4. August 2008 by Patrick Budowski.

If they were every going to get serious about saving gas, it would start with the Federal employees. Not all federal employees can take mass transit, in the area I live in few do outside of D.C. It gets used but only by those who have to use it. Drive in would be to long, or they live right on one of the lines.

What the Feds could do is start working 4 10 hour days. Of course this could not be everyone, and some people would get mad, have to work Friday or Monday while most of the other folks are off. However tough luck. Most of of the office’s could do this. From the FBI to Congress. Now I am not saying take the police or the agents off, since they are more then likely working more the 10 hours a day now. I am talking about the staff. Instead of having 300 people on the phones for the IRS 5 days a week, lets cut down to 200 a day. If each person could have one day off during the week. That would cut 300 trips to work each week. Before I forget, I am not talking about shutting down offices or services. They would still be open 5 days a week or whatever their normal work days are now.Take 4 days and work 10 hours on those days.

Lets make the math simple. Since there are a ton of variables, let just say the average car gets 20 mpg. Since a lot these trips you are stuck in traffic. Round trip to work and home is 100 miles, you get 20 mpg and work 5 days a week. 500 miles each week. That’s 25 gallons a week. Lets say gas cost $4 even, means you spend $100 on gas.
Now take my plan ( I am sure some one much smarter then me has thought of this) Now you are driving 400 miles a week. Cost of fuel $80 each week. Doing this way save you $20 per week, or $ 1040 per year.

Now that’s not bad an extra grand each year, but wait I have not shown you the big picture yet. You now have an office that was burning 390,000 gallons of gas each year down to 312,000 gallons a year. Saving 78000 gallons per year. Now this is only one office. I also left those that could work from home 4 days a week and only go into the office one day a week, off of this. Like I said earlier there are so many variables
Someone much smarter then me should do the math, since its 5:30 am here, and I have been up since 2 am.
This plan IMO is much better then to just go on vacations which is what congress did. House side at least, the Senate is playing games so they open up, sort of every 3 days.

Posted in life, politics, News | Print | No Comments »

16. July 2008 by Patrick Budowski.

This seems like the longest election I have witnessed in my life. We need a new law saying you can only start running 18 months or so before the election date. I would prefer 12 months. However the media would have a fit.
What I would really like to see is, a debate on each issue. So if there are 10 main issues, then let them debate those 10 issues. Get rid of the smear ads from both sides, and lets elect the best person for the job.

To me, the way we have are elections, we limit those that are willing to run, because they do not want to expose their family to the media. Think what might happen if we had some good CEO’s or CFO’s in office?Instead we seem to get is a bunch of lawyers. Not that I have anything against lawyers.
It’s time for real change in our government and sadly; Obama nor McCain are the men to get the job done. McCain’s real strength is that he is not afraid to go against the grain.

Posted in politics | Print | No Comments »

28. June 2008 by Patrick Budowski.

I am sitting inside a dealer having  some work done on my
car, (yes I know dealers cost more but it’s a hybrid) On the news they are
talking oil prices, and one of the other people in here, said “that the oil  prices would not go down if we started to drill offshore”to me this is nuts, now the reason the guy said what he said was he is an Obama supporter. Of course Obama is against anything that would get him in trouble with the far left. Having been watching the market and seeing how the slightest thing can set oil prices rising, allowing us to start drilling off shore would lower the prices. Of course this is all done by the speculators. Supply and demand play a big part, however it’s the speculator that are driving the price up.

Most Americans do not have time to follow the news and research what the news they do see say. Since most “news” stations put a slant on what they report, be it left or right. So without researching they are making their decisions based on which news station they are watching.

Oil will go up or down depending on what the market dictates, when I say market I mean both supply and demand as well as what the speculators do.

If you’re waiting on the Federal government to fix or lower the prices you’re in for a long wait. At best they will help increase the price, since just about anything the Federal government gets involved in gets screwed up worse than it was before they stuck their hands in. Don’t believe me? Just look at Social Security.

Best thing for the World would be for all the governments to stay out of the free market.

