Author: mstrmac711

Retired Naval Officer, Submariner, Lean Systems Consultant, Master Trainer, Master Story Teller, Writer

All Posts by mstrmac711

City of Brotherly Love 6

American History, Declaration of Independence, Freedom • Tags: , ,

This is the 300th blog for theleansubmariner.

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Philadelphia has a special place in my heart and in my family’s history.

It was on her shores that many of my forefathers first arrived in America and in her neighborhoods where our story began in this land of the free. The city has many nicknames. Besides the City of Brotherly Love, it is known as the Cradle of Liberty, Quaker City and the City of Neighborhoods. There are many wonderful sights to see there including Independence Hall, the National Constitution Center, the Liberty Bell, the Franklin Institute and countless memorials to the Spirit of American independence and freedom.

Philly is a big city

It is the fifth largest city in the United States now with a very diverse population of over 1,517,000 people. Caucasians make up about 39 % of the population, Blacks 44 % Hispanics about 12.5 % and the rest is a jumble of everything else on the planet. From Wikipedia:

The largest concentrations of native-born blacks are in Germantown, the central, northern, and western neighborhoods of North Philadelphia, the Point Breeze neighborhood of South Philadelphia, parts of Southwest Philadelphia, and most of West Philadelphia. Together these neighborhoods have a population of about 610,000 and are roughly 82% black; making it the fourth largest predominantly black area in the United States after Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, Detroit, and South Side Chicago.

While Philly is still predominantly listed as a Christian dominant area due to the high number of Catholics, it also has one of the highest populations of Jews. The Muslim African American community in Philadelphia has grown with great strength over the last decade. According to several statistics, Philadelphia has surpassed Detroit and New York City to become the American metropolitan area with the highest proportion of Muslims. This is as much due to an influx of immigrants from the Horn of Africa as it is to the more American movement of Islam in Black communities.

One of the key measures of a populated are is something called population density.

As far as the density of population in Philadelphia is concerned, it is a thickly populated city with 11,233.6 people inhabiting per square mile, as per the 2000 census data. A comparison is Lancaster PA with a population density of 8000 per square mile. To be fair, New York City has a density of over 27,000 per square mile but the statistics from Philly include many areas that are neighborhoods in a truer sense of the word.

The Major Industries in Philadelphia are all service related. They are:

  • CITY OF PHILADELPHIA (Public Administration)
  • SCHOOL DIST OF PHILADELPHIA (Educational Services)
  • TRUSTEES OF THE UNIVERSITY OF PA (Educational Services)
  • THE CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL OF PHILA (Health Care and Social Assistance)
  • THOMAS JEFFERSON UNIVERSITY HOSP (Health Care and Social Assistance)
  • SOUTHEASTERN PA TRANSPORTATION AUTH (Transportation and Warehousing)
  • TEMPLE UNIVERSITY Educational Services
  • US AIRWAYS INC Transportation and Warehousing
  • TEMPLE UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL INC Health Care and Social Assistance
  • ALBERT EINSTEIN MEDICAL CENTER Health Care and Social Assistance

According to the most recent statistics, Philadelphia has an astoundingly low number of manufacturing jobs. From Philly.com:

At a postwar height in 1953, 359,000 Philadelphians were employed in manufacture, 45 percent of the city’s labor force; in our own times, the number of industrial jobs has dramatically fallen to below 30,000, 5 percent of the total. These figures reflect the greater deindustrialization of the United States, though the downward spiral for Philadelphia far exceeded the nation as a whole.

The massive General Electric Switchgear Plant at 69th Street and Elmwood Avenue used to be a two-square-block building that employed more than 7,500 workers in its heyday. But downsizing hit both the workforce and the building.

Today’s GE building is about a third smaller and fewer than 500 men and women work there.

A population of 1,517,000 people and less than 30,000 of them make something. Interesting.

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Where do all those people get their electricity?

