And The Problem Is...?

I'm a native of the land of Fruits, Nuts & Flakes (California). I live on a small island in the San Francisco Bay off the coast of Oakland. We have two local newspapers. I tend to read the one that comes out on Friday, because it has a better real-estate section than the paper that comes out on Wednesday. I always read the Editorials & occasionally respond to them. The particular item that I wish to discuss here, is the political cartoon. It shows our Republican Gubernatorial candidate, Meg Whitman, holding a money bag, and the caption is "If you have to ask how much?... You can't afford to be governor."

The implication is that a wealthy individual willing to spend their own hard-earned money to campaign for a political office is somehow a bad thing.

Personally, I think it's a wonderful thing. Just think - she's not beholden to the Union fascists, the Oil Companies, the Environmental fascists, the racist Hispanics who want to remake California back into the paragon of civilization called Mexico (what's the murder rate there right now?), or the ad nauseum etcs. that belong in that ilk.

I guess she's wealthy enough she can actually afford to listen to what the citizens of California want her to hear.

On the other hand, all the above types of interest groups spending "independently" on Moonbeam's behalf will no doubt be whispering in his ear loudly and often enough that he won't really be listening to you or me. Not to mention that he has in one interview long ago admitted lying in his campaigns to win. In another more recent interview (in L.A. I believe) after accusing Whitman of lying, he was asked if he had ever lied. (I paraphrase here ...) "I've never lied - although I have equivocated. And when I did equivocate, it was obvious to the voters." Now, you don't really need to run off to your dictionary to look up the definition of equivacation. It's a fancy word for lieing when done intentionally. It's about the same level as Clinton's famous "define is" moment. So I suppose we should give Moonbeam some points for being honest about lieing? Boy, there's a conundrum - but hardly a recommendation for my vote.

Personally, I'm choosing the person who is so committed to trying to save California that she's willing to spend more money than anyone else has in American politics over someone who admits he's willing to say anything just to get back in office.

Regardless of the size of her fortune, I have no doubt that Moonbeam has more lies than Whitman has dollars.

The Purpose Of A Business Is...?

I've been a natural born citizen of the US for over 60 years now. I've been employed, or self-employed in some capacity for over 40 years. When I was in college, I had part-time jobs (often several concurrently), and began full-time employment in 1976. Since then, I've been an employee, self-employed, and had a consulting business with nearly twenty staff members. During that time, it's become clear that the common perception of why businesses exist has changed.

These days it seems most people think the purpose of a business is to provide jobs to people.

It's not.

A business exists to create profits for its owners. Period - finito - end of story.

Some businesses create those profits through employing others, and paying them for their efforts. However, there are many other businesses that have no employees. Most of them are now on the Internet. Some businesses have small numbers of owners, and many others have millions of owners through shares publicly traded on stock exchanges.

Regardless of the form of ownership, or the size of a company, each has been  started for one and only one reason; to make a profit for the owners. Nobody in their right mind starts a business with the main purpose of employing people. Starting a business for any other reason than profit dooms it to failure from the beginning. If profit is not the main reason for your business, then the choices you make as an owner will eventually fail to bring you the money you need to keep the business in existence.

Somehow, Union-ites(*), Democrats, liberal Republicans, and a few other Left Wing Nut Jobs, don't understand this. Clearly the people in the Administration don't get it. Which is why the stimulus is not really working. They're all Academics who've never been in business, let alone owned a business. Until they finally understand this, or surround themselves with business people to whom they will actually listen, EVERY attempt they make to stimulate the economy will fail and waste more of my and your money.

I finally stopped having a small business and went back to being self-employed. It was too risky and too painful to have employees. I was fortunate enough to not have to deal with unions in addition to all the headaches employees provide.

All I can say is I prefer to be self-employed with all those risks, than to be an employer and all the headaches and increased risk that comes from being an employer.


(*)Union-ites: A common precipate of the unfortunately prevalent element Absurdium.