Also, I don’t get your line about communist counties having a better economy than us. Which countries? China? All of those shots of Hong Kong and Shanghai, with their big skyscrapers and fancy cars, is a small percentage of the country. Most lower class Americans would be middle class in China. America’s per capita GDP PPP is 45,725, 6th in the world according to the IMF. China? 5,325, 100th in the world. Yeah, they’re the gold standard…and I’m better at hockey than Ovechkin.

For someone who likes to say people are “out of touch,” I’m surprised at some of the things on the list.

Here’s one completely out of the box idea for your friend in the new admin:

Stop spending our money.

I know it’s radical isn’t it. I mean who would’ve thought that if you don’t have the money don’t spend it huh?

Who would’ve thought that if federal spending went up over $1 trillion dollars in the last 8 years that spending more money like the new administration is going to do (probably 1 to 2 trillion dollars in ONE year) is going to do anything different but prove an incontrovertible fact:

Government does not create wealth – it only shuffles money around.

Unfortunately, the new administration in all their educated brilliance doesn’t have the brain power to grasp this concept.

Oh well I guess more of the same for the next 4 years.

—— will continue this when I get off the bus.

2. I agree with Steve on the workday, for the most part. 4 ten-hour days would greatly reduce the amount of driving, fuel, road use etc. In addition, parents have more time to spend with their children.

3. Rather then denying the elderly healthcare, we should eliminate government sponsored abortion clinics. Our nation needs our population to grow. Throughout history, a large percentage of pregnancies were unplanned. Part of the population deficiency is that abortion eliminates these children from our system.

4. Cater to math, science and foreign language at a young age. Put advanced students in advanced classes to eliminate boredom and make better use of their time.

8. should have read:
Hint, rehashing history isn’t thinking out of the box. No, we don’t need more people in this country. Automate the difference (to make up for less workers), it’s going to happen anyway.

Again while I could have spent more time in other sections I really just want to reverse less to more.

Force them to pay us? Ask them to pay us maybe…

I see some guy getting beat up on the street, hey, I’ll help you if you give me $5, otherwise forget it.

Whether you agree with the war or not, you don’t ask the people you are liberating/invading to foot the bill. It might sound good on paper (as many of these do), but your customer service is horrible and rightly so.

As for out-of-the-box thinking, I like Rep. Louie Gohmert’s (R-Texas) idea to cut taxes for 2 months (individual and corporate). Be a lot better than just giving them money (bailout). Of course everyone will say it’s just a tax cut for the rich…well, yeah, they (you) pay ‘em.

#6
Goes with a few others, like cutting off old people from Medicare. Retirement at 70. Real out-of-the-box thinking would be to treat the symptom…Social Security. Get rid of it. Personal bank accounts. How about Galveston, TX: http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba/ba514/

Less Technology for the Military, what?

I understand the point about making it more difficult for those in power to decide to go to war, but again, you’re treating the symptom. Those that decide will still decide to go regardless of the technology. Only thing that would hurt are the seamen, soldiers and marines.

I like thinking out-of-the-box, but I think you can come up with much better ideas.

With Much Respect,
chet

#2 is misguided, to me. On Thanksgiving, my mother, who has worked in healthcare for her entire 40+ year career, was telling us that it cost nearly $8K for my stepfather’s recent 2-hr stress test. She only found out when they got the bill from their insurance co for the balance and subsequently learned that Medicare paid 80% of this outlandish bill. Where is the oversight here? This is where we need focus our energies. Not on some random cut-off of benefits–which is frankly inhumane–but on having oversight committees to efficiently and effectively scrutinize and overhaul current Medicare practices along with wasteful, illogical and harmful practices of all the rest of our dysfunctional healthcare system.

To #9, I would also add the farming/agriculture industry. We’re finally coming around to understanding that just because you can buy apples cheaper from China, doesn’t mean that the ultimate cost of doing so isn’t higher for us in the end, once you add fuel and the price of putting our farmers out of business (not to mention good taste!). I’m not a big believer in subsidies, but we must, as a nation, support those who study and learn agriculture and develop new technology that enables us to grow better and more efficiently. We need to produce more that other countries want to buy, and we mustn’t make it impossible for small farmers to coexist along with the big ones.