PECO is the primary supplier of electricity for the city and county of Philadelphia. PECO is an Exelon company with a major face in Pennsylvania. The major sources of fuel that keep the city’s lights burning comes from a network that is still heavily dependent on coal. Forty eight percent of the energy in Pennsylvania is from coal, 35.1 % from nuclear energy and 13.4% natural gas. Despite recent attempts to use solar as a source, no statistically significant amount of energy is produced to power the televisions, X-box games, lights and other household needs.

http://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/state-regs/pdf/Pennsylvania.pdf

With very little fanfare in October of 2012, PECO was allowed to raise the rates for residential customers. Reason? People on the grid are not paying their electric bills and the utility is not allowed to cut them off. With the expected increases in the cost of energy related to the closing of coal fired plants, it should be no surprise to anyone that prices will continue to go even higher.

I wonder if anyone who lives in the Philadelphia neighborhoods realize what the main source of their energy actually is?
I wonder what their reaction will be when they find out that coal has been declared an enemy of the state?

 

From Wikipedia: Crime

Like many American cities, Philadelphia saw a gradual yet pronounced rise in crime in the years following World War II. There were 525 murders in 1990, a rate of 31.5 per 100,000. There were an average of about 600 murders a year for most of the 1990s. The murder count dropped in 2002 to 288, then rose four years later to 406 in 2006 and 392 in 2007.[102] In 2006, Philadelphia’s homicide rate of 27.7 per 100,000 people was the highest of the country’s 10 most populous cities.[103]

In 2004, there were 7,513.5 crimes per 200,000 people in Philadelphia.[104] In 2005, Philadelphia was ranked by Morgan Quitno as the sixth-most dangerous among 32 American cities with populations over 500,000.[105] Among its neighboring Mid-Atlantic cities in the same population group, Baltimore and Washington, D.C. were ranked second- and third-most dangerous cities in the United States, respectively.[106] Camden, New Jersey, a city across the Delaware River from Philadelphia, was ranked as the most dangerous city in the United States.[106]

In 2008, Camden was the second-most dangerous city in the country, lower than its 2004 ranking, but still high for a city its size, while Philadelphia as ranked 22nd.

Hey, you have to have something to be known for right?

You would think that with all those people, there would be a giant farm nearby to provide them with food. Of course you would be wrong. Food, like everything else the people of Philadelphia need must be grown and trucked in. Unfortunately, that requires trucks they don’t make, fuel they don’t have on roads they don’t pay for.

As time goes by, the city that once brought freedom and liberty to the world will slowly become even more dependent on others for everything they do. When the infrastructure crumbles, they will be the most dependent of all. One only has to look at the neighborhoods of New York that are still struggling with the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy to see what the future holds.

If America does not change, we will all become Philadelphia. Unable to feed ourselves, unable to provide for our own resources, no longer capable of making anything anyone will buy from us, and totally dependent on a government that only harvests our votes.

There is no future in that kind of life.

Mister Mac

Quick Update: Dateline November 16th 2012.

Courier-Post [Cherry Hill, NJ]

“Camden — The city set a grim record today, with its 59th homicide
of the year. The latest victim was shot dead on Independence Road in the city’s
Fairview section around 11:30 a.m, according to the Camden County Prosecutor’s
Office. Additional details were not immediately available, but radio dispatches
said police were seeking a masked man. The previous high mark for homicides was
58, set in 1995.(Snip) Law enforcement officials have attributed the surge in
violence in part to massive layoffs that nearly halved staffing levels at the
city’s police department in early 2011.”

The Odometer Continues to Roll… Thank You 5

Uncategorized • Tags:

Sometime last evening, the view counter on this blog rolled past 50,000 hits. I had actually been anticipating the event for a few days now since it seemed like a pretty significant number. 50,000. I don’t think I have ever done anything that got a score of 50,000 (except maybe pinball which I gave up years ago when I realized how little it actually mattered to anyone else).

The reality sets in pretty quickly though after you hit a milestone. There is another one in the distance yet to be achieved. So today I take a few moments to say thank you. Maybe I’ll even pat myself on the back for a moment. Then, back to work.

