails, and even clothing for many years. Henry Ford used it to help make (and fuel) cars. It's a renewable resource that can be used to make hemp oil, which can power diesel engines, or make ethanol to blend with gasoline.
Hemp oil is biodegradable, and does not produce sulfur dioxide when burned. A group of people even converted a car to run on hemp oil, and drove it cross-country. It sure doesn't sound like the demon weed it's purported to be!

In the wake of these hard economic times, growing hemp would be a boon to farmers struggling to keep family farms going. It can be grown from border to border, with little or no attention, and can be used for many products that now rely on dwindling supplies of petrochemicals. With all these things going for it, why does the government at all levels, try to eradicate it? In my opinion, this could well be the goose that laid the golden egg! We now need to promote it, not destroy it.

And going back to the local pot bust, and the economy of late; what's wrong with growing it in order to make money? Jobs are drying up, people are falling behind on their mortgages, and other bills, and the outlook is getting bleaker. Perhaps this little patch was just to help someone survive for a little while longer. It's no different than the stills that popped up here during prohibition. It's American ingenuity at it's best! Just because the Government can't regulate it doesn't make it bad.

At the beginning of this article, I mentioned that our government urged people to grow pot? They even produced a short newsreel promoting it! Click the following link and see for yourself: http://www.boingboing.net/2009/04/04/hemp-for-victory-194.html

Whoever planted that patch in Marion County wasn't a criminal, they are a true patriot! Hemp for victory!

Pay more, and get less!

Ever notice that what be buy nowadays isn't like it used to be? We've all seen the cost of living go up steadily over the years. From apples to automobiles, prices have climbed, in some cases, beyond what the average person can afford. I guess this is progress, but now that we're living on a fixed income, it's time for some serious discussion of the subject.

What started this whole train of thought was an estate sale we did last December. The sale was held in a condo in a neighboring town, which in itself, is not unusual. What was amazing, is that the condo had been sealed up since the early 1980's, with everything left as if the people would be back in a moment or so. There were no perishables in the house, but everything else provided a trip intro the past.
The couple that had owned the home, had several others, so this was like a vacation getaway for them. They bought things at the local stores, and in many cases, never even took them out of the boxes. I was amazed at how much prices had gone up on many items!
For example, a roll of Aluminum Foil is a pretty basic thing to find around a home. However, a 1970's roll of the "heavy duty" stuff is at least three times as thick as the current offerings. The price was also 80 cents less than the same item\brand today. Do we get what we pay for? I think not.

However, what really got me to thinking, was literally nothing to sneeze at! It was a few boxes of Puffs tissues. They were the "designer" ones that you see in the stores in the little square boxes. They had been sitting in the bottom of a closet since the 1970's, and smelled of mothballs (as did the whole condo).
The tissues in the still unopened boxes were priced at 85 cents for a box of 100 ct. Fast forward to today, where the same box of Puffs contains 72 tissues, and costs $1.30 or more. Living here in the Ozarks, I've discovered a truckload of allergies I never knew I had. I go through at least a box of Kleenex a week.

And that's the point of this whole tirade. We have been loyally buying products over the years, and paying more and more over time, while getting less and less.
Wages in America have not gone up as fast as the cost of living, and we're slowly finding ourselves unable to buy the things we used to. While it may seem unimportant that the cost of Kleenex has gone up, think about the cost of an automobile, and the gas it takes to run it. That's at the far end of the consumer spectrum. We ourselves, can no longer afford a new car, and can barely afford the cost of gas and repairs for our old one.
Consumers have been getting a bad deal, and it's showing no signs of letting up any time soon.

Thanks a lot, corporate America!

Farewell, Billy!

Billy Mays died today.

For many, it's not a big deal, but for some of us, it marks yet another TV pitchman silenced. No, he didn't have the following that Farah had, in fact he was rather annoying. He didn't live as decadently as Michael did, but he was everywhere on our televisions.

Growing up in a small town South of Chicago in the 1950's, I came to enjoy the shrill pitchmen that graced local television. Sounds odd, but the fact that they were always there, and a bit comical to boot, was quite entertaining. Nearly every part of the country had there own "salesmen", pitching local products and businesses.

In the local Chicago market in those days, we were bombarded by the Bert Weiman commercials, featuring Lyn Burton. We learned that Bert was our TV Ford man, located at 3535.... NORTH;.... on Ashland Avenue. Every Saturday, he'd shill for Bert, in a dramatic voice, urging us to buy a new, or used car. Of course, we always got to see just one side of the car he was promoting, and had to assume the other side was there! Then there was Larry Goodman, for Goodman's Community Discount stores. The closest one to us at the time was up in Harvey Illinois, and when I got older, I had to go see one for myself. It was a total PIT, with things just thrown about by the shoppers. And who could forget Bushelle carpet cleaning (and I know I spelled it wrong) at HUDSON 3-TWO-SEVEN-HUNDRED! Or C.E.T. for television, at "Mowhawk 4-4100 Call for a free home demonstration" which featured a "Native American" and a pounding tom-tom beat, where they sold TV's using the unique "quarter meter bank" You put in a quarter to watch TV, and eventually paid for it.

Later, the ads got more savvy, such as the Long Chevrolet ads, featuring a young kid dressed as an old time paperboy named Timmy. He'd shriek "Extra. Extra, Read all About it!", and you wanted to just choke him! Of course, the pitchman that endured the longest was the "Empire Man" hawking Empire carpets at 588-2300; EMPIRE! I'll admit, we even succumbed to his pitch, and had Empire install a carpet in our old house.

TV pitchmen (and women) are an integral part of the viewing experience, whether we like it or not. They live on, no matter where you move to.
When we arrived in the Ozarks, we immediately discovered Stephanie, who hawks furniture for Furniture Factory Outlet, or a huge horse puppet who sells carpets for The Carpet Barn. Better yet, an (at least) million year old Robert Vaughn, "The Man From Uncle", shills for a local lawyer's office, urging us to "Call on the hurt line.......Right now!"
It's as much a part of Americana as anything out there. Love them, or hate them, they're with us 'til we turn the TV off.

So rest in peace, Billy, and I'm picking up some Oxi-Clean tomorrow when I go to town!