Change is Good!

Ladies and Gentleman, Brothers and Sisters, Fellow Ohioans, Friends, Romans, and Countrymen,

Did I get your attention?  I certainly hope so because I feel that what I have to say is important!!  I worked last night and spent most of my time alone while the residents slept.  Let that be a forewarning; I had a lot of solitude time to think.  It all made perfect sense in my head at 3:00 a.m. so hopefully it will here.

First off, yes, I am talking politics!  I hope you didn't leave my blog............ Voting in this country is NOT a right, it is a privilege!  There are many U.S citizens who can't do that.  For example, one must be 18 years of age.  That leaves out a lot of folks.  One also must not be a felon.  Unfortunately, that leaves out way too many people as well.  To clarify that, I mean it is unfortunate to have so many people convicted of felonies in this country, not that we don't allow them to vote.     ----------   I have heard so many people during this election season say that they don't vote or that there vote doesn't matter.  That seems sad to me.  Yes, it is true that a president can win without the majority of popular vote, BUT the electoral congress votes the way the people in a particular state votes.  Ohio has 18 votes.  Those votes count!  Statistics show that NO republican has ever won the presidential election without winning Ohio.  If a candidate loses by even one popular vote, all of  the electoral votes could conceivably go to that winner.  That is how important your vote can be!

Change was the title of this blog so here I go.  When a company is going under, business is dropping, money is being lost, etc, guess what happens to that CEO.  Exactly, he is booted out by the Board of Directors.  For you sports fans, what happens to a coach who cannot produce a winning team?  Does he get chance after chance to do something different?  NO.  The owners have a meeting and out goes the coach!  Those leaders do not usually have the opportunity to make excuses or blame the other guy; they are simply replaced when their contracts are up!  Shouldn't that be the same case in the United States?  If something doesn't work, should we not try something else???  And frankly, even you nay-sayers have to admit, this is not working.  We, as a country are NOT working!

Facts:  
1.  For you young people who may be reading this.  Unemployment rates among young people ages 16-25 is up to 16.8%.  That is a lot of young Americans not working.  I will explain how that impacts our country further into this blog.

2.  For you women (especially those who feel that Romney is out of touch with you)  According to the Labor statistics, women are definitely getting the rough end of this economic mess we are in.

First off to address the working women - we are still earning 77% that of men.  "Women with a college degree will earn hundreds of thousands of dollars less than a man over the course of their lifetime".  Barack Obama made that statement in April 2012!  That was 3 + years after he signed the Lilly Ledbetter Bill!  Now as for that bill....... He made it a point in his debate to make sure everyone knew that he signed it on day one of his presidency.  The point he didn't make is that the bill was not a new concept.  The Equal Pay Act was initiated in 1963!!!!!!  It has been there, just really handled poorly!  What Pres Obama did was to basically  amend that act stating that the 180-day statute of limitations for filing an equal-pay lawsuit regarding discrimination resets with each new paycheck affected by that discriminatory action.  Just a reminder, he signed that bill in 2009.  But in 2012 women are still getting "77 cents to every $1.00 that a man earns".  His words, not mine.  The law was not an equal pay law.  It was about opening up lawsuits.  Not sure what the statistics of lawsuits are because I couldn't find any.  Just so you know, YES, I am in favor of equal pay for equal jobs, whether it is man/woman, white/black, hairy/bald.  If you do the same job, you should get the same pay!

Follow this link to get an interesting viewpoint on women in cabinet positions.  It seems both candidates need to work on this!  http://www.forbes.com/sites/rickungar/2012/10/18/white-house-record-on-women-should-be-better/  Women are just not equally represented, period!

Now on to those unemployed women -  I can go to 100 different sites (I basically did) and get 100 different reports on this.  The two things that are agreed upon is that  way too many women are not working, and that the recovery among women is much slower than that among men.  Statistically, that has not been the case - in past recession recoveries, woman are usually must faster to recover than men.  I am a little foggy as to why that matters and why that isn't happening.

Wow, I have said a lot.  But I have so much more to say.  Just can't continue right now.  Come back tomorrow for part 2.