A special thanks to my best friend who supports me every day… I love you honey

 

Mister Mac

It Was a Real Honor 5

American History, Freedom, Service and Sacrifice, Veterans, World War 1, World War 2 • Tags:
I ran into my younger brother’s recruiter last night as we were waiting to get into a local restaurant

I haven’t seen George in many years but he recognized me right away. He hugged my wife and her sister and then turned to me and said “You look just like your old man”. I wasn’t surprised since I have heard that many times in the past few years. It’s a good memory to think about Dad every once in a while. I will especially think about him tomorrow.

John C. MacPherson Jr. Boot camp picture   August 1972

I remember my recruiter pretty well. He was a Master Chief Machinist Mate and he had come to the high school for a visit in the spring of my senior year. The uniform was covered with ribbons and he had these silver “wings” on his chest that stood out pretty well. Naturally, he was quick to point out that they weren’t wings at all, they were dolphins. A smart young guy like me would be able to advance pretty far if he had the right attitude and ambition.

In 1972, Vietnam was already winding down from its height but the Navy still had river patrol boats in country. They were working with the locals to train them as part of the Nixon “Vietnamization” plan. For some crazy reason, I saw myself on the front 50 of one of these boats and no one was going to talk me out of it. Maybe it was too many John Wayne movies or McHale’s Navy, but I wanted to be in that place doing just that job. I signed up for delayed entry and promptly got covered in kisses mixed with tears from my sweetheart.

Heck, I hadn’t even put on my first real uniform and I was already feeling the benefits.

My buddies were all supporting me, my parents thought I might actually amount to something, and she was going to make sure that if I didn’t make it back, I would have some nice things to remember as I checked out on my way to the big PX in the sky.

Boot Cmp 1960 s GL

BM1 Schmidt and the classifier in Boot Camp steered me in the right direction once the starts were out of my eyes. Running with the old Springfield rifles everywhere we went convinced me that maybe I wasn’t such a good candidate for small arms hauling.

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Being introduced to shipboard life and the dull aches of mopping and sweeping tore away any romantic notions about sailing the seven seas and adventure. This crap was hard work and you didn’t get much sleep.

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Of course, as any graduate of basic training or boot camp will tell you, it was all worth it in the rear view mirror. There is one special memory that I will keep forever. It was passing in review the first time you are declared a sailor and no longer a boot.

Boot Camp 1972 003

Seeing that big American Flag displayed so proudly was a focal point to all we had done and all we were about to do. On that day, I joined my Dad who graduated during World War II and my Grandfather who served in World War I in becoming a small part of a group who do something no one else in the world can do: We protect the American way of life at sea in boats, ships, planes, and many stations around the world.

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Both of those men had their share of campaign ribbons and memories but neither would be classified as a hero by most. But both became what all good sailors, soldiers, Guardsmen, fliers and Marines eventually become. They are all Veterans. They are distinct in their identities because at one point in their lives, they were willing to put their life on the line for something greater than themselves. They all have given something to ensure that the country can have freedom, peace, the ability to agree or disagree, and a standard of living like no place else on the planet.

The grey in my sideburns has migrated up to my hair now. I use reading glasses from time to time because I no can no longer convince myself that the room lights aren’t bright enough. I’m afraid if I had to carry a submersible pump anywhere, the ship would probably sink first. But I still have one part of me that works quite well. My heart still beats a little stronger when I see the red white and blue. The threads that really hold old glory together are the long continuous lines of heroes who gave so much for so many for so little in return. Men like my Dad.

As George said his goodbyes and was walking away, he told me again how much I looked like my old man.

It was a real honor to have him think so.

Special MacPherson Memories 001

Happy Veterans Day to all who served.

 

Mister Mac

The Battle Within 4

American History, BHO, Election 2012, Freedom, Processed Foods, White House • Tags: , ,

Diet and exercise are simple and relatively easy ways to overcome weight issues.

By now, anyone who can read understands that fat, salt, sugar, and preservatives will effect the way a body retains or loses weight. If you continue to eat too much food without balancing it with some exercise, you should  not be amazed when your pants sizes go inverted.

Translation: waist larger than length.

The health consequences of such a program are also pretty well known. We are a nation of diabetics, heart patients, chronic ailments and consumers of more pills than the world combined. Its not for a lack of information. Television, magazines, newspapers, the internet all scream WARNING YOU ARE KILLING YOURSELF.

