PolitiFact Georgia is supposedly a non-partisan media watchdog group that rates comments from politicians and political advocates on something called a Truth-O-Meter. The scale ranges from completely true and goes beyond completely false to a "liar, liar, pants on fire" category that denotes the most egregious offenders. PolitiFact Georgia recently declared a group known as Sovereign Citizens United (SCU) had their "pants-on-fire" given their claim that U.S. Congressmen from Georgia Hank Johnson and John Lewis were both socialists. The media watchdog gave that evaluation of the SCU statement U.S. Reps. Hank Johnson, John Lewis and other members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus are socialists who are openly serving in the U.S. Congress. Agreed, making the unfounded accusation that a U.S Congressman is a socialist does cast that member in a negative light, in effect demonizing him (or her) in the eyes of many, but a hero in the eyes of some. And if SCU wasn't telling the truth, their accusation would be a rather insidious, terrible lie. That much is true. Which begs the question... Quid est veritas? The fact-checkers decreed The S-word [Socialist] is overwhelmingly considered a toxic label in American politics. Yet, it is used more frequently these days, most often as a way to demonize liberal politicians. I get it -- it's bad to call someone a socialist if it isn't true. And what irrefutable proof did the fact checkers procure making them confident enough to declare SCU such bold-faced liars with their pants on fire? Well...they did ask … [Read more...]

Investor genius Warren Buffett recently made headlines when he announced to the world that his tax bill was too low. In an opinion piece published by the New York Times, Buffett lamented that his secretary’s personal income tax rate surpassed his capital gains rate paid on investments. In doing so, Buffett created the clear impression that he would gladly pay higher taxes if only the government asked. There’s only one problem with this picture: the government has asked, and Buffett has repeatedly refused to pay higher taxes. Newsmax reported that Buffett’s firm Berkshire Hathaway is currently embroiled in a legal battle with the IRS over $1 billion in unpaid taxes. And it isn’t the first time – as recently as 2005, Buffett agreed to a favorable settlement with the IRS over a dividends-received deduction after a protracted 14 year battle. It seems that Warren Buffett believes everyone should pay more taxes – except him. … [Read more...]

Founder and editor-in-chief of publishing house epress-online, Ms. Margaret Carr was found dead of natural causes in her home last week after she failed to attend a company meeting. On October 30, 2000 Ms. Carr announced to the world the pending arrival of epress-online into the publishing world. She helped pioneer electronic publishing, a world about to explode with the advent of the Kindle and other reading devices. I never had the opportunity to meet Margaret Carr to thank her personally for all she has done for me. ePress-online published my first book and only book to date, Divine Evolution. With no small amount of pride I can say that I am a published author (not self-published) thanks to her. She will be missed by all of her friends, and aspiring authors everywhere. … [Read more...]

Most Americans must be financially illiterate. There's no other explanation for the lack of overwhelming outrage over the irresponsible rate of federal spending. Daniel Gross wrote a remarkably ill-informed article for Yahoo! Finance, blaming Congressional Republicans for our credit rating downgrade. The very people Gross chose to criticize are the only ones in Washington trying to introduce the federal government to fiscal responsibility. In stark contrast, Dave Ramsey did a beautiful job explaining our national spending crisis in terms anyone can understand.  Our growth of federal debt is unsustainable and requires drastic change immediately, which he made remarkably clear. At his website DaveRamsey.com, he wrote The federal government will take in $2.173 trillion in 2011. That’s their income, and it sounds pretty good. Until, that is, you factor in that the federal government will spend $3.818 trillion during the year. So, just like many families, the government’s outgo exceeds their income—to the tune of $1.645 trillion in overspending. That’s called the deficit. Altogether, the government has $14.2 trillion in debt. What would happen if John Q. Public and his wife called my show with these kinds of numbers? Here’s how their financial situation would stack up: If their household income was $55,000 per year, they’d actually be spending $96,500—$41,500 more than they made!That means they’re spending 175% of their annual income! So, in 2011 they’d add $41,500 of debt to their current credit card debt of $366,000! What’s the first step to get … [Read more...]

President Obama gave a speech last night about raising the debt limit. Having become quite accustomed to have any politician twist the meaning of words beyond comprehension, I naturally expected his narrative to deviate from the truth in no short order. According to a transcript of his speech, significant distortion of the truth began with his fifth sentence. One of the first four was, "Good evening." Maybe even that was debatable. Courtesy of the White House press secretary, here's the full transcript of his opening remarks. Good evening.  Tonight, I want to talk about the debate we’ve been having in Washington over the national debt -- a debate that directly affects the lives of all Americans. For the last decade, we’ve spent more money than we take in.  In the year 2000, the government had a budget surplus.  But instead of using it to pay off our debt, the money was spent on trillions of dollars in new tax cuts, while two wars and an expensive prescription drug program were simply added to our nation’s credit card. He was right about one thing : the prescription drug program is cost prohibitive.  Yet POTUS conveniently forgot to mention the "expensive" program Bush created was opposed by Democrats for being too stingy with taxpayer money. I cannot stress this idea enough. I'm tempted to "shout" in capital letters. A tax cut does NOT equal government spending. Government spending describes funding the military, our legal system, and yes, social programs like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Plus student loans, research, and don't forget, … [Read more...]