Posted in life, politics, News | Print | No Comments »

25. June 2008 by Patrick Budowski.

Reading through today’s headlines,sadly nothing shocks me anymore; Bomb kills 51, Iran has sentenced 177 people under the age of 18 to death over the past decade, Pakistan: Gunmen kill 4 Shiite Muslims. These are just a few from today. What happened to the World? Why does everyone just gloss over these issues? Granted we are getting so used to these type of headlines, it’s almost that anything good that happens does not get reported, since we all know blood sells. Those are just a few.

What scares me the most is we are all getting so used to it, that it seldom bothers us anymore.

Posted in life, politics, News | Print | No Comments »

31. May 2008 by Patrick Budowski.

This is posted with the permission of SGM Gibeau

His post was in response to people getting up on their high horses about actions that some member’s of the Service have done or are alleged to  have done.

I share his views, and am a strong supporter of our Military. I feel that they are under paid and over worked, the job they do is no job at all, it’s a duty that they felt called too. I will always back our Armed Forces 110%. I wish every time someone reads, that the people in Washington are about to cut funding for the Military, they would get mad enough to write their elected officials and let them know they disapprove of these actions. Without People like SGM Gibeau this Country would not exist.

The next time you see a person in uniform, thank them for all that you have. Here is another idea, ask them how they are, what they need, how you can help them when they have to deploy, how our Country can help them.

Just thoughts.

I am a Sergeant Major in the United States Army. I have read alot of the things written here about this young man, about his freedom of religion, how he should be jailed, how he should walk, etc etc.

NONE of you are correct. First, NO soldier has the freedom of religion. No soldier has the protection of the US Constitution. Soldiers (I say soldiers, and mean this to include the Air Force, the Navy The Coast Guard and the Marines.) All soldier have the freedom to worship any way they please, up to but not including the infringement of the rights and beliefs of anothers religion. They are protected by one book, and one book only. UCMJ, or the Uniform Code of Military Justice. We are held to a much higher standard than civilians. We are expected to conduct ourselves in a manner that sets us above and apart from civilians. We are expected to have a much higher sense of honor and a much greater sense of dignity and integrity than civilians. Whether or not we believe in this war is irrelevant. We all signed up for a minimum of eight years, and MOST of us have been here (The military) longer than that. Regardless of what the media says, most of us believe in what we are doing here, because we see things that the rest of you do not and will not ever see.

I fought in the first Gulf War, in 90-91. I fought here again in 1998 when President Clinton was trying to turn attention away from his impeachment. I then fought here in this war, as well as Afghanistan. (I have actually fought in every conflict the US has been in since Panama, just to demonstrate that this is not my first rodeo…)

What the “sniper” (I doubt he actually carried the Tango identifier in his MOS, since no Military Sniper School I know of allows someone with that level of emotion and obvious rage slip through the psych evaluation…) did, according to these people was unconscionable. Legally, it falls under the guise of “action unbecoming” and that is punishable. We are not here to feel as they feel, we are here to help rebuild, maintain the peace, and assist in enforcing the law, and help the rule of law take hold. Their laws will not necessarily mirror ours. Defilement of their holiest scripture is a crime here. Therefore, the soldier will be punished. When a Foreigner goes to America, if he breaks the law there, he is punished. It is no different for us as Americans in other countries, especially for our soldiers. That is the long and short of it.

I get real sick sometimes of the things that people say and do on these forums. I read them on ocassion to get an idea of how the mood is back home. Some of you **bleep** need to crawl back under your rock, work on your manners, learn to be a real warrior, and not a keyboard warrior, pick up a rifle, a shovel, or a pen, and do some good rather than lamenting all you see wrong.