Yet we continue to prop up the fast food industry and pour sugary drinks down our collective throats. Apples sit sadly alone in the fresh fruit drawer while we pop another pastry in our mouth. Carrots shrivel in lonely desperation in the darkest corner of the refrigerator silently crying at their neglect while we mercilessly attack that brownie pan. Sometimes, we even revert to using our bare fingers to pry them from their metallic prison in our haste to satisfy our wants. Rules are for losers.

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Instead of a simple program of diet and exercise, we look for the quick and easy fixes.

Pills, shakes, special processed food is sold by the ton, magical machines that will melt away the pounds, videos, TV infomercials, and on and on. As long as it looks like we are trying, we can feel good about ourselves. Until we step on the scale or take a quick glance as we try to sneak past the full length mirror.

Quite simply, we are all fighting a battle within of one kind or another.

It might be food or it might be any of the other things we consume too much of for our own good. In the end though, if things go too far out of balance, the problems come home to a place where the days of quick fixes are forever gone. The basic systems begin failing and the new patient has plenty of time to stare at the ceiling of the emergency room cubicle while nurses and doctors rush around trying to prolong their life.

With each beep of the monitor, the patient thinks to themselves, oh, if only I get another chance, I will do this and this differently. “Dear God,” (if they actually still talk to him) “I promise I will be better… more fruits and veggies, longer walks, I’ll …”

the beeps suddenly turn into a long steady tone………

On Tuesday, November 6th, the patient had been seen going into a voting booth.

Inside the voting booth there were no written names. (Few could actually read anymore since the education system had long since been converted into a useless irrelevant structure) On the ballot were two pictures. On the left hand picture was a colorful montage of an attractive smiling man with bowls full of candy, rich pastries, sizzling steak, and a brand new phone. On the right was a black and white picture of a dour old man with a frown on his face and a bowl full of broccoli (with no butter).

The choice was actually already well defined. For years, the press had published many beautiful and colorful pictures of the choice on the left surrounded by hip musicians, delightful smiling actors and actresses and happy thoughts about equality and new found wealth for all. At the same time, deeper and darker pictures had been portrayed of the man who wanted to steal the candy from their babies mouths and make the old people sit in rotted out chairs with nothing to eat but broccoli.

The choice was simple for the candy people.

By Wednesday morning, the broccoli had been discarded. By Thursday night, the sweets were gone from an orgy of consumption. The patients family had used the phone to call 911. 911 never arrived since it had been paid for by the broccoli people and they no longer had the way to support the services that the candy people demanded.

Upon arrival at the hospital, there were long lines and few doctors. Since the candy people no longer had to pay for anything, the doctors left the business and found other things to do. Lawyers for the candy people started suing each other and within a short time, everyone who was not in line at the hospital was in line at the court.

The broccoli people survived as they always have. They simply continued to grow more broccoli. The system that had grown up trying to steal and convert their broccoli into candy failed in the end. The battle within will eventually be won or lost when people realize you can never convert broccoli into candy no matter how good the idea feels. As a child you probably struggled with that. As an adult, you finally figured it out. Sadly, we still have too many little children in this country. Enjoy your candy while it lasts kids.

One bright hope: the Candy people are firm believers in abortion. Maybe someday they will eat and abort themselves into oblivion.

I am going back to posting submarine and history stories for a while.

Thanks for the almost 50,000 views I have had and I hope you will find something here that entertains or educates in the future.

I stepped on the scale this morning and it seems like I have been  consumed with self gratification too recently. Maybe having people steal my broccoli and trying to convert it to candy over the next four years will give me more motivation to achieve a different outcome next time.

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Mister Mac

I Used to Worry 1

Submarine • Tags: , ,

“Man Battle Stations Missile”… dong dong dong dong dong dong

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You had only been asleep for about an hour, a deep sleep where the work that kept you awake for eighteen hours finally caught up with you. Maybe it was the leaking packing on the trim pump. Maybe it was a circuit board that eluded your trouble shooting skills. Maybe it was just the family gram that you got that seemed so empty of facts in its shortly worded manner.

Whatever it was, you were asleep when the harsh electronic alarm went off near your rack. The sound of curtains ripping back in the berthing area fill the air. You know you only have a few minutes to get to your station and start your tasks. Phones are manned. Gear is broken out. Valves are being positioned in faraway compartments as teams of sailors and officers rush to answer the alarm.

In your haste, did you hear the Captain’s announcement?

Are we spinning up all missiles? Is this a 1SQ and not a drill… does it matter? If something goes wrong, not really. One false move, one unintended consequence might start a sequence that will quickly spiral out of control. If it’s not a drill… what will it matter?

You feel yourself involuntarily sweating. You ask yourself again for the thousandth time, “Can you do it if you have to? Can you really help launch a devastating attack on people you don’t know?”

Then, over the 1MC, “Man Battle Stations Torpedo” and the unmistakable lurch of the boat taking a radical turn

… the question you asked a moment ago is now academic… something is happening… “Torpedo in the Water”… sound the collision alarm

I used to worry…

http://freebeacon.com/russian-subs-skirt-coast/

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Could somebody please hit the “reset button”? I really need some sleep

Mister Mac

All or Nothing 4

American History, US Navy, World War 1, World War 2 • Tags: , , , , , , ,

Radical and Revolutionary

Those were words used to describe one of the greatest Battleships ever to sail the seas in defense of freedom. The USS Nevada (BB-36) was the second IS Navy ship to be named after the 36th state and was the lead ship of the two Nevada-class battleships. Her sister ship was the USS Oklahoma.

A grand ship

Her keel was laid on November 4th 1912 and when she was launched a short two years later, she represented a great leap forward in almost every technology associated with dreadnoughts. The three key technologies that made her both radical and revolutionary were features that would be included in every future US battleship (as well as many of their subsequent enemies).

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Three radical revolutions

The first was the development of the three gun turret. These monsters were 14” superfiring canons that could place a concentrated firepower on any ship in existence and pound through the armor protecting their inner skins.Nevada was built with two three gun turrets and two two gun turrets giving her a slight edge over anything built before her time.

The second part of the revolution was her conversion to oil rather than coal. Previous dreadnoughts and most other ships built at the end of the sail era were powered by coal. While coal was a leap forward in its own way, the need for refueling placed serious limitations on fleet movements. When the Great White fleet had sailed in previous years, it was a dramatic show of the US capability to extend itself into previously difficult areas. The Japanese particularly were alarmed by the ability of the fledgling fleet to exert such a powerful influence.

Coal or Oil

But the need for coaling stations around the world was a weakness that would impact the fleet’s ability to stay on station. Plus, coal powered ships were very manpower intensive. First, the colliers were required to constantly be in motion and manpower was a key method to moving the coal from point a to point b. Second and more important, large engineroom crews were required to fuel the boilers underway.

Ship design was affected by having more logistical support for the larger crew which reduced the amount of space for other critical items. Third, coal is not as as efficient as oil in a naval environment. Conversion of the fuel to energy was not nearly as great resulting in lower steaming days and shorter distances.

“using oil gave the ship an engineering advantage over the earlier coal-fired plants,as oil is much more efficient than coal because it yields "a far greater steaming radius for a given amount of fuel". The ability to steam great distances without refueling was a major concern of the General Board at that time. In 1903, the Board felt all American battleships should have a minimum steaming radius of 6,000 nmi (11,000 km) so that the US could enforce the Monroe Doctrine.”

Using oil would result in replacing 100 firemen (stokers) and 112 coal passers with 24 enginemen. This would eliminate crews quarters saving weight for other items and reducing the amount of fresh water and provisions that a ship would need for extended operations.

Ability to take hits

The third revolution was the new placement of armor. Instead of spreading thin armor over all areas, Nevada focused on critical areas such as the magazines and engines.

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This radical change became known as the “All or Nothing” principle. Protecting the vital innards of a ship was never done before the “Standard Battleship” design was adopted. The idea was that if you protected the ammunition, steering and engines of the ship, she could better survive any type of attack known at the time. (Note: prior to Billy Mitchell proving the tactic’s vulnerability to air power tactics, the Navy was still focused on surface and sub surface attack strategies.)