SGM Gibeau

Posted in life, politics, News | Print | No Comments »

28. May 2008 by Patrick Budowski.

Seems everyone wants to play the blame game about the cost of gas, the Left blame the right, saying its Bush’s fault, the right point back to Bill Clinton vetoing the law to allow us to explore and drill in parts of the USA. Then we have those who blame congress since the Left took over. Seems gas prices have gone up 67% since they took control of congress. What most people fail to understand is that Both China and India have increased their consumption of oil, so with the increase from both of those countries combined with the silly regulations that our own Government (USA) puts out, it makes it even harder to figure out who to blame. Since the Petroleum refiners in the US must meet the EPA’s federal fuex oxygenate requirement from Title ll of the Clean Act Amendments of 1990, add that with the law that refiners are required to drain all winter fuel from their tanks before replacing it with summer fuel, and this must be done by April 1^st. Now before I started reading this I had no idea there was a difference in winter/summer fuel. Now that’s just the Feds, then the states get to add their own formulas, so we have in the US more the 40 different types of fuel requirements depending on which state you happen to live in. I sit here shaking my head about this.

Now we get to the not in my backyard, most folks do not want a refinery built around them, nor do they wish to have storage tanks or tank farms as they are called built near them. So we have another strike against the cost of gas.

Now back in 2004 there were some changes made that lawmaker new was going to drive the cost of gas up, now I am no expert on this, but it has something to do with lowering the sulfuric content which cost companies more money to refine the product, which mean the price at the pump was going to go up. Add that to the fact the oil companies are going to spend more on having to meet this demand from the Feds which will mean less output from the refineries here in the states.

Now we could lay the blame on the green people, saying it’s all their fault, however that would be wrong as well.

Let’s look at the Country of Brazil, they buy flex cars, which means it can run on gas or alcohol, which is ethanol that is produced from sugar, this can been done with corn, or beets as well. So they have a choice on how they fuel their vehicles. As of 2005 in the US there were only 4 million flex cars on the road. Not sure how many we have now, but am guessing a few more.

There are more ways to produce ethanol; wood is a prime example, while its being turned into paper there is another substance that it has which is called xylan. Xylan can be fermented to produce ethanol.

So here is the question, why with just these few ways to reduce the USA dependence on oil have we not embraced these alternative fuels?

Posted in life, politics, News | Print | No Comments »

22. May 2008 by Patrick Budowski.

Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take but by the moments that take our breath away.

Are we Americans as dumb as we appear — or — is it that we just do not think?
While the Chinese, knowingly and intentionally, export inferior and even toxic products and dangerous toys and goods to be sold in American markets, the media wrings its hands and criticizes the Bush Administration for perceived errors.
Yet 70% of Americans believe that the trading privileges afforded to the Chinese should be suspended.
Well, duh..why do you need the government to suspend trading privileges?

SIMPLY DO IT YOURSELF, AMERICA!!

Simply look on the bottom of every product you buy, and if it says ‘Made in China’ or ‘PRC’ (and that now includes Hong Kong), simply choose another product, or none at all. You will be amazed at how dependent you are on Chinese products, and you will be equally amazed at what you can do without. Who needs plastic eggs to celebrate Easter?

If you must have eggs, use real ones and benefit some American farmer. Easter is just an example, the point is.. do not wait for the government to act.

Just go ahead and assume control on your own.
THINK ABOUT THIS If 200 million Americans refuse to buy just $20 each of Chinese goods, that’s a billion dollar trade imbalance resolved in our favor…fast!!
The downside? Some American businesses will feel a temporary pinch from having foreign stockpiles of inventory. Wahhhhhhhhhhhh
The solution ?

Let’s give them fair warning and send our own message. Most of the people who have been reading about this matter are planning on implementing this on June 4, and continue it until July 4.
That is only one month of trading losses, but it will hit the Chinese for 1/12th of the total, or 8%, of their American exports. Then they will at least have to ask themselves if the benefits of their arrogance and lawlessness were worth it.

Remember, June 4 to July 4.
EVEN BETTER. . . START NOW.

Show them we are Americans and NOBODY can take us for granted.

If we can’t live without cheap Chinese goods for one month out of our lives, WE DESERVE WHAT WE GET!

I got this emailed to me, while I am not sure of the facts or the author, it does make some sense to me. Why not give it a try?Can’t hurt. Also with the economy being tight why not just hold off on buying anything made in China till after he 4th of July.