All three of these radical designs and ideas would set the stage for the major battles to be fought in the century of surface warfare. Nevada would go on to fight in both World Wars and prove the reliability of the builders who designed and made her.

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A real fighter

She rose from the mud of Pearl Harbor to help our troops in both theaters of operations.

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She served faithfully throughout the war ending up victorious in Tokyo Bay.

Even in her dying days, she showed her unwillingness to give up. After being involved in two nuclear tests, she was used as a target vessel for the USS Iowa which ultimately failed to sink her. Her end came at the end of an air launched torpedo.

800px-USS_Nevada_(BB-36)_Operation_Crossroads_Target_Ship

The daring designers and innovation that created her are hallmarks of the American spirit. A need was identified, methods were created to overcome the need, and we had the national will to execute and operate this technology. American know how and capability were employed to create something that set the stage for victory. The real question is, could we do it again?

Someone famously said that the world is no longer a game of “Battleship” because of newer technology.

Sadly, they trivialize the vision that still needs to be present in an increasingly dangerous world. The greatest threat to our future is ignorance of the past and the leap forward in technologies represented by American power projection. In the history of mankind, there have always been dictators and tyrants. Nations have coveted the lands and resources of other nations. The weak get chewed up and spit out by the strong. Projecting weakness to pacify your opponent only encourages them to build bigger weapons to ensure your complete subjection.

America has been great because it understands the changing nature of power and power projection. Having leaders willing to support that is and will be the link to a secure future.

God Bless America, and Thank you to the Men who sailed a great ship, USS Nevada BB 36

 

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Mister Mac

1913 was a very unlucky year – an entire country lost its freedom 2

American History, Congress, Constitution, Election 2012, Freedom, White House • Tags: , , ,

As we opened the new year (2013) I was thinking about how precarious life has become in this new age. A majority of the voters thought enough of Obama to reelect him last year. It would seem that there is a broad spectrum of support for taxing other people in the interest of “fairness”. The same seems to be their desire when it comes to spreading the healthcare costs to other people even in the face of doing so at a cost of people’s belief’s and individual freedom. And so it goes.

How did it all start? This little article from earlier last year gives some giant size hints. The ratification of the Sixteenth amendment is the crowning achievement of the progressive movement at that time in an effort to spread the money around. Remember this though: At its inception, there was supposed to be a permanent cap of just 1%.

Well, Happy New Year boys and girls. The progressives are not quite done picking your pockets just quite yet. I hope we somehow survive the next four years as a nation. Maybe the cold hard reality of seeing all your hard-earned money may convince enough people to pull the balance back the other way. It’s going to be tough though. Everybody loves Santa.

 

Woodrow Wilson became the 28th President of the United States. Democrats controlled both houses of the Congress.

woodrow-wilson-president-1913-1921_i-G-55-5565-3DNLG00Z

Wilson and his party were known as Progressives and he was the champion of many Progressive reforms that had been bubbling under the surface of America. According to the historian John M. Cooper:

In his first term, Wilson successfully pushed a legislative agenda that few presidents have equaled, and remained unmatched up until the New Deal.This agenda included the Federal Reserve Act, Federal Trade Commission Act, the Clayton Antitrust Act, the Federal Farm Loan Act and an income tax. Child labor was curtailed by the Keating–Owen Act of 1916, but the U.S. Supreme Court declared it unconstitutional in 1918. He also had Congress pass the Adamson Act, which imposed an 8-hour workday for railroads.Wilson, after first sidestepping the issue, became a major advocate for the women’s suffrage. Although Wilson promised African Americans ‘fair dealing…in advancing the interests of their race in the United States” the Wilson administration implemented a policy of racial segregation for federal employees.

The U.S. Department of Commerce and U.S. Department of Labor was established by splitting the duties of the 10-year-old Department of Commerce and Labor. The creation of these two progressive organizations were marginally constitutional and have created millions of man-days of waste in both commerce and labor since their creation.

In 1913, Wilson did something that had not been done since Adams was President.

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He requested a joint session of Congress to urge them to reform the tariff acts.  The Revenue Act of 1913 passed the House, 281 to 139, on May 8, 1913. Wilson used his patronage powers to guide it to Senate passage 44 to 37, on September 9, 1913. Politically it was considered a major triumph for President Woodrow Wilson.

Something far more important happened in the passage of this law. That “something” was the inclusion of something called an “income tax”.

The Act also provided for the institution of a federal income taxes a means to compensate for anticipated lost revenue because of the reduction of tariff duties. The most recent effort to tax incomes (Wilson-Gorman Tariff of 1894) had been declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court because the tax on dividends, interest, and rents had been deemed to be a direct tax not apportioned by population. That obstacle, however, was removed by ratification of the Sixteenth Amendment on February 3, 1913.The Act provided in part that: subject only to such exemptions and deductions as are hereinafter allowed, the net income of a taxable person shall include gains, profits, and income derived from salaries, wages, or compensation for personal service of whatever kind and in whatever form paid, or from professions, vocations, businesses, trade, commerce, or sales, or dealings in property, whether real or personal, growing out of the ownership or use of or interest in real or personal property, also from interest, rent, dividends, securities, or the transaction of any lawful business carried on for gain or profit, or gains or profits and income derived from any source whatever.

The incomes of couples exceeding $4,000, as well as those of single persons earning $3,000 or more, were subject to a one percent federal tax. Further, the measure provided a progressive tax structure, meaning that high income earners were required to pay at higher rates.

It would require only a few years for the federal income tax to become the chief source of income for the government, far outdistancing tariff revenues.

Less than 1% of the population paid federal income tax at the time. The act was applicable to incomes for 1913, 1914, and 1915.

Every election since that time has really been about one thing: who will control all the money the government takes from the people who actually create wealth

I suppose you could argue it is about a number of other issues as well and you would be partially correct. But once Congress figured out a way to control the distribution of the national wealth and income, there was no turning back.

Make no mistake about what elections are about. The party that controls the money controls the agenda. The last voice you have left is your vote. Giving that vote to a person of either party that wants to redistribute your wealth in a manner inconsistent with your beliefs is just plain stupid.

America is still the best country on the face of the planet. But we should never forget that an unfettered government will kill that dream more surely than any external enemy. As we remember the birth of the “income tax” system we currently suffer under, remember how it was done. The Obama care health program will be another link in the chain that burdens what is left of a free society. Left in place, a hundred years from now the people of the future will sadly look back on how yet another progressive program destroyed what was man’s best hope of freedom on this planet.

Mister Mac

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So far…

Marathon Man 4

New York Marathon • Tags: , ,

As of this afternoon, the New York Marathon will go on thanks to the bold decision of Mayor Bloomberg who supports the President for reelection.

Morons

As of this afternoon, millions of people are struggling to find food, shelter, warmth, electricity, a place to wash their bodies and clothes and so on. If you have ever lost power for a few days you know how inconvenient that can be. Now imagine ti will not be turned on for another week.

People who had temporary shelter have been ordered out of their hotels to make room for higher paying marathoners. Interestingly enough, gasoline shortages abound all the way around the city and in many of the surrounding areas. Will the marathoners be bringing their own gas with them? Or perhaps they will do a warm up run.

I can envision the mayor and his guests tonight sipping beverages and eating warm toasties as they prepare for the grueling weekend ahead. His socks are dry, his suit is pressed and a vehicle awaits his every need including a police escort to make sure he doesn’t get bogged down anywhere. The side streets will be blocked off by multiple police also.

Meanwhile, the gas lines grow, people are diving in dumpsters, and friends of mine don’t know where their next meal is coming from. Police will not be in many neighborhoods tonight and without the necessary generators, people with questionable values will rule the night.

I hope you have a lovely run Mayor Bloomberg. I hope all of you runners who are more self focused than civically focused don’t hurt yourselves running on all that hard pavement. Maybe some of you will even bring a few cans of food. But honestly, I hope with every step you take you choke on your own spit for causing more harm to the people who need desperate help.

I only have one question; would we ever hear the end of this if George Bush was still President?