Posted in life, politics, News | Print | No Comments »

2. May 2008 by Patrick Budowski.

Politics and Money

With the amount of money spent on this Presidential election, we could have cut into our Nations deficit. What makes people keep sending money into a certain candidate? For this race I see no one who is so good that I would donate 2300 dollars too. For McCain who is the worst money raiser of the 3 he collected 12 million in January. If he did that each month for 12 months that’s 144 million dollars. Obama collected 40 million in March. This is just over the top. It makes me wonder how much people really care about the mortgage problems. Let alone all the other problems we are facing as a nation.

Why not have 6 or 8 debates on just the issues? Instead of spending so much on getting elected, or playing the he said she said. This would allow us to find out exactly what the candidates stands for. It’s sad in a way how we, the American people tune in to all this crap. Are we that short sighted? I guess.

For me it’s not who the best in this election is, but who’s the lesser of the 2 evils. Since we know it’s going to be McCain vs. Hillary or Obama. Out of the 3 I must say McCain so far looks the lesser of the 3 evils.

One other thought is why we allow Politicians to keep their jobs, in this case 3 senators, while running for another. Would your boss allow you to take time off with pay while you looked for another job?

Last thought, anyone have any idea what it’s costing us for them to have Secret Service protection?

Posted in politics | Print | No Comments »

2. May 2008 by Patrick Budowski.

Things go bad; it’s true, life happens. However it’s how we deal with things which make us different. Every person handles things different, those that look at things with a positive outlook, tend to deal with life as it happens much better. Those are the folks that don’t see a problem, only a solution. Then we have those who look to place the blame for the bad things, instead of trying to fix it, or find a solution. Of course we also have to have those that deny there is a problem.

Instead of forcing those who have served our Country to go to a VA hospital, why not just allow them to go to any hospital? Some VA hospitals are very well run, and some are rotten. Why do we treat folks here in our Country, illegal for free at our best hospitals? Yet they turn away are Veterans? What about programs for decompressing our Combat troops when they come home? Those are the ones who need help before being discharged. Why not some programs that help them get a job, and still get counseling paid for by the Feds? After all they only have the problems due to serving our Country.

I do not care how you feel about the war in Iraq, or Afgan. I only care about what; we as a Nation are going to do for our service personal? Write you’re Congressman or women let them know they need to put a good program in place, not a band aid, but something that works. Here is an idea, why not talk to the Professionals, find out what would work for them, then do it. Instead of just putting it in the same room with Social Security and Medicare, lets at least try to fix something. Take the time to find out what is being done in your name, by your Congressman or women. Look at the annual pig book that gets put out. See what pet projects get snuck into a bill. Hell, just today, we had a news report about Louisiana State government trying to pass a law for the name of the State Cocktail. Please someone tell me how this is more important than our veterans. Granted this was on a State level. If you take the time to read what passed and what failed in Congress over the last 8 years, hell just go back for the last 2 years. Before you blame it all on Bush, if someone tells you that they will veto a law, and you don’t have the votes to override it, why work on that? Why not spend time working on laws that will get passed. Bottom line we need to overhaul our Government.

Maybe I am just getting grouchy in my old age.

Posted in politics | Print | No Comments »

2. May 2008 by Patrick Budowski.

If you really wanted to do something about what’s wrong with our Country, you could stop posting about all the negative stuff, without posting a solution to the problem, Bush and Congress are both at fault for everything that has happened in the last year when it comes to the Government, I do not care if your left, right or in the middle, the problem is neither side wanted or wants to work together. If someone makes a post with a link check it out, read it don’t just close your mind because it comes from the left or the right, read it and try to figure out what they are thinking, and why they think that way.

Let’s face it there is no news media anymore, they all have their own agendas. So news is no longer news.

I honestly can say that I do not hate anyone; I do dislike some people’s ideas.

So what are you going to do? Be part of the problem or part of the solution?

How hard is it to listen to someone from the other side? It cost you nothing, and they may have a good idea. There are thing that I agree with the left on, and things that I agree with the right. Why should we have picked a person, based on the party platform? Why not pick someone who may be from the outside, but hey it really cannot get any worse.

I am sorry there are only 2 people running right now that I might vote for, McCain and Obama.

Yet I feel with either one we still lose, because we are right back to square one, with it being the right vs the left.

Posted in politics | Print | No Comments »