Selfish Morons

Mister Mac

Brought to you by the letter “I” 2

American History, BHO, Congress, Declaration of Independence, Election 2012, Leadership, White House • Tags:

Obviously, if you are a conservative and watched the Alfred Smith Dinner and enjoyed Governor Romney’s you will remember the best line of the night. In reference to the non-story about Sesame Street being “savagely attacked” by Mitt, he famously said that evening: “Brought to you by the letter O. and the Number 16 trillion”.

Brilliant.

The crowd was roaring, pundits were scribbling, liberals were searing hot at the attack on their guy and America was listening. Its still a few days until a majority of the public can vote but there is a cautious optimism that four years of failing government is about to meet its end. Endless failed programs and excuse making are about to be shown a terminal exit. There is a strong belief once again that responsible people will be at the helm and even though the turnaround may be hard, at least it will stop us from drifting aimlessly on the sea.

There are so many words that have been used to describe how we got here but the simplest one is the word “I”.

Last night as we watched the news, Obama was crowing about his latest foray into being president. He said “I have directed all of my agencies to leave no stone unturned and spare no expense to help the victims of this disaster.” The thoughts are nice and we should all be happy that our national treasure will be used in a way to help our fellow citizens in their hour of need.

It was just the most recent revelation of the use of the word “I” and why so many are ready for the narcissist in chief to go away. To truly bolster the alcohol industry, I would propose a national drinking game where every time Obama used the word “I”, you would need to take a shot. For those that don’t drink, a substitute measure could be to put a dollar in a jar each time any of the personal pronouns linked to the word “I “ are used.

Outside of Bill Clinton, there are not many other public figures in my memory who have been so in love with personal pronouns linking themselves to everything.

Even when Obama uses the word “We” its only to remind you how dependent he thinks you are on him. In the rare times he says “you” it is typically in a way that reminds you that you are merely a subset of an organization that supports him or is in defiance of him. There is a definite center to the universe in his mind and he is it.

The excuse machines for why he will most likely lose are already starting to crank up.

Naturally, the Republicans are the center of that universe. The lame stream media lazily phones in stories about how the Pubbies stopped him dead in his track with evil and sinister plots. They conveniently forget the majorities they held in Congress the first two years and the pounding through of key legislation without a single opposition vote in the house and only a few RINO votes in the Senate.

 

No, this president set the record straight in a very profound way the first time he met with the opposition. He did it with two words:

I won

The press forgets the public outcry called the Tea Party where people of all walks of life suddenly realized that the pretender in chief was trying to socialize the country they loved. Instead, the press tried to protect his highness with slavish stories depicting “racism” and “ignorance”. Never mind that these hard working people probably contributed more in tax dollars and church donations in one year than every democratic elected official combined (based on Joe Biden’s record anyway).

When all of us wake up next Wednesday morning, we will see if there is still a chance for America. America has always been a collection of people who focused more on the saying “We the people” than “I” the person.

The fact that he was even elected four years ago is a sad reflection of how many people were so readily able to associate themselves with a selfish ego-centric snob whose single goal in life was to transform something we knew into something more to his own image.

Next Wednesday morning, a large wave will have washed over this historically horrible mistake of a presidency and washed it forever out to sea. Or, next Wednesday morning, we will find ourselves overwhelmed with defeat caused by the hands of people who were too ignorant to see that an America based on Freedom and Liberty has been lost by a greater power of selfishness.

This election is a true choice.

Will we continue to support the principles of the Declaration of Independence? Or will we be subjects to a new Declaration of Dependence that forever locks us into a government dictated slavery ? Liberty or Slavery? Freedom or Tyranny?

Please don’t let this be our last vote.

Mister Mac

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Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy.

Winston Churchill

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Reblogged from theleansubmariner:

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The launch was not detected by our satellites because they were looking in the wrong area. No one would have suspected that the slow moving foreign flagged freighter carried such a horrible surprise deep within its hold. The sea was relatively calm and the moon reflected off the water as the crew labored to set up their makeshift launching pad. They would only get one shot since their friends within the pentagon had long ago warned them of the surveillance system that would ensure their fiery death.

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Normally I would wait for a few months before reblogging. I missed the China Japan connection the first pass. It does add a certain dimension of reality